CSU Professor Temple Grandin will join artist Colleen Plumb for a talk about animal welfare and emotions on Aug. 20, following screenings of Plumb’s videos of elephants coping with their captivity by swaying back and forth.
Their discussion will be held at 6:30 p.m. at the Museum of Art Fort Collins, 201 S. College Ave., and will be followed by a question-and-answer session. The event is already at full capacity for attendance. The talks will be recorded and posted via The Center for Fine Art Photography’s Facebook page (C4FAP).
Grandin, a professor of animal sciences, is a world-renowned spokesperson for autism and humane livestock handling.
Plumb’s powerful images will be projected on the west side of the Lory Student Center Theatre beginning on Aug. 17 at 8:45 p.m. Plumb will attend that event to answer questions about her work.
Her large-scale video, “Thirty Times a Minute,” is projected onto the sides of buildings in an effort to bring art to the public, to raise awareness about the plight of elephants removed from their herd and natural environments and placed in captivity, and to disrupt viewers’ daily/normal experience. Since 2014, the artist has installed more than 70 public projections of her elephant video, in locations such as Chicago, Portland, Detroit, New Mexico, Idaho, Wyoming, New York, Berlin, Vienna and Paris.
Other viewings of Plumb’s art are planned, including at 8:45 p.m. on Aug. 18 at Oak Street Plaza, where the videos will be projected on the side of the Museum of Art Fort Collins. All of the events are being presented through a partnership between The Center for Fine Art Photography and CSU.
“The public installations trigger conversations between strangers — talking about isolation and friendship and what is humane,” Plumb says. “Through these conversations, incremental or momentary connectedness occurs. The public projections have grown into an offering: honoring the place of projection, the spectators that stop to watch, and the elephants themselves.”
Plumb also plans to visit several CSU classes on Aug. 20. For more information about the artist, visit www.colleenplumb.com.
