Artist Pulls Out of Harvard Talk Over Academic Freedom Concerns
The university was meant to host artist Janiva Ellis in conversation with art historian Rizvana Bradley, who has also withdrawn her participation.
Artist Janiva Ellis, whose work is on view at the Carpenter Center for Visual Arts at Harvard University, has withdrawn from a scheduled talk on campus along with event co-lead and art historian Rizvana Bradley over concerns about recent university actions that the pair say “repress academic freedom.”
The event, slated to take place tomorrow, April 3, has since been canceled after Ellis and Bradley shared a co-written statement announcing their withdrawal via Instagram stories earlier this week.
In the statement, Ellis and Bradley cited the university’s decision to dismiss faculty leaders of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies last week over “insufficiently balanced programming on Palestine,” as well as the suspension of a research partnership between the School of Public Health and Birzeit University in the Occupied West Bank that came days prior.
“The Carpenter Center for Visual Arts respects Ellis’s and Bradley’s choice of using their platform at this critical moment and remain dedicated to supporting artists and scholars in sharing their work on their own terms,” a spokesperson for the institution told Hyperallergic.
Bradley and Ellis go on to reference a public letter by Harvard President Alan Garber, published on March 31, that addresses the federal government’s threat to pull $9 billion in funding amid a review of alleged antisemitism on campus. Garber’s words, Ellis wrote, “suggest a capitulatory orientation to the Trump administration’s intimidation.”
They also drew attention to the university’s African and African American Resistance Organization’s (AFRO) allegations that the Harvard administration has interfered with their attempts to gather in student spaces as an “unrecognized” student organization. AFRO did not immediately respond to Hyperallergic‘s inquiry.
“Solidarity with those who face oppression is crucial, and we stand firmly with those advocating for it,” Ellis and Bradley wrote.
Hyperallergic has contacted Ellis and Bradley for comment.
