Elizabeth Grosz on Darwin
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World-renowned contemporary feminist and philosopher Professor Elizabeth Grosz will deliver the keynote lecture in the Australian Centre for Contemporary Arts ‘Look who’s Talking’ series, complementing Lyndal Jones Darwin with Tears exhibition.
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Grosz, who has written several agenda-setting books focusing on sexuality and power, will explore the relevance of Darwin’s theory of evolution and the links between animal sexuality and the most elementary forms of architecture and art.
The lecture, presented by ACCA, will be held on August 14th at RMIT’s Storey Hall and follows the Darwin with Tears exhibition by video and performance artist Lyndal Jones. The exhibition looks at the series of works created by Jones during a ten year study of Darwin. In Darwin with Tears, Jones explores Darwin’s ground breaking thesis ‘Origin of the Species’ with an artists sensitivity, creating playful, provocative and sensual works about animal attraction, gender difference and sexual selection. ,
Professor Elizabeth Grosz trained in philosophy in Australia, is professor of Women’s and Gender Studies at Rutgers University in New Jersey, and is currently working on evolutionary theory, theories of space and time, and the future of feminist theory.
In this lecture, she will focus on the writings of Jacob von Uexküll and Karl von Frisch on insect 'architecture’ to examine how we may re-conceive architecture and the built environment, more directly linked to excess, extravagance and sexuality, rather than functionality of necessity or survival. From Elizabeth’s perspective, if Darwin is right, then art and architecture are forms of enhancement and excitation as much as, or more than, forms of survival.
Elizabeth Grosz’s recent publications include Architecture from the Outside: Essays on Virtual and Real Space (2001); The Nick of Time: Politics, Evolution and the Untimely (2004) and Time Travels: Feminism, Nature, Power (2005). Her latest book is Chaos, Territory, Art Deleuze and the Framing of the Earth (Columbia, 2008). Copies of the books will be available at the lecture.
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‘Look who’s talking’ - SPECIAL KEYNOTE LECTURE
Professor Elizabeth Grosz
August 14th @ 6.30pm
RMIT Storey Hall Auditorium
For further media information: Katrina Hall on 03 9697 9999,
mobile 0421 153 046 or email khall@accaonline.org.au
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This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body.
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