Art & Art History News

News, October 6, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 06 Oct 2026 16:58:49 +0000

News, October 6, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 10/06/2026 - 10:58 Art & Art History News

Events

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Thursday, October 8, 2026 at 5:45pm (JUST 2 DAYS AWAY)
Norlin Library, Center for British & Irish Studies (room M549)

Lecture: Immersive Waters, or Notes Towards a Genealogy of Water Art

As a long-standing and vital element in the production of visual art, water had been employed variously—as subject, liquid base for pigments, and fundamental to the cleaning and maintenance of tools—from time immemorial through the mid twentieth century. Today, the use of water as an artistic material in the production of different forms of sculpture, performance, and installation art is so common that it would be all but impossible to systemically track its use. In the interim—that is, during the latter half of the twentieth century, coincident with dramatic ecological changes at a planetary level—the element of water began to be employed in the work of the postwar neo-avant-garde, and, increasingly, throughout subsequent experimental movements of the twentieth century. Taking select contemporary practices as a point of departure, this paper will consider the range and genealogy of these activities—focused primarily on North America and Western Europe—in the hope of distilling the disparate instances in which water appears during the period of 1945–2000 into a more closely connected series of conversations among artists and orientations of practice.

James Nisbet is Professor in the Department of Art History and PhD Program in Visual Studies at the University of California, Irvine. He has published widely on the history and theory of modern and contemporary art, with special interests in ecocritical visual art and the history of photography. Nisbet’s research has been supported by institutions including Cornell University’s Society for the Humanities, Georgia O'Keeffe Research Center, Dumbarton Oaks, and Getty Research Institute. His book projects include Ecologies, Environments, and Energy Systems in Art of the 1960s and 1970s (MIT Press, 2014), Second Site (Princeton University Press, 2021), and as editor with Lyle Massey, The Invention of the American Desert: Art, Land, and the Politics of Environment (University of California Press, 2021).

Department News & Announcements

News, September 29, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 15:13:09 +0000

News, September 29, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 09/29/2026 - 09:13 Art & Art History News

Upcoming Events

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Thursday, October 8, 2026 at 5:45pm
Norlin Library, Center for British & Irish Studies (room M549)

Lecture: Immersive Waters, or Notes Towards a Genealogy of Water Art

News, September 22, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 22 Sep 2026 17:17:32 +0000

News, September 22, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 09/22/2026 - 11:17 Art & Art History News

Upcoming Events

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Thursday, October 8, 2026 at 5:45pm
Norlin Library, Center for British & Irish Studies (room M549)

Lecture: Immersive Waters, or Notes Towards a Genealogy of Water Art

Faculty News

Brianne Cohen, Associate Professor, Art History

Brianne Cohen recently published an article titled, "Contemporary Art on Climate Adaptation: Staking Trees and Bracing Spines in Singapore" in the journal Arts. Read the full article: open access link.

In this article, I explore the visual culture of Singapore’s ableist-nationalist greening campaigns alongside artworks such as Marvin Tang’s A Guide to Tree Planting and History of 39 Cuttings—Hybrids, and Woong Soak Teng’s Ways to Tie Trees and Rules for Photographing a Scoliotic Patient. I argue that Tang and Woong highlight adaptation issues in the face of eco-ableist sustainability in Singapore, challenging simplistic notions of climate adaptation by attending to vulnerable, sexed and gendered more-than-human bodies. The field of art history has an opportunity to probe ableist visions of ecological sustainability—within an emerging discourse between environmental justice and disability studies—by historicizing and interpreting such art, as it speaks to enduring, more-than-human impairment and climate adaptation.

Corrina Espinosa, Assistant Teaching Professor

Artist Talk: Corrina Espinosa
Portal Juice

Sunday, September 27, 1–3 p.m.
Location: The Lab on Santa Fe, 840 Santa Fe Drive, Denver
Admission: Free and open to the public

Join Espinosa for a conversation about the conceptual frameworks, material processes, and technological strategies informing the work.

Portal Juice, a solo exhibition by CU �Ǹ�Թ� Assistant Teaching Professor Corrina Espinosa, examines the strange, evolving relationship between humans and machines. Through augmented reality, interactive sculpture, collage, and printmaking, Espinosa uses subtle humor and parody to investigate the absurdities of digital culture and simulated reality, while destabilizing the boundaries between physical and virtual experience.

Moving between the tangible and the imagined, Portal Juice engages a form of digital metaphysics: What constitutes the real when experience is increasingly mediated by machines, interfaces, and constructed environments?

