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2026 Braun Memorial Lecture Featuring Artist Gabriel DaweThe Oakland University Art, Art History and Design Department is excited to announce the 2026 Jean S. Fred M. Braun Memorial Lecture, featuring renowned visual artist Gabriel Dawe.
Join us on THURSDAY, MARCH 12, 2026, from 6:00–7:00 P.M. in GOLD ROOMS B & C at OAKLAND UNIVERSITY'S OAKLAND CENTER for this year's lecture event.
Born and raised in Mexico City, Gabriel Dawe has created a practice informed both by his childhood fascination with needlework as well as his frustration with the restrictive gender norms that forbade him access to it as a young boy. Challenging the traditional categorization of textiles within domestic craft, the artist’s work weaves together reflections on gender, fashion, and architecture. Dawe’s large-scale installations emulate the optical phenomena of refracted light, captivating viewers by inviting them into an ethereal and celestial experience within the bounds of the venerable walls and ceilings of art institutions. Dawe explains his intent is to “materialize light, to give it density, so that I can offer the viewer an approximation of things otherwise inaccessible to us—a glimmer of hope that brings us closer to the transcendent.”