The Willson Center 2020 - 2021 ANNUAL REPORT The Willson Center 2020 - 2021 ANNUAL REPORT The Willson Center 2020 - 2021 ANNUAL REPORT The Willson Center 2020 - 2021 ANNUAL REPORT

WELCOME FROM OUR DIRECTOR Nicholas Allen
Professor in Humanities
Director, Willson Center for Humanities and Arts Dear friends,
Like you, we have all had a long year, full of uncertainty. I look forward with hope, not least because of all the brilliant things our community has done to be safe, survive, and grow.  READ MORE WELCOME FROM OUR DIRECTOR X Nicholas Allen
Professor in Humanities
Director, Willson Center for Humanities and Arts Dear friends,

Like you, we have all had a long year, full of uncertainty. I look forward with hope, not least because of all the brilliant things our community has done to be safe, survive, and grow. This year’s report registers many successes, and many more kindnesses, which together have shown the strength we share as a society of learning. We have tried at all times to be with you in your moment, and I promise we will continue to do so as the world changes again. Please know then how important you all are to our work together. The humanities and arts have excelled in the University of Georgia this past year. Your kindness, your attention, your contributions, and your good company have made this so.

I know how proud you will be when you read this report. I hope you will see how far we have come, and how much further we have to go. Please stay with us on this journey, and support us however you can. As this past year shows, solidarity, creativity, and self-reflection are the foundations for a better future. We appreciate you all, and all that you do, and I hope in reading this report you’ll celebrate with us the many reasons we have to support the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts.

Yours truly,



Nicholas

about The mission of the Willson Center is to promote research, practice, and creativity in the humanities and arts. It supports faculty and students through research grants, lectures, symposia, publications, visiting scholars, visiting artists, collaborative instruction, public conferences, exhibitions, and performances. It is committed to academic excellence and public impact. ADMINISTRATION BOARD OF FRIENDS FACULTY ADVISORY BOARD THE WILLSON CENTER Learn More

Willson Center receives $1 million
Mellon Foundation grant to partner
with Penn Center The Willson Center has received a $1 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to partner with Penn Center, one of the nation’s most important institutions of African American culture. The partnership will support education and sharing among communities in the Sea Islands region of the Southeastern United States and students from UGA and its partner institutions. Rev. Jesse Jackson; Joan Baez; Ira Sandperl; Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; and Dora McDonald on the Penn Center campus in 1964
[photo: Bob Fitch, courtesy of Penn Center] Learn more

“I am passionate not only about the classical contemporary music field, but also about being able to showcase music by living underrepresented composers…”  Zaira Castillo-Ramos
Master’s candidate
Hugh Hodgson School of Music
Arts Lab Graduate Fellowship recipient

UGA ARTS LAB The University of Georgia Arts Lab is a new, multi-year initiative to enhance research, practice and community engagement in the arts. Spearheaded by the UGA Arts Council and facilitated by the Willson Center, the Arts Lab provides course development fellowships for faculty, micro-fellowships that will facilitate faculty research projects, and new fellowships for graduate students. It is funded by the Office of the Provost, the Office of Research, Graduate School, Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, and the Willson Center.
Arts Lab Graduate Fellowship recipient Zaira Castillo-Ramos, Hugh Hodgson School of Music Learn More

