COFAC CoLab

The COFAC CoLab is an incubator for ideas, projects and collaboration. The lab is a home for interdisciplinary work. It's a hub where ideas can be cross-fertilized and put into motion. Designed as a space where fields of study are porous, the objective is to build new knowledge for an ever-evolving world.

2021-24 Theme: Invisible Architectures

Professors Dr. Kalima Young, (Department of Electronic Media & Film) and Ada Pinkston (Department of Art + Design, Art History, Art Education) have been selected to be Towson University’s new College of Fine Arts and Communication CoLab Directors from 2021-2024.

Inspired by the truth and reconciliation process, their project, Invisible Architectures is a multi-year, interdisciplinary container designed to create avenues for projects and programs that reinscribe the voices of Black, Brown, Indigenous, and Immigrant populations in the narrative of Towson University. It also aims to make visible the place-based strategies and cultural frictions that have contributed to Towson University’s growth and development as an anchor institution in Baltimore.

Every year will explore Invisible Architectures through a different framework. The first year is dedicated to defining truth and reconciliation while unearthing Towson University’s history of place-based frictions. The second year will explore the archival silence which informs the way art is produced and taught within the College of Fine Arts and Communication. The final year of Invisible Architectures is dedicated to producing scholarship that will create a new, more equitable archive for the university as it continues to create an anti-oppressive and anti-racist educational environment.

Though housed within the College of Fine Arts and Communication, the CoLab directors wish to engage the overall Towson University community, the larger USM system, and the local communities surrounding the college. In doing so, Invisible Architectures hopes to create a blueprint for embedding truth and reconciliation processes within educational institutions in Maryland.


Archival Silent NOISE | Conference

April 13 - April 15, 2023 

This year as part of TU’s College of Fine Arts and Communication’s CoLab (Invisible Architectures), we will host Archival Silence, a conference that considers the invisible, ignored, and silenced areas of our artistic disciplines.  By exploring approaches to re-visibilizing and reimagining the archives of our disciplines in the field and in the classroom, Archival Silent NOISE will create a space to honor and generate joyful noise and good trouble.

Archival Silent NOISE considers the invisible, ignored and silenced areas of our artistic disciplines. By exploring approaches to re-visibilizing and reimagining the archives of our disciplines in the field and in the classroom, Archival Silent Noise will create a space to honor and generate joyful noise and good trouble. 

Performance is a “means and a space from whatever elements or resources are available to resist or subvert the strategies of more powerful institutions, ideologies or processes.”  The same can be said for myriad forms of artistic expression, from visual arts, dance, music, and filmmaking.

A publication will bookend the conference in 2024.

SCHEDULE

All sessions will take place in VB 204 unless otherwise indicated by ** 

Thursday, April 13, 2023   

6 - 8 p.m.: Conference Opening and Keynote address Dr. Ashley Minner Jones 

 

Friday, April 14, 2023   

9 a.m.: "The Guest Artist Corner: A Collaboration between The James E. Lewis Museum of Art and Regional Artists" Dr. Schroeder Cherry  

9:30 a.m.: "The Cart" Jennifer Yablonsky 

10 a.m.: “Commedia Dell’Arte”  Tara Cariaso 

11 a.m.: "Insurgent Learning Workshop PT I"  Marshall Tramell (VIRTUAL) ** 

1 p.m.: "Redacted Grammar Language"  K. Kennedy (VIRTUAL) ** 

2 p.m.: "Ms. Museum"  Kathleen Hulser, Julia Szabo 

3 p.m.: "World-Building For and Against the Archive: Photography on Oregon’s Lesbian Lands" Raechel Root  

3:30 p.m.: "DX: Exploring the Art of Dialog Editing for Film" Adam Schwartz 

4 p.m.: "The Business of Art"  Dominique Clayton (VIRTUAL) ** 

6 p.m.: "Olfaction and Bias(implicitly): A participatory performance that considers the social landscapes that are created through the sense of smell" Laure Drogoul 

7 p.m.: "Insurgent Learning Workshop PT II"  Marshall Tramell (VIRTUAL) ** 

8 p.m.: "Dada Morte: A collaborative multimedia performance exploring the ephemeral nature of our bodies and technologies" Carrie Fucille and Brenton Lim 

8:30 p.m.: "A Thousand Cuts" Desirée Rowe and Michael Tristano, Jr.  

