Arts & Culture

Over the last five decades, pioneering conceptual artist Luis Camnitzer has earned an international reputation for his subtly biting prints, multiples and sculptural works that combine poetic lyricism with political and social engagement. This spring, Camnitzer will receive the Printmaker Emeritus Award during the 2011 annual conference of the Southern Graphics Council International, hosted March 16 to 19 by Washington University’s Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts. In recognition, the university’s Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum has organized Luis Camnitzer: Forewords and Last Words, an exhibition of works spanning the career of this influential artist.  

Poet Kathleen Peirce will ready from her work at 8 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 10, for Washington University’s Writing Program in Arts & Sciences. Peirce is the author of four books of poetry: Mercy (1991), Divided Touch, Divided Color (1995), The Oval Hour (1999) and The Ardors (2004). 

Art historian Richard Meyer, associate professor at the University of Southern California (USC) and author of Outlaw Representation: Censorship and Homosexuality in Twentieth-Century American Art (2002), will launch the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts’ Multiple Feminisms Lecture Series Feb. 2. Designed to expand the conversation about what it means to be feminist, the series will investigate the ongoing cultural debate over sexuality and gender, as well as the effects of that debate on modern art, visual culture and academic practice.

Washington University alumnus Julie Alexander will return to campus as the 2010-11 Marcus Artist in the Dance Program in the Performing Arts Department (PAD) in Arts & Sciences. While in residence, she will present a free informal performance, titled “Weaving Traditional Japanese Dance and American Postmodern Dance,” at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 1. 

Banana-slinging catapult? Check! Smoke ring cannons? Check! Bright orange lab coat and goofy protective goggles? Check! Say hello to Doktor Kaboom!, “ze smartest man to ever enter any room.” Later this month, the humble Doktor will bring his sidesplitting, family-friendly tour of the modern scientific method to Washington University’s Edison Theatre for a special one-time-only performance. 

The Washington University Chamber Orchestra will present “Follow the Fugue,” a concert of fugues in a variety of forms and arrangements, at 8 p.m. Monday, Jan. 24, in Graham Chapel. The program will feature examples by Johann Sebastian Bach, Franz Joseph Haydn, Felix Mendelssohn, Ludwig van Beethoven and Ernst Toch.

In architecture as in life, the devil is in the details. Few know this better than Edward Ford, an educator, architect and author whose two-volume The Details of Modern Architecture (1990 and 1996) provided the first comprehensive analysis of how detailing and construction techniques can distort, camouflage or enhance a building. On Jan. 24, Ford, the Vincent and Eleanor Shea Professor of Architecture at the University of Virginia, will launch the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts’ spring Public Lecture Series. 

Since its formation in 1978, Island Press has evolved from a traditional contract print shop — producing high quality editions in standard media and formats — into a uniquely collaborative and educational enterprise known for complex, large-scale works by a range of nationally and internationally renowned artists. In January, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum will explore that evolution with Island Press: Three Decades of Printmaking. Curated by Karen K. Butler, assistant curator of the Kemper Art Museum, the exhibition will survey more than two dozen works highlighting the press’ history of technical innovation, artistic experimentation and student participation.

The Department of Music in Arts & Sciences will launch its spring Danforth University Center Chamber Music Series with a concert titled “Music from Spain and the Middle East” at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 19. The performance will include works by Joaquin Turina, Isaac Albeniz, Enrique Granados and Pablo de Saraste, as well as traditional Kurdish and Persian folk music. Soprano Stella Markou will perform with pianist Martin Kennedy April 7.

One of the most celebrated American painters of her generation, Elizabeth Peyton is among today’s foremost contemporary figurative artists and a renowned chronicler of modern life. Her subjects include personal friends and heroes as well as visual artists such as Georgia O’Keeffe, David Hockney, Andy Warhol and Robert Mapplethorpe, and historical and cultural figures ranging from William Shakespeare and Richard Wagner to Eminem and Chloe Sevigny. In January, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum will present Ghost: Elizabeth Peyton, the most extensive critical survey of Peyton’s work as a printmaker to date.