The Critics Series

The Dalhousie Art Gallery's biennial Critics Series was initiated in 1991 by the Gallery's curator, Susan Gibson Garvey, with the purpose of stimulating critical thought and discussion on issues in contemporary visual arts and culture. Prominent writers, critics and practitioners are invited to tackle topics from the point of view of their own particular disciplines and passions, and the series has included such notable speakers as film critic Stanley Cavell, sociologist and art critic Janet Wolff, filmmaker Trinh T. Min-ha and art critic Hal Foster.

Transcripts of some of the Critics Series have been published by the Gallery and are available for purchase ($5:00 each plus $2:00 postage and handling):

The Third Critics Series
(1995/6 Notions of the coming millennium)
John Bentley Mays: "Criticism in the Twilight of Privilege"
Robert Enright: "Flesh in the Milennium: the Body Near the End of Things"
Arthur C. Danto: "Thirty Years after the End of Art"

The Fourth Critics Series
(1997/8 The uses and limits of psychoanalysis in arts criticism)
Serge Guilbaut: "Deliquescent Bodies with Eyelashes"
Joan Copjec: "The Strut of Vision: Seeing's Somatic Support"
Jeanne Randolph: "Theory as Praxis"

Transcripts from the First, Second and Fifth series are not available.

The Critics Series is generously funded by the Canada Council for the Arts.

Back to Top