8:45 p.m.: Performance Q/A 

 

Saturday, April 15 

9 a.m.: "Mapping the Road to Freedom Through Nature, Art and Stories"  Nancy Goldring, Bev Bickel

11 a.m.: "Live Painting and Artist Talk" Chris Kolpeace 

11:15 a.m.:  "Homie House Press"

1 p.m.: “koumboleza a collaborative short film on mourning from a community’s perspective” Linnea Poole and Samantha Mitchell 

2 p.m.: "Voices of Baltimore: Learning Adventures for Students and Teachers"  Pat Kelly, Gary Homana,  Monica Heiser, Morna Mcnolty, Sharon McCullough, Delana Penn, Melissa Stephenson (HYBRID) 

3 p.m.: "Sex Noises in the Classroom" Michaela Frischherz

3:30 p.m.: "Artists & Writers Engaged in the global struggle for Human Rights and Racial Justice" Naomi Greene, Ousmane Power-Greene

6 p.m.: "Building Community Archives: The Pennsylvania Avenue Black Arts District Historical Photography Project" Angela N. Carroll et al

6 p.m.: "Move Move Collaborative: A case study in least-hierarchical Performance Making"  Cristal Sabbagh, Orlando Johnson, Ashley Shey, Emmett Wilson, Maggie Schneider, and Peter Redgrave (VB 213) ** 

7 p.m.: "Black English and Hip-Hop Should be Celebrated In Higher Education, Not Silenced" Sara Alexander

8 p.m.: "See Through Me"  Rikiesha Metzger

8:15 p.m.: "You Can’t Spell America Without the N-Word: Racial Epithet as Talisman and Historical Monument to Genocide"  Dr. Thomas Stanley

8:45 p.m. : "Epochs, Ages, and Yugas: Macro-Temporal Texture and the Expiration of White Power" Dr. Thomas Stanley 

Archival Silent NOISE will take place on Towson University’s campus over four days, April 13-15, 2023. 

If you have any questions, contact Co-Lab Co-Director,


CoLab Directors

Ada Pinkston

Ada Pinkston, MFA | Department of Art + Design, Art History, Art Education

Ada Pinkston is an artist, educator, and cultural organizer living and working in Baltimore, MD, where she is a lecturer in Art Education at Towson University. Her work explores the intersection of imagined histories and sociopolitical realities on our bodies using performance, digital media, and mixed-media sculptures and installations. She is currently a Monument Lab transnational Fellow facilitated by Goethe Institute and part of the inaugural cohort of artists participating in LACMA x Snap AR Monument Project.

Learn More
Kalima Young

Kalima Young, Ph.D. | Department of Electronic Media and Film

Dr. Kalima Young is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electronic Media and Film at Towson University. Her research explores the impact of race and gender-based trauma on Black identity and Black cultural production.  A Baltimore native, videographer, and activist, Dr. Young served on the leadership team for FORCE: Upsetting Rape Culture’s Monument Quilt Project from 2014-2019.  She is also a member of Rooted, a Black LGBTQ healing collective. Her new manuscript, Mediated Misogynoir: The Erasure of Black Women and Girls’ Pain the Public Imagination is scheduled to be released by Rowman and Littlefield’s Lexington Books in 2022.

Learn more

Call for CoLab Co-Directors

The COFAC CoLab will begin its third iteration in Fall 2024.  

We are asking interested faculty to submit one application as a team of two. The model of co-directors is to emphasize the collaborative and interdisciplinary focus of the CoLab. Priority will be given to applications that include one faculty member from Art+Design, Music, Theatre or Dance and one faculty member from Comm Studies, Mass Comm, or EMF. The Co-Directors will be appointed by the Dean. 

The CoLab Co-Directors should be visionary leaders who will work with faculty, student, staff, artists, and scholars to develop collaborative and interdisciplinary activities and curriculum across departments, colleges, and communities. The focus of the CoLab is not to advance individual scholarship, but collaborative scholarship.

Each Co-Director will receive one course reassigned time each year for three years to lead the CoLab; the Dean’s Office will allocate funds to hire adjunct faculty members to cover reassigned time if necessary. In addition, the COFAC Dean’s Office will provide up to $5,000/year to support CoLab projects.  

Primary Activities

  • Create collaborative projects including students and interdepartmental workshops for students, staff, and faculty – at least one large-scale activity per year
  • Facilitate faculty research and creative activity – provide support and resources for collaborative scholarship across departments, colleges, and communities
  • Develop and co-teach an IDFA Special Topics course
  • Build a coalition of faculty/staff/students to advance the work of the CoLab
  • Work with the Dean’s Office to establish each year’s focus

Apply

Submit an application to the Dean’s Office with the following information by Monday, April 1, 2024:

  • Names/departments
  • CVs and short bios
  • Scholarship interests
  • Title, description, and goals/objectives of the CoLab focus for academic year 2024 – 2027

Contact Information

Program Directors

COFAC CoLab
Kalima Young & Ada Pinkston
Hours
Monday - Friday
8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Phone