The 2019 Nasher Prize Graduate Symposium offers master’s and doctoral students from any academic discipline the opportunity to present scholarly work on a host of questions and topics related to the work of 2019 Nasher Prize Laureate Isa Genzken. 

The Nasher Sculpture Center announces an open call for participation in the Nasher Prize Graduate Symposium, which aims to expand scholarship on the field of contemporary sculpture in its many forms. Submissions should address themes related to the work of the 2019 Nasher Prize Laureate Isa Genzken. With a career spanning four decades, Genzken has continually reinvented the language of sculpture by creating objects inspired by popular culture and historical events that explore the complexities of contemporary realism. Engaging a diverse range of media such as wood, plaster, concrete, textiles, and detritus and working in a variety of modes, including sculpture, photography, filmmaking, painting, drawing, and collage, Genzken transforms vernacular materials into wholly unique forms. Her inventive, ad hoc approach to making, as well as her fearless embrace of chaos and change, has inspired a generation of artists, even as she continues to adapt, expand, and redefine her protean oeuvre.

The annual Nasher Prize Graduate Symposium offers master’s and doctoral students from any academic discipline the opportunity to present scholarly work on a host of questions and topics related to each year’s new Laureate. Addressing a broad audience of art historians and museum professionals, participants will receive feedback from fellow presenters, an invited keynote speaker, and audience members. Students selected to present papers will also have their work published in the annual symposium compendium, together with the paper delivered by the keynote speaker.

Suggested Topics* for the 2019 Nasher Prize Graduate Symposium: Isa Genzken: 

• Sculpture, Architecture, and the Body
• The “Unskilled” Aesthetic in Post-War Art
• Genzken’s Narrative Urbanism
• Historical Trauma in Post-War Sculpture
• Contemporary Realism via Sculptural Assemblage
• Art, Branding, and Identity Within Genzken’s aesthetic
• Fashion, Architecture, and Sculpture in the Work of Genzken

*Preference will be given to those papers that address Genzken’s work directly.

Complete proposals must include the following:

• Contact information, participant’s field and university affiliation, and CV
• Paper title and abstract of no more than 200 words that includes 3 to 5 keywords 

Proposals are due by Sunday, December 9, 2018.

We hope to notify successful applicants by January 14, 2019.

 Send submissions and questions to [email protected] 

Registration information will follow.

Presenting Sponsor: JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Media Partners: 
Presenting: Belo Media Group  
KERA’s Art & Seek and PaperCity

Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) is the public transportation partner for Nasher Prize Month.