Particle Episode 6: Linda Weintraub

Linda Weintraub formats this Particle episode as a commencement address to inspire an honest and positive response to this challenging moment. Through creative, critical analysis she reminds us that art can contribute to a beneficial outcome of the pandemic. Using the framework of the Minimalist movement of the 1960's, she illuminates that when things become stripped down and removed of context or knowing, we are left with essential facts and a real opportunity to look, feel, and respond with authenticity. From this place, perhaps we can create new and more sustainable perceptions and ways of being in the world and with one another.

Linda has had a substantial impact on us at the ArtSci Center. She has been involved with us since 2006, hosting workshops, lectures, and participating in a number of symposiums. Her work, lifestyle and presence have been vital and warmly influential to us all.

About

Linda Weintraub is a curator, educator, artist, and author of several popular books about contemporary art. She has earned her reputation by making the outposts of vanguard art accessible to broad audiences. The current vanguard, she believes, is propelled by environmental consciousness that is not only the defining characteristic of contemporary manufacturing, architecture, science, and philosophy; it is delineating contemporary art. Weintraub’s books exploring contemporary art and ecology include WHAT’s NEXT? Eco Materialism & Contemporary Art (2018), To LIFE! Eco Art in Pursuit of a Sustainable Planet (2012), and Avant-Guardians (2007), a series of textlets that include EcoCentric Topics: Pioneering Themes for Eco-Art; Cycle-Logical Art: Recycling Matters for Eco-Art; EnvironMentalities: Twenty-two Approaches to Eco-Art. Weintraub applies environmental concerns to her personal life by managing a sustainable homestead where she practices permaculture.

She served as the director of the Edith C. Blum Art Institute located on the Bard College campus where she toured many of the fifty exhibitions she curated, and published over twenty catalogues. Weintraub was the Henry Luce Professor of Emerging Arts at Oberlin College; and currently teaches in the Nomad9 MFA program at the University of Hartford. She is the curator of the Artnauts’ 20th Anniversary exhibition.