Yaseen Lecture Series

The Yaseen Lectures on the Fine Arts bring acclaimed scholars and artists to the Neuberger Museum of Art and Purchase College, SUNY to discuss their work and address contemporary ideas and issues. Since the lecture series began in 1974, prominent authors, artists, scientists, poets, composers, performance artists, activists, historians, critics, and scholars have discussed themes as distinctive as the speakers themselves. The topics are always pertinent to the moment.

The lectures are endowed by a gift from the late Helen and Leonard Yaseen, art collectors from Larchmont, New York, who were invested in modern and contemporary art scholarship. The Yaseens were inaugural members of the Friends of the Neuberger Museum of Art Board of Directors; they financed a similar lecture series at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The legacy of the Yaseens’s gift and its impact on our community continues today through the support of Roger Yaseen and his family in honor of his parents. The Yaseen Lectures on the Fine Arts Fund is stewarded by the New York Community Trust.

Yaseen Lectures on the Fine Arts

1974
On Patronage : Sir Hugh Trevor-Roper

1976
The Phenomena of Taste : Joseph Alsop

1979
On Sculpture : Robert Irwin, Barbara Rose, George Segal, Jan Van der Marck and Christo

1980
On Constructivism : Margit Rowell, Reyner Benham, Vladimir Petric and George Rickey

1982
On the Public Monument: Robert Hughes, Thomas Hoving and Claes Oldenburg

1984
On the Future: Carlos Fuentes, Arthur Schlesinger and Isaac Asimov

1986
On Creativity : Philip Glass, Stephen Jay Gould and Joyce Carol Oates

1988
On Time : John Cage, Murray Gell-Mann and Mario Vargas Llosa

1990
On Culture Watching : Eric Fischl, Maya Angelou and Susan Sontag

1992
Identity and Difference : Dr. Rayna Green, PhD., Wendy Wasserstein and Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. PhD.

1994
Film and Photography : Gordon Parks and Zev Kedem

1996
Portraits in Words and Images : Chuck Close and Doris Kearns-Goodwin

1999
Renaissance Contemporaries : Meredith Monk and Robert Wilson

2000
The Museum Complex: Art’s Place in the New Century: Thomas Krens and Michael Brenson

2003
Andy Goldsworthy: Three Cairns

2004
Alex Katz

2006
The Potential of the University Museum : Marcia Tucker and Ian Berry

2008
Reconsidering Hannah Wilke: Griselda Pollock, Saundra Goldman, Tom Kochheiser, moderated by Tracy Fitzpatrick

2010
Faith Ringgold: More than 50 Years

2013
Ethan Bronner

2014
In Conversation : Fred Wilson and Paul Kaplan

2018
In Conversation : John Shearer and Hugh Price

2021
Where Art Meets Activism : Hank Willis Thomas and Eric Gottesman