The Department of Art History is pleased to announce Experiencing Mass Images, a two-day conference to be held this spring at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities.

On Thursday, April 16, and Friday, April 17, Drs. Jennifer Roberts, Michael Leja, and Jennifer Greenhill will provide interdisciplinary approaches to investigating the impact of mass images on American experience in recent history (circa 1750-1930). These scholars are interested in how developments in the production, consumption and use of widely reproduced images can indicate social change, resistance, or unrest. Their presentations will coalesce around questions relating to the material dimension of mass images and how viewers cognitively and physically interact with them. Effectively, the speakers will seek to address the phenomenological dimension of popular culture and its literacies.

Day 1 - Thursday, April 16: Michael Leja & Jennifer Greenhill
4:00pm, Northrop Auditorium, Crosby Seminar Room (240)
Michael Leja, Professor of History of Art, University of Pennsylvania
“The Beginnings of Mass Visual Culture in the United States”
Jennifer Greenhill, Associate Professor of Art History, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
“‘Black spots and queer blotches’: Magazine Pictures and the Biodynamic Blur”

Day 2 - Friday, April 17: Jennifer Roberts
12:00 noon, 1030 Heller Hall
Jennifer Roberts, Elizabeth Cary Agassiz Professor of the Humanities, and Chair of the Program in American Studies, Harvard University
“Currency as Metaprinting: the Case of Benjamin Franklin”

For more information, contact the conference organizer, Christina Michelon (miche355@umn.edu) or Madeline Whitman, Outreach Coordinator (whitm160@umn.edu).