News, September 15, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 14:12:42 +0000

News, September 15, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 09/15/2026 - 08:12 Art & Art History News

Upcoming Events

News, September 9, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Wed, 09 Sep 2026 16:40:38 +0000

News, September 9, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Wed, 09/09/2026 - 10:40 Art & Art History News

Upcoming Events

Faculty News

Richard Saxton, Professor

Counterpublic has announced the opening program for Coyote Time, the third edition of its citywide Triennial in St. Louis, bringing together artist talks, performances, tours, activations, and collective gatherings across the city.

Counterpublic 2026 includes SPS faculty Richard Saxton and M12 Studio with a new installation titled A Shape Without A Word showing at the National Building Arts Center in former Monsanto, ill.

Opening Week: September 9–13, 2026

More information about Coyote Time

Megan O'Grady, Assistant Professor

Megan O'Grady will be reading from her book, How It Feels to Be Alive: Encounters with Art and Ourselves, at Poets & Writers on September 23rd to celebrate their “New Nonfiction” issue. More information

O'Grady also recently published an interview with Collier Schorr for BOMB magazine. Read the full interview.

Hanna Rose Shell, Professor

Hanna Rose Shell recently received a Creative Futures Fellowship from Venture Partners at CU �Ǹ�Թ� for her project “Mining the Sun: An Arts and Humanities Public History Initiative,” which creates new platforms for civic engagement and community development through documentary art practice, creative storytelling, and the curation of archival media.

In August, she presented a lecture, “The Observatory at Climax,” as part of “Science and Resources in the West” at the WEST Annual Meeting, held at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Gothic, Colorado. Earlier this month, she also presented the project as part of “Cosmic Entanglements: Art, Theory, and the Reimagining of Space-Time” at the Mellon-supported Material Cosmographies Symposium at CU �Ǹ�Թ�.

A “Mining the Sun” exhibition opens at the end of September at the National Mining Hall of Fame and Museum in Leadville, Colorado.

Robin North, Assistant Professor

We are excited to welcome Robin North to the Department of Art & Art History!

Robin North is an interdisciplinary visual artist and preservation activist whose research-based practice uses expanded photographic practices to investigate history, systemic and structural racism, and the experiences of Americans of African descent across the African Diaspora. Drawing on Black geographies as an interdisciplinary research approach, his work examines how historical systems of racial exclusion, displacement, and unequal access to land have shaped the ways Black communities establish spatial presence through settlement, family memory, cultural practice, and relationships to land.

North is an Assistant Professor of Photography and History of Photography at the �Ǹ�Թ�. He received a BFA in Photography and Digital Media from the University of Houston and an MFA in Art with an emphasis in Photography and Multimedia from San Diego State University. His work has received recognition through PhotoLucida Critical Mass Top 50, Houston Center for Photography, FotoFest, and other grants, awards, and fellowships.

Current Projects or Research Focus
Robin's current research focuses on Texas Freedom Colonies across the rural Gulf Coast through his AI3 framework, using interdisciplinary media arts practice as a form of preservation activism and inquiry into Black geographies. The work examines how lived experience, archival absence, and the materiality of place can make histories visible, sustain cultural memory, and challenge their erasure from institutional narratives.

Classes Teaching This Term
ARTS 3171: Photography 2
ARTS 3191 / 4161 / 5161: Photography 3, 4, and 5

Professor Emeritus Dr. George Rivera and Alumna Martha Russo

Recently featured in the CU Arts & Sciences Magazine.

CU �Ǹ�Թ� alumna Martha Russo and Professor Emeritus George Rivera currently are displaying art pieces in Venice, Italy, in a show organized by the European Cultural Centre

Read the full article

News, September 1, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 01 Sep 2026 17:55:49 +0000

News, September 1, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 09/01/2026 - 11:55 Art & Art History News

Upcoming Events

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Thursday, October 8th at 5:45 PM
Center for British & Irish Studies, Norlin Library

Immersive Waters, or Notes Towards a Genealogy of Water Art
James Nisbet, University of California, Irvine

James Nisbet is Professor in the Department of Art History and PhD Program in Visual Studies at the University of California, Irvine. He has published widely on the history and theory of modern and contemporary art, with special interests in ecocritical visual art and the history of photography. Nisbet’s research has been supported by institutions including Cornell University’s Society for the Humanities, Georgia O'Keeffe Research Center, Dumbarton Oaks, and Getty Research Institute. His book projects include Ecologies, Environments, and Energy Systems in Art of the 1960s and 1970s (MIT Press, 2014), Second Site (Princeton University Press, 2021), and as editor with Lyle Massey, The Invention of the American Desert: Art, Land, and the Politics of Environment (University of California Press, 2021).

