Keynote Address: Krzysztof Wodiczko
Friday, Feb. 16, 9:30 a.m. Evans Hall, Cummings Arts Center
Open to the Public
“The sustainability and well-being of the democratic process depends on the vitality of the public space. Such vitality depends on creation of psychosocial and cultural conditions for people to fearlessly speak in public, on devising effective media means for their speech transmission, and on inventing affective aesthetic strategies that inspire the speakers' expression and public reception.
In such a communicative and democratic project, priority should be given to those whose voice has been least heard and whose existential experiences, needs and demands have been least known and publicly acknowledged. In building a better life and advancing democratic society, the voice of marginalized and neglected people must be heard first.
I strongly believe that cultural and artistic projects are indispensable means for expressive articulation and public dissemination. Such projects must necessarily be interdisciplinary and collaborative, involving many people, organizations and institutions.
In this presentation, I will elaborate on the social, psychological, technological, aesthetic, and design aspects of some of my projects that were developed with less privileged city dwellers to help them appear and be heard in the public space.”
Biography of Krzysztof Wodiczko
Krzysztof Wodiczko is a Professor of Art, Design and the Public Domain at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design. He was born 1943 in Warsaw, Poland, lives and works in New York City, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and in Warsaw.
He is renowned for his large-scale projections on architectural facades, and monuments. He has realized over ninety of such projections in twenty countries. Since the 1980s, through his projections and communicative instruments, he works with marginalized city residents on enforcing their public voice and expression.
Wodiczko's work has been presented at Documenta, Venice Biennale, Whitney Biennial, Yokohama Triennial and many other international art exhibitions and festivals. He is a recipient of 4th Hiroshima Art Price "for his contribution as an artist to world peace.” He has held retrospective exhibitions at Walker Art Center, Fundacio Antoni Tapies, Muzeum Sztuki, Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, and other museums and art centers. His work was presented in the PBS television series, Art in the Twenty-First Century.
Wodiczko is the author of "Critical Vehicles," MIT Press; "City of Refuge: Sept. 11," "The Abolition of War," "The Transformative Avant-Garde," and other books, including a large monograph, "Krzysztof Wodiczko," Black Dog, London.
Krzysztof Wodiczko's 1988 Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC, Restaged Exhibition, February 13 - 15, 2018
Keywords
Parrhesia
Trauma recovery
Cultural prosthetics
Interrogative design
Public projection
Democratic process