the arts paper may 2015

The Arts Paperartists next door 4 nhso 6 arts council at 50 8 college st music hall 18

a free publication of the Arts Council of Greater New Haven • newhavenarts.org May 2015

Cinematic DancesThursday, May 28 • 7:30pm • Shubert Theater

Bella Histrova, violin soloist • William Boughton, conductorWest Side Story • Bolero • The Sorcerer’s Apprentice • The Red Violin

203.562.5666 | NewHavenSymphony.org

2 • newhavenarts.org may 2015 •

staff

Cynthia Clair executive director

Debbie Hesse director of artistic services & programs

Kyle Hamilton director of finance

Matt Reiniger communications manager

Denise Santisteban events & advertising coordinator

Winter Marshall executive administrative assistant

David Brensilver editor, the arts paper

Amanda May Aruani design consultant

board of directors

Robert B. Dannies, Jr. president

Eileen O’Donnell vice president

Lois DeLise second vice president

Ken Spitzbard treasurer

Mark Potocsny secretary

directors

Daisy AbreuLaura BarrWojtek BorowskiSusan CahanTodd JoklCharles KingsleyKenneth LundgrenJocelyn MamintaJosh MamisElizabeth Meyer-GadonFrank MitchellMark MyrickUma RamiahDavid SilverstoneDexter SingletonLindsay SklarRichard S. Stahl, MDRick Wies

honorary members

Frances T. “Bitsie” ClarkCheever Tyler

The Arts Council of Greater New Haven promotes, advocates, and fosters opportunities for artists, arts organizations, and audiences. Because the arts matter.

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Brubeck Inspires

NHSO Program Reaches 10,000 Students

4 Artists Next Door

Greg Sherrod Sings the Blues

8 Music Hall Opens its Doors

College Street Venue Opens Anew

18Arts Council at 50

Reflections on the Organization’s History

6

may 2015

The Arts Paper

Cinematic DancesThursday, May 28 • 7:30pm • Shubert Theater

Bella Histrova, violin soloist • William Boughton, conductor

Featuring cinematic classical music soundtracks including West Side Story, Bolero, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, and The Red Violin, this NHSO concert will be the ultimate

surround sound experience!

203.562.5666NewHavenSymphony.org

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• may 2015 newhavenarts.org • 3

Letter from the editorIn this issue of The Arts Paper, we at the Arts Coun-cil celebrate the organization’s 50-year history. It’s a history that saw Audubon Street transformed from a tired industrial area to an arts district that’s home to several of the city’s beloved cultural institutions. The Arts Council’s history is the story of the people who believed 50 years ago that the arts could be an integral part of the city’s postwar redevelopment. Today, we at the Arts Council continue to believe that the arts community makes the city and the Greater New Haven region a special place to live, work, study, and create and engage with art. While some of the people who worked tirelessly five de-cades ago to nurture New Haven’s creative commu-nity and develop the city’s cultural landscape are no longer with us, many still are. And it was a pleasure to hear them describe the spirit and sense of pos-sibility that brought Audubon Street to life, created a Regional Cultural Plan that assessed the city’s cultural offerings and facilities, and raised millions of dollars, through the Greater New Haven Arts Sta-bilization Project, that bolstered the financial posi-tions of eight local arts institutions. As we celebrate what has been achieved, we should continue to find ways that our creative community can make the city and its environs a better place for everybody to live, study, and work, and create and engage with art. While the challenges we face today as a community are different than those that the city and region faced 50 years ago, the creative community is one that can always make a difference in people’s lives. We at the Arts Council remain inspired to help local artists and arts organizations do just that.

This issue of our monthly publication also in-cludes an article by Lucy Gellman about the College Street Music Hall and its history as the Roger Sher-man Theater and the Palace Theater, an Artists Next Door feature by Hank Hoffman about local sing-er-songwriter Greg Sherrod, and an article about multi-instrumentalist and composer Chris Brubeck’s residency with the New Haven Symphony Orches-tra, through which, between late February and the beginning of May, he’ll have worked with and performed for some 10,000 area public-school stu-dents. Also included in this issue of The Arts Paper is a column by local writer Ken Carlson about the New Haven Ballet’s Shared Ability Program, in which Carlson’s daughter participates. For our monthly Sounds Off feature, the Arts Council’s communica-tions manager, Matt Reiniger, spent an afternoon at Creative Arts Workshop learning the ins and outs of encaustic painting. We have yet to see the work he created.