research The Willson Center is an active supporter of scholarly research in the humanities and arts. Willson Center Fellowships provide faculty with time to engage in research and creative activity. The Willson Center Graduate Research Award provides support to arts and humanities graduate students for relevant expenses related to completion of their terminal degree. a2ru Research Clusters Faculty Achievements & Awards Graduate Research Awards Research Seminars Faculty Fellows The Willson Center is a participating member of the Alliance for the Arts in Research Universities (a2ru), a partnership of over 30 institutions committed to ensuring the greatest possible support for the full spectrum of arts and arts-integrative research, curricula, programs, and creative practice for the benefit of all students and faculty at research universities and the communities they serve. Learn More a2ru X Nik Heynen
Professor, Department of Geography
University of Georgia
Distinguished Research Professor 2021
(Photo: Rinne Allen) The University of Georgia faculty and graduate students in the humanities and arts have great success at winning awards and fellowships from national and international organizations, in addition to internal UGA honors. LEARN MORE Faculty Achievements & Awards X “Bloom,”
steel, 9 ½’ x 4 ½’ x 4’
Kelsey Wishik,
MFA Candidate Lamar Dodd School of Art
From MFA Exhibition: Bloom Graduate Research Awards provide support toward research‐related expenses for arts and humanities projects that are essential components of a graduate degree program. Application is open to any humanities and arts graduate student registered for an advanced degree. LEARN MORE Graduate Research Awards X Willson Center Research Seminars support faculty organizing year-long interdisciplinary discussion groups on particular research topics. Seminars bring scholars from other institutions to the UGA campus. LEARN MORE Religion and the Common Good
Organizers: Robert L. Foster (Religion),
Joshua Patterson (Institute of Higher Education) X Research Seminars Elizabeth Bishop in Key West, ca. 1937
Experimental Bishop
Susan Rosenbaum
Associate Professor
Department of English
(Photo: Elizabeth Bishop Papers, Vassar College) Willson Center Faculty Fellows are selected by an interdisciplinary UGA committee of distinguished artists and scholars. Fellowships support excellence in the humanities and arts by providing faculty with time to engage in research and creative activity. LEARN MORE Faculty Fellows X Flyer for DIGI Colloquium
March 26, 2021
From DIGI: Willson Center Digital Humanities
Lab Director: Emily McGinn
Head of Digital Humanities
UGA Libraries Faculty Research Clusters support groups of faculty who are organized to address large-scale humanities and arts questions in partnership with colleagues from allied departments, colleges, centers, and institutes. The program is designed to build research capacity in the humanities and arts and increase the profile and competitiveness of faculty for grants and support. LEARN MORE UGA Arts Lab Cluster X

shelter projects In the spring of 2020 the Willson Center, in partnership with the Graduate School, the UGA Arts Council, the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, and Flagpole magazine, awarded 34 micro-fellowships in a new program we called Shelter Projects. The $500 fellowships supported graduate students and community-based artists and practitioners in the creation of shareable reflections on their experience of the COVID-19 pandemic through the arts and humanities. See Online exhibition Aaron Strand
“Here with Me”
Short film
see more Katharine Miele
#AloneTogether
Series of embroidered portraits of couches
see more Hannah Jones
“Shelter in Space: Retreat into Color”
Short film
see more SJ Henderson
“Define Pandemic?”
Poem / spoken word performance see more Cheryl Washburn
Sheltering in Nature
Series of oil paintings
see More

“My pieces celebrate the people who were staying home during the Shelter in Place ordinance. They memorialize the time we, as an international body, stayed home and sat on our sofas.
Alone. But alone together.”  Katharine Miele
MFA candidate
Lamar Dodd School of Art
Shelter Project award recipient

Global Georgia The Global Georgia Initiative public event series brings world class thinkers to Georgia. It presents global problems in local context by addressing pressing contemporary questions, including the economy, society, and the environment, with a focus on how the arts and humanities can intervene. The Spring 2021 series was conducted entirely online and expanded to 14 free public events, more than twice the number in any previous year.
Learn More Kevin Day
Performance and Discussion: “More than words…”
February 18, 2021 Learn More Carole Emberton
“Beyond Redemption: Race, Violence, and the American South after the Civil War”
February 23, 2021 Learn More Conversation on Athens Hip Hop
“Now Is the Time: Shouting Fire in a Crowded Theater”
February 25, 2021
Learn More Helon Habila
“Searching for Home: Africans in Europe”
March 4, 2021 Learn More Joy Harjo & LeAnne Howe
Reading and Conversation
March 10, 2021 Learn More Megha Majumdar
“Writing Socially Engaged Fiction”
March 18, 2021
Learn More Jee Leong Koh
“Translation as a Literary Trope”
March 25, 2021
Learn More Arts Roundtable
“E Pluribus Unum: Reflections on Immigration in America in Music and Visual Art”
April 7, 2021
Learn More Renee Gladman & Val Jeanty
“Conjurations: Composing at the Intersections of Sound, Line, and Language”
April 20, 2021 Learn More

