Athens, Ga. – Steven Tepper, a leader in the field of cultural policy and research on the impact of the arts on everyday life, will speak Jan. 22 at 4 p.m. in the M. Smith Griffith Auditorium of the Georgia Museum of Art. The lecture on “Creative Work and the Work of Creativity: How Colleges and Universities Can Prepare Graduates to Reinvent Our World,” is supported by the University of Georgia Jane and Harry Willson Center for Humanities and Arts, Ideas for Creative Exploration and the Georgia Museum of Art.
Tepper is the associate director of the Curb Center for Art, Enterprise and Public Policy and an associate professor of sociology at Vanderbilt University. At the Curb Center, he works to develop national policy reports and create research tools that examine and measure the effectiveness of support models for the arts. He currently serves as the principal investigator of “Artful Living: Examining the Relationship Between Artistic Practice, Subjective Wellbeing and Materialism Across Three National Surveys,” supported by a research grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
“Steven Tepper will share some of his insights, findings, and methods from his work in measuring the value of creativity to society, research that combines approaches from the arts, social sciences, economics and law,” said Mark Callahan, artistic director of ICE, an interdisciplinary initiative for advanced research in the arts at UGA. “His visit to UGA will engage multiple aspects of contemporary culture and its impact on the future of education.”
Tepper’s most recent publication is a book entitled “Not Here, Not Now, Not That! Protest Over Art and Media in America” (University of Chicago, 2011). He was the co-editor, with Bill Ivey, of “Engaging Art: The Next Great Transformation of America’s Cultural Life” (Routledge, 2007). His articles appear in numerous publications, including the Chronicle of Higher Education, Review of Policy Research, Journal of Arts Management, Law and Society and the Journal of Cultural Economics.
The talk is part of the Willson Center’s 2012-2013 Distinguished Artists and Lecturers series.
Willson Center for Humanities and Arts
The Jane and Harry Willson Center for Humanities and Arts is a unit of the Office of the Vice President for Research at UGA. In the service of its mission to promote research and creativity in the humanities and arts, the Willson Center sponsors and participates in numerous public events on and off the UGA campus throughout the academic year. It supports faculty through research grants, lectures, symposia, publications, visiting scholars, visiting artists, collaborative instruction, public conferences, exhibitions and performances. For more information, see http://willson.uga.edu/.
Ideas for Creative Exploration
Ideas for Creative Exploration is a catalyst for innovative, interdisciplinary creative projects, advanced research and critical discourse in the arts, and for creative applications of technologies, concepts, and practices found across disciplines. It is a collaborative network of faculty, students, and community members from all disciplines of the visual and performing arts in addition to other disciplines in the humanities and sciences. ICE enables all stages of creative activity, from concept and team formation through production, documentation and dissemination of research. For more information, see http://ice.uga.edu/.
