arts Archives - Page 7 of 15

Dense, Disconcerting Bite

Posted on July 30, 2014December 6, 2023

That I could have written it shorter had I only more time has been attributed to great writers from Montaigne to Mark Twain. Those multiple attributions may be the best testament to the statement’s truth. It is hard to write “good short.” Unless you’re Writer-in-Residence Diane Seuss ’78, winner of Indiana Review’s 2013 1/2K Prize for her prose poem “Wal-Mart Parking Lot,” which was published in IR’s Summer 2014 issue.

More good news: IR editor Peter Kispert interviewed Di about various prize-related matters, including which actual Wal-Mart inspired her, how she approached making her poem, and the challenges and triumphs of the compressed form. You can read that interview online. In the 1/2K, word count cannot exceed 500 and all genres are open–albeit constrained. Di is spending part of the summer at Hedgebrook on Whidbey Island in Puget Sound. Hedgebrook is a retreat for women writers. “If you receive the residency you get your own little cottage (overlooking Mt. Rainier and the Sound), solitude, and meals out of their organic garden,” wrote Di. “I’m not sure how to receive such a gift, but I’m working on it.”

In other news, The Missouri Review published Di’s poem “Still-Life with Two Dead Peacocks and a Girl (after Rembrandt),” one of a series that arose from Di’s interest in still life painting. “What I discovered about still lives is that they are not still,” Di said, “or their stillness draws out our projections like a poultice lures poison.”

K Instructor Dhera Strauss Awarded Community Medal of Arts

Posted on July 15, 2014June 13, 2024

Kalamazoo College video instructor Dhera Strauss — Dhera Strauss, K video instructor and 2014 Community Medal of Arts recipient.

K Media Producer and Instructor Dhera Strauss has been awarded the 2014 Community Medal of Arts from the Arts Council of Greater Kalamazoo. Dhera is a documentary filmmaker, writer, and producer, in addition to her duties as an instructor in the K Department of Art and Art History, where she instructs students through her skills and by example.

“I love teaching,” she told a Kalamazoo Gazette reporter in 2010. “The kids have this energy and motivation, and I get to impart my love of filmmaking.”

Many people in Kalamazoo and beyond also know Dhera from her award-winning documentaries including Kitchen Conversations (a group of professional women in Kalamazoo invite viewers into their kitchens, where each prepares a recipe that reminds her of her family) and Donut Day: 24 Hours at Sweetwater’s (the character and characters of a 24-hour Kalamazoo doughnut shop).

And many know her as the wife of Kalamazoo College Professor of History, Emeritus David Strauss.

Congrats, Dhera!

Time is of the Essence

Posted on July 10, 2014March 24, 2022

Professor Emerita of English Gail Griffin has been particularly prolific recently, publishing a number of essays in a variety of journals. A short list and description of those essays will appear in the Fall issue of LuxEsto, but we couldn’t wait that long to share one that will let you know that Gail is now a published baseball writer! Her essay “Night, Briggs Stadium, 1960” describes her 10th birthday present–a Tiger’s night game! It appears in the new book A DETROIT ANTHOLOGY, a collection of some 60 stories about what it was (and is) like to live in the city of Detroit. Gail gave an interview about the piece on WMUK radio station. Consider the following short excerpt a first-inning triple topped by a steal of home:

“A rectangle of night sky opens ahead. Brilliant banks of lights against the black. The low crowd hum, rising, like a sea sound. Then acres of green seats and then, below it all, the blazing diamond, emerald they should call it, nothing has ever been so green.

Left field, Maxwell. Right, Colavito, the outrageous Cleveland trade, who points his bat at pitchers like a gun.

Humidity haloes the lights. Men yelp HOTdogs, HOTdogs, PROgram. I am transfixed…”

So are we.

Ensemble Kalamazoo Includes K Harpist

Posted on July 3, 2014March 24, 2022

Harpist Eleanor Wong — Eleanor Wong ’12 plays harp for the group “Ensemble Kalamazoo.” Photo by Aaron Geller ’08

A group known as “Ensemble Kalamazoo” recently proved that music can be equal parts silence and sound. The group performed a collection of atonal pieces during a late June concert. Its harpist is Kalamazoo College alumna Eleanor Wong ’12.

