This year’s conference celebrates 15 years since the founding of the Conney Project on the Jewish Arts at UW–Madison’s Center for Jewish Studies.

The 2019 conference will be framed within the historical context of the 92Y and will address the practices, histories, and current state of the Jewish Arts across a diverse spectrum of genres and experience. This year’s conference features artists, scholars, and performers across the arts, including visual art, dance, literature, theater, poetry, music, and film as seen through the lens of Jewish identity.

“Our mission is to create a vibrant and respectful space for artists and scholars to present new research in the interdisciplinary field of Jewish arts and by extension, to participate in shaping the ever-evolving field into a robust contemporary discourse,” says UW–Madison’s Douglas Rosenberg, the director of the Conney Project on Jewish Arts and the chair of the School of Education’s Art Department.

The project began in 2004 with the first Conney Colloquium on Jewish Arts, called, “Experimental Jews: Projecting Jewish Identity in the New Millennium,” with the eminent curator Norman Kleeblatt as the first keynote speaker.

This year’s keynote speaker is Naomi Jackson, who will deliver a presentation on Monday, April 1 titled, “Moving Beyond Walls: The Y’s Resonance for Modern Jewish Artists.” Jackson is an associate professor in the School of Film, Dance and Theatre at Arizona State University. She has served as a member of the boards of the Society of Dance History Scholars, and Congress on Research in Dance.

“The Conney Conference on Jewish Arts supports the multiple ways in which historical narratives concerning Jewish identity in the arts are both fluid and contested and how, throughout history, those practices are culturally inscribed,” says Rosenberg. “We are interested in new interpretations, new theorizing and new ways of lensing Jewish culture through the arts and throughout history to the present and into the future.”

For complete details visit the 2019 Conney Conference on Jewish Arts website.