feels to shoot a gun and pretend to kill someone in a movie—which is worth talking about. I’m comfortable with nudity, especially when it enriches the storytelling.” For Hoffmann, commercial success and critical recognition have come in tandem. She had a high-profile story arc on Girls, Lena Dunham’s HBO series about four 20When Gabrielle “Gaby” Hoffmann ’04 entered high something women building lives in New York City, for which school, she had already built a CV that adult actors would she earned a 2015 Emmy nomination for outstanding guest envy. She’d had feature roles in Uncle Buck, Sleepless in actress in a comedy series. Hoffmann has also been nomiSeattle, Now and Then, Field of Dreams, and Everyone Says I nated twice (2015 and 2016) for the Emmy Award for outLove You. Yet Hoffmann was using acting as a means to an standing supporting actress in a comedy series for her end. “I had a plan that when it was time to go to college, I performance as Ali Pfefferman in Amazon’s hit comedy would stop acting,” she says. “I knew back then I wanted to Transparent. Hoffmann’s character is the youngest sibling in attend Bard, like my sister did.” (Hoffmann’s older sister is a family coping with their father’s transition to becoming a yoga teacher, actor, and writer Alexandra Auder ’94.) “The woman. Debuting in 2014 on Amazon’s streaming service, College completely shaped who I am, and most of the peoTransparent has won a Golden Globe for best television ple who are actively in my life I know from Bard.” Hoffmann series (musical or comedy), and lead actor Jeffrey Tambor recalls the strong influence of several Bard professors: won an Emmy for outstanding lead actor in a comedy series. Peggy Ahwesh, Joel Kovel, Elizabeth Frank, Jacqueline Hoffmann knows how fortunate she is. She and Chris Goss, and Susan Fox Rogers. Dapkins ’01 have a 2-year-old daughter, Rosemary, and When she left Bard, Hoffmann was unsure of her Gaby Hoffmann ’04. photo Larry Busacca Transparent’s shooting schedule allows her plenty of time next steps. Over the next 10 years, she acted only occato stay home. “My life has been working out magically,” she sionally to make money, but she couldn’t bring herself to says. “Acting is a beautiful way to make a living but you need to be very dive into any other career. She decided to spend one year saying yes to every grounded outside of acting or it will make you crazy.” role she was offered. “I fell in love with acting again, largely due to Sebastian When we spoke, Hoffmann had recently returned from the People’s Silva and Crystal Fairy.” Crystal Fairy and the Magical Cactus, an adventure Summit in Chicago, a three-day event in which more than 3,000 people gathcomedy directed and written by Silva, stars Hoffmann and Michael Cera as ered to build a national political agenda to pass legislation that advances social, Americans seeking a hallucinogenic plant in Chile. Crystal Fairy earned favorable racial, and economic justice. Says Hoffmann, “The summit was inspiring. I have reviews and Hoffmann was widely praised. However, the film triggered one of gone through long periods of being shut down about politics, but got reengaged two subjects that Hoffmann can never dodge in interviews. The first is her with Bernie Sanders’s campaign. It was a heartbreaking and energizing year. I’m upbringing in the infamous Chelsea Hotel in New York City by an infamous looking forward to voting for Zephyr Teachout for Congress on November 8.” mother—writer, artist, and Warhol “girl superstar” Viva Hoffmann. The second,
SPOTLIGHT Gaby Hoffmann ’04: Renewed Love of Acting
directly linked to the hype about Crystal Fairy, is her fearlessness about being nude on screen. “I look forward to the day when we don’t have to talk about the nudity, because the culture will have evolved,” she says. “Nobody asks how it
—William Stavru ’87
Artist Architects Named New Haring Fellows
A Survivor Speaks
The Center for Curatorial Studies (CCS Bard) and Human Rights Project at Bard College (HRP) selected Sandi Hilal and Alessandro Petti, architects and critics based in Beit Sahour, Palestinian Territories, as the third recipients of the Keith Haring Fellowship in Art and Activism. They are founding members and codirectors of the Decolonizing Architecture Art Residency (DAAR), an architectural office and artist residency program that combines conceptual speculations and architectural interventions. They are also founders of Campus in Camps, an experimental educational program in Dheisheh refugee camp in Bethlehem. Long before the current refugee crisis, Hilal and Petti focused on the lives and representations of refugees, and explored ways of creating “different social, political, and spatial relationships between people, state, and territory beyond the liberal notion of citizenship.” Recent projects include the design of a girls’ school in the Shufat refugee camp in Jerusalem; a “concrete tent” in Dheisheh; and a public square in Fawwar camp, near Hebron. Made possible through a five-year grant from the Keith Haring Foundation, the Haring Fellowship is an annual award for a scholar, activist, or artist to teach and conduct research at CCS Bard and the Human Rights Project. Hilal and Petti began their one-year appointment in September and will teach at the College in the spring.
A capacity crowd filled Bard Hall in September to hear 23year-old Nadia Murad talk about the genocide of her people, the Yazidi; the brutality she suffered at the hands of Islamic State (ISIS); and her campaign to bring the perpetrators to justice and end sexual slavery. Murad is Nadia Murad, center, talks with students. photo Karl Rabe a United Nations Goodwill Ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking, and has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. ISIS attacked Sinjar Province, Iraq, where Murad lived, in 2014. Six of her brothers died. She and her mother were among 6,500 women and children captured. Murad later saw her mother killed. “All 6,500 of us wish we’d been killed that day,” said Murad, who escaped. Through tears, several in the audience asked what they could do. “Go sit with the girls in the refugee camps,” she replied. The event was sponsored by the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities and cohosted by the Center for Civic Engagement, Bard Model UN, and Human Rights Program. on and off campus 33