About this Event
Join us to celebrate the 2025-26 Student Acquisition: and you, all future tense, leak through by artist Antonius-Tín Bui. Bui’s wide-ranging practice spans hand-cut paper, community engagement, performance, and soft sculpture, often engaging with hybrid identities and our complex relationship with time.
Bui will be joined in conversation by Joshua Chambers-Letson, professor of Performance Studies and Asian American Studies at Northwestern University. A member of the Block Museum Student Associates will offer a brief introduction to the student-led acquisition process and their selection of Bui’s work.
There will be a light reception from 5:00 pm-6:00 pm, preceding the public program.
Each year, the Block Museum Student Associates (BMSAs)—an interdisciplinary group of Northwestern undergraduates—study museum collecting practices and recommend works of art for acquisition that invite reflection, inquiry, and discussion. Learn more about the 2025-26 acquisition and hear directly from students about their selection.
and you, all future tense, leak through will be on view in The Block Collects from September 9, 2026.
About the Speakers:
Antonius-Tín Bui (b. 1992, Bronx, NY) is a polydisciplinary artist and shapeshifter invested in the transformative potential of improvisation, portraiture, craft, and ritual. The child of Paul and Van Bui, two Vietnamese refugees who carved futures from grief and grit, Antonius-Tín carries their legacy in every gesture. Bui received their BFA from Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD. Bui has had recent solo exhibitions at Various Small Fires, Dallas, TX (2024); moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL (2026, 2023, 2021); Hudson D. Walker Gallery, Provincetown, MA (2020); Laband Art Gallery, LMU, Los Angeles, CA (2019); Lawndale Art Center, Houston, TX (2018).
Joshua Chambers-Letson is the chair of the Department of Performance Studies and professor of Performance Studies and Asian American Studies at Northwestern University. Conducting research at the intersection of performance theory, queer of color critique, and the study of contemporary performance and art, he is completing a book on queer love and loss and the art of grief. Chambers-Letson is also the author of After the Party: A Manifesto for Queer of Color Life (NYU Press, 2018) and A Race So Different: Law and Performance in Asian America (NYU Press, 2014). Both books were winners of the 2019 and 2014 Outstanding Book Award from the Association of Theatre in Higher Education and After the Party was recipient of the 2019 Erroll Hill Award from the American Society for Theatre Research.
The Block Museum of Art acknowledges support from the Illinois Arts Council.
Image credits: Antonius-Tín Bui (born 1992), and you, all future tense, leak through, 2023. Mixed media on hand-cut paper. Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University, 2025–2026 Block Museum Student Associates acquisition, purchase funds provided by Craig Ponzio, the Rubens Family Foundation, and the Block Student Impact Fund. 2026.9.
Image of Antonius-Tín Bui courtesy of the artist.
Event venue & nearby stays
Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University, 40 Arts Circle Drive, Evanston, United States
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