Eleanor came to the harp by way of her reluctance for the piano. An early hint: during childhood piano lessons she much preferred to strum the strings inside the instrument rather than finger the keys outside. Not a problem when a musical tradition is as strong as it is in the Wong family. Eleanor’s uncle, Bradley Wong, who attended the June concert, was recently named Western Michigan University’s director of music.

The concert’s compositions sounded like a musical equivalent of the post-war art movement of abstract expressionism. Peter Ablinger’s Weiss/Weisslich 3” (White/Off-White), for example, sounded like a blank white canvas painted white and splashed with a few drops of various colors that seldom coincided.

“It was difficult to play at first,” said Eleanor. And she remarked on the long rehearsal sessions the unorthodox song structures required, “But the emphasis on texture rather than traditional melody and harmony trains your ear in a new way,” she added.

The unorthodox selections featured some fascinating instruments–such as WMU graduate Zachary Boyt’s comb-and-Macbook combination (part of fellow WMU graduate Valeria Jonard’s composition The Broken Harp) that produced a sound that seemed to blend a wind chime and a leaky faucet. The composition’s simplicity and complexity turned on the Boyt’s strumming of the comb, which was amplified by the computer.

“Watching the performance refueled my own artistic opinions,” said Adam Schumaker, an instructor of musical composition at Kalamazoo College. He stressed the importance of experiencing live performances. “Even though I approach music differently, avant-garde performances reinforce what I want to do with music.”

If he, or anyone else, wishes to enjoy Eleanor’s work with “Ensemble Kalamazoo,” then he will have to attend the group’s summer concerts. Eleanor is off to the University of Oregon in August to study arts administration.

The World is My Oyster, and I am the Pearl: Peer Gynt at Festival Playhouse

Posted on May 8, 2014March 24, 2022

Students rehears for "Peer Gynt" — A scene from PEER GYNT (photo by Emily Salswedel ’16)

It’s grand finale time for Festival Playhouse of Kalamazoo College’s golden anniversary. To close its 50th season, Festival Playhouse presents Colin Teevan’s adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt, Thursday through Sunday, May 15-18, in the Nelda K. Balch Playhouse.

Guest Director Todd Espeland has set the play in a contemporary punk rock club, with an “in-your face” attitude still capable of shocking a 21st century audience. (Peer Gynt contains mature subject matter and language, and some of the material may not be suitable for children.)

“I selected this modern adaptation because I felt that the updating of the language and situations would make the message and story connect more to our students,” says Espeland. “The roughness of the language, modernizing Peer’s adventures by making him a human trafficker, and its references to the way we idolize TV celebrities, brings Ibsen’s message into the 21st century while still keeping the heart of the fairy tale.

“As human beings, each of us must ask ourselves who we are, what we believe, and to whom we have obligations,” Espeland adds. “This play inverts the usual paradigm of characters that look inward for answers: Peer looks outward to the entire world to serve him. His duty toward himself is to manipulate others to fulfill his needs, regardless of the suffering his manipulations impose on others.”

Dramaturg David Landskroener ’14 comments: “Audiences will be struck by this play’s denouncement of pride and self-interest. The ever-increasing modern societal message is that everything is about ’me,’ which this adaptation deconstructs in an even more timely and resonant fashion through references to reality TV.”

Peer constantly changes his persona to suit the occasion at hand: he’ll do and say anything to get what he wants. Kyle Lampar ’17, who plays the title role, describes his character as “vulgar, carefree, and unapologetic…but behind that persona of tough teenage angst, there’s a fragile individual who only wishes to fulfill his dreams.”

The design team includes Theatre Arts Professor and Scenic Designer Lanford J. Potts, Costume Designer Elaine Kauffman, Lighting Designer Katie Anderson ’15, and Sound Designer Lindsay Worthington ’17.

The show opens Thursday, May 15 at 7:30pm (which is “pay-what-you-can” night), and runs Friday and Saturday, May 16-17, at 8pm, and Sunday, May 18, at 2pm. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for seniors, and $15 for other adults and may be purchased at the door. To make reservations, please call 269.337.7333 or visit the website for more information. Note: Thursday’s performance will be followed by the golden anniversary’s final alumni talk back, led by Kristen Chesak ’94, managing director of the Kalamazoo Civic Theatre.

