The Roberta Buffett Institute supports creative collaborations that connect artistic practice with global research, teaching, and engagement.
Read about the forms that previous projects have taken below and learn about the Roberta Buffett Institute programs that supported them.
LEARN MORE
SPOTLIGHTING THE WOMEN SAVING YEMEN'S HERITAGE
Brent Huffman, Professor and Director of Documentary Journalism, was a 2025–26 Buffett Faculty Fellow. He spent the year working on his forthcoming documentary, The Future is Written in Stone. It follows a group of Yemeni women archaeologists, heritage specialists, and cultural advocates who are working to protect Yemen’s ancient sites, museums, and historical treasures amid the devastation of civil war, looting, and environmental threats. The film highlights both the richness of Yemen’s cultural heritage and the determination of these women to preserve their country’s history and identity for future generations, while challenging international perceptions of Yemen as defined solely by conflict and crisis.
DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKING FOR HUMAN RIGHTS & ACADEMIC FREEDOM
Turkish filmmaker and film scholar Can Candan will join the Roberta Buffett Institute’s Keyman Modern Turkish Studies Program as a Buffett-Keyman Distinguished Artist in Residence from September 2026 through June 2027. During his residency, he will develop a new documentary project, deliver film workshops and public talks, and collaborate with faculty and students. An internationally recognized independent documentarian, educator, and human rights activist, Candan’s acclaimed films include My Child (Benim Çocuğum), a groundbreaking documentary about the parents of LGBTQ+ individuals in Turkey. A vocal advocate for democratic values, institutional autonomy, and academic freedom, Candan has also documented the Turkish government’s crackdown on academics who signed a petition protesting state violence against Kurdish communities. Formerly a faculty member at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, he was repeatedly dismissed from his position because of his activism.
FIRST US FESTIVAL DEDICATED TO NIKOLAI MEDTNER'S MUSIC
With the support of the Roberta Buffett Institute’s event co-sponsorship, Northwestern’s Bienen School of Music and Department of Slavic Languages & Literature are hosting the first Medtner Festival of America in November 2026. The festival will commemorate the 75th anniversary of the death of Russian composer Nikolai Medtner (1880–1951) through a series of concerts, lectures, and educational programs featuring Northwestern students and faculty as well as distinguished guest artists. As the first major US festival dedicated exclusively to Medtner’s life and music, the event will convene performers, scholars, and audiences from across disciplines, creating opportunities for cultural exchange and intellectual engagement.
INTEGRATING QUEER VOICES INTO MUSICAL VOCAL TRAINING
With the support of a Buffett Global Collaboration Grant, Associate Professor of Theatre Instruction Kelli Morgan McHugh’s research-practice initiative Queer Voices is rethinking vocal training and musical theatre pedagogy to better support transgender, nonbinary, and gender-expansive performers. From workshops in Evanston to performances at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music in Australia, their work is translating insights from speech-language pathology into practical tools for singers, educators, and ensemble directors navigating an increasingly diverse performance landscape—and building a global network of scholars, educators, and artists to do it.
NEO-HAKAWATI NIGHTS WITH OMAR OFFENDUM & ZAFER TAWIL
Award-winning Syrian-American poet and rapper Omar Offendum was joined by acclaimed Palestinian multi-instrumentalist Zafer Tawil to perform Neo-Hakawati Nights, the opening performance of the spring 2026 Buffett Symposium, Brave New Futures. A powerful performance blending poetry, rap, storytelling, and live Arabic music, the concert drew from Offendum’s off-Broadway work Little Syria, which explores themes of identity, migration, justice, and shared humanity. Neo-Hakawati Nights reimagined the traditional Arabic hakawati storytelling tradition for a contemporary audience. The event set the tone for the symposium’s broader focus on imagining more just and sustainable global futures.
ARTS ADVOCACY FOR WATER ACCESS
Award-winning photographer and educator Aïda Muluneh will be a Buffett Distinguished Visiting Artist in 2027. Northwestern University faculty in any department can apply to sponsor a visiting artist, scholar, or practitioner through the Roberta Buffett Institute. While on campus, Muluneh will connect with Northwestern students and faculty and present her current project. In partnership with National Geographic, water scientists, and local communities, Muluneh is developing fog harvesting installations to capture clean water in Ethiopia, Namibia, and Morocco and making a documentary that will serve as an advocacy tool around water access.
AMPLIFYING ARTS OPPORTUNITIES THROUGH FULBRIGHT
Our 2026 Fulbright Week keynote conversation featured Pulitzer Prize- and Tony-winning playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Professor in the Practice of Theater and Performance Studies at Yale University, and the Northwestern University School of Communication’s Dean E. Patrick Johnson. They discussed the global experiences that informed Jacobs-Jenkins’ bold, genre-defying plays, reflecting on how his Fulbright experience in Berlin provided the distance to rethink home, history, and heritage—ultimately influencing works that examine race, family, and national identity. Together, they explore how cultural exchange fuels artistic innovation and how encountering new perspectives can transform both identity and craft. Discover Fulbright opportunities >>
DECOLONIZING CLASSICAL BALLET
Supported by a Buffett Global Collaboration Grant, Associate Professor of Art Theory & Practice Brendan Fernandes is developing an international research and artistic collaboration to decolonize classical ballet, focusing particularly on the historically influential ballet La Bayadère and its embedded colonial and orientalist narratives. The project will connect artists, scholars, and ballet institutions across Chicago, Amsterdam, and Melbourne through multiple research exchanges. The project will culminate in a film and a public symposium in Chicago that brings together dancers, academics, and practitioners to explore new, more inclusive approaches to ballet, positioning the art form as a space for critical inquiry and cultural transformation.
CONNECTING ECO-CINEMA ACROSS BORDERS
Filmmaker and anthropologist JP Sniadecki, Professor of Radio/Television/Film, launched the China-America Reel Ecology Project (CARE), a curricular and research initiative that connects artists and students at Northwestern University and Tongji University in Shanghai through the intersection of art practice and ecological thinking. Building on his leadership of one of the Roberta Buffett Institute’s inaugural Global Working Groups, Climate Crisis + Media Arts, CARE reimagines filmmaking practices to reduce environmental impact while strengthening transnational artistic and academic collaboration. The project began with support from a Global Collaboration Grant and two Buffett Undergraduate Research Fellows. Professor Sniadecki used the grant to host workshops in Beijing and Shanghai that convened filmmakers, students, and grassroots artists to explore sustainable film techniques, alternative processing methods, and the role of analog filmmaking in the digital age.
ENVISIONING AFRICA’S CREATIVE FUTURES
In partnership with the University of Ghana and leading cultural institutions in Accra’s emerging arts district, and supported by a Buffett Global Collaboration Grant, Associate Professor of Performance Studies and Black Studies Dotun Ayobade organized African Arts Futures: Accra 2026. This was an international symposium examining Afrobeats and contemporary African cultural production through the lenses of labor, sovereignty, and creative practice. Building on two previous symposia held at Northwestern and supported by Buffett event co-sponsorship, the 2026 gathering brought scholars, visual artists, DJs, dancers, choreographers, and cultural practitioners to Accra to explore how African cultural production can foster more equitable and sustainable creative ecosystems. The symposium's organizers are continuing their collaboration to produce an exhibition and co-author a book publication.