Panel

“My practice starts with my hands. When I put my hands on your body, I get information. That’s where I begin, with my hands on your body on my massage table. We talk. I get an idea of you and your energy and your particular needs; a sort of psychic reading.”
—AA Bronson

A unique opportunity to hear one of the great figures of American conceptual art, and to have his practice illuminated by one of the key critics of the genre, Gregg Bordowitz. Eminent anthropologist Elizabeth A. Povinelli offers a reprise of their conversation that will touch on death, memory, and healing.

A founding member of the legendary Canadian art group General Idea, AA Bronson began his training as a healer in 1989, when his two partners in General Idea, Felix Partz and Jorge Zontal, were first diagnosed with AIDS. His intention was to act as a kind of midwife to the dying. Five years after their death in 1994, Bronson started to exhibit again, now under his own name. By 2003, he was incorporating his work as a healer back into his artwork, with exhibitions at Galerie Frederic Giroux in Paris (2003) and John Connelly Presents in New York (2004), and in his performance Butt Massage Demonstration the same year. His work has also been seen at the Vienna Secession, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the List Visual Arts Center at MIT, and the Power Plant in Toronto.

Gregg Bordowitz is a writer, film, and video maker. He teaches at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is the author of The AIDS Crisis Is Ridiculous (among other publications). Elizabeth A. Povinelli is a professor of anthropology at the Institute for Research on Women and Gender at Columbia University and is Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Law and Culture.

Prior to the conversation, Bronson will conduct free one-on-one healing sessions with volunteers (off-campus, and by appointment).

This event is part of the “Considering Forgiveness Cycle.”