This group exhibition of artists graduating from the UCSD MFA program takes its title from philosopher Michel Foucault’s expression “history of the present,” which appears in the first chapter of Discipline and Punish (1975). In this seminal text, Foucault points out that the past can become a lens to better understand the present—that exploring historical trajectories allows for a better understanding of the contingencies of the present. This is also true for the history of art. A critical analysis of this history, as it is constructed and researched, can alter our observations of contemporary phenomena, opening our eyes to hidden facets of history previously overlooked and taken for granted.

Paying particular attention to troublesome, underrepresented and forgotten pasts, these emerging artists are linked by an overarching social agenda: to identify and transform engrained social systems by developing or revising historical concepts.

Due to Covid the exhibition was moved online: https://sites.google.com/ucsd.edu/gradexhibitions/past-exhibitions/2020-mfa-theses