Sex and the City

Distinguished artists, architects, architectural historians and curators will explore perceptions and functions of city spaces within a gendered context in Sex and the City, a panel discussion taking place at York University on Tuesday, Feb. 1.






 


Topics of discussion include domesticity, safety, gender-based assumptions about private and public space, the roles of architecture and technology, and the ethics of daily life in city places.


The participating panelists include:


Annmarie Adams, professor in the School of Architecture, McGill University. Adams is the author of Architecture in the Family Way: Doctors, Houses, and Women, 1870-1900 (1996); and co-author of Designing Women: Gender and the Architectural Profession (2000) and People, Power, Places (2000). Her current work focuses on Canadian hospital architecture.


George Baird, dean of the Faculty of Architecture, Landscape & Design, University of Toronto. A partner in the Toronto architecture and urban design firm Baird Sampson Neuert, Baird is the author of The Space of Appearance (1995), and co-editor of Meaning in Architecture (1969) and Queues, Rendezvous, Riots (1995).


Shelley Hornstein, professor of art and architectural history and theory, Department of Visual Arts, York University. Her forthcoming works include Losing Site: The Resounance of Architecture and Place, and Romancing the Stone: Architectural Tourism and Our Fascination with Places.


Janet Jones, professor in the Department of Visual Arts, York University. An artist whose research interests focus on painting, feminist geography and the techno-sublime, Jones has given talks on her research worldwide and shown her paintings throughout Canada and in England, Germany, France and New York City.


Philip Monk, director and curator, Art Gallery of York University. Monk is the author of Double Cross: The Hollywood Films of Douglas Gordon (2003).


Hornstein will open the discussion, followed by Adams’ talk titled “Designing Women”, Baird’s presentation titled, “Publicness and Limits to Plurality”, and Jones’ exposition, “Painting the Spaces of Feminism: Drifting with the Flaneuse”. Monk will conclude the discussion by responding to the various viewpoints.


Sex and the City is presented by the Department of Visual Arts, Faculty of Fine Arts, in association with the Graduate Program in Women’s Studies, the Urban Studies Program and the Faculty of Environmental Studies, York University.


The event takes place from 2:30 to 4:30pm in room 1004 in the Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) Building located on York’s Keele campus. The public is welcome to attend and admission is free.


This article was submitted to YFile by Mary-Lou Schagena, publicist, Faculty of Fine Arts.