SMART Girls and K Women Team Up for Art Hop and More

Posted on May 2, 2014March 24, 2022

K students with some of the SMART group girls — K students (l-r) Morgan Mahdavi ’14, Chelsey Shannon ’14, Isabelle Ciaramitaro ’16, and Jordan Earnest ’14 with some of their SMART Girls.

Each Friday afternoon during the fall, winter, and spring quarters of the 2013-14 academic year, five Kalamazoo College female students have met with 16 Kalamazoo area preteen girls in a mentoring program focused on themes of identity, self-awareness, and self-worth.

Every Friday afternoon. For two hours. No exceptions.

“Consistency is most important in our mentor role,” said Jordan Applebaum Earnest ’14. “The girls know to expect us every Friday for the school year.”

Morgan Mahdavi ’14, Chelsey Shannon ’14, Isabelle Ciaramitaro ’16, Rian Brown ’16, and Jordan are mentors for the SMART Girls program, a collaboration of the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Kalamazoo and the Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Center for Civic Engagement at K.

The K women meet with the SMART Girls (ages 9-12) at the Boys and Girls Club to discuss themes of identity, self-awareness, and self-worth. Another team of K women also mentors a Teen SMART Girls program at the Club. Both groups of mentors meet regularly on their own to plan lessons for the girls and hold structured reflections about their own mentoring experiences.

“Over the course of the year, our lessons, activities, discussions, and writing exercises with the girls have placed a strong emphasis on healthy relationships, self-care, and emotional processing,” said Jordan. “The girls have come to recognize their own strengths and they have developed more confidence, determination, and positive energy.”

“We have, too,” said Jordan.

Jordan is a Civic Engagement Scholar through the “Mary Jane” Center and serves as director of the SMART Girls program. Hers is a funded position paid through a grant to the Center by former City of Kalamazoo Mayor Caroline Ham. The other K students are volunteers.

During the Friday May 2 downtown Kalamazoo Art Hop, K mentors and SMART Girls will host “Who We Are,” a photographic exhibit meant to demonstrate the inner strengths that each SMART Girl believes she possesses. Each SMART Girl served as art director for her own photo, choosing the props and poses that Georgina Graff ’16 captured with her camera.

“The photos represent who the SMART Girls want to grow up to be,” said Jordan. “They demonstrate qualities such as trustworthiness, intelligence, health, and creativity—all chosen by the girls themselves.”

Kalamazoo College SMART Girls mentors and mentees will host the Art Hop reception from 6-7:30 p.m. at Edison Place, 1350 Portage St., in the Washington Square/Edison neighborhood. The exhibit was curated with the help of Jessica Mancino from the Boys and Girls Club, and funded through a generous grant from Linda DeRose Primavera ’77.

Four in an Evening

Posted on April 18, 2014March 24, 2022

The Kalamazoo College Bookstore will host an author event featuring readings by four writers with strong K connections. Gail Griffin (professor emerita of English) joins fellow English department faculty members Bruce Mills and Andy Mozina and Professor of Physical Education (and women’s volleyball coach) Jeanne Hess on Wednesday, May 14, from 6 PM to 8 PM in the Hicks Center Banquet Room. The four will read from current works that include Gail’s The Events of October, a compelling account of the murder-suicide on K’s campus in 1999; Bruce’s memoir An Archaeology of Yearning, a chronicle of family relationships (particularly with his son, Jacob) and the role of art (particularly storytelling) as a way to fulfill human yearning for contact between people whose ways of knowing may differ; Andy’s new collection of short stories, Quality Snacks, which will be fresh off the presses for the May event; and Jeanne’s Sportuality, an examination of the intersection of sports and spirituality. The event will allow ample time for Q&A. Books will be available for purchase; the authors will gladly sign them; and refreshments will be served. All are invited; let’s move the number four more toward four hundred.

Like Lit? Come to K …

Posted on March 25, 2014March 24, 2022

Dean of Kalamazoo area poets Con Hilberry — Con Hilberry, dean of Kalamazoo area poets, during a recent reading and celebration of his latest collection of poetry in the College’s Olmsted Room. Photo by Ly Nguyen ’14.

