2026 Attention and Flourishing Conference
Jueves 11 junio Viernes 12 junio Sábado 13 junio
The Boston College and the Bonds, Creativity and Culture research group of the Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) organize the 2026 Attention and Flourishing Conference at the University of Navarra. Bringing together artists, scholars, psychotherapists, and practitioners from around the world, this Conference seeks to examine the undertheorized relationship between the virtue of attention, mental health, and the flourishing of individuals and communities. Hosted in the Museo Universidad de Navarra, the Conference is intent on exploring the modes of attention at play in artistic practices and the spaces dedicated to them, and how such approaches can foster richer notions of mental health, wellbeing, and the life well-lived.
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Plenary Speakers
· D. Graham Burnett, Princeton University
· Clare Carlisle, King's College London
· Adam Green, Georgetown University
· Dario Robleto, Artist, Writer & Filmmaker
Program
Thursday June 11
| 10:00 h |
Check-In / Coffee (Location: Patio Norte and Museolab)
Ongoing artistic performance over the three days: “Apuntes de un posible accidente” Javier Yániz (Location: Sala Proyección, floor 0. See map for location) |
| 11:00 h |
Location: Aula 1
Welcome: Jaime García del Barrio, Adjunct to the Rector, Director of the Museo Universidad de Navarra (MUN), and Director of the Instituto Cultura y Sociedad (ICS) |
| 11:10 h |
Location: Aula 1
Opening Remarks: Matthew Clemente, Center for Psychological Humanities and Ethics |
| 11:30 h |
Location: Aula 1
Session 1
Forming Persons: Contemplation, Receptivity, and Spiritual Praxis
- Moderator: Inés Olza
- Carmen Guarino, “Distractedly. For an Echology.”
- Richard La Fleur, “The Attentive Soul: How Spiritual Practice Cultivates Mattering and Human Flourishing”
- John Witvliet, “Liturgical Participation, Virtue Formation and Human Flourishing: Ecumenical Perspectives”
- Daniel Bernardus van Schalkwijk, “Acceptance as a Bridge between Mental Health and Catholic Spirituality”
Attention in an Age of Fragmentation (Location: Aula 2)
- Moderator: Jerónimo Ayesta
- Chiara Palazzolo, “Humanizing Justice: The Role of Art and Music in Restorative Practices”
- María Noguera & Pablo Castrillo Maortua, “Sheen vs. Grain: The Streaming Aesthetics’ Challenge to Flourishing through Cinema”
- Andrew Stojkovich, “The Balkanization of Attention”
- Austin Williams, “Towards a Phenomenology of Passive Attention and Its Disorder"
Symposium 1 “Habit, Attention, Emotion, and Pathology” (Location: Sala Gabriela Willson)
- Javier Bernácer (Mind-Brain Group, ICS, UNAV)
- José Ignacio Murillo (Mind-Brain Group, ICS, UNAV)
- José Víctor Oron-Semper (Universidad Francisco de Vitoria)
- Mafalda Cardoso-Botelho (Georgetown University)
|
| 12:45 h |
Coffee (Location: Museolab) |
| 13:00 h |
Group Attentional Exercise (Museum Galleries) |
| 14:30 h |
Lunch |
| 16:30 h |
Session 2 (Location: Aula 1) Educating Attention: Measurement, Assessment, and Formation
- Moderator: Sam Gable
- Brendan Case, “Assessment as Attention: Towards a Psychometric Phenomenology”
- Erin Farrow, “Attending to Student Success: Implementing Attention Strategies in College”
- Jayme Yeo, “Listening to Other Readers: Cultivating Student Attention Within and beyond the Classroom”
