AUD hosts renowned photographer marc Joseph berg
Lecture: “FORM, PURPOSE, CONTENT: Well, What Do We Make?”
Opening of AUD Student Exhibition: “Photography Today”
The Department of Visual Communication at The American University in Dubai hosted a lecture on photographic artworks entitled, “FORM, PURPOSE, CONTENT: Well, What Do We Make?” led by Mr. Marc Joseph Berg, renowned photographer and instructor at The School of Visual Arts in New York City.
The lecture highlighted Berg’s latest portfolio of photographs published in his book New and Used, and was attended by AUD faculty and students, along with prominent dignitaries from the fine arts, landscape and educational fields.
On his own reflections about the photographic spectrum conferred in the lecture, Prof. Roberto Lopardo, AUD’s Chair of Visual Communication and Assistant Professor of Photography, commented, “We are very excited to have Marc Joseph visit AUD and lend his unique expertise on contemporary photography to our students and to the city of Dubai. Marc’s understanding of how photography works in relation to context, is of timely importance considering Dubai’s ever shifting sense of public and private spaces”.
In turn, Berg outlined his theoretical approach to the concept of how the interest in art enriches the sense of tangibility stressing, “The world remains an analog one, and some of the things we see are things that we can also behold. I’m a big believer in understanding the usefulness of art in this way, in our need to be physically present with it. Occasionally physical things give back something that is not tangible or easily defined, and some of the interest we have in art or objects represents a certain hope for that possibility.”
The lecture was followed by the opening of the AUD student exhibition, “Photography Today,” in the Rotunda Gallery of the A Building. The exhibition showcased students’ photographic works, ranging in style from portraiture, documentary, landscape, to fine art photography. The exhibition is set to run till Thursday, the 5th of March, 2009.
