SAIC Places Art Therapy Professor on Leave Over Pro-Palestine Assignment

Savneet Talwar, who directs the graduate art therapy program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), has been placed on leave after she tasked her students with developing a mock treatment plan for a queer Arab woman concerned about potential backlash for her support of pro-Palestine protests during the Trump administration. Hrag Vartanian, editor-at-large for Hyperallergic, interprets this incident as indicative of authoritarian decay within democratic frameworks. In other news, the Obama Presidential Center will open to the public on Juneteenth in Chicago; critic Lori Waxman describes it as embodying pluralism and civic duty, albeit with ideals that seem remote. Additionally, last month, a self-portrait by Clarence Heyward was deliberately vandalized at the Houston Museum of African American Culture, and the International African American Museum in Charleston has laid off all its staff due to financial difficulties. The newsletter also includes an interview with novelist and AIDS historian Sarah Schulman discussing four decades of lesbian literature, along with a community roundup featuring Jean Shin's tribute to trees at Greenwood Cemetery.