Black Mountain College Symposium
It was the largest city I’ll ever know, the swiftest. —Charles Olson
The Center for Poetry and Poetics in collaboration with the The McGillicuddy Humanities Center presented a symposium on the history and legacy of Black Mountain College at the University of Maine in Orono on October 22-24, 2015.
The BMC Symposium coincided with the opening of Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College, 1933-1957, a major exhibition curated by Helen Molesworth with Ruth Erickson at the ICA/Boston, and the publication of the accompanying catalog by Yale University Press.
The Symposium brought together artists, critics, curators, educators, scholars, students, and writers from across the nation and across the disciplines and departments for a wide-ranging conversation about the people, ideas, artworks, social contexts, and conflicts that defined Black Mountain College during its relatively brief but highly influential existence.
The BMC Symposium featured presentations, roundtable discussions, readings, and open forums. Presentations included:
Brenda Danilowitz, chief curator of the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, on the transition from Bauhaus to Black Mountain College.
Ruth Erickson, assistant curator at the ICA/Boston and editor, with Helen Molesworth, of the Leap Before You Lookcatalog, on John Cage’s Theater Piece Nº1.
Kaplan Harris, Associate Professor of English at St. Bonaventure University and co-editor of the Selected Letters of Robert Creeley, on the Jargon Society.
Jonathan Hiam, curator of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound at the New York Public Library, on the 1945 Music Institute, which was held at Kenyon College after dissension at BMC.
Vincent Katz, curator and editor of Black Mountain College: Experiment in Art, on Robert Creeley’s editing of the final issue of Black Mountain Review.
Katherine Markoski, a recent postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian, on Cy Twombly and Charles Olson.
Jenni Sorkin, Assistant Professor of Art History and Architecture at UC Santa Barbara, on MC Richards, with a focus on her translations of Antonin Artaud and experimental theater work.
In addition, poet Anselm Berrigan, co-chair of the Graduate Writing Program at Bard, was a discussant.
Among the University of Maine faculty who participated in the Symposium were Carla Billitteri (English, CPP), Steve Evans (English, CPP), Gene Felice (New Media / Intermedia), Benjamin Friedlander (English, CPP), Kirsten Jacobson (Philosophy), Jennifer Moxley (English, CPP), Justin Wolff (Art History), and others.
The Symposium built on three courses offered at the University of Maine in 2015 by Steve Evans (English) and Justin Wolff (Art History) and looked ahead to a sequence of roundtables and gallery talks at the seventeenth annual Modernist Studies Association conference in Boston in November of 2015.
Program
Kick-Off Event: Thursday, October 22
The Poetry of Black Mountain College: A Celebration
A special event in the UMaine New Writing Series
4:30pm in the Allen & Sally Fernald APPE Space, Stewart Commons 104
Featuring Symposium participants Anselm Berrigan, Vincent Katz, & Kaplan Harris along with faculty and students from the University of Maine, including Carla Billitteri, Steve Evans, Ben Friedlander, & Jennifer Moxley.
Day 1: Friday, October 23
Venue: The Graduate Commons, Room 57 Stodder Hall
10:00am | Preliminary Roundtable: The symposium begins with introductory remarks by participants, brief project descriptions, and some installation views of Leap Before You Look.
12:00pm | Lunch break
01:00pm | Brenda Danilowitz, the chief curator of the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation, presents on the transition from Bauhaus to Black Mountain College with an emphasis on the composers and musicians.
02:00pm | Jonathan Hiam, curator of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound at the New York Public Library, presents on the 1945 Music Institute, which was held at Kenyon College after dissension at BMC.
03:00pm | Ruth Erickson, assistant curator at the ICA/Boston and editor, with Helen Molesworth, of the Leap Before You Look catalog, presents on John Cage’s Theater Piece Nº1.
04:00pm | UM Faculty Roundtable: Justin Wolff, Gene Felice, Nate Aldrich, and Jon Ippolito reflect on Black Mountain’s impact on late 20th-century avant-garde art and performance.
05:30pm | Reception at University of Maine Museum of Art (RSVP required to steven dot evans at maine dot edu)
In conjunction with the Symposium, the UMMA is featuring a gathering of works from the permanent collection by Josef Albers, Ilya Bolotowsky, Willem de Kooning, Robert Motherwell, and Robert Rauschenberg.
DAY 2: Saturday, October 24
Venue: The Graduate Commons, Room 57 Stodder Hall
10:00am | Vincent Katz, curator and editor of Black Mountain College: Experiment in Art, presents on Robert Creeley’s editing of the final issue of Black Mountain Review.
11:00am | Katherine Markoski, a recent postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian, presents on Cy Twombly and Charles Olson.
01:00pm | Kaplan Harris, associate professor of English at St. Bonaventure University and co-editor of the Selected Letters of Robert Creeley, presents on Jonathan Williams and The Jargon Society.
02:00pm | Jenni Sorkin, assistant professor of Art History and Architecture at UC Santa Barbara, presents on MC Richards, with a focus on her translations of Antonin Artaud and experimental theater work.
03:30pm | UM Faculty Roundtable: Carla Billitteri, Benjamin Friedlander, & Jennifer Moxley reflect on the legacy of Black Mountain poetry and poetics.
04:30pm | Concluding roundtable: In closing, we’ll focus on new directions for BMC-related research in the wake of Leap Before You Look.
06:00pm | End of Symposium