The Brown Symposium is a biennial event funded through an endowment established by The Brown Foundation, Inc., for professorships at the University. In 2025, together with religion and environmental studies professor Dr. Laura Hobgood, we developed and organized the symposium relating our research areas with the theme, Visualizing the Abstract.
Abstract concepts come in many flavors, concepts like mathematics and freedom which prove difficult to express in any physical form, and those like climate change which seem almost impossible to grasp because of their overwhelming complexity. We often find ourselves shutting down trying to understand them and find it difficult to connect on an intellectual or emotional level. And yet, the hard work of those who accept the challenges of exploring abstract ideas allows us to move forward as a society and tackle existential threats.
This symposium featured speakers who work with a variety of visual media and ideas to make the intangible more tangible for themselves and for others through storytelling, metaphor, and craft. From metal, wood, and crochet to filmmaking, animation, and imagining worlds, the speakers seek to demystify the abstract to promote greater awareness, understanding and connection.
The featured speakers were artist Dr. George Hart, artist and writer Margaret Wertheim, TED-Ed editor Alex Rosenthal and animator Jeremiah Dickey, environmental-justice scholar/activist Dr. Jola Ajibade, and global food expert Dr. Raj Patel. As part of the Symposium, we commissioned Hart to design a sculpture consisting of five hanging geometric orbs for permanent display in the Fondren-Jones Science Center, which were assembled under his direction by students, faculty and staff. Wertheim led a workshop on crafting hyperbolic planes from paper, while a companion exhibition featured mathematical art works by Daina Taimina and Star Varner alongside pieces by Jennifer Spiller and Mic Dooley. Ron Geibel and Moses Thai organized an Empty Bowls project, Jennifer Spiller organized a yarn-bombing of the Monstrance sculpture, and Megan Firestone worked with students to put together a library exhibit of past Brown Symposium posters. This event could not have happened if not for the hard work and dedication of Kelly Lessard and Laura Polanco.
Additional photos and videos of the talks can be found on the symposium website.
Brown Symposium Returns with 2025 Theme of “Visualizing the Abstract”, 2025