Images and Others -- Migration, Law and the Image: Beyond the Veil of Ignorance
Tuesday, March 30 in Rawles Hall, room 100 at 7:30 p.m.
Mitchell will discuss the convergence of three disciplines: the law, with its entire edifice of judicial practice and political philosophy; migration, as the movement and settlement of living things, especially (but not exclusively) human beings, across the boundaries between distinct habitats; and iconology, the theory of images across the media, including verbal and visual images, metaphors and figures of speech as well as visual representations.
Images and Others -- Idolatry: Nietzsche, Blake, Poussin
Thursday, April 1 in Rawles Hall, room 100 at 7:30 p.m.
He will examine the diagnosis of the return of idolatry and its evil twin, iconoclasm, in contemporary global political culture, and especially in the contemporary tendency to conceive of war in religious, Manichean terms, as a struggle between good and evil. Working through the transvaluations of the idolatry/iconoclasm complex in the philosophy of Nietzsche (Twilight of the Idols and Thus Spake Zarathustra) and the paintings of William Blake, the lecture will stage a re-reading of Nicholas Poussin's classic scenes of idolatry in "The Adoration of the Golden Calf" (London: National Gallery) and "The Plague at Ashdod" (Paris, The Louvre).
As part of Professor Mitchell’s scheduled activities, the following films will be screened on Wednesday, March 31 at 7:30 in Fine Arts 102:
Khaled Jarrar's Journey 110 (2009) (12 minutes) focuses on the 110 meter passageway through a sewage underpass that Palestinians use to go to and from Jerusalem without passing through checkpoints. Since most Palestinians in the West Bank are prohibited from going to Jerusalem, this passageway under a highway that is restricted to Israelis is the only way for many people to visit their relatives or to conduct business. Employing the minimalist techniques of structuralist cinema, Journey 110 offers a perspective on the daily life of Palestinians as seen by a young artist from Ramallah.
Avi Moghrabi's Avenge But One of My Two Eyes (Israel, 2005) (100 minutes) documents the perceptions of an Israeli film-maker of conscience who is in dialogue by telephone with an unidentified Palestinian interlocutor, and who is trying to see his country from the Palestinian point of view. The film captures both ordinary and extraordinary scenes of daily life in the occupied territories showing the touristic Masada ritual, the Samson complex, the Settler's festivals, and daily life at checkpoints. It is an award-winning film that provides one of the best introductions to the moral dilemmas facing Israeli liberals today.
W. J. T. Mitchell, Gaylord Donnelley Distinguished Service Professor, Department of English, Department of Art History, University of Chicago
Tuesday, March 30 and Thursday, April 1 in Rawles Hall, room 100 at 7:30 p.m.
Mitchell teaches in both the English and the Art History departments and edits the interdisciplinary journal, Critical Inquiry, a quarterly devoted to critical theory in the arts and human sciences. He works particularly on the history and theories of media, visual art, and literature, from the eighteenth century to the present, exploring the relations of visual and verbal representations in the culture and iconology (the study of images across the media). Through his own research and Critical Inquiry, he has published special issues on public art, psychoanalysis, pluralism, feminism, the sociology of literature, canons, race and identity, narrative, the politics of interpretation, postcolonial theory, and many other topics.
