Photography and Migration Conference
April 23-25, 2015
Colby College, Waterville, ME
This conference was one of many events at Colby that addressed the college-wide arts and humanities theme in 2014-2015, “Migrations,” hosted by the Center for the Arts and Humanities. It included formal presentations and discussions, a film screening, a photography contest, as well as exhibitions of historical photographs and artworks.
The keynote speakers included: Anthony Lee (Mount Holyoke College), who discussed the photography of F. Holland Day in relation to period discourse on immigration; anthropologist Jason de León (University of Michigan) and photographer Michael Wells, who have collaborated on the Undocumented Migration Project on the US-Mexico border; and Thomas Allen Harris, a New York-based writer and documentarian who co-founded the Digital Diaspora Family Reunion Roadshow and directed the critically acclaimed film Through a Lens Darkly: Black Photographers and the Emergence of a People (2014). Kicking off the conference on April 23 was an additional lecture by Ethiopian photographer, Aida Muluneh.
The call for papers closed on December 15, 2014. To stimulate lively and productive exchanges during the conference, we solicited proposals for 15-minute presentations from scholars, curators, image-makers, and others that highlight major questions about photography and migration. Following each presentation will be a short response (5-10 minutes) by a discussant from Colby College and other local institutions. We encouraged proposals that address directly the theme of the conference; foreground their own critical and creative interventions; and engage deeply with a set of images, or even a single image.
Click here for the conference program.