Special Lecture with Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw: Kara Walker, Winslow Homer, Blackness, & AI

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The keynote lecture considers the ongoing engagement with "Harper’s Weekly" illustrations made by Winslow Homer and other artists during the Civil War, by contemporary artists, like Kara Walker, who seek to reframe them, and the everyday art lovers who search for historical images of African Americans to add to their walls. What insight can these contested historic images give us into the desires of the contemporary art market at a time when artificial intelligence is radically reshaping the creation and consumption of art?

A renowned scholar of Kara Walker’s work, Dr. Shaw’s research focuses on portraiture and issues of representation, with an emphasis on the construction of race, class, gender, and sexuality in the American context. She has previously served on the faculty of Harvard University and as the Director of Research, Publications, and Scholarly Programs at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. She is the author of "Seeing the Unspeakable: The Art of Kara Walker" (2004) and "The Art of Remembering: Essays on African American Art and History" (2024).