School of Critical Studies

Emerson Whitney (Critical Studies MFA 14) (they/them) shares a gripping exploration of childhood, causality, and the body in their first prose book Heaven (McSweeney’s Publishing). The book diarizes Whitney’s resolve to understand their relationship with their mother and grandmother, and...

Performance and art space Automata recently announced the six grantees of its 2020 artist residencies, all of whom are CalArtians. In light of COVID-19, the Los Angeles-based Automata devised a new series of individual artist residencies, created to serve artists while group...

School of Critical Studies faculty Anthony McCann’s nonfiction prose work Shadowlands: Fear and Freedom at the Oregon Standoff (Bloomsbury) has been named a finalist in the 30th annual Reading the West Book Awards. Shadowlands investigates the 2016 occupation of Oregon’s Malheur...

On Friday, April 17, the Writing Now Reading Series introduces “Across Social Distance,” a literary marathon hosted by American performance artist, poet, and School of Critical Studies faculty Gabrielle Civil. Readers include CalArts faculty Michael Leong, Stephen van Dyck (Critical...

On Friday, April 17, the Writing Now Reading Series introduces “Across Social Distance,” a literary marathon hosted by American performance artist, poet, and School of Critical Studies faculty Gabrielle Civil. Readers include faculty member Michael Leong, Stephen van Dyck (Critical...

In late March, literary magazine Sublevel celebrated the release of its fourth issue, Edge.  This latest edition “explores what constitutes the pornographic today,” and grapples with the “inherent difficulty of defining its perimeters.” Edge features contributions from artists, writers, and...

In our current climate of social distancing and quarantine, what better than a good book to help experience another reality for a while? We have compiled a list of written works from CalArtians including memoirs, fictional short stories, and graphic design retrospectives. Here are some titles...