Image credit: Images by Sandy Aldieri of Perceptions Photography
Performance Studies Alumni Joshua Lubin-Levy (M.A. '10, Ph.D. '20) has been appointed the new Director of the Center for the Arts at Wesleyan University.
Wesleyan University posted about Joshua's appointment saying, "Nicole Stanton, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, and Professor of Dance, Environmental Studies, and African American Studies, said the search committee that selected Lubin-Levy “was impressed not only by his rare combination of performing and visual arts knowledge but also with his clear commitment to collaboration and team building. It became clear that he could serve as an advocate for the arts across campus, as a scholarly and creative practice, and within the community of Middletown.”
Lubin-Levy’s goal is for the Center for the Arts to be more than “decoration for the University,” elevating what art does beyond illustrating ideas. “We are not just putting art up on walls. We are not just bringing in performers to entertain us,” he said. “Artists are our collaborators, they’re our colleagues…We need to ask ourselves what the culture of artistic research is on campus. What does it really mean to think about art as a modality of research, a kind of hub of research, in the way that we do about the sciences, or in social sciences, or the humanities?”
He’s looking to rewrite the terms on which the CFA engages with artists, helping to host them within the framework of ongoing Wesleyan programs such as the Creative Campus and Embodying Antiracism initiatives, honoring their needs, and giving them “access to the hive mind of the University” across disciplines. “It creates capaciousness around the way the work we’re doing can interact with each other…I want to go to artists and say, ‘What would you want to do if you had access to all the resources of the CFA?’” he said."
Congratulations Joshua!