The art installation people the We is seen in ghostly green light through the windows of Sibley Hall. (Anson Wigner / AAP)
Peek Inside the Galleries at AAP’s Freedom of Expression Show
Stories You May Like
The exhibition of works by students, faculty, alumni, and others is a highlight of the University’s 2023–24 theme year
By Beth Saulnier
A wooden “mobile library” showcasing banned books. A brightly hued fabric installation that evokes the Latinx experience, on the Hill and beyond. A piece of silent performance art comprising live writing on a blank white canvas by its two creators.
These and many other thought-provoking works have been on display in the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning’s galleries during the month of March for the Cornell Council for the Arts’ Freedom of Expression Exhibition.
Mounted in various galleries in AAP, the show is among the major events of the University’s first-ever theme year: “The Indispensable Condition: Freedom of Expression at Cornell.”
(Other events have included a fashion exhibit in Human Ecology and a performance of the opera Scalia / Ginsburg—inspired by the friendship, despite stark ideological differences, between Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’54. Currently underway: a competition to create a theme-year ice cream flavor!)
The show features more than a dozen works by students, faculty, alumni, and other contributors—drawn from nearly 50 submissions—in a variety of media including painting, fabric, video, 3D printing, and performance art.
In Bookmark for Freedom Pages, a wooden sculpture doubles as a shelf displaying banned books on a variety of topics—both commenting on the danger of book bans and suggesting a practical way to defy them.
Stories You May Like
A work titled people the We comprises video installations, a reimagined American flag, and a large, reordered depiction of the first three words of the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution.
“Who belongs and who doesn’t?” it asks, according to the exhibition’s online catalog.
“Whose dreams are whose nightmares? How can notions of nationhood be projected as a process rather than a settled thing, place, or entity?”
The video installation Beauty Standards contemplates how Asian women are often sexualized by the Western gaze, while Barbie comprises (among other items) issues of a glossy, high-fashion-style magazine created by a student as a way of entering a space historically closed to Black people and immigrants.
“We invite you to consider the practice of free expression and envision a world without it,” says exhibit coordinator Tina DuBois. “What might become of creativity? Would authentic art cease to exist?”
Top: The art installation people the We is seen in ghostly green light through the windows of Sibley Hall. All photos by Anson Wigner / AAP, unless indicated.
Published March 27, 2024
This exhibit, as described here, is saturated with the identity – oppression narrative. As such, in stark contrast to the name of the exhibit, it reflects a single oppressive point of view. Perhaps this is because of what the writers chose to highlight— let us hope Cornell is better than this.