News, August 25, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 25 Aug 2026 13:54:36 +0000

News, August 25, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 08/25/2026 - 07:54 Art & Art History News

Upcoming Events

ARTNAUTS 30th Anniversary Exhibition Rhizome: Origins

Artnauts: Three Decades of Art, Dialogue and Global Connection

OPENING CELEBRATION
Thursday, September 3 | 4–6 PM
University of Colorado Art Museum
1085 18th Street, �Ǹ�Թ�

A 30-Year Story That Began at CU �Ǹ�Թ� The Arnauts was founded in 1996 at CU �Ǹ�Թ� by Dr. George Rivera, Garrison Roots, Dr. Beth Krensky, Dennis Dalton, and Luis Valdovino. More than 220 artists have participated over 30 years creating 256+ exhibitions, in 27 countries and 5 continents. The collective has worked across art, activism, social practice, peace building and global issues. The 2026 exhibition brings together 22 artists with CU �Ǹ�Թ� aliations. Many of those artists earned their MFAs or PhDs at CU �Ǹ�Թ�. Thirty years after its founding at CU �Ǹ�Թ�, the Artnauts return to the University as an established international collective, bringing the story of three decades of collaborative artistic practice back to its place of origin.

More information about the history of the Artnauts

SPECIAL MUSEUM PROGRAM — FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 4 from 2-4 PM
University of Colorado Art Museum Social Sculpture: 1000 Knots, Gallery Talks & Memorial Scholarship Awards
2:00–2:15 PM Opening remarks by Hope Saska, Director, CU Art Museum
2:15–2:30 PM Social Sculpture: 1000 Knots, Pamela Beverly-Quigley
2:30–3:30 PM Gallery talks with participating out-of-town artists 3:30–4:00 PM Memorial Scholarship Awards

Exhibited Artists: Valerie Albicker, Pamela Beverly-Quigley, Barbara Colombo, Andrew Connelly, Dennis Dalton, Rebecca DiDomenico, Michael Dixon, Suzanne Faris, Heather Hanson, Samira Hemmat, Ben Jackel, Claire Jackel, Tsehai Johnson, Dr. Beth Krensky, Jane McMahan, Dr. George Rivera, Eileen Roscina, Martha Russo, Luis Valdovino, Rebecca Vaughan, Summer Ventis, Joo Yeon Woo.

Faculty News & Summer Highlights

Marina Kassianidou, Associate Professor, Art Practices

Marina Kassianidou participated in the group exhibition Nature Unbound, Between Remedy and Poison, at the Armenian Center for Contemporary Experimental Art (NPAK), Yerevan, Armenia, between June 12 and July 3, 2026. The exhibition, curated by Artemis Eleftheriadou, explored nature as a political, cultural, and symbolic field shaped by history, power, and collective memory.

Duration: June 12 - July 3, 2026

https://www.accea.info/nature-unbound/

Marina is also participating in the group exhibition Cita con el horizonte, at Artnueve (Project Space AP1), Murcia, Spain. Curated by Aitor Lajarin-Encina, the exhibition revolves around quotations, horizons, and conversations between artists.

Duration: June 24 - September, 2026

https://artnueve.com/expo/cita-con-el-horizonte-2/

Marina has a solo exhibition, Aggregate, at Sic. Contemporary Culture, Nicosia, Cyprus. Aggregate takes the form of a site-specific response looking into Sic. Contemporary Culture’s space as an architectural and social object, activating a sense of place and possibility through the acts of looking, marking, shifting, drawing, dust gathering, and printmaking. Kassianidou practices a sustained and sustainable mediation that collapses the poles of being-in-relation-to and being-in-resistance-to, turning them into visible, painstakingly crafted demarcations in which the infinitesimal becomes a matter of positioning: of where and how one stands. The exhibition is part of the program world-un-making curated by Evagoras Vanezis.
Duration: July 29 - end of September 2026

https://www.siccontemporary.com/

Yumi Janairo Roth and Emmanuel David

Selected as Sesquicentennial Faculty Scholars

In celebration of CU �Ǹ�Թ�’s 150th anniversary, the Sesquicentennial Faculty Scholars recognition program spotlights some of the university’s most inspiring voices—faculty members whose research and creative work transform lives and serve the public good. This prestigious program elevates faculty whose scholarship benefits communities, informs policy, advances innovation, and addresses society’s most pressing challenges. Through two high-profile public events and compelling storytelling taking place in Fall 2026, the Sesquicentennial Faculty Scholars program amplifies CU �Ǹ�Թ�’s identity as a comprehensive public research university in service to Colorado, the nation, and the world.