… would be the advice of an article by Anna Clark titled “Kalamazoo quietly emerging as a literary hot spot” that appeared in the Detroit Free Press and Lansing State Journal. Of course, K stands for Kalamazoo (the city) but certainly includes Kalamazoo College. The article quotes Bonnie Jo Campbell (author of American Salvage and Once Upon a River, among others) extensively, and Campbell has taught creative writing at K, and she has served as the College’s 2012 Summer Common Reading author. Literary prizes abound for Kalamazoo-area-related authors (Campbell has been a finalist for both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics’ Circle Award; David Small is a National Book Award finalist for his graphic memoir Stitches (and a former faculty member in K’s art department); and Western Michigan University’s Jaimy Gordon is the 2010 National Book Award Winner (Lord of Misrule). Kalamazoo College connections abound, as well. Campbell was a frequent member of a Monday night poetry class taught by Professor Emeritus of English and poet Con Hilberry (11 books, including, most recently, the highly acclaimed Until the Full Moon Has its Say). Campbell’s poems have appeared in Encore Magazine. Other former students of Con include published poets (and Kalamazoo residents and alumnae) Susan (Blackwell) Ramsey ’72 (A Mind Like This) and Gail (McMurray) Martin ’74 (Begin Empty Handed and The Hourglass Heart). Kalamazoo College Writer in Residence (and Kalamazoo resident and alumna) Diane Seuss ’78 will soon publish Four Legged Girl, which follows her two previous volumes of poetry (It Blows You Hollow and Wolf Lake White Gown Blown Open). Fiction writer and Professor of English Andy Mozina has published The Women Were Leaving the Men, and his new collection of short stories, Quality Snacks, is forthcoming. Professor of English Bruce Mills is currently on sabbatical promoting his new memoir An Archeology of Yearning. Mozina and Mills both reside in Kalamazoo. Professor Emeritus of English Gail Griffin (another Kalamazoo resident) is using her retirement to work on her next work. She is the author of the breathtaking “The Events of October”: Murder-Suicide on a Small Campus. Gail is also a published poet, and she has written a number of essay collections, including Calling: Essays on Teaching in the Mother Tongue and Season of the Witch: Border Lines, Marginal Notes. Yes, Kalamazoo College is the right place for literature. There may be no other place where it’s likely to go better.

New Old(er) Book

Posted on March 25, 2014March 24, 2022

Kalamazoo College alumnus Teju Cole — Teju Cole ’96 (photo by Chester Higgins Jr./New York Times)

Nigerian-American Teju Cole ’96 (nom de plume of Yemi Onafuwa) is coming out with a new old(er) book. This week Random House is publishing Every Day Is For the Thief, a work of fiction Cole wrote prior to his critically acclaimed novel Open City (published by Random House in 2011). The New York Times recently published an article on Cole (“In Words and Photos, Cramming in Life,” by John Williams, March 19, 2014). The article notes the liberal arts journeys of Cole, which include an original pre-med school undergraduate pathway that morphed into his B.A. (from K) in art and art history; master’s degrees in art history and philosophy; a Ph.D. (in progress) on Northern Renaissance Art, which may or may not be completed due, in part, to his recent deep explorations of writing and photography. Cole also has written for his alma mater. LuxEsto published his story on artist Julie Mehretu ’92 in Spring of 2011. Cole took the photographs for that article as well. According to Williams, Every Day Is For the Thief was inspired by Cole’s return trip to Lagos, Nigeria, after more than a decade away. Both books have in common the voice of a wandering narrator, though Open City opens the interior life of its narrator through its stream of consciousness style. “Every Day adopts the more simple perspective of a travel journal,” wrote Williams. “Like Open City, Mr. Cole said, it includes ’versions of some things that might have happened, and then things that are completely made up, but made up to look like they are memoirish.’” Cole is currently at work on a non-fiction book about Nigeria.

Teju Cole was also the subject of a New York Times Sunday Book Review Q&A posted March 6, a New York Observer Spring Arts Preview article posted March 10, and a National Public Radio interview on March 24.

Classmates’ Creativity

Posted on March 6, 2014March 24, 2022

Two junior writers are getting their creative work published widely. Kate Belew ’15 published three poems (“Marrow,” “Leaning Tower of Lady Liberty,” and “God Tree”) in the Fall 2013 issue of Minetta Review. Journey was the theme of that issue. Jane Huffman ’15 is an English and theatre arts major who also is publishing in quite a few places–including a recent interview in NewerYork.