In this first episode of a two-part series, contributors to the volume Life in Plastic: Artistic Responses to Petromodernity discuss plasticity and myth, stretchy superheroes, how plastic became gendered, plastic as a colonizing force, plastic in art and everyday life, and more. Featuring Caren Irr, Lisa Swanstrom, Jennifer Wagner-Lawlor, and Daniel Worden.
From drawn diary comics to graphic art narratives of quarantine, visual mediums have been critical in documenting the impacts of the pandemic. On Thursday, March 25 from 4 - 5 PM EDT, the Modern Literature and Culture (MLC) Research Centre hosted its fifteenth webinar in the Pandemic series to explore the importance of comics in our understanding of and artistic response to COVID-19 with three experts in the field. Moderated by MLC director Irene Gammel and executive member Jason Wang.
On May 4, 2020 (Star Wars Day), the RIT Cary Graphic Arts Collection debuted their newly digitized covers of the original 1970s Star Wars comics, published by Marvel. During this online event, RIT experts discussed how the story lines of these comics meshed with the films, while also being a spring board for current publishing around the Star Wars franchise. The event was moderated by Amelia Hugill-Fontanel, Associate Curator of the RIT Cary Collection, and featured Svea Elisha, RIT Libraries Digitization Assistant and Class of 2020 (Fine Art Photography), Professor Trent Hergenrader, Associate Professor in the Department of English, and Professor Daniel Worden, Associate Professor in the School of Individualized Study and Department of English.