Celebrate CU �Ǹ�Թ�’s 150th anniversary with us at the Sesquicentennial Faculty Scholars events—an inspiring evening of short, story-driven presentations by faculty across the university whose research and creative work advance the public good. Join us August 27 in Denver or November 19 in �Ǹ�Թ� to experience bold ideas and their real-world impact firsthand.

Upcoming Event: August 27, 2026

Location: History Colorado Center, 1200 Broadway, Denver CO 80203

Time: 5:30 – 8:00 p.m.

�Ǹ�Թ� the event: Celebrate CU �Ǹ�Թ�’s 150th anniversary with us at the Sesquicentennial Faculty Scholars events—an inspiring evening of short, story-driven presentations by faculty across the university whose research and creative work advance the public good.

More information

Megan O'Grady, Assistant Professor, Art Practices

Assistant Professor of Critical and Curatorial Studies Megan O’Grady was interviewed by Colorado Arts & Sciences Magazine about her new book, How It Feels to Be Alive: Encounters with Art and Our Selves.

Link to full feature article

Stephanie Su, Associate Professor, Art History

Professor Stephanie Su’s latest article, “White in Onchi Kōshirō’s Work in the 1930s: Abstraction, Aspiration, and Contradiction” is now out in the Review of Japanese Culture and Society, vo. 37 (2025). What can a single color reveal about art, identity, and empire? Prof. Su takes white as her guide through the work of Onchi Kōshirō work, the leader of Creative Print Movement in modern Japan, tracing how his bold experiments with color and printmaking sits intersects with abstraction, design, and materiality. The result is a compelling look at how Onchi’s art opens up bigger questions about cultural identity, artistic innovation and the contradictions of imperialism. https://muse-jhu-edu.colorado.idm.oclc.org/article/995452

Anna Tsouhlarakis, Associate Professor, Art Practices

Anna Tsouhlarakis was the Yale University School of Arts commencement speaker on May 18. She addressed the graduating MFA students and faculty in a ceremony held at the Yale University Art Gallery in New Haven, CT. Link to her speech.

This summer Anna Tsouhlarakis was appointed to the Board of Governors of Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. She was a participant at Skowhegan in the summer of 2002 and returned as Resident Faculty in the summer of 2025. Skowhegan

Recently, Anna Tsouhlarakis was invited to submit a proposal for the High Line Plinth in New York City. The High Line will pick 2 of the 62 proposals to be created and installed for 18 months in 2029 and 2030.

Link to more information

In June, Anna was interviewed by Colorado Public Radio News concerning her participation in the 2026 Whitney Biennial. Link to CPR News

In August, Anna will open two solo exhibitions. The first is at Temple Contemporary Gallery at Tyler School of Art in Philadephia, PA. The second exhibition is at the galleries at Missouri State University in Springfield, MO. More information

Throughout the summer, Anna has been part of group exhibitions at the Frist Museum in Nashville, TN; WOLF gallery in Walpole, ME; East Window in �Ǹ�Թ�; and the Farnsworth Museum in Rockland, ME.

Visiting Artist Lecture Series, Fall 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 18:49:46 +0000

Visiting Artist Lecture Series, Fall 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Wed, 08/12/2026 - 12:49 Art & Art History News

Linda Nguyen Lopez & Mathew McConnell

Monday, October 26th at 4:00 PM
Visual Arts Complex, 1B20 Auditorium (lower-level)

Linda Nguyen Lopez is a first-generation American artist of Vietnamese and Mexican descent whose vibrant ceramic sculptures examine the psychological resonance of domestic life. Investigating objecthood, material culture, and animism, Lopez explores how everyday items absorb and project human emotion, rearticulating common household forms into fluid, organic abstractions.

Central to Lopez’s practice is the poetic re-imagining of the mundane. Through textured and glazed ceramic forms, she constructs a visual lexicon where inanimate objects seem to possess distinct personalities and moods. Sponges, lint, and furniture fragments are transformed into soft, slumped silhouettes that blur the line between utility and abstraction, inviting viewers to reconsider their relationship with static objects.

