Dr. Baruch Gottlieb
Revolutionaries in the Arts: Paul & Eslanda Robeson
Block Seminar, English, 2 SWS, 2 ECTS
Saturday/Sunday, 27./28.9. and 11./12.10.2025, 10-18 h, Hardenbergstr. 33, room 110

Registration on Moodle is open: https://moodle.udk-berlin.de/moodle/course/view.php?id=2796 
Enrollment Key: robeson

This seminar will examine what goes into the preparation, execution and communication of an archive-based exhibition on the work of one of the most influential and famous performing artists of his time, Paul Robeson, and his wife, the activist, author and anthropologist Eslanda Robeson.  Course work will involve research into various aspects of the Robesons' practices, theater, music, film, as well as activism and militancy.  We will look at the role of art in society, the political dimensions and limitations of art, and what Walter Benjamin described as aesthetics in the service of a movement. 

Research sessions will also take place at the Paul and & Eslanda Robeson archive at the Akademie der Künste Berlin. Some results of the course work in this seminar may be featured in an exhibition and work project being hosted at the AdK in Winter 2025.

This seminar will consist of discussions, readings and viewings, field trips, workshops, group and individual activities and presentations.

Fulfilment criteria for ungraded accreditation: regular and active participation in the seminars, two small presentations, individually or in groups.

Baruch Gottlieb, trained as a filmmaker at Concordia University Montreal, has a doctorate in digital aesthetics from the University of Arts Berlin. Author of "Gratitude for Technology" (ATROPOS 2009), "A Political Economy of the Smallest Things" (ATROPOS 2016),and Digital Materialism (Emerald 2018) he currently is Prof3Dual lecturer in political philosophy of digital art the Potsdam University of Applied Sciences, and regularly gives seminars in digital aesthetics and transdisciplinary methods at the University of Arts Berlin. He is a practicing artist, curator and educator with a strong social practice. Working at West Den Haag since 2017 he has developed a rich transdisciplinary curriculum including summer schools, reading and discussion circles and a wide range of experimental public events, developing new institutional methodologies for address complex challenges related to climate change, legacy and present of colonialism, structural injustice and rapid technological transformation, He practices engaged pedagogy, strongly influenced by bell hooks, Paolo Friere and Jacotot, with a focus on embodied thinking and situated knowledge. With disnovation.org he has developed widely touring art-science projects which address question of sustainability, particularly through a concentration on energy, photosynthesis and metabolism.