After the success of last year’s edition, the Faculty of Humanities once again organised a new series of Vespres Culturals (Cultural Evenings) . The first quarter of the 2024-2025 academic year gave us three sessions with topics as interesting and current as the evolution of the role of women in the history of art, artificial intelligence (AI) and its social repercussions, and historical memory. 

The series was organised with Cases Singulars and the Fundació Institut Amatller d’Art Hispànic, and once again took place in the former photography studio of Antoni Amatller under the guidance of lecturers Judith Urbano, Gabriel Fernández and Xavier Baró.

The first session of the month of October was given by Dr Urbano with the title “Women represented as objects or as creative subjects in the history of art.” The dean of the Faculty of Humanities spoke about the work of some of the most important artists in the history of art, analysing how the role of women has changed over the centuries and how they have moved from being an object of representation to creators of art. “The role of the woman has been changing for some time. We are most familiar with that of representation, either in painting or sculpture, but little by little we are discovering that women have always been artists too,” explained Dr Urbano.

November’s session was “Artificial intelligence and the future of society: where will it all lead?” presented by Dr Gabriel Fernández Borsot, expert in the humanistic facets of AI. His session was a philosophical reflection on the challenges presented by innovations in AI and on whether it is plausible that machines could rebel and take over. “For the first time we have machines that talk to us, and they will keep us company in the future, capable of convincing us because they will have a lot of information from our data,” assured the lecturer.

Finally, Dr Xavier Baró gave the session on “History and Memory: an uncomfortable but necessary debate”,  on 11 December. The Humanities lecturer spoke about the ongoing debate of whether to turn over new leaf or reopen the wounds of the past. “The reality is that not a week goes by without news about on which reading we must give the past. We do not have a definitive answer, but we can provide some tools to ethically manage this troubled history”, explained the expert.

Cultural Evenings will be soon launched again with new topical proposals on current affairs.