Students offer views on race in America at Hunter - April 27

Hunter Museum of American Art will premiere an event on Sunday, April 27. Its first undergraduate student symposium will focus on "Race in America."

Four students from regional colleges have been selected to present their research, and a fifth will conclude the afternoon with a specialized tour of the museum's current exhibition, "African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era and Beyond." Dr. Andrea Becksvoort, lecturer in English at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, will serve as a respondent for the four panelists.

The participating students are:

¦ Liz Simakoff, an economics student from Covenant College, speaking on performance and identity in the photographs of Gordon Parks, best remembered for his photographic essays for Life magazine and as the director of the 1971 film "Shaft."

¦ Megan Oelgoetz, a studio art student from Austin Peay State University, on the cultural history of New Mexico during the Colonial period.

¦ Heather Murray, an accounting student from UTC, on rap and political activism.

¦ Barry Bookheimer, a history and engineering student from UTC, on perceptions of Haitian Vodou and the religion's relation to arts practice.

¦ Rebecca Theus, a history student at Southern Adventist University, will guide visitors through the exhibition, incorporating her research on the labor economy of the South during the Civil War and its lasting effects on the imagery of artists working in the 20th century.

The free symposium will begin at 1 p.m. at the Hunter, 10 Bluff View. To learn more, call 423-267-0968 or visit www.huntermuseum.org.

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