Lucien Castaing-Taylor
Encyclopedia
Lucien Castaing-Taylor is an anthropologist and artist
who works in film, video, and photography.
Since 2002 Castaing-Taylor has taught at Harvard University
, where he is Director of the Sensory Ethnography Lab
. His works include In and Out of Africa, which he made with Ilisa Barbash in 1992. It is an ethnographic video about issues of authenticity
, taste, and racial politics in the African art market that won eight international awards. He also recorded the film Sweetgrass
(2009), which is described as "an unsentimental elegy at once to the American West and to the 10,000 years of uneasy accommodation between post-Paleolithic humans and animals." He is the founding editor of the American Anthropological Association
’s journal Visual Anthropology Review (1991–94).
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
who works in film, video, and photography.
Since 2002 Castaing-Taylor has taught at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, where he is Director of the Sensory Ethnography Lab
Sensory Ethnography Lab
The Sensory Ethnography Lab at Harvard University is an interdisciplinary center for the making of anthropologically informed works of media that combine aesthetics and ethnography...
. His works include In and Out of Africa, which he made with Ilisa Barbash in 1992. It is an ethnographic video about issues of authenticity
Authenticity in art
Authenticity in art has a variety of meanings related to different ways in which a work of art or an artistic performance may be considered authentic.Denis Dutton distinguishes between nominal authenticity and expressive authenticity....
, taste, and racial politics in the African art market that won eight international awards. He also recorded the film Sweetgrass
Sweetgrass (film)
Sweetgrass is a 2009 documentary film that follows modern-day cowboys as they lead their flocks of sheep up into Montana's Absaroka-Beartooth mountains for summer pasture. It was directed by Lucien Castaing-Taylor, a Harvard anthropologist, and produced by his wife Ilisa Barbash...
(2009), which is described as "an unsentimental elegy at once to the American West and to the 10,000 years of uneasy accommodation between post-Paleolithic humans and animals." He is the founding editor of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association
The American Anthropological Association is a professional organization of scholars and practitioners in the field of anthropology. With 11,000 members, the Arlington, Virginia based association includes archaeologists, cultural anthropologists, biological anthropologists, linguistic...
’s journal Visual Anthropology Review (1991–94).
Filmography
- Made in USA (1990)
- In and Out of Africa (1992)
- SweetgrassSweetgrass (film)Sweetgrass is a 2009 documentary film that follows modern-day cowboys as they lead their flocks of sheep up into Montana's Absaroka-Beartooth mountains for summer pasture. It was directed by Lucien Castaing-Taylor, a Harvard anthropologist, and produced by his wife Ilisa Barbash...
(2009) - The High Trail (2010)