An ardent believer in “how art can give tools to people, make us freer, more aware ... help us imagine the future differently,” Bruguera will discuss the challenges of art-making in the world of today and explain her most recent projects, one of them dealing with the situation of political prisoners in Cuba.
For over twenty years, Cuban performance artist Tania Bruguera (Havana, 1968) has created socially-engaged performances and installations that examine the ways in which art can be applied to the everyday political life and the nature of political power structures and their effect on the lives of society’s most vulnerable individuals and groups. Her work often exposes the social effects of political forces and present global issues of power, migration, censorship, and repression through participatory works that turn “viewers” into “citizens.” Bruguera has explored both the promise and failings of the Cuban Revolution in performances that provoke viewers to consider the political realities masked by government propaganda and mass-media interpretation. Advancing the concept of arte útil (useful art) she proposes solutions to sociopolitical problems through the implementation of art, and has developed long-term projects that include a community center and a political party for immigrants, and a school for behavior art, an art grounded in the act of “doing.”
She holds an M.F.A in Performance from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, as well as degrees from the Instituto Superior de Arte and the Escuela de Artes Plásticas San Alejandro in Havana. In her home city of Havana, she established the Arte de Conducta (Behavior Art) program at the Instituto Superior de Arte in 2002. In 2015, Bruguera opened the Hannah Arendt International Institute for Artivism, a school, exhibition space, and think tank for activist-artists and Cubans. She has been awarded Doctor Honoris Causa at the Maryland Institute College of Art and from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago; selected one of the 100 Leading Global Thinkers by Foreign Policy magazine; shortlisted for the
#Index100 Freedom of Expression Award; a Herb Alpert Award winner; a Radcliffe and Yale World Fellow; and the first artist-in-residence in the New York City Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs.
Organized by Iliana Cepero.
This event is part of VIRTUAL BODIES, a weekly series of webinar discussions, presentations, and performances featuring artists and curators, hosted by faculty from the Department of the Arts at Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts, The New School. All events are free and open to the public, but require advance registration.
October 29, 2020
6:00 - 7:00 PM
THE ARTS |
https://www.newschool.edu/lang/arts/
EUGENE LANG COLLEGE OF LIBERAL ARTS |
https://www.newschool.edu/lang/THE NEW SCHOOL |
https://www.newschool.edu/