The Division of Student Affairs at the University of Michigan is pleased to announce calls for presentations and panels for the Ninth Annual Student Affairs Research Symposium: Getting to Nine on 16 May 2012. The 2012 Student Affairs Research Symposium invites presentations from staff, students, and faculty nationwide on topics related to issues of theory to practice in our work with students. This year, we extend that collaboration to include initial work about accreditation, in order to share research and dilemmas. We strive to build a true dialogue around the application of theory to practice, and the ways that practice shapes theory.

View selected items from the world’s foremost archive of international radical social protest movements. "Social protest movements often involve intense passion, so expect to see some edgy and offensive items on display," says Labadie Collection curator Julie Herrada.

The Labadie Collection is the world’s largest publicly accessible research collection covering just about every 19th, 20th, and 21st century protest movement that can be documented on paper, from the French Revolution to Occupy Wall Street. It has served as a resource for thousands of people the world over, from high school students to seasoned researchers, from young activists in search of their roots to documentary filmmakers unearthing eye-catching images. Books, serials, manuscripts, pamphlets, photographs, audio recordings, posters, and political buttons are all part of this eclectic group of materials.

View the exhibit during Audubon Room hours: Mon-Thurs 8:30am-7pm, Fri 8:30am-6pm, Sat 10am-6pm, Sun 1pm-7pm

Fluxus emerged in the early 1960s as a loose, international network of artists, composers, and designers-"led" by Lithuanian-born American artist George Maciunas (1931-1978)- that was noted for blurring the boundaries between art and life. Fluxus artists like Maciunas, Nam June Paik, George Brecht, and Yoko Ono, among many others, challenged the notion of high art by creating unassuming, often humorous objects and performances that redefined the terms of artistic production by demonstrating the idea that "anything can be art and anyone can do it." Because of their disregard for traditional artistic media, many of the objects in the exhibition are-often by design-acutely resistant to conventional forms of museum display. Variously conceived as carriers of ideas, absurdist send-ups of consumer products, and invitations to direct, playful participation by the viewer, these works attempt to undermine the idea that art is separate from the activity of living one's life. Through 116 works, Fluxus and the Essential Questions of Life will introduce visitors to the study and appreciation of art as an exciting and intellectually rewarding experience, and to the notion that art is something that can play an active role in their own approaches to life's essential questions.

This exhibition was organized by the Hood Museum of Art and was generously supported by Constance and Walter Burke, Dartmouth College Class of 1944, the Marie-Louise and Samuel R. Rosenthal Fund, and the Ray Winfield Smith 1918 Fund. UMMA's installation is made possible in part by the University of Michigan Health System, the University of Michigan Office of the Provost, Arts at Michigan, and the CEW Frances and Sydney Lewis Visiting Leaders Fund.

Peter Campus is a pioneer of video art who experimented with the medium in the 1970s alongside other notable artists Bill Viola, Bruce Nauman, and Joan Jonas. Video represented a new frontier, one that allowed artists to expand upon common artistic concerns of the era, including minimalism, performance, and conceptual art Campus pursued many directions, and created both large-scale projections and a series of little-seen installation works that employ live video feeds, of which Kiva (1971) is one. Campus experimented with closed circuit cameras not with an interest in surveillance and control, but rather because they were the ideal tools for producing situations of interactive engagement between viewer and image.

Kiva—the title refers to a kind of ceremonial room used by Native Americans of the Southwest for ritual and spiritual ceremonies—comprises a monitor with a closed circuit camera mounted on top; the lens is pointed directly at the viewer of the monitor, but the camera's view is restricted and manipulated by the placement of suspended mirrors. The camera shoots through a hole in one mirror to the surface of the other, both constantly shifting in relation to each other as they turn like a mobile. The mirrors fragment and multiply the image, allowing the camera to take in aspects of the room, the viewer, and the eye of the camera itself.

This project is made possible by the UMMA Director's Discretionary Fund.

Celebrate the 90th anniversary of the famed Nichols Arboretum Peony Garden, the largest collection of antique and heirloom peonies in North America. The festival features self-guided tours, cut-flower display in the Reader Center, peony-inspired artwork, and more. Or just come out to see the dazzling display of 10,000 blossoms during peak bloom. Free admission. Nichols Arboretum is open sunrise to sunset. For peony garden updates visit the Matthaei-Nichols website or Facebook page, or call 734-647-7600 for more information.

Two new archival collections focusing on acclaimed filmmaker and actor Orson Welles (1915-1985) were recently added to the U-M Special Collections Library’s already substantial Welles holdings. Selections from the new materials, including correspondence relating to Welles’s never-completed film Don Quixote and several costume designs credited to Welles for The Chimes at Midnight, are on display in the Special Collections Library (7th floor, Hatcher Graduate Library, University of Michigan) now through June 2012.

Special Collections Hours: Mon-Wed 10am-8pm, Thurs-Fri 10am-5pm, Sat 10am-noon, Sun closed.

All invited for a series of twice-daily, free staff-led tours of the U-M Nichols Arboretum Peony Garden, May 15-20 during the 2012 peony bloom season. All tours take place in the Arboretum, 1610 Washington Hts., at 12:15 & 7 pm. Due to unseasonably warm weather last winter and this spring we've moved the bloom time up. Today’s tours: 12:15 pm: Elements of Style - Demystifying peony forms and fashions; 7:00 pm: What’s in a Name? - Peony names of the past—the who, what, when, and why.

Two tours each day: 12:15 & 7 pm