August 31–September 2, 2021
Join Aperture and the International Center of Photography (ICP) for the first in a series of online symposia that takes up some key issues addressed in the first two volumes of The Lives of Images: An Aperture Reader Series, edited by artist and critic Stanley Wolukau-Wanambwa.
The Lives of Images explores the roles, histories, and contemporary uses of reproducible images in relation to specific grounding themes. To speak of the reproducible image in this moment is to address not only photographs, film, and videos, but screen prints and billboards; GIFs, memes, and emojis—a wide array of technically mediated scripto-visual forms that together constitute and remake both our visual landscape and image economies. The Lives of Images aims to gather together recent and contemporary scholarship that helps to animate and inform a rich dialogue on the role of the image in contemporary culture. Both the series and the symposium will engage theorists, scholars, and artists whose practices move fluidly between a focus on still and moving images. Symposium discussions will range across an array of uses of reproducible images that include, but regularly extend beyond, traditional fine art.
Taking place August 31–September 2, 2021, the symposium will be the first in a series of public group discussions held online, hosted by ICP in partnership with Aperture. A second symposium is planned for late November 2021. Each symposium will explore a specific set of contributions and themes arising from one of the first three volumes of the series: Repetition, Reproduction, and Circulation (Vol. 1, September 2021); Analogy, Attunement, and Attention (Vol. 2, November 2021); and Archives, Histories, and Memory (Vol. 3, Spring 2022).
In each session, Wolukau-Wanambwa and David Campany, Managing Director of Programs at ICP, will serve as interlocutors for two invited guests whose work is either published or discussed in the series. The talks aim to delve in greater depth into these thinkers’ and artists’ contributions, and to provide a space for discussion as to their resonances in artistic practice and social life more broadly.
Schedule for The Lives of Images Symposium Series
Session 1: Paul Pfeiffer and Jodi Dean on Image Circulation, Capital, and Racial Difference
Tuesday, August 31, 1–2:30pm EST
Session 2: Erika Balsom and Aria Dean on Reproducibility, Copyright, and Appropriation
Wednesday, September 1, 1–2:3-pm EST
Session 3: Lucas Blalock and Vivian Sobchack on Medium, Materiality, and Attention
Thursday, September 2, 1–2:30pm EST
Purchase The Lives of Images: An Aperture Reader Series, Vol. 1: Repetition, Reproduction, and Circulation and pre-order The Lives of Images: An Aperture Reader Series, Vol. 2: Analogy, Attunement, and Attention (November 2021) through ICP’s shop. All online book purchases made before August 30, 2021 will receive access to both symposiums.
Please note that schedule and speakers are subject to change. Registration includes access to all three online events.
Dates and registration for the second symposium in late Fall, which will address content from The Lives of Images: Vol. 2 and Vol. 3, to be announced.
The Lives of Images symposium series has been made possible through the generous support of Marina and Andrew Lewin.
About ICP
The International Center of Photography is the world’s leading institution dedicated to photography and visual culture. Cornell Capa founded ICP in 1974 to champion “concerned photography”—socially and politically minded images that can educate and change the world. Through our exhibitions, education programs, community outreach, and public programs, ICP offers an open forum for dialogue about the power of the image. Since its inception, ICP has presented more than 700 exhibitions, provided thousands of classes, and hosted a wide variety of public programs. The International Center of Photography (ICP) launched its new integrated center on Manhattan’s Lower East Side on January 25, 2020. Located at 79 Essex Street, ICP is the cultural anchor of Essex Crossing, one of the most highly anticipated and expansive mixed-use developments in New York City. Visit icp.org to learn more.
About Aperture
Aperture, a not-for-profit foundation, connects the photo community and its audiences with the most inspiring work, the sharpest ideas, and with each other–in print, in person, and online. Created in 1952 by photographers and writers as “common ground for the advancement of photography,” Aperture today is a multi-platform publisher and center for dialogue within the photo community.
