Please join us for 2 talks by recent CAS Associates! At 11am, Brett Kaplan (Comparative & World Literature) discusses her most recent book project, Epiphany's Lament and at noon, Ben Grosser (Art + Design) speaks on Finite Social Media, Degrowth Aesthetics, and Reimagined Digital Futures. More information here.
11:00am-11:45am: Brett Kaplan, CAS Associate 2023-24, Comparative & World Literature
Epiphany’s Lament
Epiphany’s Lament is a novel about looted art, failure, loss, intersecting displacements, and love. Poppy (a piano refinisher), and Max (an FBI Art Crime special agent) search for a looted Velázquez which may or may not have been hidden in a Vietnamese Refugee Center by a mysterious Belgian charmer with quite an elaborate past.
Noon-12:45pm: Ben Grosser, CAS Associate 2022-23, Art + Design
Finite Social Media, Degrowth Aesthetics, and Reimagined Digital Futures
What if social platforms didn’t need—or want—our endless attention? How are cinematic narratives reflecting and reinforcing the techno-optimist’s devotion to growth and scale? Does TikTok’s feed algorithm really cater to our interests, or does it just feel that way? This talk will present recent and in-progress art projects that deploy an aesthetics of degrowth, an intentional practice of investigating, manipulating, and recomposing the digital landscape in ways that recapture a feeling of the finite in the face of our digital infinite.