Lopez has exhibited extensively across the U.S. and internationally in Italy, England, and New Zealand. Notable museum venues include the Craft Contemporary Museum, Museum of Arts and Design, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and the Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. A 2024 United States Artists Fellow, Lopez serves as Associate Professor of Art at the University of Arkansas and currently lives and works in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

Mathew McConnell is an artist, educator, and researcher whose ceramic practice critically investigates artistic influence, historical lineage, and the mechanics of visual perception. Working primarily in ceramics, McConnell explores how form, texture, and cultural memory are transmitted through replication, systematically destabilizing notions of authorship, originality, and historical record.

McConnell’s conceptual framework begins with the work of other artists, historical artifacts, or iconic design objects. Through a deliberate process of re-creation and formal abstraction, his sculptures interrogate the spaces between copy and invention, examining how objects alter over time when filtered through personal memory. His smooth, carefully articulated clay surfaces and restrained compositions challenge viewers to consider how value and authority are constructed within the visual arts canon.

McConnell earned his MFA from the University of Colorado, �Ǹ�Թ�, and his BFA from Valdosta State University. He has presented solo exhibitions at Mindy Solomon Gallery and Greenwich House Pottery, and has participated in over 80 group exhibitions globally. Recipient of an NCECA Emerging Artist Award, he has completed residencies at the Archie Bray Foundation and Anderson Ranch. McConnell serves as Associate Professor and Area Head of Ceramics at the University of Arkansas.

News, April 28, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 15:40:58 +0000

News, April 28, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Tue, 04/28/2026 - 09:40 Art & Art History News

News, April 22, 2026

Kirsten Stoltz — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 16:06:59 +0000

News, April 22, 2026 Kirsten Stoltz Wed, 04/22/2026 - 10:06 Art & Art History News

Art & Art History News

News, October 6, 2026

Events

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Ana Teresa Fernández: Visiting Artist Lecture

Department News & Announcements

Photography students featured in prestigious Colorado exhibition

BFA Program - Application Deadline — Oct. 15th!

Ecological Remedies: Visualizing the Environment in/as Health Symposium

News, September 29, 2026

Upcoming Events

Cultural Crawl at the Visual Arts Complex — TOMORROW!

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Ana Teresa Fernández: Visiting Artist Lecture

Art History Club

Department Announcements

BFA Program - Application Deadline — Oct. 15th!

News, September 22, 2026

Upcoming Events

Andrew Polk: Visiting Artist Lecture Series

Cultural Crawl at the Visual Arts Complex

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Faculty News

Brianne Cohen, Associate Professor, Art History

Corrina Espinosa, Assistant Teaching Professor

News, September 15, 2026

Upcoming Events

Artnauts: Collective Visions, panel discussion

Andrew Polk: Visiting Artist Lecture Series

Culture Crawl at the Visual Arts Complex

Faculty News

Transforming Images: New Mexican Santos in-between Worlds

News, September 9, 2026

Upcoming Events

Angela Ellsworth: Visiting Artist Lecture

Andrew Polk: Visiting Artist Lecture

Culture Crawl at the Visual Arts Complex

Faculty News

Richard Saxton, Professor

Megan O'Grady, Assistant Professor

Hanna Rose Shell, Professor

Robin North, Assistant Professor

Professor Emeritus Dr. George Rivera and Alumna Martha Russo

Student Announcements

Ayuj Consul, MFA candidate in Film

Andi Newberry, MFA Alumna

News, September 1, 2026

Upcoming Events

Angela Ellsworth: Visiting Artist Lecture

CU Art Museum Exhibition Opening Celebration

James Nisbet: Visiting Art History Scholar Lecture

Faculty News

Corrina Espinosa, Assistant Teaching Professor, Art Practices

Campus News

Culture Crawl 2026

News, August 25, 2026

Upcoming Events

ARTNAUTS 30th Anniversary Exhibition Rhizome: Origins

Art History Club

Angela Ellsworth: Visiting Artist Lecture

Faculty News & Summer Highlights

Marina Kassianidou, Associate Professor, Art Practices

Yumi Janairo Roth and Emmanuel David

Megan O'Grady, Assistant Professor, Art Practices

Stephanie Su, Associate Professor, Art History

Anna Tsouhlarakis, Associate Professor, Art Practices

Visiting Artist Lecture Series, Fall 2026

Visiting Artist Lecture Series

Angela Ellsworth

Andrew Polk

Ana Teresa Fernández

Linda Nguyen Lopez & Mathew McConnell

Rebecca Fortnum

News, April 28, 2026

Events

Art & Art History Department Graduation Ceremony & Reception

Faculty News

Megan O'Grady, Assistant Professor, Art Practices

Stephanie Su, Associate Professor, Art History

Student Announcements

Coffee + Collage + Mail art