The Tibetan and Himalayan Studies Centre's celebration of the Tibetan New Year of the Iron Ox 2148!

Join the Wolfson Feminist Society for a casual crafting event! We will look at the work of some collage and 'femmage' artists and activists for inspiration before trying our hand at feminist collage. All are welcome, including any other members of your household who would like to join in.

If you would like a materials kit delivered to your pidge ahead of the event, please sign up here.

The meeting will take place on Zoom. 

Old Wolves event

Thursday 11 February 2021 1.30 p.m. via Zoom*

Skilled Crafts in the early Stone Age

A talk by Laurence Hutchence

Wolfson DPhil candidate Laurence Hutchence has degrees in Archaeology from UCL and Cambridge. He worked in Media before returning to academia.

In his spare time, when not adding to his collection of homemade tools, Laurence works in the Wolfson College Library and assists the College Archivist.

*Please join Zoom Meeting

Meeting ID: 880 7151 7595
Passcode: 817485
Download Zoom here

The event is organised as part of our Old Wolves series but is open to all – no charge. It is a change to the original programme.

Contact: College Archivist archives@wolfson.ox.ac.uk
 

*The pre-recorded talk will be released on the OCLW website a week before the event - please watch the video before joining us on zoom at 6pm for the Q&A session.*



Poetry was the most affordable art form in the Roman world: all it required were words, and someone with a talent to arrange them in a meaningful, aesthetically convincing way. It offers a unique insight into Roman life; it also served as a form of life-writing. The verse inscriptions as evidence for poetry are ubiquitous, and attest to inclusive cultural practice of the people of ancient Rome beyond the palaces of its urban aristocracy. How is the empire’s considerable regional and ethnic diversity reflected in the engagement with inscribed verse?

The Cluster is delighted to welcome Ming Xue to digital Wolfson. The director will be available for a Q&A session after the screening and will provide further insights into the making of the documentary.

Film details:

Rebgong is well-known for its Tibetan Buddhist thangka art for centuries. However, Tibetan women were not allowed to learn or paint Thangkas until recent years. Lutso is one of the few Tibetan female thangka painters and is the only female painter who operates an art studio of her own in the region. She is also a mother, a wife, and the oldest daughter in the family. The film captures Lutso's unique life as a thangka painter, who has a career to develop and a family to support.

About the director:

Ming Xue received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from UCLA. Her research focuses on topics of art commerce, social change, and gender politics in rural Tibet. She has been conducting ethnographic research about Tibetan thangka painters in Rebgong (Qinghai province, China) since 2009. Recently, she integrates the visual approach, i.e. documentary filmmaking, into her research. Her documentary films, A Woman Who Paints Thangkas (2019) and Nagarjuna Art School (2016), were official selections of international film festivals and academic conferences, including the Margaret Mead Film Festival, International Heritage Film Festival, and IUAES annual meetings.

Mary Wollstonecraft was a philosopher and the author of "Vindication of the Rights of Women" (1792), a groundbreaking early contribution to feminism. A statue of her, created by Maggi Hambling, was recently unveiled in London and stirred significant backlash and debate. During this event, we will discuss Hambling's statue, the question of nudity and women's representation in art more broadly, and will also consider the Mark Quinn statue of BLM protester Jen Reid which briefly stood in the place of the statue of Edward Colston torn down during protests in Bristol last year.

Zoom meeting information:

Zoom link

Meeting ID: 835 6946 6647

Passcode: 629437

Suggested pre-watching and pre-reading:
 

1. John Berger, "Ways of Seeing [Episode 2]," 1972 (30 minutes).
   
   This short documentary is both a time capsule of early 70s British TV and also a discussion of nudity in art that at times feels startlingly relevant. Click here to watch the short documentary.
    
2. Two short articles on Maggi Hambling's 2020 Mary Wollstonecraft statue:
   
   Rhiannon Lucy Cosslet, "Why I hate the Mary Wollstonecraft statue"
   
   Claudine van Hensbergen, "Mary Wollstonecraft statue: a provocative tribute for a radical woman"
    
3. Two short pieces on Marc Quinn's 2020 statue of Jen Reid:
   Marc Quinn and Jen Reid, "A joint statement"
   
   Thomas J. Price, "The problem with Marc Quinn's Black Lives Matter sculpture"

Please email wolf.fem.soc@gmail.com with any questions!

On Thursday March 6th at 6pm we are lucky enough to have with us Samanth Subramanian, author of the award winning 2020 biography of the geneticist and occasional communist JBS Haldane, “The Radical Politics and Restless Science of JBS Haldane.” Haldane, and his father before him, lived in the house “Cherwell” which occupied the ground we now know as Wolfson College. Our annual Haldane lecture, and the Haldane Room, are both named after the two famous scientists.

Click here to join on YouTube

The Wolfson Feminist Society is delighted to present this interdisciplinary flash presentations seminar, celebrating some of the exciting research of the Wolfson community.

Everyone is welcome. Please email wolf.fem.soc@gmail.com by midday on 24 November to register and receive the Zoom link.