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Winter 2020

Installation and Performance Series in a courtroom at the UM Law School

Litigation

@UMICHLAW

UMMA to Present Witness Lab Courtroom Installation and Performance Series

A courtroom installation and performance series that frames witnessing as a social and artistic act will open at the University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA) in February.

Created by Courtney McClellan, the 2019–2020 Roman J. Witt Artist in Residence at U-M, Witness Lab collapses courtroom, theater, classroom, laboratory, and artist studio in order to study the relationship between performance and law.

In hosting mock trials, court transcript readings, and trial advocacy workshops, the artist investigates who performs the role of witness in our society and how that understanding may compare with the narrower legal definition of the role.

The installation will host legal simulations from participating groups, including Michigan Law’s Trial Advocacy Society and the Oral Argument Competition, as well as the undergraduate team of the Collegiate American Mock Trial Association. Taking on the role of courtroom sketch artists, or court reporters, students from the U-M Stamps School of Art & Design will observe and document the courtroom performances through drawing, text, photography, and video.

The evolving installation and performance project demonstrates how law courts employ performance and representation to establish truths and mold perception. At the same time, it explores how eyewitness testimony in a courtroom relates to the practice of creating artistic records through observational drawings.

Audiences are invited to attend all performances, and passersby may also casually observe the experience through the glass walls of the gallery.

Witness Lab runs February 15 through May 17 in UMMA’s Irving Stenn Jr. (’55) Family Gallery. It is being presented in partnership with the Roman J. Witt Artist in Residence Program at the Stamps School of Art & Design, with lead support provided by Michigan Law and the U-M Office of the Provost.

This article is reprinted with permission from Courtney McClellan and the University of Michigan Museum of Art.

Photo: Courtney McClellan, Moot (University of Michigan) 11, 2019, digital print.
© Courtney McClellan. Courtesy the artist

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