screaMachine | Festival Henge
September 2–October 10
Disabled Artists in Conversation
Wednesday, October 8
1-2pm
Zoom
The MIT Disabilities ERG will present a series of events for Disability Employment Awareness Month this October. Join them on Wednesday, October 8 for a moderated panel discussion between MIT community artists with disabilities.
Each will make a short presentation of their work and will discuss their process, themes, and modifications relative to disability. This will be followed by a broader discussion between the artists. The artists featured include: Gearóid Dolan, ACT Technical Instructor-Media; Nelly Kate, a Creative Director at MIT Spatial Sound Lab; and, Laura Beretsky, Grant Writer, MIT Introduction to Technology, Engineering and Science. It will be moderated by Emily Garner, Senior Manager, Campus and Public Programs, List Visual Arts Center.
Please register to attend. A Zoom link will be provided closer to the event date.
Speakers:
Gearóid Dolan (they/them) is an activist artist from Dublin, Ireland, working in the US under the branded name screaMachine. Their ouevre spans the worlds of performance art, film-making, audio, animation and interactive works, which often all combine in large scale street intervention projects with arrays of video projectors. Known especially for their work with protest movements, Dolan has shown at MOMA-PS1, The Kitchen, Franklin Furnace, Moving Image Gallery, The Storefront for Art and Architecture, Superchief Gallery and many more spaces in NYC as well as numerous galleries and festivals around the world. They taught digital media courses for 20 years in Cooper Union and Hunter College and are a five time winner of the New York State Council on the Arts Film, Media and New Technologies Award, along with awards from Media the Foundation, Experimental Television Center, C.A.S.E., Participatory Safety Inc. and the New York City Artist Corps. Dolan is also known for their costume design and presence in the nightclub scene and has won numerous awards for their feature documentary film “The Biggest Obstacle” which examines accessibility in the New York City Transit system for people with disabilities.
Dolan has a degree in sculpture from the National College of Art in Dublin, Ireland and an MFA in Integrated Media Arts (IMA) from Hunter College, NYC. Dolan taught Digital Media courses in Cooper Union NYC for 17 years, followed by Filmmaking and Web Development in Hunter College. Currently, in ACT, Dolan teaches Introduction to Interactive, Participatory, and Generative Art Making in the Fall semesters and Documentary Film Production in the Spring semesters, along with workshops in projection mapping, motion graphics, audio field recording, darkroom techniques and a lot more.
Nelly Kate:
Nelly Kate is a studio artist with an expanded practice in sound, expressing its material power through tones, tapes, water, wood, metal, and fiber. Over the past decade, Nelly has experienced fluctuations between late-deafness and hearing. This informs her creative research and practice in slowness, the awkwardness of inclusion, collaboration, and repetition. Her work takes the form of installation, performance, and print. She creates spaces for public imagination and healing, often working with trash, reclaimed, and repurposed materials. Nelly Kate holds an MFA in Print Media from Cranbrook Academy of Art. She is currently a creative director at MIT Spatial Sound Lab, and works in other studios across the unceded land of the Massachusett, Pawtucket, Naumkeag, and Wampanoag nations. www.nellykate.net
Laura Beretsky:
Laura Beretsky is an author and community activist based in Somerville, Massachusetts. Her recently published memoir Seizing Control, describes the challenges of living with epilepsy. The book explores the sacrifices we make and risks we take to live—or appear to live—a “normal” life, and gives hope to those who fear their path to fulfillment might be impossible to navigate.
Laura’s work has appeared in WBUR’s Cognoscenti, Health Story Collaborative, Sisyphus, and Wire’s Dream magazines. She is a member of the writing community at GrubStreet, the largest creative writing center in the U.S.
Laura has a BA from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. As a tween, she learned the value of participating in actions that yield community change. These lessons were critical to her journey negotiating seizures and others’ reactions to them, and pushing back against stigmatization. They were also key to her recovery from brain surgeries.
Other events in this series
10/3 – Festival Henge Jam Session
10/6 –Making Inclusion and Accessibility Part of All Your Work with Rachel Tanenhaus
10/10 – Festival Henge Jam Session
10/15 – Building Inclusive Workplace Practices: A talk with Laura Beretsky
10/17 – Festival Henge Jam Session
