Cara Romero in Conversation: Students Shape the Collection

Join us at The Block to celebrate the Block Museum Student Associates 2023-2024 acquisition of Cara Romero’s photographs, TV Indians (2017) and Amber Morningstar (2020). Artist Cara Romero will discuss her practice and these new acquisitions to the museum’s collection, following an extended introduction by members of the Block Museum Student Associates program. Romero will be joined in conversation by Aaron Golding, Co-Chair of the Chicago American Indian Community Collaborative Education Committee and Sr. Program Administrator in the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University. 

Each year, the Block Museum Student Associates learn about museum collecting practices and recommend acquisition of works of art centered around a theme. Their 2023–2024 acquisition focused on the use of humor as an artistic strategy. Romero’s nuanced works explore themes of identity and tradition, and poke fun at the many ways Indigenous communities have been misrepresented and stereotyped in American culture. Read more about the 2023-2024 BMSA Student Acquisition and hear our students’ reflections on their selection.  

TV Indians is on view in Looking 101 and Amber Morningstar  is on view in The Block Collects. Block Museum Student Associates will be available in the galleries before and after the program to discuss their acquisition. The galleries will remain open after the program until 8pm.  

Participation level – light, participants can choose to participate by submitting questions via Social Q&A or requesting the microphone to ask a question.

Programs are open to all, on a first-come first-served basis. RSVPs are not required, but are appreciated.

RSVP

About Program Participants

The Block Museum Student Associates serve as tour guides, public facilitators, peer-to-peer ambassadors for the museum on campus, and in-house student advisors for all levels of museum staff and our Board of Advisors. They lead tours throughout the museum and engage our broad array of campus and community visitors in dynamic conversations about art and ideas that are relevant to our lives today. In addition to this public-facing role, Associates serve as key campus ambassadors for The Block and student advisors for all levels of museum staff and leadership, help to shape programming and projects at the museum, and learn more about museum practice through behind-the-scenes insights and experience. Student Associates span the campus, majoring in English, Philosophy, Economics, Sociology, Global Health, Theater, Journalism, Middle Eastern and North African Studies, Industrial Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Social Policy, Radio, Television and Film and more.

Aaron Golding is an enrolled member of the Seneca Nation. Aaron has worked in non-profit sector to support arts education programs at various organizations around Chicago. He serves as a Sr. Program Administrator in the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University. He is also co-Chair of the Education Committee for the Chicago American Indian Community Collaborative. In addition, Aaron is a writer who centers his stories on Native Peoples reconnecting with their culture and identity, which mirrors his own experiences. He lives in Chicago with his wife, two children, and two cats.

Cara Romero (b. 1977, Inglewood, CA) is a contemporary fine art photographer. An enrolled citizen of the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe, Romero was raised between contrasting settings: the rural Chemehuevi reservation in Mojave Desert, CA and the urban sprawl of Houston, TX. Romero’s identity informs her photography, a blend of fine art and editorial photography, shaped by years of study and a visceral approach to representing Indigenous and non-Indigenous cultural memory, collective history, and lived experiences from a Native American female perspective.

One Book One Northwestern: Romero’s artwork "Amber Morningstar" is featured in the Block’s forthcoming collection teaching resource inspired by the 2024-2025 One Book One Northwestern selection, "The Night Watchman" by Louise Erdrich. One Book One Northwestern is a university‐wide reading program that aims to engage the campus in a common conversation centered on a carefully chosen, thought-provoking book. The Block is proud to partner annually with One Book to explore the themes of this shared text, selecting artworks from the museum collection that can broaden discussions.