Vera List Center

Vera List Center Focus Theme: If Art is Politics
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Our Focus Theme lasts for two years and informs everything we do and creates opportunities for shared learning with artists, scholars, activists, public intellectuals, students, and political and cultural leaders. Focus Theme for 2020-22 is "As for Protocols"

Explicitly—or not—protocols determine much of what we do. Supplanting traditional notions of “good manners,” protocols are languages that

regulate how people relate to each other, to their cultural, social, and political environments, and to the technologies that create them. They are evidence of governmental, organizational, social, or corporate power structures. Protocols speak to processes, rather than finite outcomes. While often overlooked or invisible, they set the tone and conditions for potential encounters. Investigating them as such will allow us to contribute to the creation of new protocols that are inclusive and equitable, ranging from computer interfaces, A.I., data aggregation, and algorithms to community agreements and culturally-specific engagement protocols to protocols undergirding scientific research. As “protocol” may also refer to documentation and minutes, the term signals a hybrid time frame of both the past and projection into the future. With the engagement of artists, scholars, activists, and students, the Vera List Center will consider protocols as the foundations for the performance of living, and begin thinking and working toward new spaces of political empowerment.

06/22/2026

Save the date! We are pleased to announce the 𝗩𝗲𝗿𝗮 𝗟𝗶𝘀𝘁 𝗖𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗙𝗼𝗿𝘂𝗺 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟲, presented on October 9 & 10 at The New School ✨

The VLC Forum is an annual international convening of key participants in the field of art and politics. This year’s forum, organized within the framework of our two-year focus theme, 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦, convenes artists, curators, writers, scholars, and designers, inviting us to explore the many forms intelligence can take.

The VLC Forum 2026 honors Brazilian artist Rosana Paulino (Rosana Paulino), recipient of the Vera List Center’s 2025–2027 Jane Lombard Prize for Art and Social Justice, with the solo exhibition ¿História Natural?, celebrating Paulino’s groundbreaking work and tracing the artist’s ongoing critical examinations of the entanglements between science, race, knowledge, and power.

The VLC Forum also assembles the finalists for the prize, named the Jane Lombard Fellows: Nepalese artist collective ArTree Nepal (Artree Nepal-Artist Collective); New York-based artist Stephanie Dinkins (Stephanie Dinkins); Hawaiian and Samoan digital media theorist and poet Jason Edward Lewis (Abundant Intelligences); and Finnish artist Jenna Sutela ().

In conversation with their nominators and invited guests—organizer and educator Neta Bomani (netazines); writer, artist, and 2025–2027 VLC Fellow Mashinka Hakopian (Mashinka Firunts Hakopian); fashion designer Prabal Gurung (Prabal Gurung); and writer Elvia Wilk (Elvia Wilk)—the fellows discuss their nominated projects. Along with other featured speakers, Chus Martínez (), curator and prize chair, delivers the keynote lecture.

Join us online and in person for presentations, conversations, performances, live broadcasts, publications and readings, and the annual VLC Community Dinner, Dream Futures.

Programming is free and open to the public! We are grateful to our funding partners who enable us to host these programs for free. Consider sustaining our work by becoming a member of Vera’s List.

Learn more about this year’s VLC

For the spring edition of the VLC’s publishing series 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤, tonal geologist Ryan C. Clarke’s “Unmastered Notes on Cr...
06/18/2026

For the spring edition of the VLC’s publishing series 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤, tonal geologist Ryan C. Clarke’s “Unmastered Notes on Creole Neotectonics” unfolds in a polyphonic rhythm, weaving between earth science, musicology, auto theory, and decolonial critique.

Constructing an epistemology that “geologizes blackness,” Clarke underscores geological processes that resituate non-Western cultural logics within diasporic frameworks, centering the ethos of Black Study as environmental thought. He explores states of land matter shaped through colonial violence and degradation to consider the indelible relationships between people, space, and place.

In doing so, he argues for Black fugitivity, self-organizing, and survivance as means of generating infinite possibilities through the voids left by erosion, displacement, and rupture.

The spring edition of 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤: Fugitive Ecologies explores forms of relational knowledge grounded in landscapes shaped by historical violence. Read Clarke’s (Christopher Clarke) text alongside Le’Andra LeSeur’s (Le’Andra LeSeur) “how empty is this space? (After Stone, After Ruins)” at the links in our bio.

𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤 is edited by the VLC’s Re’al Christian (Re'al Christian).

