Bethany Collins: Tempest

Bethany Collins (1984) is a multidisciplinary artist whose conceptually driven work is fueled by a critical exploration of how race and language interact. Language is both her subject and primary material—from dictionaries and encyclopedias to literary journals and newspaper archives. Language is also a prism through which she explores American history and the nuance of racial and national identities.

Collins received her BA in Studio Art and Photojournalism from the University of Alabama in 2007, and her MFA from Georgia State University in 2012. She was the 2013-2014 Artist-in-Residence at the Studio Museum in Harlem, and 2019 Public Humanities Practitioner-in-Residence at Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina. Collins was awarded the Joan Mitchell Fellowship in 2022, the Efroymson Contemporary Arts Fellowship in 2018, and the Hudgens Prize in 2015. Recent solo museum exhibitions include presentations at the Frist Museum, Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, CAM St. Louis, The University of Kentucky Art Museum and the Art Institute of Chicago.

www.bethanyjoycollins.com

Artist's Residency, March 16 - 20
While in residence, Collins produced a series of performances of The Battle Hymn of the Republic: A Hymnal (2023), a work included in the exhibition at the College. These performances aimed to bring together community participants and audiences in sung versions of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic."

Written by the abolitionist Julia Ward Howe in 1861, The Battle Hymn of the Republic is perhaps the most familiar early American contrafacta, a musical term referring to a song in which the melody remains constant while the lyrics are rewritten over time. Each re-writing in support of a passionately held cause—from revolution, suffrage, temperance and Indigenous sovereignty, to the Confederacy and abolition—articulates an often contradictory version of what it means to be American.

Performances of Bethany Collins' The Battle Hymn of the Republic: A Hymnal 

• Duet of suffrage and confederate versions
  arranged in collaboration with Philadelphia-based composer Peter Christian
  Friday, March 17, 5:30pm
  1912 Gallery, Canaday Library
• Choral concert of Mark Twain's anti-imperialist versions
  performed by The Unsung, a New York-based music collective
  Saturday, March 18, 6:00pm
  Bethel AME Church, 50 S. Merion Avenue, Bryn Mawr 
  attendance is limited
• Endurance singing of all 100 versions
  performed by five Bryn Mawr College students
  Monday, March 20, 5:00-8:30pm
  Music Room, Goodhart

This artist residency represents a collaboration between Special Collections, Center for Visual Culture, Museum Studies, and the Dance Program. It is funded by the Friends of the Bryn Mawr College Libraries.