Sheldon’s fall exhibition on waste organized by Anania
calendar icon28 Jul 2021
Lincoln, Neb.--Assistant Professor of Art History Katie Anania has organized the exhibition “The Nature of Waste: Material Pathways, Discarded Worlds,” which opens Aug. 13 at Sheldon Museum of Art. The exhibition continues through Dec. 31.
Trash and waste produced by human beings now exceed the combined weight of all life forms on the planet. The exhibition takes an interdisciplinary approach to waste products, showing how artists have used and depicted castoffs, junk, detritus and ruins in the 20th and 21st centuries.
With subjects ranging from 19th century ragpickers to the ecocritical practices of the present day, the works highlight waste’s complex relationship with colonialism and industrial production. In so doing, the show centers artmaking as a key “way in” to various approaches to natural resource and conservation studies.
Two special events are scheduled in conjunction with the exhibition. A workshop for University of Nebraska–Lincoln faculty titled “Engaging Environmental Justice through Art Objects” will be held Monday, Aug. 16 from 2-3:30 p.m. The event is co-hosted with the Center for Transformative Teaching at UNL and will show faculty how to use artworks as a basis for dynamic class discussions. For more information or to register, visit https://go.unl.edu/0zi3.
There will also be a keynote lecture by Jack Halberstam, professor of gender studies and English and Director of the Institute for Research on Women, Gender and Sexuality at Columbia University. His lecture, titled “An Aesthetics of Collapse” will be Thursday, Oct. 21 from 5:30-7 p.m. at Sheldon. The lecture is free and open to the public.
Halberstam is the author of seven books, including “Wild Things: The Disorder of Desire.” Places Journal awarded him its Arcus/Places Prize in 2018 for innovative public scholarship on the relationship between gender, sexuality and the built environment.
Exhibition support is provided by the Hixson-Lied Endowment, Nebraska Arts Council, Nebraska Cultural Endowment, Sheldon Art Association and UNL’s Daugherty Water for Food Institute.