Center for Human Rights & the Arts

Center for Human Rights & the Arts Center for Human Rights & the Arts at Bard College supports art & activist practices globally

Congratulations to our Class of 2026 MA in Human Rights & the Arts. 🎉👏🏽Join us in wishing Lubnah Ansari, Mona Benyamin, ...
05/23/2026

Congratulations to our Class of 2026 MA in Human Rights & the Arts. 🎉👏🏽

Join us in wishing Lubnah Ansari, Mona Benyamin, Mahmoud El Safadi, Tara Rodríguez Besosa, João F. Rufatto Ferreira, Omayma Sbeih, and Nádia Yracema the best of luck in their future endeavors in art and research. 💫 🎓

CHRA graduate Isabella Indolfi (‘23) has just co-founded MESH_Arts, a cultural hub in Brooklyn, New York “where art meet...
05/13/2026

CHRA graduate Isabella Indolfi (‘23) has just co-founded MESH_Arts, a cultural hub in Brooklyn, New York “where art meets research, technology, and since. Through peer-led public programming, including exhibitions, talks, and workshops, MESH_arts aims to foster inquisitive practices and expand critical conversations on the role of art, and the impacts of technology on society and environment, while reimagining possible futures.

The inaugural exhibition of MESH_arts, Soft Screens, will run May 21 – June 21, 2026. It is co-curated by Isabella Indolfi and Paige King.

Soft Screens is a group exhibition about the interfaces of our hypermediated reality. Featuring artists Nouf Aljowaysir, Anna Frants, Alexandra Lerman, and Mari Nagem, Soft Screens explores the ways digital media subliminally shape our attention, habits, and agency. Bringing together practices that reflect on emergent technologies without strictly relying on them, Soft Screens traces the outline of our entanglement with ever-evolving digital systems and social structures.

Soft Screens
May 21 – June 21, 2026
Fridays–Saturdays, 1-6pm, & by appointment
Email Contact: [email protected]

Opening Reception
Thursday May 21, 6–9pm
RSVP: https://luma.com/9ypqv3vx

MESH_Center for Art, Research, Technology, & Science
Address: The Old American Can Factory, 232 Third Street, , Brooklyn NY 11215

Please join tomorrow Wednesday, May 6, 6pm for the last screening of Mona Benyamin’s film Unravel, as part of OTHERWISE,...
05/05/2026

Please join tomorrow Wednesday, May 6, 6pm for the last screening of Mona Benyamin’s film Unravel, as part of OTHERWISE, the MA Class of 2026 Thesis Exhibition.

The work will screened at Preston Theater, Annandale Campus.

See you tomorrow!

03/11/2026

WATCH: An excerpt from CHRA’s latest evidence-themed talk by architect and urbanist Abir Saksouk from Public Works Studio in Beirut.

“Mapping and Documentation as Tools Against Erasure,” narrates the towns and cities targeted during the Israeli war on Lebanon as sites of contestation between state plans, lived realities, and continued aggressions. It underscores the power of documentation, material evidence, and archives in deconstructing dominant discourses around reconstruction.

A link to the video excerpt is in the bio.

Public Works Studio explores a wide array of action research, analysis, and visualization tools to deal with the sheer b...
02/18/2026

Public Works Studio explores a wide array of action research, analysis, and visualization tools to deal with the sheer breadth of social, ecological, and political challenges in Lebanon. Their exhibition, In Search for Justice Among the Rubble, was presented as part of the Evidence curatorial program hosted by Dream City Festival in Tunis in October 2025. It documents the impact of the Israeli war on Lebanon and questions the urban justice to come.
“Mapping and Documentation as Tools Against Erasure” is a webinar talk presented by Abir Saksouk, cofounder and codirector of Public Works Studio on Wednesday, February 25 at 12:00 pm EST/7pm Beirut.

This talk is produced in collaboration with Fen Live Lab (فل) . It is moderated by CHRA director Tania El Khoury.

