Arts of Dignity

This now annual series will focus on how the arts provide ways of concretely experiencing the dignity of people and cultures marginalized by various forms of injustice. 

Spring 2023

Calling all UND, SMC, HCC, and IUSB undergraduate and graduate creatives to submit work for the Arts of Dignity juried exhibit. Works can explore contemporary realities in which dignity is threatened or enhanced. The show will open on April 20 at the Center for Social Concerns.  

• Eligible Media: Any original painting, drawing, printmaking, photography, sculpture, ceramic, mixed media, and design made in 2021–23 is eligible. Students can submit up to three entries. 
• Submission Information: The art should be photographed and images submitted, along with title and artist statement describing how the work explores the question of dignity. Please provide hi-res photos with good lighting. Crop if necessary to ensure nothing external to the artwork is included in the photo. 2-D work that is accepted should be framed or have hanging wire fastened to the back. 
• Jurors: Undergraduate submissions will be juried by the University of Notre Dame's Geneva Hutchinson ('23, MFA) and graduate submissions juried by Fr. Martin Nguyen, C.S.C. (Faculty, Art/Art History/Design)
• Prize: $100 cash prizes will be awarded to top entries.

Submission deadline: April 13, 2023 at 11:59 p.m.

submit art

Selections from the 2023 student art exhibit will be on display throughout Geddes Hall. Stop by to view pieces that explore contemporary realities in which dignity is threatened or enhanced. Food and drink will be served.

Friday, April 21, 2023 | 4:00 p.m. | Geddes Hall, Andrews Auditorium

MacArthur “Genius” Nicole R. Fleetwood is a celebrated writer, cultural theorist, curator, and art critic. Growing up in Hamilton, Ohio, she witnessed the vulnerability of her community to excessive policing, punitive surveillance, and mass incarceration, and the direct impact these had on her family, especially her male cousins. The concept for her groundbreaking book Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration started in 2010, when she hung photographs of her cousins in Ohio prisons on the walls of her Harlem apartment. Marking Time explores the impact of US incarceration on contemporary visual art, highlighting artists who have been incarcerated alongside artists whose art examines US institutions and systems of confinement. Based on interviews with currently and formerly incarcerated artists, prison visits, and the author’s own family experiences with the penal system, Marking Time shows how the imprisoned turn ordinary objects into elaborate works of art.

Past Events: 

December 12, 2022 | 12:00–1:00 p.m. | La Casa de Amistad

All are welcome to celebrate the completion of South Bend's newest mural, a collaborative project between the Center for Social Concerns' Art and Social Change class and La Casa de Amistad's Citizenship class. The project was led by local artist, Freddy Rodriguez, and students contributed to the design and painting as they sought to translate immigration narratives into visual language and explore the role of beauty in enacting the common good. Lunch provided.