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Featured Programs

More than presenting work, the Center for the Arts is a hub for visiting artists to incubate new work, access the resources of Wesleyan University, develop partnerships across campus, and nourish academic innovation.

Make Jazz Tril
Make Jazz Tril

Fall 2026 Featured Programs

Helen Marten, detail of "Evidence of Theatre (they wept)," 2023, Sprayed aluminum; screen printed aluminum; sandcast aluminum; steel; cast jesmonite; stitched fabric; modelboard; walnut; ash; number tags; handmade paper; candy foil; coffee filter; nylon inks, 98 1/2 x 84 3/4 x 20 inches. Courtesy of the artist and Greene Naftali, New York.
Mozart's Chair
Discover international artworks and live performances that blur the lines between foreground and background and explore how furniture shapes our actions. 
Make Jazz Trill Again musicians
Make Jazz Trill Again

Experience jazz as a communal language of trust-building, intergenerational connection, and collective artmaking.
Veronica-May Clark, untitled, 2025. Colored pencil on paper, 11 x 17 inches.
Drawn Between The Lines

A multi-part exhibition of works on paper created by Wesleyan students at Cheshire Correctional Institution through Wesleyan’s Center for Prison Education.
Specimen bottles of Chinese imports and exports. Photo by Laura Nadelberg. Mystic Seaport Museum.
Collecting China

A student-curated exhibition of thousands of artifacts sent home by 19th-century missionaries that shaped American perceptions of China.

Signature Event Highlights

Signature events at the Center for the Arts include an annual series of exhibitions, performances, public programs, workshops, and festivals.

On left: A green and white, textured background displays a silhouetted, leaping figure and the foliage of a tree. In the center "Ways to Move: Black Insurgent Grammars / x / Jonathan González" appears in white text. In the bottom right corner "Ugly Duckling Presse" is written in white text.
AFTERWORDS
AFTERWORDS is the Center for the Arts’ annual public program series, asking: what happens after the encounter with the work of art?
People seen from behind in front of fence on rooftop looking down at street
In Process
A development residency program where visiting artists create new work in collaboration with Wesleyan students and faculty. 
Kathak (North Indian classical) dancer Jin Won performs during the Navaratri Festival at Wesleyan.
Navaratri Festival

Since 1976, the Navaratri Festival has been a joyful annual celebration of Indian music, dance, and artistic traditions.
People dancing
WesGrooves
A community dance party featuring global social dance styles, beginner workshops, and live or recorded music. All are welcome. 
Man playing vibraphone
Wesleyan Jazz Orchestra Weekend
A multi-day celebration bringing world-class musicians, rising artists, and students together for a vibrant exchange of jazz. 
Artwork on pedestals in gallery
Middletown Public Schools Art Exhibition
Celebrate K–12 creativity at the annual Middletown Public Schools Art Exhibition, presented with community partners.

Spring 2026 Featured Programs

A dancer performs the work dArK oXyGen.
dArK oXyGen
A sonic dance exploring choreographies of breath, inspired by deep-ocean oxygen production where sunlight cannot reach.
A painting by Robert Lostuttter.
Robert Lostutter and Kristi Cavataro
A cross-generational exhibition pairing Lostutter’s paintings and drawings with Cavataro’s stained glass sculptural works.
An artwork from the College of East Asian Studies collection.
The Blooming Mirror
An exhibition exploring cycles of growth, reflection, and renewal through immersive visual works and interdisciplinary storytelling.

Visiting Artist Partnerships

Dancer on floor reaching toward sheet suspended above with other people sitting and lying down in background

Visiting Artist Partnerships

The Center for the Arts is committed to the catalytic role visiting artists can have on building relationships across disciplines to develop new forms of knowledge that meet urgent questions facing the present and future world we create together. Learn more about our artist-led approach to curating and creating new work.
Detail of interior of galllery with limestone walls and large windows showing trees outside

Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery

The Zilkha Gallery presents groundbreaking exhibitions that explore contemporary issues, often through interdisciplinary approaches.
Visit the Zilkha Gallery

Upcoming Events

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