- Chiara Ginevra Berra and Arne Sander, “The Form of Habit: Plasticity, Attention, and Social Responsibility”
Making Room for Attention: Museums as Attentional Ecologies (Location: Aula 2)
- Moderator: Gabriel Pérez-Barreiro
- Rebecca Taylor, “Museums as Aesthetic Ecologies for Attention and Flourishing in the Age of AI”
- Bianca Romano, “Neurodiversity and Neurological Conditions in Exhibitions and Contemporary Art Museums”
- Carlota María Fanjul Alemany, Javier Antón, Mikel Martínez Ciriero, and Javier Yániz “Estrategias de atención en el MSU Broad Art Museum. Resonancia y Mímesis”
- Nieves Acedo & Inés Olza, “Choreographies of Attention: Documenting Spectator Flourishing through Narrative Agency”
Symposium 2 Attention in Mental and Vocal Prayer in Francisco Suárez SJ. (1548–1617) (Location: Sala Gabriela Willson)
- Daniel Heider
- Joshua Keatley
Artistic Performance: “Listening the Self Back Together: A Sound Practice for Attention” by Uche Okolie (Location Talleres) |
| 17:45 h |
Break (Location: Museolab) |
| 18:30 h |
Plenary 1 (Location: Theater - open to public)
Attention Liberation as Emancipation: The Ambition of Attensity! by D. Graham Burnett |
| 20:00 h |
Poster Session / Cocktail Hour (Location: Museolab)
- Javier Bernacer, “Creativity, Neuroscience, and Habit: A Scoping Review”
- Nicholas Duran, “Practicing Attention: Somatic and Artistic Pathways to Flourishing”
- Catherine Enwrithg, "Teaching Literature, Attention and Resilience"
- Maria Soledad Hershey and Andrew Bogatz, “Art’s Gateway to Flourishing: Cultivating Attention through Art in Adolescents with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)”
- Uche Okolie, “Who Am I After This? Attention, Identity, and the Work of Wholeness”
- Álvaro Sanz-Fernández, “Music as Discourse: A New Simbolic Approach Based on Narrative Intermodality”
- Tim Stewart, “Serving With Soul: Attention as a Wellness Practice in Community Engagement”
|
Friday June 12
| 10:00 h |
Coffee (Location: Patio Norte) |
| 11:00 h |
Award Ceremony. Guestbook Award to ROOM: A Sketchbook for Analytic Action (Location: Aula 1) (Matthew Clemente) |
| 11:30 h |
Location: Aula 1
Session 3
The (Psycho) Politics of Recognition: Clinical Approaches to Attention
- Moderator: Justin Karter
- Aurelio Fernández, “The Consequences of Smartphone Use and Mutual Attention in Everyday Social Interactions”
- Bhupin Bbutaney, “Functional Neuroanatomy of Attention: Mentalization, Presence, and Flourishing”
- Charlotte Witvliet, “Attention to AND: How Noticing Benefits in Adversity Aids Bio-Psychosocial Transformation”
The Art of Attention: Suffering, Becoming, and Imagination (Location: Aula 2)
- Moderator: Matthew Clemente
- Gustavo Gómez Pérez, “Attention and Hesitation: A Reading of Juan Manuel Echavarría’s Series Silencios”
- Hannah Venable and Mark Allen, “Meaning and Suffering in Art: Preoccupation of Meaning and Art’s Ethical Voice”
- Sofia Rietti, “Why Fairy Tales Still Captivate: Bettelheim, Beauvoir, and the Existential Appeal of Immanence”
- Robert Reed, “Simone Weil’s Decreative Attention: A Levinasian Ethics of Poetic Living”
- Madeleine Hadinoto, "Becoming: Attention as an Artistic Process"
|
| 12:45 h |
Coffee |
| 13:00 h |
Plenary 2 (Location: Aula 1)
Pay attention! Philosophy and Pedagogy: Two Case Studies by Clare Carlisle
Respondents:
- Sofia Rietti, Boston College
