History of Art and Architecture

Queer Afterlives in Artist Archives

Friday, April 15, 2022 - 12:00pm to 3:00pm

A virtual symposium in collaboration between the Mattress Factory and the Department of History of Art and Architecture at the University of Pittsburgh, co-organized by Mattress Factory Digitization Archivist Sinéad Bligh and Isaiah Bertagnolli, PhD student at the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of History of Art and Architecture.

Queer Afterlives in Artist Archives will re-examine and contextualize Greer Lankton’s artwork and initiate discussion on her incredible collection with the communities in which Lankton was a central figure.

This symposium will bring together archivists and scholars with artists whose work engages with archives, the histories of Queer art and the identities it can reveal.

This event is free and open to the public. To register for the event, please visit the Mattress Factory Museum's website.

The schedule is as follows:

12:00–12:10pm Opening Remarks Mattress Factory Executive Director, Hayley Haldeman, Senior Archivist Sarah Hallett and Project Digitization Archivist Sinéad Bligh

Panel 1: Writing from Archives
12:10–12:30pm: Alice Butler, Centre for American Art Terra Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow, Courtauld Institute of Art, London, UK
12:30–12:45pm: Ace Lehner, Visiting Artist, Department of Art and Art History, University of Vermont
12:45–1:00pm: Cyle Metzger, Assistant Professor of Art in Residence, Art History, Bradley University Design Department, Bradley University.
1:00–1:15pm: Questions/Discussion
1:15–1:25pm: Break

Panel 2: Body as Archive
1:25–2:00pm: Liz Cohen, Photographer and performance artist and Eric Crosley, Poet, artist and writer
2:00–2:15pm: Bekezela Mguni, Artist, Activist, Educator and Radical Librarian at Black Unicorn Library and Archives, Pittsburgh
2:15–2:30pm: Carmel Curtis, Moving Image Archivist, Researcher and Curator, Indiana University Bloomington
2:30–2:50pm: Questions/Discussion


2:50–3:00pm Closing remarks Isaiah Bertagnolli, PhD student at the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of History of Art and Architecture