Laurel Braitman, Historian: The Zookeeper's Couch
Art & Science Transdisciplinary Lecture
Tuesday, September 14, 6pm
Parsons The New School for Design
Kellen Auditorium, Sheila C. Johnson Design Center
2 West 13th Street at 5th Avenue
Admission: Free
A new initiative co-organized with the School of Art, Media, and Technology and the Fine Arts Program Parsons, this lecture series captures the increasingly trans-disciplinary nature of scientific, academic, artistic and cultural practices and, in particular, focuses on the complex cross-disciplinary settings for art's production in contemporary life. Clustered around specific subjects such as geophysics, system theory, economics, and the physics of time, the lectures are presented in thematic pairs, one week apart from one another. Members of The New School's acclaimed faculty alternate with external scholars, experts and artists. All lectures are open to the public.
Looking at other animals is, for most humans, a fun thing to do. That is, unless it's depressing. Contemporary zoos go to surprising lengths in order to satiate our desires to see animals that look happy—from spraying Calvin Klein cologne in tiger enclosures (to inspire them to be more active) to giving female gorillas human contraceptives so that they can have the joy of sex without the complication of too many babies. But how do we know if a zoo animal is happy or not? And once we've figured it out, what on earth do we do about it? In this talk, Laurel Braitman explores human understandings of animal happiness and discontent in the context of zoos and aquariums and just what these ideas say about us.
Laurel Braitman's lecture is paired with a talk by artist Nina Katchadourian on September 21, 2010, also focusing on human/animal relationships.
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