35th Annual Helen Clark Berlind Symposium: American Solastalgia

Deepen your engagement with the 115th Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Art: American Solastalgia during this half-day event. The program offers a space where artists, scholars, students, and community members can explore the intersection of climate change, creative practice, and interdisciplinary research. Schedule: 12 noon | Museum doors open 1 pm | Opening Remarks from the Curators Charlotte Hecht and M. Stang 1:30 pm | Artist Talk Panel with Kate Greene, Abbey Hepner and Josh Villalobos 3 pm | Community Roundtable: What is American? 3:40 pm | Community Roundtable: What is Solastalgia? 4:15 pm | Closing Remarks from the Curators 4:30 – 5 pm | Reception Community Roundtables Join us for two open-forum discussions with the exhibition’s curators and artists alongside faculty and staff of Randolph College. We will collaborate with the public to answer some of the exhibition’s biggest questions: What is American? This exhibition falls on the 115th anniversary of the Maier’s annual show of American artists at a time when the United States is celebrating its 250th birthday. Against this backdrop, this discussion invites reflection on what it means to be American in a time of ecological uncertainty and social transformation. Whose narratives are at the center of these changes, and whose are at the margins? How has art captured and shaped American landscapes across the nation’s history? What is Solastalgia? The term solastalgia, a word to describe the sense of loss that occurs as climate change reshapes home beyond all recognition, was conceived by philosopher Glenn Albrecht in 2005. The work featured in this exhibition, as it seeks to document and represent contemporary American environments, is necessarily engaged with the concept of solastalgia. This discussion will consider what it means to try to capture—through visual art or words—the experience of living within changing landscapes. What are the possibilities and limitations of representation?