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Podcasts & Media
The Block Museum offers recorded video and audio of select events. Scroll down to see what is available or select the audio/video you want from the list below. The Block Museum's podcasts are supported by the Terra Foundation for American Art.
Meaning and Methodology: Robert Motherwell and Henry Moore On October 17, 2009, David Getsy, the Goldabelle McComb Finn Distinguished Chair in Art History at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and Robert Mattison, the Marshall R. Metzgar Professor of Art History at Lafayette College, spoke about Robert Motherwell's and Henry Moore's creative processes and writings in relation to their artwork. Huey Copeland, assistant professor of art history at Northwestern University, moderated the discussion. This talk took place during the Block's exhibition of Robert Motherwell: An Attitude Toward Reality, From the Collection of the Walker Art Center and Henry Moore: Elephant Skull. Download "Meaning and Methodology: Motherwell and Moore" (60 MB, audio, 1:27 minutes) Gordon Parks: A Renaissance Man
Download "Gordon Parks: A Renaissance Man" (63 MB, audio, 1:31 minutes) David Parks on Gordon Parks
Thank you to the Northwestern University Department of Academic and Research Technologies. Robert Mapplethorpe: Artist and Activist
Download "Robert Mapplethorpe: Artist and Activist" (73.8 MB, audio, 1:46 minutes) Winter 2009 Exhibitions: A Curator's Perspective Hear Block Museum senior curator Debora Wood talk about Polaroids: Mapplethorpe and From Michelangelo to Annibale Carracci: A Century of Italian Drawings from the Prado and watch a slide show of images from both exhibitions. (12:48 minutes; Adobe Flash Player required).
Thank you to the Northwestern University Department of Academic and Research Technologies.
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Connoisseurship and Scholarship in Italian Drawings: Two Cogent Collections Compared On February 5, 2009, Suzanne Folds McCullagh, the Anne Vogt Fuller and Marion Titus Searl Curator of Earlier Prints and Drawings at the Art Institute of Chicago, spoke about the collections behind the Block Museum exhibition From Michelangelo to Annibale Carracci: A Century of Italian Drawings from the Prado and the Art Institute's Drawn to Drawings: The Goldman Collection. Download "Connoisseurship and Scholarship" (34.7 MB, audio, 49:39 minutes)
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On January 30, 2009, musician, poet, artist, and activist Patti Smith spoke with filmmaker Steven Sebring and Chicago Sun-Times pop music critic Jim DeRogatis following the screening of Sebring's film Patti Smith: Dream of Life at Block Cinema. A streaming video of this conversation can be watched below (62:29 minutes; Adobe Flash Player required). Click here to see Patti Smith perform the song "My Blakean Year" or to watch her recite the lyrics to "People Have the Power."
Photographs of the event can be seen on the Block Musuem's Facebook page. Smith's appearance at the Block coincided with the exhibition Polaroids: Mapplethorpe, which includes instant photographs of Smith taken by her friend and collaborator, the late photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. Thank you to the Northwestern University Department of Academic and Research Technologies.
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The Artist at War: John Swope and the History of War Photography On September 26, 2008, Carolyn Peter, director of the Laband Art Gallery, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, spoke about photographer John Swope's images of Japan at the end of World War II and their relationship to war documentation. Peter is the curator of the exhibition A Letter from Japan: The Photographs of John Swope, which was on display at the Block September 19 to November 30, 2008. Download "The Artist at War" (35.5 MB, audio, 51:07 minutes) |
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Dialogues with the Past and Present: The Vivid World of Samuel Bak On October 29, 2008, Jeffry Diefendorf, the Pamela Shulman Professor in European and Holocaust Studies at the University of New Hampshire, discussed the work of artist Samuel Bak. Download "Dialogues with the Past and Present" (25 MB, audio, 35:49 minutes) Artwork by Samuel Bak was on display at the Block Museum September 19 to November 30, 2008 in the exhibition Drawn from Memory: Holocaust and History in the Art of Samuel Bak. |
The Block's podcasts are produced by Andrew Hermann. Video is produced by Robert Medich and Academic and Research Technologies, Northwestern University. | |
On May 16, 2009, the Block hosted a panel discussion about Gordon Parks's influence on photography and film. Participants included Bob Black, cofounder and vice president of the Chicago Association of African American Photographers; Philip Brookman, director of curatorial affairs, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Darlene Clark Hine, chair and professor, Department of African American Studies, and professor of history, Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, Northwestern University; and Maren Stange, associate professor of American studies and visual culture, The Cooper Union, New York. 
On March 7, 2009, the Block Museum hosted a panel discussion about Robert Mapplethorpe's influence on contemporary photography, activism, and issues of the body and sexuality. Participants included photographer Catherine Opie, 