Christopher Clarke Le’Andra LeSeur Re'al Christian Vera List Center for Art and Politics

For the spring edition of the VLC’s publishing series 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤, Tulsa and New York-based artist Le’Andra LeSeur’s “how e...
06/03/2026

For the spring edition of the VLC’s publishing series 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤, Tulsa and New York-based artist Le’Andra LeSeur’s “how empty is this space? (After Stone, After Ruins)” marks the final chapter in a three-part series exploring the body’s response to landscapes shaped by historical Black violence, taking Tulsa and the southern coast of Georgia as familiar points of departure.

Combining a 16mm film, an undulating score, historiographical notes, and annotative gestures, the project documents and archives sound within these landscapes to uncover traces left behind—from the site of the 1864 Ebenezer Creek Massacre outside of Savannah, Georgia, where the film was shot, to the Tulsa Massacre of 1921.

In this process of attunement and embodied wayfinding, LeSeur questions how the land remembers.

The spring 2026 edition of 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤: Fugitive Ecologies explores forms of relational knowledge grounded in landscapes shaped by historical violence. Read / watch / listen to LeSeur’s project alongside Ryan C. Clarke’s () “Unmastered Notes on Creole Neotectonics” at the links in our bio.

𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤 is edited by the VLC’s Re’al Christian ().

06/02/2026

Ariella Aïsha Azoulay’s film 𝘈 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘴 (2026) tells the story of jewels and their guardians, both living remnants of the once-thriving Jewish Muslim world in North Africa.

Conceived as a necklace of tales, the film intertwines a plurality of voices with the lines of the Kol Nidrei prayer, which traditionally opens Yom Kippur services. Like a golden thread, the prayer runs through the film, revoking false promises as it resurrects the anticolonial imaginary of the ummah, the community of believers that is also the subject of Azoulay’s publication, The Jewelers of the Ummah (Verso 2024).

Join the and the Institute for Critical Social Inquiry (ICSI) on Wed, June 11, at 6 pm, for the New York City premiere of 𝘈 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘴, hosted .

The screening is followed by a conversation with and singer and artist Laura Elkeslassy (), who is featured in the film. The dialogue is introduced by Carin Kuoni and moderated by Ann Laura Stoler.

The program is free and open to the public. Kindly register in advance at the link in ’s bio.

Credits:
Cantors: Laura Elkeslassy, Sarah benichou, Reine Ruby, camera: Yohana Benattar, editor: Juna Suleiman. Video courtesy the filmmaker.

06/02/2026

Ariella Aïsha Azoulay’s film 𝘈 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘴 (2026) tells the story of jewels and their guardians, both living remnants of the once-thriving Jewish Muslim world in North Africa.

Conceived as a necklace of tales, the film intertwines a plurality of voices with the lines of the Kol Nidrei prayer, which traditionally opens Yom Kippur services. Like a golden thread, the prayer runs through the film, revoking false promises as it resurrects the anticolonial imaginary of the ummah, the community of believers that is also the subject of Azoulay’s publication, The Jewelers of the Ummah (Verso 2024).

Join the and the Institute for Critical Social Inquiry (ICSI) on Wed, June 11, at 6 pm, for the New York City premiere of 𝘈 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘴, hosted .

The screening is followed by a conversation with Azoulay and singer and artist Laura Elkeslassy (), who is featured in the film. The dialogue is introduced by Carin Kuoni and moderated by Ann Laura Stoler.

The program is free and open to the public. Kindly register in advance at the link in ’s bio.

Credit:
Cantors: Laura Elkeslassy, Sarah benichou, Reine Ruby, camera: Yohana Benattar, editor: Juna Suleiman. Video courtesy the filmmaker.

Join us online this evening, June 1, for 𝘈𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘴, 𝘚𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘭𝘢𝘳𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘚𝘱𝘪𝘦𝘴, our 6th 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 seminar. 🔎We close...
06/01/2026

Join us online this evening, June 1, for 𝘈𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘴, 𝘚𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘭𝘢𝘳𝘴, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘚𝘱𝘪𝘦𝘴, our 6th 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 seminar. 🔎

We close out year one of the 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 Seminar Series with a look at how knowledge has been implicated in and mobilized by both covert and overt forms of state and imperial power, while also treating these entanglements as vital subjects of artistic and scholarly inquiry.

