Profs and Pints - Nashville

Profs and Pints Nashville presents: “A Guide to Conceptual Art,” on the origins and evolution of an art movement that produced signed urinals, floating sheds, and wall-mounted bananas, with Jennifer Gagliardi, independent curator and contemporary art lecturer at Middle Tennessee State University and Pratt Institute in New York.

[Doors open at 6 pm. Talk starts at 7. Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/conceptual-art ]

Few art movements have met with as much buzz and backlash as conceptual art, associated with installations and performances that often leave people scratching their heads or deep in thought.

Come to Nashville’s Fait La Force taproom for a talk on conceptual art that will deepen your appreciation and understanding of it. We’ll consider works such as Martin Creed’s empty room with lights going on and off, Maurizio Bolognini’s programming of computers to generate images no human will ever view, and Tracey Emin’s exhibition of an unmade bed, exploring their deeper meaning.

To frame her discussion, Gagliardi will talk about how the history of art is big and wild, with the first work of "art" technically being made around 28,000 BCE. When we think about art, we often consider paintings, sculptures, or digital objects, but Marcel Duchamp sparked a radical shift in the art world by presenting a urinal as art in 1917. After World War II, artist groups began experimenting with the very definition of art, and by the 1970s, the focus had shifted from the finished product to the idea of art itself.

We’ll look at how art and philosophy blended in the 20th century to inspire conceptual artists to transform art from functional object to form of intellectual entertainment, favoring idea over physical product. Gagliardi will discuss Japan’s avant-garde Gutai artists, who ran through paper, as well as works focused on the conceptual definition of a chair.

We’ll talk about Yves Klein’s exhibition of an empty gallery and Clement Greenberg’s theories on avant-garde and kitsch. Attendees will come away with a new understanding of some of contemporary art’s most famous—and seemingly impenetrable—works.

Among the questions Gagliardi will tackle: Is art the concept or is it the finished piece? (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID.)

Image: Joseph Kosuth’s “One and Three Chairs” (Photo by Gautier Poupeau / Wikimedia Commons).

Profs and Pints Nashville presents: “The Hospitals of Civil War Nashville,” on the city’s days as an epicenter of care for victims of strife, with Brandon Hulette, epidemiologist, historian, and associate professor at Vanderbilt University.

[Doors open at 6 pm. Talk starts at 7. Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Available at https://events.ticketleap.com/tickets/profsandpints/nashville-civil-war-hospitals ]

Today’s Nashville is known as the “Healthcare Capital of the World,” being home to several hospitals, three medical schools, and more than 900 healthcare companies ranging from industry giants like HCA to a vibrant array of startups. However, the city’s history as a major healthcare provider began long before today’s big players came into being, having its origins in a period of devastating national conflict.

During the Civil War, Nashville was home to over 26 military hospitals serving the sick and injured from both the Union and Confederate armies throughout the conflict. Its massive complex of hospitals served over 100,000 patients during the war, and it served 20 to 30 percent of all Confederate soldiers in need of care even after Nashville was occupied by the U.S. Army in 1861.

Hear the fascinating story of Nashville's Civil War Hospitals from Vanderbilt professor and Army Medical Service Corps Officer Brandon Hulette. He’ll describe how all of this came to be, he’ll tell the stories of the people involved, and he’ll point out locations in Nashville where Civil War hospitals existed.

You’ll learn how as the war progressed Nashville became known as one of the most important cities for military medicine. It even had a dedicated hospital train to move wounded to the city.

You’ll gain an appreciation of the rich history of the city and the noble origins of its commitment to healthcare. (Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID.)

Image: A hospital in West Nashville devoted to those afflicted with smalplox (Tennessee State Library and Archives).