shared programs The Willson Center supports dozens of public events each year through recurring funded programs and special provisions. These include visiting artists and speakers, performances, screenings, discussions, and other events that are shared with the community on campus and beyond.
CInema Roundtables Spotlight on the Arts Short-Term Visiting Fellows Distinguished Artists and Lecturers Public Impact Grants Special Events “Wartime Suspense in Dunkirk and 1917: A Conversation with Kristin Thompson and David Bordwell”
November 6, 2020 The Willson Center Cinema Roundtable meets to discuss topics of film history, criticism and theory. Richard Neupert, Wheatley Professor of the Arts, Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor and film studies coordinator in the Department of Theatre and Film Studies, organizes and moderates one roundtable each semester. Audiences are invited to participate and the events are free and open to the public. Cinema Roundtable X LEARN MORE SPLICE Festival IV
October 2020 The Willson Center Distinguished Artist or Lecturer program supports individual faculty or interdisciplinary groups in bringing leading thinkers and practitioners to campus in support of ongoing and innovative research projects.


Learn More Public Impact Grants X Lisa Wolpe
February 24, 2021 The Willson Center Short-Term Visiting Fellows, nominated by UGA faculty, bring distinguished artists, scholars and performers to the arts and humanities community at the University of Georgia. Visiting Fellows conduct intensive workshops for faculty and students, and give public presentations of their work. Short-Term Visiting Fellows X Learn More Claudio Saunt in Conversation with Nicholas Allen
October 22, 2020 The Willson Center supports numerous public events each academic year outside of its recurring grant-funded programs. Many of these events are hosted and sponsored by the Willson Center itself, or in collaboration with on- and off-campus partners. Others are hosted by faculty and/or students with Willson Center support through Research Seminars, Research Clusters, Mellon Foundation-funded Global Georgia projects, and other programs. Special Events X Learn More “Cool Town: A Conversation on the Past and the Future of Athens Music”
November 12, 2020 The University of Georgia spotlights its arts programs and venues during an annual nine-day festival that includes concerts, theater and dance performances, art exhibitions, poetry readings, film festivals, discussions on the arts and creativity, and more. Learn More Spotlight on the Arts X Eddie Glaude
September 29, 2020 The Willson Center Distinguished Artist or Lecturer program supports individual faculty or interdisciplinary groups in bringing leading thinkers and practitioners to campus in support of ongoing and innovative research projects.


Distinguished Artist or Lecturer X Learn More

“Sometimes our biggest periods of growth happen after our greatest losses.”  Claire Korfas
Class of 2021
Department of Dance

01 06 Giving Support arts and humanities programs by giving to the Willson Center. The Willson Center promotes interdisciplinary innovation, public programs, and community engagement in the arts and humanities. We support faculty and students through research grants, lectures, symposia, publications, visiting scholars, visiting artists, collaborative instruction, public conferences, exhibitions, and performances. Learn More 02 06 $100 $100 supports one virtual speaker fee for faculty and students. Learn More 03 06 $200 $200 supports one matching award for a department invited artist or lecturer. Learn More 04 06 $500 $500 supports creative research projects in the arts. Learn More 05 06 $1,250 $1,250 supports one Graduate Research Award. Learn More 06 06 $10,000 $10,000 supports one Research Fellowship for UGA humanities and arts faculty. Learn More