Department of the

History of Art

and Architecture

UMass

21st Annual Mark Roskill Graduate Symposium

Reduction, Regeneration, Restoration: Art as Agent in the Age of Climate Crisis

Credit to Michael Singer Studio.

1:00pm October 3rd, 2020via Zoom

Keynote Address by Michael Singer, Artist and Principal Designer at Michael Singer Studio

Guided conversations to follow.

With generous support from the Department of the History of Art and Architecture at UMass Amherst.

1:00pm

Opening remarks. Introduction to the keynote by Dr. Margaret Vickery.

1:15pm

Keynote address by Michael Singer.Michael Singer: Regenerative Design in the Public Realm

2:45pm

Discussion groups convene.

2:45pm - 3:15pm

A: Myths of the Nineteenth-Century LandscapeHosted by: Samuel Nehila and Matt Blanchard

3:20pm - 3:50pm

B: Art as Agent: Implications of Vibrant MatterHosted by: Jill Hughes and Andy Bowers

3:55pm - 4:25pm

C: A Beautiful Disaster: The Art and Aesthetics of Petromodernity

Hosted by: Yonatan Levia

4:30pm

Closing remarks.

Schedule of Events21st Annual Mark Roskill Graduate Symposium

Reduction, Regeneration, Restoration: Art as Agent in the Age of Climate Crisis

Department of the

History of Art

and Architecture

UMass

Mark Roskill Graduate Symposium, 2020Discussion Group A � 2:45pm - 3:15pm EST

Myths of the Nineteenth-Century Landscape

Frederic Edwin Church - The Icebergs, 1861. Dallas Museum of Art.

“As for me, a landscape to be paintable must be humanized. All landscapes that have been well painted are those in which the painter feels the influence of the

hand of man and generations of labour.”-Henry Ward Ranger, 1914

The nineteenth century gave way to many artistic movements that shifted the primary subject matter from the human figure to the grand landscapes of Europe

and North America. However, the relationship between humans and nature contin-ued to dominate the narrative within these landscapes, leaving little room for open

interpretation and admiration of the environments being depicted.

Through close looking of selected paintings, discussion participants will think criti-cally about the inclusion of human intervention in landscape scenes. Additionally, this conversation hopes to challenge concepts such as the hierarchy of painting,

reality versus imagination, and the very definition of “nature” itself.

Department of the

History of Art

and Architecture

UMass

Mark Roskill Graduate Symposium, 2020Discussion Group B � 3:20pm - 3:50pm EST

Art as Agent: Implications of Vibrant Matter

Sea sculpture, ca. 1725-1998, Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

“Why advocate for the vitality of matter?” asks political theorist Jane Bennett, author of Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things, “Because my hunch is that the image of dead or thorough-

ly instrumentalized matter feeds human hubris and our earth-destroying fantasies of conquest and consumption.” We will consider the implications “vibrant matter” holds for the ways in which

we conceive of, and conduct scholarship on, art and architecture (or even, more broadly speaking, “the made”). Participants will grapple with the question of who—or what—exercises agency in the creation and "life" of a work of art or architecture and what, precisely, it is that acts to shape the experience(s) of the viewer/user. What is illuminated, complicated, or rendered newly mysterious in an object or structure when we approach the materials that comprise it not as inert and ma-

nipulable media but rather as unruly, potent, and even “intelligent” agents or actants? What might it look like to conduct scholarship (art historical or otherwise) in this vein? What kinds of concep-

tual and practical challenges might we encounter when thinking in terms of vibrant matter? And how can we be accountable to the matter we engage?

Joining us will be UMass Amherst M.A. candidate John White, who has drawn on Bennett’s ideas in his ongoing work on the fascinating “sea sculptures” at the Victoria & Albert Museum—assem-blages of porcelain and natural substances recovered from a centuries-old shipwreck and now

auctioned and displayed as art objects.

Department of the

History of Art

and Architecture

UMass

Mark Roskill Graduate Symposium, 2020Discussion Group C � 3:55pm - 4:25pm EST

A Beautiful Disaster: The Artand Aesthetics of Petromodernity

Edward Burtynsky - Shipbreaking #9ab diptych, 2000. Chittagong, Bangladesh.

Described by Stephanie Lemenager as “a modern life based in the cheap energy systems long made possible by petroleum,”1 petromodernity is a reality which offers no escape. The built environment—one which is constructed for and by

the extraction of petroleum from the earth—is supported by an interconnected ecosystem of art, literature, and media which reinforces our reliance on

petroleum-derived fuels.

Participants in this discussion group will examine pieces of art, literature, and popular media which illustrate the entwined material and aesthetic representa-tions of petroleum in society and popular culture. At the heart of this discussion are these questions: What are the implications of an aestheticized petroleum in art and popular culture? How will the relationship between art and petroleum

change as we deplete our finite natural resources?

1. S. LeMenager, “The Aesthetics of Petroleum, after Oil!,”

American Literary History 24, no. 1 (January 1, 2012): 59–86,

https://doi.org/10.1093/alh/ajr057.