To wrap up this spring’s Peace and Conflict Studies film series, we will screen The Art of Un-Warfollowed by a discussion with the film’s director, Maria Niro.
Pizza, salad, and beverages will be provided! This event is open to the public.
“The Art of Un-War is an in-depth exploration of the life and work of renowned artist Krzysztof Wodiczko. The film features Wodiczko’s artistic interventions that he creates as powerful responses to the inequities and horrors of war and injustice. Throughout the film, the artist’s powerful interventions become examples of how art can be used for social change and for healing.”
The Art of Un-War With Director Maria Niro March 22 (Wed), 4:30 PM Singer Hall Room 033 Swarthmore College
Trailer: The Art of Un-War
Come watch the film (with pizza, salad, and drinks) and stay for the special discussion with Director Maria Niro.
Co-sponsors: Peace and Conflict Studies, Art, Film and Media Studies, Lang Center, Music, Political Science, Sociology and Anthropology, Spanish
The Peace and Conflict Studies Film Series features five films that explore the evolution of militarism; the role of art and personal narratives in overcoming violence, trauma, and conflict; and the potential for building justice through different means.
An Artistic Journey of Israel/Palestine
in celebration of International Day of Peace Sunday, September 22 at 7:30PM
ARTolerance will celebrate the International Day of Peace with an evening of music, spoken word, visuals, and more from Israeli & Palestinian cultures. We hope to introduce aspirations through cultural expressions and provide bridges towards impactful dialogues.
In collaboration with Swarthmore College’s Department of Music and Dance, Peace and Conflict Studies Program, and The Office of the President of Swarthmore College.
Interested in co-creating a graphic novel about migration with a small group of faculty/staff and individuals resettled to Philadelphia from Syria and/or Iraq? Then consider taking PEAC:094 Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary.
In addition to the course, which will meet at McCabe Library on Wednesdays 1:15-4:00 for the first half of the semester, students will participate in workshops facilitated by local community artist Josh Graupera to create a narrative that will then be illustrated by Eric Battle, who has done work with such companies as Marvel Comics. Students must be able to participate in all three workshops, which will take place at the Lang Center for Civic and Social Responsibility on the afternoons of 9/9, 9/23, and 10/7.
Enrollment is by permission only. Interested students should send a short paragraph to Katie Price (kprice1) and Peggy Seiden (pseiden1) about why they are interested in the course.
COURSE DESCRIPTION
PEAC 094: Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary Instructors: Peggy Seiden & Katie Price
Wednesdays 1:15-4:00 PM | Ends before Fall Break
In this half-credit engaged scholarship course, students will learn about historical and contemporary refugees through a variety of methods, including readings, archival research, and co-creation. As part of the course, students will participate with resettled Iraqis and Syrians and Swarthmore faculty and staff in a series of artist-led workshops in which participants will co-create a graphic novella. The course will include discussions and written reflections based on the readings and workshops. This course is tied to Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary, a two-year project funded by The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage that brings renowned book artists into conversation with Syrian and Iraqi individuals who have resettled to Philadelphia. Students will be working with and learning directly from project collaborators, and their work may be shared publicly on the Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary website and may also be published or exhibited in Spring 2019.
Limited to five students, by permission of instructors. Course will be taught CR/NC unless otherwise requested. The course will run for the first half of the fall semester.
As part of the College’s Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary project, supported by The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, the Peace and Conflict Studies program will sponsor a related half-credit course in the spring.
In what ways can engaging with art inspire conversations, change perspectives, or increase empathy?
How might sharing personal experiences through the process of making art about migration, displacement or refuge increase our senses of belonging?
How might historic stories of displacement impact understandings of our current moment?
In this half-credit engaged scholarship course, taught by College Librarian Peggy Seiden and Dr. Katie Price (Lang Center), students will (a) conduct primary and secondary research related to resettled individuals (refugees) living in Philadelphia, (b) conduct archival research related to questions of displacement, empathy, and belonging, and (c) conduct primary and secondary research on artists’ books. Additionally, students will be required to volunteer for at least one book artist workshop (taking place on Sundays in Philadelphia, exact dates and times TBD) during the term. This course is tied to Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary, a two-year project funded by The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage that brings renowned book artists into conversation with Syrian and Iraqi individuals who have resettled to Philadelphia. Students will be working with and learning directly from project collaborators, and their work will be shared publicly on the Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary website and may also be published or exhibited in Spring 2019.
