January Highlights

	Karl Pribram, George Farre, and Fr. Patrick Heelan

The University of Chicago Divinity School
Conference: Physics, Physiology, Philosophy: Three Paths, One Spirited Product
8 a.m. — 6 p.m., Friday, Jan. 26
Swift Hall, 1025 E. 58th St., third floor lecture room.
http://marty-center.uchicago.edu/conferences/ph3/bios.shtml

Three scholars from diverse educational and academic interests will come together to discover commonalities and conflicts. The three Georgetown professors are George Farre professor emeritus and director of the interdisciplinary program in cognitive science; Karl Pribram, distinguished research professor in psychology and cognitive science; and Patrick Heelan, S.J. William A. Gaston professor of philosophy. Embracing physics (evolution of matter), physiology (brain and consciousness) and philosophy (philosophical and theological implications), this conference will highlight the possibilities of what could arise when these paths converge.

	Panel of six tiles, ca. 1540, Iznik, Turkey

Smart Museum of Art
Cosmophilia: Islamic Art from the David Collection, Copenhagen
Opening Reception and Lecture 5 — 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 1
Exhibit open Thursday, Feb. 1 through Sunday, May 20
5550 South Greenwood Ave.
http://smartmuseum.uchicago.edu

Cosmophilia—“literally love of ornament”—examines one of the most characteristic and attractive features of Islamic art. Covering a millennium of Islamic history in regions extending from Spain to India, this comprehensive exhibition demonstrates the extraordinary range and visual virtuosity of one of the world’s great artistic traditions. With works drawn from the David Collection in Copenhagen, Denmark, it offers a rare opportunity for audiences in the United States to study one of the finest collections of Islamic art in the world. At 6:30 p.m., the introductory lecture “Ornament and Islamic Art” will discuss decoration, one of the most characteristic and attractive features of Islamic art. The lecture will be presented by exhibition curators Sheila Blair and Jonathan Bloom, the Norma Jean Calderwood chairs of Islamic and Asian art at Boston College.

University Symphony Orchestra
New Babylon: Silent Film with Live Orchestra
8 p.m. Friday, Jan. 26 and Saturday, Jan. 27
Mandel Hall, 1131 E. 57th St.

The University of Chicago Symphony Orchestra offers a unique multi-media concert event: two full screenings of the classic silent film New Babylon accompanied by a live orchestra performance of the score by Dmitri Shostakovich. These performances will mark the world premiere of the newly restored version of the uncut, original film of New Babylon, one of the final masterpieces of Soviet silent cinema. Music Director Barbara Schubert will conduct. To purchase tickets, call (773) 702-9075, between the hours 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.

	Scott Short Untitled (white), oil/canvas 2005

The Renaissance Society
Scott Short Solo Exhibit
Sunday, Jan. 7 through Sunday, Feb. 18
5811 S. Ellis Ave., Room 418
http://www.renaissancesociety.org

Chicago-based painter Scott Short has a simple and highly refined method for arriving at abstract compositions. He places a piece of colored construction paper on the scanning bed of a black and white photocopier and makes a photocopy of a photocopy of a photocopy, a couple hundred times. Within a few generations the photocopied images become monotonous fields of black and white static, which Short faithfully and painstakingly reproduces on canvases varying in size. This very restricted economy provides Short a wealth of visual effect in which value, arrived at through the textural interplay of black and white becomes as rich and complex a phenomenon as color itself.