Graduate Student Colloquium on the History and Theory of Photography

The Developing Room, a working group at the Center for Cultural Analysis (Rutgers University) announces its second annual graduate student colloquium. This event is for Ph.D. candidates from any field of study who are working on dissertation topics in which photography - its histories and theories - play a central role. We encourage presentations on underrepresented histories globally. Students selected to present will have an opportunity to share their work with their peers and an official respondent who is a leader in the field. Students may be at any stage of dissertation research, but ideally presentations will consist of a dissertation chapter or section and an account of how that chapter/section fits within the larger project. The format involves a formal presentation of 25 minutes in length, followed by 30 minutes of discussion. Although only five presentations are given at each colloquium meeting, the Developing Room invites a large audience of students in order to ensure a rich conversation, and to build a constituency from which papers can be drawn in subsequent years. Last year, our inaugural event brought together an international group of researchers working across a wide range of topics related to photography.

This year’s respondent will be Leslie Wilson, Assistant Professor of Art History at Purchase College, State University of New York. Professor Wilson’s teaching and research focuses on the global history of photography, modern and contemporary art from Africa and the African diaspora, American art post-1900, and museum studies. Her current project charts the development and popularization of color photography in South Africa, from its inception in the early twentieth century to contemporary practice. From 2015 to 2017, she was a 24-Month Chester Dale Predoctoral Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

More information about the Developing Room can be found at developingroom.com

To apply, please send the following to developingroomgmail.com by January 15th, 2019:
- An abstract of 250 words or less
- A summary of your dissertation progress, 250 words or less
- CV
- A short biography of 150 words