CFAR Banner at 510 Oak Marisa Williamson: Welcome Back  On View: October 2026- January 2027 Location: 510 Oak Street, Eugene, OR 97401

Welcome Back is a digital collage featuring a survey of historic figures; indigenous elders, colonizers, artists, and the majestic landscapes and visual narratives they occupied, captured, and made home. “Welcome Back” buries the warm language of the new academic year under layers of shadowy history. It was created as an homage to the timelessness of confrontation. “We’ll come back!” it seems to read. It is an homage to the personae who haunt and cohabit our world and embody the complex ethos of the American west.

Marisa Williamson is a project-based artist who works in video, image-making, installation, writing and performance around themes of history, race, feminism, and technology. Williamson’s projects map the past onto geographies of the present. Her work has been featured in exhibitions throughout the US, as well as in Rome, Berlin, Switzerland, and Buenos Aires. Her work has been supported by grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Virginia Humanities, The Graham Foundation, and the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America. She was a 2012 participant in the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture and the Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program in 2014-2015. Williamson holds a BA from Harvard University and an MFA from CalArts. She is a 2026-2027 Fellow at the Warren Center for Studies in American History at Harvard University, on leave from the University of Virginia where she is an Assistant Professor of Studio Art.

This banner was commissioned under an open call by CFAR Researcher-in-Residence Jabari Zuberi. The curatorial approach was to ask how art can contribute to changing the material conditions and social relations that shape people’s lives. Drawing from dialectical materialism, its curatorial approach considers art as both a product of those conditions and a means of intervening in them. Who makes an image, whose interests it serves, and how it reaches a public are central to what that image can do. The project moves beyond representation, observation, and contemplation as the primary measures of creative success, asking what the work makes possible for the people who encounter it. Through its production, content, and public presence, the banner aims to connect visual experience to the conditions of everyday life and the possibility of collective action. At its core is a question: what does it mean for art to take changing the world seriously?

Feel that shift in the air? It’s not just fall — it’s Walktober 2026!

Lane County’s favorite walking celebration is back for its 4th year, with free, fun, and themed walks happening all October. You can join tree walks, birdwatching tours, historic cemetery walks, urban art strolls, a group thrift walk, the ever-popular Coffee Shop Hop, and the challenge — yes, there are prizes! Walks are being added every week, and there’s something for every age and pace. Grab a friend, lace up, and explore your community on foot.

Full schedule including events at UO and details at wewalklane.org

Celebrate the murals of Eugene with this exhibit featuring the City of Eugene's 20x21EUG Mural Project and Urban Canvas murals. The purpose of the exhibit is to create opportunities for UO students to learn about and engage with the city of Eugene and the greater Eugene community. https://www.eugene-or.gov/4636/Murals

The Ducks in Downtown section will of the display will be photos from you, out in town seeing the wonderful art.

Send in a photo with a Eugene mural to be a part of the exhibit and a chance to win a prize pack! Email a selfie of you with a Eugene mural to mcmillangallery@uoregon.edu. The submissions will be accepted starting September 15. Prizes drawing will be Friday of week 5 and week 10. To have your picture displayed in the gallery exhibit, you must sign a model release form. more information on our instagram https://www.instagram.com/uomcmillangallery/ or email us. Only photos on display at the date of the drawing will be entered into the raffle. All are welcome to submit photos for the gallery, but only UO students are eligible to be entered into the raffle. 

Reception October 13 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. free refreshments, open to all

Calendar entry image of mural by AIKO (Japan/USA) Reflection