Mar 22, 2012 | Intercom
Romance, passion, majesty and timeless beauty will fill the air Friday, April 13, 2012 when the Juan Siddi Flamenco Theatre Company, as part of their first national tour, brings the excitement of flamenco to the Milliken Auditorium of the Dennos Museum Center at Northwestern Michigan College with the award-winning flamenco dancer and choreographer Juan Siddi at 8 pm.
Tickets are $25 in advance, $28 at the door, $22 for Museum Members. Tickets may be purchased by calling the Museum Box office at 231-995-1553 or on line at www.dennosmuseum.org.
Joined by an array of sensual and powerful dancers, singers and musicians from Spain, France and the United States, Siddi will present a mixed repertory program, including the stunning work, “Encuentro” which was nominated in San Francisco, CA in 2009 for an Isadora Duncan Award.
Honored recipient of Santa Fe’s 2011 Mayor’s Awards for Excellence in the Arts, Artistic Director Juan Siddi and his Flamenco Theatre Company have made their mark in the world of flamenco with their unique, world-class artistry. The company has made appearances throughout the Middle East, Europe and the United States, and with their summer seasons in Santa Fe, NM.
Michael Wade Simpson of the Pasatiempo calls Siddi’s work “…a refined, intellectual… contemporary take on flamenco.”
Flamenco is a genre of music and dance that originated in Andalusia, Spain in the 18th century, influenced by Gypsy traditions going back to Rajasthan India. The development of flamenco can be traced back to the Middle Ages and the meeting and mixing of several musical traditions in Andalucia where African and Arabic music developed along with the Spanish guitar and its rhythms. During the Spanish Inquisition, groups of persecuted peoples – Romani, Greeks, Visigoths, Moors, and Jews – married their songs and dances of exile, despair, suffering, and also hope and celebration, with the ecstatic religious sounds of Andalucian music to produce flamenco, whose essence is duende.
Duende’s deep emotion is the ineffable mystery of life in art, song, music and dance. The Spanish poet and playwright Federico Garcia Lorca once said about duende: “The greatest artists of Spain, whether Gypsy or flamenco, whether they sing, dance, or play, know that no emotion is possible unless the duende comes. All arts are capable of duende, but where it finds greatest range, naturally, is in music, dance, and spoken poetry, for these arts require a living body to interpret, being forms that are born, die, and open their contours against an exact presence….It is truly deep, deeper than all the wells and seas in the world, much deeper than the present heart that creates it or the voice that sings it, because it is almost infinite.”
In November 2010, the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) deemed flamenco a cultural treasure on its Intangible Heritage List. Since 2007, Juan Siddi Flamenco Theatre Company has interpreted flamencoʼs depth and passion in highly regarded venues throughout Europe, the Middle East and the United States. Today, the Juan Siddi Flamenco Theatre Company is one of the top flamenco companies in the United States.
Artistic director, choreographer and principal dancer Juan Siddi will be joined by a cast of some of Spainʼs most authentic and world-class artists of today, among them singers Coral de los Reyes and Jose; guitarist Jose Valle, “Chuscales”; and cellist Michael Kott. Siddiʼs colorful array of female dancers will interpret his choreographies to traditional and original musical scores created by the talented cast of musicians.
Justin Nadir, executive producer and managing director for the company, says, “We are very excited to share the unique talent and artistry of the Juan Siddi Flamenco Theatre Company throughout the United States. A greater awareness of flamenco’s richness has been recognized over the past several years, and Juan Siddi Flamenco Theatre Company brings to audiences an unparalleled and world-class experience.”
Mar 22, 2012 | Intercom
The Dennos Museum Center at Northwestern Michigan College will host the exhibition Harvey Gordon: Recent Paintings from April 14 – June 17, 2012.
For nearly fifty years, Harvey Gordon’s art has reflected his life by depicting resonant aspects of his visual experience. In simpler terms, he paints what moves him in what he sees around him. His approach builds on the artist’s direct, unimpeded connection to his or her surroundings that blossomed with the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist movements during the late nineteenth century. His technique integrates major characteristics of Post-Impressionism and moves forward from it by incorporating contemporary materials and technology; a highly analytic method of execution; and a personal sensibility shaped in part by the dynamic, perplexing, self-conscious twentieth century. He seeks to balance convincing representation with an open, painterly surface while simultaneously striving for maximum grace and refinement in his brushwork. After succumbing periodically to the pressures of both commerce and ego to produce larger paintings, he determined, about ten years ago, that his aesthetic goals were best achieved, and his long standing natural inclination was best satisfied, by working on a smaller, more modest and intimate scale. The paintings in this exhibition are the result of that decision.
Gordon’s paintings have been exhibited widely, received several awards, and been the subject of eight one person exhibitions in New York City galleries and six in Michigan museums, including Flint, Grand Rapids, and Kalamazoo. His work has been collected by museums, corporations, and private collectors in this country and abroad. His writing on art and culture has been published in several periodicals, and he taught art at the college level for thirty years.
