IDS public lecture series spring 2020

The IDS public lecture series, designed as an introduction to some of the most pressing questions driving contemporary thought and practice, consists of lectures by artists, theorists, scientists, activists, writers, and other practitioners involved in the arts from positions that embody an interdisciplinary approach or that imply new uses for disciplinary traditions. Each lecture is part of The Cooper Union’s Intra-Disciplinary Seminar (IDS). The seminar and series are organized by Leslie Hewitt and Omar Berrada.

This year’s IDS lectures are organized along three general directions: “Expansion,” which considers ways of knowing within an expanded field, including entanglements of human, animal, plant, and machine; “Counterpoint,” which studies how perception and politics interact in polyphonic ways; and “Dreamwork,” which examines the active role of imagination in strategies of resistance and survival.

Spring 2020 IDS public lectures

February 4
Jace Clayton, Underdog Sonics & Uncivil Spaces

February 11
Catherine Malabou, Expansion as Gift: on Peter Singer’s The Expanding Circle 

February 18    
Preview screning: The Infiltrators (2019)

February 25
Cristina Ibarra & Alex Rivera, Addressing the Border

March 3
Kaneza Schaal, Killing Zombies: Social Practice, Creative Practice, and the American Avant-Garde

March 10
Rayyane Tabet, Notes on Arabesque

March 24
Jack Halberstam, After All: on Dereliction, Destitution and Dispossession

March 31
Frances Negrón-Muntaner, Valor y Cambio: Uplifting Puerto Rico with Value and Change

April 14
Adania Shibli, A Canon for an Impossible

April 21
Andreas Keller, Olfaction and Experiential Authenticity

April 28
Hassan Darsi, Kariati Hayati [My Village My Life]

May 5
Safaa Fathy, Revealing the Poem: from Narrative to its Elemental Image

May 12
Greg Tate, Hello Darknuss: The Radical Black Futurist Imagination vs. Slavery, Inc.


IDS lectures take place on Tuesdays at 7pm. They are free and open to the public.


The Cooper Union School of Art
Founded by inventor, industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper in 1859, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art offers education in art, architecture, and engineering, as well as courses in the humanities and social sciences. The School of Art is firmly committed to a generalist curriculum that encompasses all the fundamental disciplines and resources of the visual arts. Each student is educated not only in specific disciplines, but also in the complex interrelationships of all the visual vocabularies. This philosophic premise relates to all the objectives of the School of Art and is the foundation upon which all teaching, creative work, service and research are based. The Studio curriculum along with the Art History and General Studies components of the BFA program all have as their goal the acquisition of communication skills, the development of critical perspective, and the mastery of the materials and intellectual premises of the study of societies and people. Throughout eight semesters, students become socially aware, historically grounded, creative practitioners. They are taught to be critical analysts of the world of contemporary visual communications, art, and the culture at large.

General support and funding
The IDS public lecture series is part of the Robert Lehman Visiting Artist Program at The Cooper Union. We are grateful for major funding from the Robert Lehman Foundation. The IDS public lecture series is made possible by generous support from the Open Society Foundations.

Rayyane Tabet’s lecture is presented in partnership with Storefront for Art and Architecture. Safaa Fathy’s lecture is presented in partnership with Tamaas.