Artist Talk: Mark Dion: Adventures in Art Explorations and The Acorn Club

FREE & OPEN TO ALL!
November 19, 5:50 PM to 7:05 PM, ART 100

Mark Dion was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts in 1961. He received a BFA (1986) and an honorary doctorate (2003) from the University of Hartford, Hartford Art School, and attended the Whitney Museum of American Art's Independent Study Program. He also has an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters (Ph.D.) from The Wagner Free Institute of Science in Philadelphia (2015) and University of Massachusetts (2023). Dion’s work examines the ways in which dominant ideologies and public institutions shape our understanding of history, knowledge, and the natural world. Appropriating archaeological, field ecology and other scientific methods of collecting, ordering, and exhibiting objects, Dion creates works that question the distinctions between ‘objective’ (‘rational’) scientific methods and ‘subjective’ (‘irrational’) influences, charting how ideology and pseudoscience infiltrate scientific discourse. Dion frequently collaborates with museums of natural history, aquariums, zoos and other institutions mandated to produce public knowledge on the topic of nature. By locating the roots of environmental politics and public policy in the construction of knowledge about nature, Mark Dion questions the objectivity and authoritative role of the scientific voice in contemporary society, tracking how pseudo-science, social agendas and ideology creep into public discourse and knowledge production. He is the co-director of Mildred's Land an innovative visual art education and residency program in Beach Lake, Dion lives with his wife and frequent collaborator Dana Sherwood in Copake, New York and works world wide. 

For four decades visual artist Mark Dion has produced a diverse and ambitious body of work focusing on art in response to environmental culture. He will speak about some of his most significant projects as well as introduce The Acorn Club and new commission for Hamilton, Ohio.