Feat.
▪️Gregory Afinogenov, historian and author of Spies and Scholars: Chinese Secrets and Imperial Russia’s Quest for World Power
▪️Nina Hartmann (), artist
▪️John Reed (), writer, New School faculty member, and author of The Never End: The Other Orwell, the Cold War, the CIA, MI6, and the Origin of Animal Farm

The program is moderated by the VLC’s Eriola Pira and artist Caitlin Cherry.

Register in advance at the link in our bio and we’ll see you online this evening!

From June 5 to 13, current VLC Fellow Moriah Evans () presents her performance […/+*^%€£¥$&@!!!!^^^] in New York. […/+*...
05/29/2026

From June 5 to 13, current VLC Fellow Moriah Evans () presents her performance […/+*^%€£¥$&@!!!!^^^] in New York.

[…/+*^%€£¥$&@!!!!^^^] confronts the body as a site of political and existential conundrums. The work probes how material, immaterial, biological, and sensorial resources coexist in dancing actions that oscillate from the unstable and unresolved to unified group choreographies of mesmerizing dance steps. In this maze of interdependence, the performance proposes non-linear thinking and embodied ways of knowing, questioning how bodies can and cannot be isolated from social, economic, and political urgencies.

[…/+*^%€£¥$&@!!!!^^^] is co-commissioned by The Chocolate Factory Theater and the and supported through Moriah Evans’ 2025–2027 Vera List Center Fellowship.

Visit the link in ’s bio for tickets.

Images:
Moriah Evans’ work-in-progress presentation of [.../+*^%€£¥$&@!!!!^^^] . May 16, 2026. Photos by Emmett Levy, courtesy the artist and LMCC.

Ahead of our next and final seminar for year one of 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦— “Artists, Scholars and Spies,” presented onl...
05/28/2026

Ahead of our next and final seminar for year one of 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦— “Artists, Scholars and Spies,” presented online on Monday, June 1—we’re sharing selections from the accompanying Are.na channel.

The channel, curated by the VLC’s , gathers readings alongside images, artist projects, and other materials shaping our seminar’s core questions. With this program we consider how forms of knowledge produced by artists, writers, scholars, and scientists intersect with those pursued by intelligence services, asking where their methods, ambitions, and objects of inquiry diverge or overlap with the logics of intelligence work itself.

Visit the links in our bio to explore these texts, including works by our speakers , and register in advance for the seminar.

The latest edition of the Vera List Center’s digital publishing series 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤 explores forms of relational knowledge g...
05/21/2026

The latest edition of the Vera List Center’s digital publishing series 𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤 explores forms of relational knowledge grounded in landscapes shaped by historical violence, feat. tonal geologist Ryan C. Clarke () and multidisciplinary artist Le’Andra LeSeur ().

The 2nd edition published under the VLC’s 2025–2027 Focus Theme, 𝘔𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦, the spring commissions consider practices of attunement, deep listening, and Black fugitivity. Clarke and LeSeur’s projects unearth forms of intelligence seemingly hidden but not absent.

Read / listen to / watch their projects, at veralistcenter.org.

𝘗𝘰𝘴𝘵/𝘥𝘰𝘤 is edited by the VLC’s Re’al Christian ().

The Vera List Center, in collaboration with the Institute for Critical Social Inquiry (ICSI) at The New School, is pleas...
05/20/2026

The Vera List Center, in collaboration with the Institute for Critical Social Inquiry (ICSI) at The New School, is pleased to present the New York premiere of Ariella Aïsha Azoulay’s latest film, 𝘈 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘴 – ألف حليّة وحليّة.

Concluding Azoulay’s () 𝘜𝘯𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘐𝘮𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘢𝘭 𝘗𝘭𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳 film trilogy, 𝘈 𝘛𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘑𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘴 relates the story of jewels and their guardians, both living remnants of the once-thriving Jewish Muslim world in North Africa. Scattered throughout the film, the jewels speak to a precolonial world that refuses to disappear and resists the colonial violence that has separated Jews and Muslims.

By sharing these stories and engaging in the making of the jewelry together, the film’s protagonists renew a truncated transmission of knowledge and know-how, thus suspending the museum verdict that, through looted objects, seals the history of this Jewish Muslim world and relegates it to a historical past.

Introduced by VLC director Carin Kuoni, the screening is followed by a conversation between Azoulay and singer and artist Laura Elkeslassy (), who is featured in the film. The dialogue is moderated by ICSI director and scholar Ann Laura Stoler.

Kindly register in advance at the link in our bio.

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