- Justin Karter, Boston College
|
| 14:30 h |
Lunch (Location: Museolab) |
| 16:00 h |
Session 4
Attention and the Good Life: Philosophical Perspectives (Location: Aula 1)
- Moderator: Sofia Rietti
- Justin Karter, “Training Attention: Philosophical Embarrassments and Therapist Formation”
- Marcela Duque, “St Augustine on Attention and the Redemptive Now: Inhabiting Time in an Age of Distraction”
- Zsuzsanna Varhelyi, “The Attentional Field: Stoic Psychology and the Relational Roots of Flourishing”
- Alexander Klee, “‘Grieved Unto Death’: Aquinas’ Defense of Grief in Gethsemane, and in the Good Life”
Power Dynamics: Attention and Questions of Justice (Location: Aula 2)
- Moderator: Inés Olza
- Mario Rodríguez Pérez, “The Three Levels of Attention in the Phenomenon of Human Flourishing”
- Darren Steven Rondganger, “Fantasy, Politics, and the Ethics of Attention”
- Cherith Pedersen, “Attention as Resistance to Carceral Dehumanization”
- Amy Hodges Hamilton, “Attending to Untold Stories: Writing, Trauma, and the Common Good”
Symposium 4 “From Cathedrals/Monasteries to Research/Clinical Rooms: Awe, Silence, & Attentive Practice” (Location: Sala Gabriela Willson)
- M. Mookie Manalili
- Carmen María Callizo Romero
Artistic Performance: “An Apology for Disorder: Letters” by Samuel Gable (Location: Talleres) |
| 17:15 h |
Coffee (Location: Museolab) |
| 17:30 h |
Plenary 3 (Location: Theater - open to public)
Screening of Ancient Beacons Long for Notice, 2024
Directed by Dario Robleto, Written by Dario Robleto and Jennifer Roberts, Original score: S. Ashbrook / beat.imprint.
Running time: 71:00
Followed by discussion and Q&A with Gabriel Pérez-Barreiro
Program in English only. |
Saturday June 13
| 09:00 h |
Coffee (Location: Museolab) |
| 09:30 h |
Session 5 (Location: Aula 1)
Therapy for the Soul: Attention and Spiritual Practice
- Moderator: Justin Karter
- Raidel Leon Martinez, “From David’s Harp to Modern Care: Music, Attention and Spiritual Practice for Dementia”
- Frederico Ozanam Agostino Camara, “Photography, Attention, and Spiritual Inquiry: A Number of Times (2021–2023)”
- Atan Kumar Barua, “A Study of Practicing Mindfulness Meditation to Overcome Anxiety and Depression”
- Carmen Callizo & Celine Stinus, “Attending to Forgiveness: Confession, Presence, and the Mediation of Divine Forgiveness”
The Good, The Beautiful, and the True: Aesthetic Attention and Moral Perception (Location: Aula 2)
- Moderator: Sam Gable
- Guillermo Gómez-Ferrer, “Ética de la atención y mirada estética a partir del pensamiento de Simone Weil”
- Emily Williamson, “Aesthetic Guidance and Communal Aesthetic Engagement”
- Jerónimo Ayesta, “Learning to Tarry: Verweilen, Aesthetic Attention, and Human Flourishing”
- Matthew Post, “Objectively Real Beauty as the Bridge from Perception to Morality to Flourishing”
Artistic Performance: “8 1/2 x 11: Notes on Paper” by Kyle Winston and Jonathan Toews (Location: Talleres) |
| 10:45 h |
Coffee (Location: Museolab) |
| 11:00 h |
Plenary 4 Thinking “Outside The Bots”: Finding the Hidden Signals of Creativity in the AI Era by Adam Green (Location: Aula 1)
Respondents:
- Javier Bernácer María, Mind-Brain Group, ICS, UNAV
- José Ignacio Murillo, Mind-Brain Group, ICS, UNAV
|
| 12:45 h |
Closing Remarks (Location: Aula 1)
Inés Olza; Institute for Culture and Society |
| 12:45 h |
Farewell Coffee (Location: Museolab) |
Organize and Fund