Seats are limited. If you are interested in taking this course, please email a short paragraph about why you are interested to kprice1 and pseiden1.
Our friends in the Swarthmore College Library and the Lang Center for Civic and Social Responsibility invite you to join them on Sunday, Nov. 19th from 1:00-4:00 at the Perelman Building at the Philadelphia Museum of Art to learn more about Swarthmore College’s Friends, Peace, and Sanctuary project.
At the event, you can meet the book artists working on the project, connect with potential collaborators, and celebrate the project’s launch with tea, snacks, and art-making.
Swarthmore College’s Friends, Peace, and Sanctuarywill bring together book artists and Syrian and Iraqi individuals who have resettled to Philadelphia. Driven by questions about displacement and refuge, history and experience, the project explores art’s capacity to build empathy and create a deeper sense of belonging.
Working in partnership with the immigrant and refugee service organization Nationalities Service Center, Swarthmore will invite a group of collaborators to work with renowned book artists and participate in multi-day workshops designed to provide access to new creative tools, and to explore various aspects of visual storytelling, artistic expression, and craft. Swarthmore’s library collections—including the Friends Historical Library and the “Peace Collection,” the largest archive of peace-related material in the U.S.—will be made available to book artists to inform their commissioned works, and to collaborators, with materials translated into Arabic.
Both the workshop collaborators and the book artists will create books that highlight the relationship between historical and contemporary stories of displacement. The project will culminate in a series of programs, exhibitions, and an exhibition catalogue that will focus on how archival, academic, and community knowledges can come together to address contemporary issues.
The theme for this workshop and performance will be Swarthmore College’s Peace and Conflict Studies’ inimitable and inspiring Global Nonviolent Action Database. Momeni and the workshop participants will collaborative create and perform a live cinema/projection performance that consists of animations depicting and annotating the contents of this database in playful and performative ways. Momeni will be assisted by artist and MFA Candidate Davey Steinman for this performance.
Ali Momeni’s performance project at Swarthmore College will combine cinema, outdoor projection, improvisation, animation, “depicting the characters, setting and methods of specific actions from the Global Nonviolent Action Database like an animated graphic novel.”
Momeni was born in Isfahan, Iran and emigrated to the United States at the age of twelve. He studied physics and music at Swarthmore College and completed his doctoral degree in music composition, improvisation and performance with computers from the Center for New Music and Audio Technologies at UC Berkeley. He spent three years in Paris where he collaborated with performers and researchers from La Kitchen, IRCAM, Sony CSL and CIRM.
Photo credit: iMAL.org under Creative Commons license 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/ http://bit.ly/2oRJgje
Between 2007 and 2011, Momeni was an assistant professor in the Department of Art at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where he directed the Spark Festival of Electronic Music and Art, and founded the urban projection collective called the MAW. Momeni is currently an associate professor in the School of Art at Carnegie Mellon University and directs CMU ArtFab, teaches in CMU’s IDEATE, Music Technology and Masters in Tangible Interaction Design degrees.
Momeni’s current research interests include performative applications of robotics, playful urban interventions, interactive projection performance, machine learning for artists and designers, interactive tools for storytelling and experiential learning, mobile and hybrid musical instruments, and the intersection of sound, music and health.
Davey T Steinman is an artist and explorer working at the crossroads of performance and technology. Davey is currently pursuing an M.F.A. in Video and Media Design in the School of Drama at Carnegie Mellon University.
This event is free and open to the public.
Sponsors: The Cooper Serendipity Fund, Kohlberg Language Center, Dept. of Theater, and Dept. of Music and Dance
November 20, 2015; 2:15-4:00 p.m.
Kohlberg Hall Room 228
Swarthmore College (directions)
Nefertiti’s Daughters is a story of women, art and revolution in Egypt. Told by prominent Egyptian artists, this documentary witnesses the critical role revolutionary street art played during the Egyptian uprisings.
