The School of Art and Design at Northern Illinois University will host a guest lecture by artist and experimental psychologist Dr. Ellen Winner, titled “How Art Works: Five Puzzles.”
Winner is professor of psychology at Boston College and senior research associate at Project Zero, Harvard Graduate School of Education. She directs the Arts and Mind Lab, which focuses on cognition in the arts in typical and gifted children as well as adults.
In her lecture, “How Arts Works: Five Puzzles,” Winner will discuss puzzles about the arts that have preoccupied philosophers as well as the general public. Can art be defined? Why do we seek out art that elicits negative emotions like sadness and fear? Why do we devalue a revered work once it is outed as a forgery? Is abstract art something “my kid could have done”? Does art enhance empathy? As a social scientist, she has tried to answer some of these questions through interviews, observations, and experiments. What she and other psychologists have found reveals surprising answers to these artistic mysteries, and helps us understand how art works on us.
The talk will be held virtually, Tuesday, November 10 at 4 p.m. Central Standard Time.
In it, she examines how psychologists have approached philosophical questions about the arts —
What makes us call something art?
Do we experience “real” emotions from the arts?
Do we believe aesthetic judgments have truth value?
Does engagement in the arts make us smarter?
Does reading fiction make us more empathetic?
Do beliefs about the artist’s process shape aesthetic judgments?
Is modern art something my kid could do?
What’s wrong with a perfect fake?
Is achieving greatness in art a matter of 10,000 hours of hard work?
Philosophers and laypeople have long puzzled about these kinds of questions. Psychologists have now begun to explore these questions empirically, and have made many fascinating discoveries using the methods of social science.
She has served as President of APA’s Division 10, Psychology and the Arts in 1995-1996, and received the Rudolf Arnheim Award for Outstanding Research by a Senior Scholar in Psychology and the Arts from Division 10 in 2000. She is a fellow of APA Division 10 and of the International Association of Empirical Aesthetics.
Elizabeth Vieyra was little when she first noticed some of her peers did not have the same opportunities she did.
Vieyra was always musically inclined, playing flute and violin. But she realized not everyone in her hometown of Aurora who wanted to take up an instrument could do so.
“I saw people around me who really wanted to try music but didn’t have the resources to do it,” she recalls. “I thought if I studied music ed I could help people like them and kids like me who just really love music.”
When Vieyra, a sophomore, completes her music education degree, she hopes to teach music at a public school and offer private lessons at an affordable price to people in her hometown.
Vieyra is inspired by her teachers, whom she said are always willing to offer help, even outside of office hours. That collaborative attitude pervades the atmosphere of the Music Building, where Vieyra said competition feels good natured and working together is the primary focus.
“People here have a really strong bond and connection,” she said. “When something isn’t working, people come together and make it work.”
Receiving the NIU Foundation Impact Scholarship opened new doors for Vieyra, who can now afford to stay on campus instead of driving home every day. That means more time for practice, more time for study, and more opportunities to be involved, she said.
“I was so happy when I found out I received the scholarship,” she said. “I ran to tell my younger siblings about it. I told them they have no excuse not to go to college because I am doing it. I am getting the help I need, and they can, too.”
When her siblings are ready for college, Vieyra said, she encourages them to choose NIU. The university and the School of Music are providing her with more than an education – they are giving her a second family.
“NIU is a place where you can make your home,” she said. “I am at home.”
Learn more about students like Vieyra during Thousands Strong, a virtual event to celebrate the thousands of Huskies whose strength, impact and generosity change lives at NIU.
Larissa Barnat, a third year Master of Fine Arts student in the School of Art and Design earned the “Best Artist Video” prize at the Dangerous Lullabies VI art exhibition in Woodstock, Ill.
The exhibition is being held at the Old Courthouse Arts Center in Woodstock, and opened on October 10. Artists were invited to submit work that explores the curious allure of things that frighten us–work of any medium designed to examine the beauty found in the ashes of terror or the magnetic pull of work that is disturbing, on-edge or dark.
Barnat’s MFA focus is on painting and she is working towards a certification in Museum Studies.
Her art has been exhibited internationally in London, and her work is part of a group exhibition in South Korea. Larissa double majored in painting and graphic design at Lewis University. She is a native of Burbank and attended Reavis High School.
Chelsea graduated from Columbia College in 2012 with a BA in Art Management. She worked in the talent management and hospitality industry before returning to NIU for the Masters in Art and Design Education program, graduating in the summer of 2020. Chelsea was hired during the government mandated shutdown in March and is currently teaching in-person at her new school as a middle dchool art teacher in Greenwich, Connecticut.
The School of Art and Design is hosting a visiting artist lecture by calligrapher, type designer and design historian Paul Shaw, on the words American graphic artist W.A. Dwiggins.
William Addison (W.A.) Dwiggins was a master calligrapher, book designer, and type designer. He began his career in Chicago working in advertising and lettering. He eventually moved to Massachusetts. He gained recognition as a lettering artist and wrote much on the graphic arts, his book Layout in Advertising was written in 1928 and remains a valuable reference still today.
Paul Shaw is a designer and design historian. He holds a BA in American Studies from Reed College in Portland, Oregon, and an MA and MPhil in American Histoory from Columbia University. He has researched and written about the history of graphic design with a focus on typography, lettering and calligraphy.
Among his areas of interest are WA Diggins, George Salter, Morris Fuller Benton, Bartolomeo Sanvito, Andrea Bregno, blackletter and the signage of the New York City subway system.
Shaw’s lecture, “The Lettering and Calligraphy of W.A. Dwiggins” will be presented via Zoom, Wednesday, November 4 at 9:30 a.m.
Zoom information Zoom.us
Meeting ID – 845 8310 3425
Passcode – 504803
The School of Art and Design at Northern Illinois University will host a guest lecture by artist and experimental psychologist Dr. Ellen Winner, titled “How Art Works: Five Puzzles.”
In it, she examines how psychologists have approached philosophical questions about the arts —
Elizabeth Vieyra was little when she first noticed some of her peers did not have the same opportunities she did.
Larissa Barnat, a third year Master of Fine Arts student in the School of Art and Design earned the “Best Artist Video” prize at the Dangerous Lullabies VI art exhibition in Woodstock, Ill.
The 
