Interplay

October 5—November 11, 2004

The theme of the conference was Interplay.

interplay:: n. action, effect or influence on one another;; v. to exert influence reciprocally

Conference themes included: On Language; Expanded Forms; By Hand and Art; and Theater and Performance. The keynote address was given by Vito Acconci. Featured speakers were Joseph Grigely, Wenda Gu, Charles LeDray, Michael Sommers and Barbara Staffords. Special events included a performance by Nina Hole.

The program included 24 panels and six speakers, beginning with a Wednesday night opening reception at the Weisman Art Museum. Conferees who participated in Thursday evening bus tours saw exhibitions at the Minneapolis Art Institute, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, the College of Visual Arts, Macalester College and the University of Minnesota’s Regis Center of the Arts. The conference concluded on Saturday evening with the closing of the "Box Fresh" exhibition at the Soap Factory,

The multi-disciplinary showcase held in conjunction with the conference also took Interplay as its theme. This juried exhibition looked at the connections and overlap among art media, ideas, and disciplinary approaches. The artists in this exhibition worked in a way that expanded—both formally and conceptually—traditional boundaries between disciplines. Examples included ceramics that became sculpture, painting that became installation, printmaking that became political intervention, and performative photography that blurred art and life. The work explored the interplay among two-dimensional, three-dimensional, and time-based media; text and image; the handmade and the digital; art and performance; and art and other social contexts.

Jurors for this exhibition were Tim Peterson, Director and Curator of Franklin Art Works, Minneapolis; Sylvia Chivaratanond, formerly a curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and Douglas Fogle, Visual Curator, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. Interplay was organized by Jan Estep, Assistant Professor, Department of Art, University of Minnesota. Participating artists included: Matthew Bryant, Cheryl Gilge, Ruthann Godollei, Suzanne Kosmalski, Jacob Lunderby, Andrew Messerschmidt, Nancy Monk, Douglas Navarra, Seho Park, Karl Raschke, Gregory Scranton, Scott Shapiro, and Scott Stulen.

The conference was co-sponsored by: the Mid-America College Art Association, College of Liberal Arts Special Events Fund [U of MN], The Humanities Institute [U of MN], Department of Art [U of MN], McKnight Arts and Humanities Fund [U of MN], Minneapolis College of Art and Design, College of Visual Arts [St. Paul], Macalester College [St. Paul], Carleton College [Northfield MN], and St. Olaf College [Northfield, MN].

Other participating organizations included: Department of Art History [U of MN], the Weisman Museum [U of MN], Northern Clay Center, Minnesota Center for Book Arts, Minnesota Center for Photography, Highpoint Center for Printmaking, Minnesota Textile Center, Forecast Public Artworks, Soap Factory, Franconia Sculpture Park, St. Croix Potters Association, Mellon Faculty Life Cycle Grant at Carleton and Macalester Colleges, and the Hopkins Center for the Arts.