International artist Cassils to speak at virtual Austin Peay event

(Posted Oct. 9, 2020)

The Department of Art + Design, with support from The Center of Excellence for the Creative Arts, is pleased to host internationally recognized artist, Cassils, to continue and incredible 2020-21 CECA Visiting Artist Speaker Series season.

“I am so excited to be able to host Cassils at Austin Peay,” said Michael Dickins, chair of the Visiting Artist Speaker Committee. “Cassils is such a powerhouse artist and has gained international recognition for a rigorous engagement with the body as a form of social sculpture. Their work is challenging, engaging and deeply personal, and has always dealt with what it means to be human. Their recent work puts a spotlight on human rights and immigration.”

Cassils’ free lecture will be via Zoom at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 13. Registration is required at .

“Cassils was scheduled to visit campus last April as part of our 2019-20 season, but due to COVID, the event was rescheduled for this season and is now being held virtually,” Dickins continued. “Though I always enjoy bringing these artists to Clarksville, I am excited to be able to open up our renowned speaker series to the rest of the world. Hosting the artist talks via Zoom webinar, we are no longer limited by the seats in the lecture hall. All of our events have always been free and open to the public – now we’ll be reaching a larger audience.”

Cassils will also visit Art + Design’s senior capstone class to discuss professional development on Oct. 14 via Zoom. This will be a unique opportunity for our students to directly engage with nationally recognized artists.

Cassils is a transgender artist who makes their body the material and protagonist of their performances. Cassils’ art contemplates the history of LGBTQI+ violence, representation, struggle and survival. Cassils’ work investigates historical contexts to examine the present moment.

Drawing on conceptualism, feminism, body art, gay male aesthetics, Cassils forges a series of powerfully trained bodies for different performative purposes. It is with sweat, blood, and sinew that Cassils constructs a visual critique around ideologies and histories.

Cassils’ work spans the world

Recent solo exhibitions include Perth Museum of Contemporary Art, Perth, Australia; The Station Museum of Contemporary Art, Dallas, Texas; Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York; Bemis Center for Contemporary Art, Omaha, Nebraska; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; MU Eindhoven, Netherlands; and Trinity Square Video, Toronto, Canada.

Cassils’ work has been featured as key art for blockbuster group exhibitions at MASS MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts; Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson, Arizona; Oakland Museum of California, California; Kunstpalais, Erlangen, Germany;  MUCEM, Marseille, France; Deutsches Historisches Museum and the Schwules Museum, Berlin, Germany; MUCA Roma, Mexico City, Mexico; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, California; Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles; Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, Salt Lake City, Utah; and Museo de Arte y Diseño Contemporáneo, San José, Costa Rica.

Cassils’ performances have been featured at The Broad, Los Angeles; The National Theatre, London; ANTI Contemporary Performance Festival, Kuopio, Finland; Wiener Festwochen, Vienna, Austria; Dark Mofo, MONA, Hobart, Tasmania; and Queer Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia.

Cassils’s films have premiered at Sundance International Film Festival, Park City, Utah; OUTFest, Los Angeles; Institute for Contemporary Art, London;  Museu da Imagem e do Som, São Paulo, Brazil; International Film Festival Rotterdam, The Netherlands; M+, at West Kowloon, Hong Kong, China; and Outsider Festival, Austin, Texas, for Early Career Retrospective: Cassils. 

Cassils is the recipient of the USA Artist Fellowship, Guggenheim Fellowship, the inaugural ANTI Festival International Prize for Live Art, California Community Foundation Grant, Creative Capital Award and Visual Artist Fellowship from the Canada Council of the Arts.

Cassils’ work has been featured in The New York Times, Wired, The Guardian, Art Forum, and academic journals such as Performance Research, TDR: The Drama Review, TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly, QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking, Places Journal, and October.

Cassils was the subject of the monograph Cassils, published by MU Eindhoven in 2015; and is the subject of a forthcoming monograph published by The Station Museum of Contemporary Art. They are represented by Ronald Feldman Gallery, NYC.

Cassils is based in Los Angeles.

To learn more

For more on Cassils and their work, visit .

For more on this lecture, contact Dickins at dickinsm@apsu.edu.

For future CECA Visiting Artist Speaker Series events, visit /art-design/exhibitions-speakers/visiting-artists.php.

All events are free and open to the public.

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