Focused on the role of women artists in the struggle for social and political change, Nefertiti’s Daughters spotlights how the iconic graffiti of Queen Nefertiti places her on the front lines in the ongoing fight for women’s rights and freedoms in Egypt today.
The film’s director Mark Nickolas is a long time veteran of US democratic politics, most notably to then Vice President Al Gore, before emerging as a prominent figure in the political media world.
Contact Information:
Name: Benjamin Smith bsmith3
Phone: 610-328-8597
Egyptian cases of nonviolent resistance in Egypt are available at http://bit.ly/1SLrsLX
A discussion of Israeli culture and music with Shaanan Streett
Friday, October 30 at 4:00 p.m. Kohlberg Hall 228 Swarthmore College (Directions)
Shaanan Streett is one of the most influential and respected cultural voices in Israel today. He is a singer and songwriter for Israeli band Hadag Nahash (“The Sticker Song”). Streett has released 7 albums with the band, as well as 2 albums of his own. He is a screenplay writer (“The Wonders”), a former columnist (Time out Israel), a peace and social activist (who founded The One Shekel Festival), and a lifelong Jerusalemite in a land where nearly the entire cultural scene has migrated to Tel Aviv.
As part of his talk, Shaanan will share with audiences what he sees as the strengths and flaws of Israel today. Through subtitled video clips he will go on to analyze and share the meanings of the lyrics and where he draws from in his writing. Following each clip, questions will be taken from the audience.
While Israel’s art and culture scene has largely moved to Tel Aviv, Shaanan remains one of the most recognizable faces in Jerusalem. Far from leaving, he owns a bar in the Shuk, has written about it for National Geographic and other publications, his children attend a joint Jewish-Arab school and, time and again, has chosen to stay in spite of the difficulties it brings. In the microcosm of Jerusalem, Shaanan will show and discuss where the lines are drawn and how culture crosses those lines. Shaanan will discuss his life as a member of Israel’s leftist political scene.
This event is organized by Swarthmore Students for Israel and co-sponsored by the History, Political Science, and Peace and Conflict Studies Departments.
All of Us or None: Responses & Resistance to Militarism
Across the globe, militarism directly impacts all of our lives. The American Friends Service Committee’s new traveling exhibition, All of Us or None, examines the effects of militarism at both the foreign and domestic policy levels. It also highlights alternatives and positive nonviolent solutions.
Exhibition: October 7–November 17, 2015
McCabe Libary Atrium, Swarthmore College
Panel Discussion and Opening Reception October 8, 4:30 p.m.
McCabe Libary Atrium, Swarthmore College (directions)
Panelists: Sa’ed Atshan (Moderator), Nanci Buiza, Sharon Friedler, Keith Reeves, and Lee Smithey
“Stop Telling Women to Smile” with artist Tatyana Fazlalizadeh November 19th and 20th, 2014
Join the Womyn’s Resource Center and artist Tatyana Fazlalizadeh in conversation around street harassment and art in activism.
“Stop Telling Women to Smile” is an art series by Tatyana Fazlalizadeh. The work attempts to address gender based street harassment by placing drawn portraits of women, composed with captions that speak directly to offenders, outside in public spaces.
Street harassment is a serious issue that affects women world wide. This project takes women’s voices, and faces, and puts them in the street – creating a bold presence for women in an environment where they are so often made to feel uncomfortable and unsafe.
Poster installation with the artist
November 19th 1:00 pm – 3:00 pm
meet in Kohlberg coffee bar at 1pm
Artist’s lecture and reception
November 19th 7:00 pm – 8:30pm
Science Center 101
Catered Lunch and Discussion
November 20th 12:00 pm – 2:00 pm
Scheuer Room
limited space, please RSVP at http://goo.gl/forms/TEmOqYPnaC
++open only to women and trans folks++
Sponsored by: Forum for Free Speech, the Serendipity Fund, Interpretation Theory, Department of Political Science, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Art Department, Peace and Conflict Studies, Department of History, and Dean Henry’s Office.
