Co-Curricular Artist Grants
The Kaplan Humanities Institute's Co-Curricular Artist Grants support curricular engagement with artists and their work, aiming for a stronger integration of the arts into undergraduate and graduate teaching at Northwestern. Co-curricular grants may help facilitate an artist's lecture or workshop in class; cover site visits to an artist's studio or event; or support other creative integrations of the arts in and beyond the classroom.
The Co-Curricular Grants are part of Kaplan's Artist Engagement Initiative which seeks to expand interdisciplinary engagement among artists, faculty, and students across all programs and departments at Northwestern.
Awarded Grants
2025-2026 Co-Curricular Artist Grants
Winter 2026 Courses
Transnational Theatre: Collective Creation Theatre of the Americas (Theatre 348)
- Taught by Henry Castillo (Mancosh Fellow, Theatre)
- For workshop by Alejandro Rodríguez (Univ. of New Mexico) on "Embodied Dramaturgies and Collective Image-Making."
Spring 2026 Courses
Fabricated Worlds: Sugar, Spice, and Narratives of Material Culture (English 340)
- Taught by Jennifer Comerford (Visiting Assistant Professor, English)
- For workshop to recreate 18th-century drinking chocolate from scratch, with discussion about the politics of chocolate production and consumption.
Graduate Critique (Art 422)
- Caroline Kent (Associate Professor, Art Theory and Practice)
- For guest artists to provide structured critique of individual students’ artworks, and to address key contemporary concerns in the work and field of contemporary art.
- Taught by Mere Taito (Postdoctoral Fellow in Native American and Indigenous Studies)
- For guest talk by Native American graphic artist Jim Terry and engagement with students for their course task producing work from three sites of memory: bodies, artifacts, and archives.
2024-2025 Co-Curricular Artist Grants
Winter 2025 Courses
Latinx Fashion (Performance Studies 336/Latino Studies 392)
- Taught by Gabriel A. Guzman (Doctoral candidate, Performance Studies)
- For leather embellishment workshop with artist Jose Villalobos and class discussions with fashion designers and collectors Jordan Chavez and Chris Alfonso Cerevantes.
Spring 2025 courses
Finishing (RTVF 378)
- Taught by Kyle Henry (Professor, Radio/TV/Film)
- Discussion with producer/distributor Ira Deutchman (Fine Line Features) for insight about being a Northwestern alum working in the film industry.
Weimar Performance and its Afterlives (English 312/Dance 335/German 346)
- Taught by Susan Manning (Bergen Evans Professor in the Humanities, English, Theatre, Performance Studies)
- For guest artist Nejla Yatkin to screen her film THE OTHER WITCH and discuss her creative research.
2023-2024 Co-Curricular Artist Grants
Winter 2024 Courses
Inaugural Co-Curricular Artist Grant
New Black Music in Chicago: Artists’ Reflections on Music, Race, and Entrepreneurship (Black Studies 327)
- Instructor and Project Coordinator: Professor Nitasha Tamar Sharma (Black Studies and Asian American Studies)
- For panel series, expert classes, and public performance
- Click HERE for a list of free public workshops and performances connected to the class and to read more about the course
Inaugural Co-Curricular Artist Grant
Eklektik BerlinIstan: Moving Multitudes Through Music in Contemporary Berlin
- Faculty Coordinator: Assistant Professor Emrah Yildiz (Anthropology and Middle East and North African Studies)
- For artist residency of İpek İpekçioğlu, Turkish-German DJ, producer, and curator.
Presented by Middle East and North African Studies and co-hosted by Anthropology, Colloquium for Global Iran Studies, German, Keyman Modern Turkish Studies, and Kaplan Humanities Institute. - Click HERE for a list of public talks and a free public performance and dance party with DJ İpek
- Taught by Michael Metzger (Pick-Laudati Academic Curator for Cinema and Media Arts, Block Museum of Art)
- For film screening and discussion with Winnipeg-based filmmaker Rhayne Vermette (Métis)
Spanish Inquisitions: Crypto-Jews and other New Christians (Spanish 397)
- Taught by Shai Zamir (Sava Ranisavljevic Postdoctoral Fellow, Spanish and Portuguese and the Crown Family Center for Jewish Studies)
- For guest lecture and discussion with poet and historian Rachel Kaufman
We’re Here, We’re Queer: Queer Narratives in Israeli Literature and Culture (Jewish Studies 279 / Middle East and North African Studies 290 / Gender Studies 231 )
- Taught by Guy Ehrlich (Postdoctoral Fellow in Israel Studies, Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies)
- For guest lecture by Israeli filmmaker and producer Nevo Shinaar
Body Building (English 101)
- Taught by Emma Cohen (Doctoral candidate, English)
- For class visit by choreographer Gillian Walsh to provide experiential, movement-based prompts for writing
Spring 2024 Courses
Artivism in Times of Political Change (Spanish 204)
- Taught by Elisa Baena (Professor of Instruction, Spanish and Portuguese)
- For class visit and discussion with author, illustrator, graphic novelist, and commentator Quan Zhou
Histories of Medicine Across Asia (History 300)
- Taught by Shireen Hamza (Postdoctoral Fellow, Science in Human Culture and History)
- For presentation and student project advice by artist Nancy Valladares