Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society

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The Neubauer Collegium explores new possibilities for humanistic research.

The Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society creates new global communities of inquiry. Through faculty research projects, a global fellows initiative, and exhibitions, the Neubauer Collegium explores novel approaches to complex human questions at the University of Chicago and beyond.

09/30/2026

It was a thrill and an honor to host the premiere of “Wonder, Wonder” at the Neubauer Collegium last Saturday. The piece, written and performed by jazz musicians Sharon Udoh and Joshua Abrams, is a beautifully entrancing meditation on divine love. It was commissioned by French artist Pierre Bismuth for the exhibition “Love Bless America,” featuring a documentary-style film about the sessions where Udoh and Abrams workshopped ideas, wonders unceasing.

“Love Bless America” is on view in our gallery through Jan. 8. We’re open M-F, 9-4.

Photos by Erielle Bakkum, Chicago Photographer

IMAGES: 1-4: Sharon Udoh and Joshua Abrams performing “Wonder, Wonder.” 5: Neubauer Collegium Curator Dieter Roelstraete. 6: Abrams with Robert Heishman, who co-produced the film for “Love Bless America.” 7: Pierre Bismuth. 8: A guest watching the film.

09/25/2026

“Love Bless America” documents the creative collaboration of two Chicago-based jazz musicians, Joshua Abrams and Sharon Udoh, who composed an original piece inspired by a lyrical prompt about divine love. The film, created by Pierre Bismuth and produced by Robert Heishman and Robert Salazar (the team behind Bob.), premieres at the Neubauer Collegium tomorrow. Please join us for a live performance of the piece by Abrams and Udoh at 2:15, presented as part of the Hyde Park Jazz Festival. Reception to follow.

“Love Bless America” will be on view in our gallery through Jan. 8. Free and open to the public. M-F, 9-4.

09/18/2026

The Revolutionary Disappointment and Recalibration project is a 2026–2027 research collaboration at the Neubauer Collegium, organized in partnership with the Chicago Center for Contemporary Theory (3CT), that brings together political and social theorists and historians of modern revolutionary movements. The project is hosting two lectures at the Neubauer Collegium in the coming weeks to investigate the forms that political hope might take.

On Thursday, Oct. 8 (5:00 – 6:30 pm), Fadi A. Bardawil will present a talk titled “Orientalism Is Not a Theoretical Machine,” in which he will consider Edward Said’s “reckoning with difference.” Bardawil, an Associate Professor of Contemporary Arab Cultures at Duke University, will be joined in discussion by Ghenwa Hayek, an Associate Professor of Modern Arabic Literature at the University of Chicago.

On Friday, Oct. 9 (12:30 – 2:00 pm), Hiba Bou Akar will present a talk titled “Highways of Collective Action,” in which she will examine Lebanon’s October 17 uprising through two charged infrastructures: Beirut’s Ring Road and the Khalde Triangle. Bou Akar is Associate Professor in the Urban Planning program at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University. She will be joined by Bardawil and Lisa Wedeen, a Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago and faculty director of 3CT.

Photo by Hiba Bou Akar, Dec. 31, 2019.

09/08/2026

OPENS SEPT 26
Pierre Bismuth: Love Bless America

This exhibition features new works by the French artist and filmmaker Pierre Bismuth. The centerpiece is a long-form meditative film documenting a creative collaboration between Joshua Abrams and Sharon Udoh, two leading figures from Chicago’s jazz and improvised music scene. Bismuth tasked them with composing a 21st-century spiritual based on a lyrical hymn he wrote for the project. The film (produced in collaboration with BOB.mov) traces the magic and workaday practice of “inspiration,” taking the traditions of religious music as a point of departure for a multi-layered reflection on love, music, and the divine. In addition to this new film, Bismuth will present a series of digital images resembling American flags emblazoned with lyrics from the hymn.

The opening reception, presented as part of the 20th annual Hyde Park Jazz Festival, will take place on Sept 26 (2-5 pm). A live performance by Abrams and Udoh of the piece they composed together will start at 2:15. Free and open to the public.

IMAGE: Pierre Bismuth, Untitled, 2026. Courtesy of the artist.

08/11/2026

This just in! A new monograph published to accompany Zoya Cherkassky’s exhibition The Global Political Crisis, on view at the Neubauer Collegium in the fall of 2025, has arrived.

The book explores a suite of recent paintings and drawings that take up the erotic tradition in art as a form of political engagement. Beautifully designed by David Giordano and featuring an introduction by Nebauer Collegium Director David Levin (2025-26) along with essays by Collegium Curator Dieter Roelstraete and art historian Abigail Winograd, The Global Political Crisis makes a compelling case for pleasure in response to contemporary conflicts.

Available now at bookstores and online retailers.

Zoya Cherkassky-Nnadi
Dieter Roelstraete

07/28/2026

Remembering Betye Saar, 1926–2026.

