Join the Wende Museum, the Thomas Mann House, and dublab radio for the fifth program in this series on the current state of democracies. How should a democracy deal with its own vulnerabilities? How do democracies need to evolve to deal successfully with increasing global levels of ecological crisis, geopolitical tensions, economic disparities, and culture wars? How much vulnerability can a democracy endure?

The Student Council consists of a team of highly engaged, talented, and diverse undergraduate and graduate students who invite prominent guest speakers to discuss topics relating to society, politics, culture, and art. In conversation with academics, journalists, politicians, and artists, the students will explore the various threats to democratic institutions and principles worldwide, as well as strategies to potentially overcome these threats.

The guest speaker for our May program, Catherine Opie, is an American fine-art photographer and educator. Opie studies the connections between mainstream and marginalized society. Merging conceptual and documentary styles, she creates pieces relating to sexual identity; to the relationship between the individual and the space they inhabit; and to the tensions between the constructed American dream and the diverse realities of its citizens. Opie has had numerous solo shows, including at the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (2006); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; and Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA. Her work has appeared in the Whitney Biennial, the Melbourne International Biennial, and SITE Santa Fe Biennial (2006)