In this ongoing Smart series, University of Chicago instructors and their invited guests enter into dialogue about one artwork on view in a current exhibition. Highlighting objects that spark the curiosity and interest of scholars across disciplines, these conversations always conclude with an opportunity for attendees to join the discussion. Allyson Nadia Field, Associate Professor of Cinema and Media Studies, continues this year’s series with a conversation inside Theaster Gates: Unto Thee. Free, no registration required.

Allyson Nadia Field is Associate Professor of Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Chicago. She is the author of Uplift Cinema: The Emergence of African American Film & The Possibility of Black Modernity (Duke University Press, 2015) and Acts of Love: Black Performance and the Kiss that Changed Film History (University of California Press, 2026). She is also co-editor with Jan-Christopher Horak and Jacqueline Najuma Stewart of L.A. Rebellion: Creating a New Black Cinema (University of California Press, 2015) and co-editor with Marsha Gordon of Screening Race in American Nontheatrical Film (Duke University Press, 2019).

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Photo by Jason Smith