IMAGES:

1: Visiting the Neubauer Collegium gallery to see her exhibition “Let’s Get It On: The Wearable Art of Betye Saar,” on view Jan. 30 – April 27, 2025. Portrait by Abel Arciniega.

2–4: Reviewing sketches from her early career in costume design during a home studio visit with (from left) Neubauer Collegium Curator Dieter Roelstraete, Roberts Projects Co-Owner Julie Roberts, and UChicago Political Scientist Adom Getachew, a member of the research team on the Neubauer Collegium’s Panafrica project, Feb. 19, 2024. Photos by Elspeth Carruthers.

5–10: Panafrica Days Reception, Neubauer Collegium, March 7, 2025. Photos by Abel Arciniega.

5) With her daughter, Tracye Saar-Cavanaugh, and UChicago English and Visual Arts Professor Bill Brown;

6 & 7) With (from left) Midwest Bamum Community Chief Paul Mbouombouo, Bamum Association Vice President Abdou Youffone, and Midwest Bamum Associate Jean-Brice Ngouen;

8) Welcoming guests with Dieter Roelstraete;

9) Signing “Let’s Get It On” posters;

10) With Theaster Gates.

11: “Let’s Get It On: The Wearable Art of Betye Saar,” published this month by Roberts Projects.

07/27/2026

Boundaries of Benevolence, a seed-stage project launched July 1 at the Neubauer Collegium, will bring together a team of medical experts, ethicists, and others to study community health care settings across regional and social divides. The team will explore the dynamics of compassion, ethical obligations, and pathways for fostering empathy in places where advantaged and disadvantaged populations live in close proximity yet experience radically different life conditions.

Learn more: https://neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu/research/boundaries-of-benevolence

IMAGE: A Palestinian Red Crescent Society blood donation campaign at Al-Amal Hospital, Khan Yunis, Gaza Strip, May 21, 2026. Photo by Doaa Albaz / Activestills.

07/23/2026

As Betye Saar approaches her 100th birthday on July 30, the celebrated artist has no interest in slowing down. "My thing, after all this time, is just to create art," she writes in a lush new book published this month by her Los Angeles gallery, Roberts Projects.

"Let's Get It On: The Wearable Art of Betye Saar" features vibrant images, archival materials, and thoughtful reflections organized around Saar’s early work in costume and jewelry design. The publication accompanies an exhibition of the same name at Roberts Projects, which runs through August 22, and emerges in part from our own 2025 exhibition, a joyous exploration of Saar's early designs presented as part of our Panafrica research project.

"The show knitted together narratives of cultural borrowing that brought new understanding to bear about a critical stage in the life and work of Betye Saar," writes Neubauer Collegium Executive Director Elspeth Carruthers in the preface, "and said something important about the nature of inspiration itself." Our curator, Dieter Roelstraete, has also contributed an essay on the significance of Saar's encounters with African material culture during a pivotal trip she took to Chicago's Field Museum in 1974.

Roberts Projects will host a book launch and signing this Saturday, July 25, 12-2pm. It is an honor to celebrate this occasion with Betye Saar and her gallery, and a great pleasure to mark a century of inspiration with one of this country's most justly prized artists. As Roelstraete writes, Saar's work reminds us to "trust art to light the way ahead."

Cheers, to Betye!

07/22/2026

In a wide-ranging interview with Mike Cloud and Nyeema Morgan published on the occasion of their Neubauer Collegium exhibition, Suzette Bell-Roberts talks to the artists about language, ambiguity, power, and the ways stories shape our understandings.

Read the piece in Art Africa magazine: https://artafricamagazine.org/making-meaning-in-an-age-of-uncertainty/

IMAGE: Installation view, Mike Cloud & Nyeema Morgan: Story Structure, Pt. 2, on view at the Neubauer Collegium April 7 – June 26, 2026. Photo by Robert Chase Heishman for Bob.

07/21/2026

The Neubauer Collegium’s Future of the Humanities initiative, supported by the MacArthur Foundation, invites applications for one-year collaborative research projects that model promising forms of humanistic research. Each team must include at least one faculty member whose principal residence is in the Chicagoland area and who is affiliated with an accredited college or university in the area. Applications are due Sept. 15 for projects that will begin Jan. 1, 2027.

To learn more about this unique research opportunity, please visit our website and register to attend a virtual informational session.

https://neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu/news/future-of-the-humanities-cfp

Info Sessions

Friday, July 31
1:00 – 2:00 pm
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/future-of-the-humanities-info-session-zoom-tickets-1994313705980?aff=oddtdtcreator

Friday, August 28
12:00 – 1:00 pm
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/future-of-the-humanities-info-session-zoom-tickets-1994365515945?aff=oddtdtcreator

Address

5701 S Woodlawn Avenue
Chicago, IL
60637

Telephone

+17738348936

Website

http://neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu/

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