Register on CHRA.bard.edu/events

explores a wide array of action research, analysis, and visualization tools to deal with the sheer breadth of social, e...
02/18/2026

explores a wide array of action research, analysis, and visualization tools to deal with the sheer breadth of social, ecological, and political challenges in Lebanon. Their exhibition, In Search for Justice Among the Rubble, was presented as part of the Evidence curatorial program hosted by Dream City Festival in Tunis in October 2025. It documents the impact of the Israeli war on Lebanon and questions the urban justice to come.
“Mapping and Documentation as Tools Against Erasure” is a webinar talk presented by Abir Saksouk , cofounder and codirector of Public Works Studio on Wednesday, February 25 at 12:00 pm EST/7pm Beirut.

This talk is produced in collaboration with Fen Live Lab (فل) . It is moderated by CHRA director Tania El Khoury .

Registration link in bio.

Our first Spring 2026 webinar talk and first collaboration with Fen Live Lab (F’LL/فل) will be by architect and urbanis...
02/12/2026

Our first Spring 2026 webinar talk and first collaboration with Fen Live Lab (F’LL/فل) will be by architect and urbanist Abir Saksouk , presenting “Mapping and Documentation as Tools Against Erasure” live from Beirut on Wednesday 25 February at 12pm EST/7pm Beirut time. Saksouk is an architect and urbanist. She is the co-founder and co-director of Public Works Studio . Saksouk is also a founding member of Dictaphone Group, a live art and research collective. She has been involved in several research projects in Lebanon, including the history of informal suburbs, the social production of shared spaces in the city, and housing rights in Beirut. Her research interests include the social production of urban space, property, and the right to the city of marginalized communities.

F’LL serves as an incubator for innovations in live art and performance practices. It was initiated in Abu Dhabi by Theater Artist Joanna Settle and her collaborators.

“Mapping and Documentation as Tools Against Erasure” builds on In Search for Justice Among the Rubble, an exhibition presented as part of Evidence international festival. It narrates the contested sites of towns and cities targeted during the current Israeli war on Lebanon.

Moderated by director Tania El Khoury
Registration link: chra.bard.edu/events

CHRA director, and associate professor of theater and performance, Tania El Khoury has been named as recipient of a 2026...
12/10/2025

CHRA director, and associate professor of theater and performance, Tania El Khoury has been named as recipient of a 2026 Support for Artists grant from the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA). The NYSCA grants are intended to increase access to arts funding and recognize the substantial economic and social impact of New York state’s arts and culture sector.

El Khoury’s award is in support of one of several new works she is developing. Mise en Abyme is an intimate interactive installation staged on a small desk inside public libraries. Guided by sound, scent, and touch, participants discover excerpts of books and hidden messages left by previous readers. The work traces how literature shapes culture and the ongoing history of banned and censored books. It also considers loneliness as a defining epidemic of the twenty-first century, and how it surfaces within late-stage capitalism. Mise en Abyme is a love letter to public libraries, to daily acts of resistance, and to knowledge shared as a public resource.

In this talk, re/presentare reflects on the practice of working from the commons, in its frictions and possibilities. “R...
11/07/2025

In this talk, re/presentare reflects on the practice of working from the commons, in its frictions and possibilities. “Reframing Evidence from the Commons” means acknowledging the challenging reality of true communal work in which different interests and visions of justice co-exist. The practice also questions what constitutes evidence and how, for communities outside of the juridical Western frame, reframing opens up other possibilities once it is mobilized through the mediation of investigative arts.

Friday, November 14th at 12:00 pm New York / 11am Mexico City. The online talk is presented with Bard Architecture and the Fisher Center and moderated by Ivonne Santoyo-Orozco

Registration link in bio.

Bonne continuation to our alumni students! As some begin PhDs at Yale, NYU, and CUNY this semester, others have been con...
09/10/2025

Bonne continuation to our alumni students! As some begin PhDs at Yale, NYU, and CUNY this semester, others have been continuing humanitarian and non-profit work, producing art and performing throughout the tri-state area, or otherwise enriching the crossroads between art and activism in their own pursuits. We wish them all the very best!

Pictured here: current students and alumni at last spring’s thesis exhibition.

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