Harvey Gordon was born in Flint in 1941 and attended Flint Public Schools, the University of Michigan, Mott Community College, Cranbrook Academy of Art (BFA), and the University of North Carolina (MFA). He has lived in Michigan and vacationed in northern Michigan almost all his life and has lived in Glen Arbor since 2004.
This exhibition is supported by grants from the Michigan Humanities Council, Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs and the National Endowment for the Arts, Local support comes from the Robert T and Ruth Haidt Hughes Memorial Endowment Fund, TV 7&4 and WCMU Public Broadcasting.
The Dennos will host a program with Gordon as part of the exhibition:
Tuesday, April 17, 2012, 12:00 pm
Harvey Gordon will discuss his process, techniques, and work in his exhibit at the Dennos Museum Center
For more information on the program call Diana Bolander, Curator of Education and Interpretation at 231-995-1029 or check online at www.dennosmuseum.org.
Mar 22, 2012 | Intercom
The Dennos Museum Center at Northwestern Michigan College will host the exhibition The Art in War: Photographs by Benjamin Busch from April 14 – June 17, 2012
Benjamin Busch, author, photographer, and film-maker, was born in Manhattan and grew up in rural New York State. He graduated from Vassar College in 1991 with a major in Studio Art, and soon thereafter accepted a commission as an infantry officer in the United States Marine Corps. The prints to be featured in this exhibition were taken during to combat tours; April – September of 2003 and February – September of 2005
Busch writes of his photography, “On my first tour I was serving as the commanding officer of a Marine Corps Light Armored Reconnaissance company during the invasion, liberation and occupation of Iraq and, when security permitted me, I recorded the unique obscurities of the country from my perspective. On my second combat tour I captured images in and around the Iraqi city of Ar Ramadi, capitol of the Al Anbar Province. Serving in combat units during both deployments, I was restricted to capturing only one or two images each day due to my position and situation. Many of these photographs address politics, war, America and Iraq but they are also dedicated to abstraction and have a dialog with the history of works in painting, printmaking, drawing, sculpture, film and, of course, photography.
I am drawn artistically to environments that rely upon artifacts to define a human presence. I have always been fascinated by archeology and there is some of it in my photography. In some ways I am searching for things while they are still on the surface, while they are still informally displayed, before we wait long enough to consider them historical evidence. I am trying to catch the moment when what we consider common no longer draws any attention. The importance of these moments will not be noticeable until they become impossible to find. Cubism, symbolism, abstraction, icons and iconography, photography and photojournalism, portraiture and cave paintings are all referenced in these images and they are as much about the history and discovery of art as they are a particular record of Iraq. They demonstrate, in some ways, the perseverance and the necessity of artists to find art in their surroundings despite circumstance.
I tried to record Iraq as its past was dissolving and its future uncertain. Photographs allow me to hold on to what I notice as I pass through time and place. This collection is a condensed rearrangement of my selected memory from 398 days in Iraq. It grants me the right to assign longevity to impermanent observations. I am often drawn to record fragile evidence and temporary debris for this reason. The images that you see are moments that cannot occur again. What I photographed there has already been repainted, burned, or discarded. I only had one chance to take a photograph of any moment there. These are the chances that I took.”
Mar 22, 2012 | Intercom
The Dennos Museum Center is pleased to announce that the iconic folk/rock singer and songwriter Judy Collins best known for her recordings of songs such as Both Sides Now and Send in the Clowns will have a second performance in Milliken Auditorium on Thursday, June 7, 2012 at 7:30 pm.
With an impressive career spanning more than 50 years, Judy Collins has thrilled audiences worldwide with her unique blend of interpretative folksongs and contemporary themes. At 13, Judy Collins made her public debut performing Mozart’s Concerto for Two Pianos but it was the music of such artists as Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, as well as the traditional songs of the folk revival, that sparked Judy Collins’ love of lyrics. Judy Collins continues to create music of hope and healing, that lights up the world and speaks to the heart.
Tickets on sale now. All tickets are $30. Please note that those holding tickets for the June 5th Judy Collins performance may not exchange them for the June 7th performance.
Tickets may be purchased online at www.dennosmuseum.org or by calling the box office at (231) 995-1553. The box office is open for walk up sales from 3:00 – 5:00 PM Wednesday through Saturday.
Mar 9, 2012 | Intercom
The Dennos Museum Center, in collaboration with the Traverse Area District Library and Interlochen Center for the Arts has been selected to serve as a community host for the Great Michigan Read traveling exhibit, We Don’t Want Them, during the month of March. We Don’t Want Them will be on exhibit at the Dennos Museum Center March 11-18, 2012.
Focusing on race and housing in metropolitan Detroit, We Don’t Want Them examines the realities African Americans faced from 1900 to the present. A prominent feature of the exhibit is the Ossian Sweet trials which is documented in this year’s Great Michigan Read selection, “Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age” by Kevin Boyle. “Arc of Justice” is the true story of Dr. Ossian Sweet, an African American physician, and the events that followed after he purchased a home in an all-white Detroit neighborhood in 1925. Through reproductions of historic documents and photographs, viewers of We Don’t Want Them will learn about the causes and effects of residential segregation.
More information available here >>