The June issue of The Arts Paper will preview the International Festival of Arts & Ideas, which is cele-brating 20 years. We encourage you to take advan-tage of the extraordinary programs the festival has to offer, many of which are free.

We hope you enjoy the stories presented herein and that you’ll remember to recycle this print publi-cation once you’ve finished reading it. n

Sincerely,

David Brensilver, editorThe Arts Paper

In the next issue …

may 2015

The Arts Paper

On the Cover

Art Installation Specialists, LLCDesign, Installation, and Art Shippingartinstallationspecialistsllc@gmail.comartinstallationspecialistsllc.com

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D A S I LVA- G A L L E RY.C O M

Chris Brubeck (trombone) performs the world premiere of his Time Changes for Jazz Combo and Orchestra with Guilford High School students Joseph Boughton (trumpet), Christopher Vanacore (saxophone), Chris Worden (bass), and Michaeljohn Alio (guitar), and the New Haven Sym-phony Orchestra. See story on page 6.

The June 2015 issue of The Arts Paper will preview and cele-brate the 20th annual International Festival of Arts & Ideas, which takes place this year June 12-27. Among the many highlights of this year’s festival program is the Mark Morris Dance Group’s staging of George Frideric Handel’s opera Acis and Galatea. Photo by Ken Friedman, courtesy of IFAI.

may 2015

The Arts Paper


Projecting Emotion

Judy Sirota Rosenthal ~ [email protected] ~ www.sirotarosenthal.com

Photography

Intimate and Timeless

birth of a banana leaf

artists next door

hank hoffman

In some ways, singer Greg Sherrod is a 21st century version of novelist Ralph Elli-son’s Invisible Man. The mainstream media depiction of African Americans leans heavily on urban stereotypes. Yet, Sherrod noted in an interview at his home, “There have been generations of Black people growing up in the suburbs and trying to integrate themselves into the world.”

Sherrod, 51, grew up in Milford, part of a very small African American commu-nity in an overwhelmingly white town. His experience inspired the appropriately titled song “Milford” on his new record, Bluesnsoulnrocknroll. The tune explores Sherrod’s “love/hate relationship with my hometown.” Sherrod wrote or co-wrote all the songs on the disc.

On “Milford” Sherrod sings, “Oh Mil-

ford/Did you ever love me/Oh Milford/Did you ever care/Oh Milford/Did you ever love me/You made me the man I am today.”

“When I was growing up, it was working class and really racist. I had to hammer through a lot of bad experiences,” Sherrod recalled. “But also with that, there was a lot of love.” A large Irish-Catholic family took him into their home when he was a homeless teenager. “I would never be here doing anything if it wasn’t for their help.”

His experience of living between two cultures deeply informs his music. Reject-ing the narrowcasting and segmentation of modern music, Sherrod embraces a sound “beyond genre/race specifications.” He was trying to make a “universal re-cord.”

“I want to get to the point where ‘it’s just music, people.’ Not white music, not black music,” he said.

Sherrod makes his living working as a vocal coach and playing music, not an easy thing to do these days. (He likened the life of a musician to being a nun

—”You take a vow of poverty.”) Working with a core group of versatile musicians in three different ensembles — The Greg Sherrod Blues Band, GS Rocks, and the Greg Sherrod Duo — he performs con-stantly in both Connecticut and Rhode Island. The Ocean State is more partial to gutbucket blues; Connecticut warms more to his rock and funk material.

Sherrod got his start as a teenager, with classical voice training and musical-the-ater performances. He was a member of the Sound of Freedom Youth Choir as a teen and later worked professionally with Dandelion Children’s Theater. Mu-sical theater, he said, “taught me how to perform and how to project my voice.” In 2007, Sherrod participated in the NBC musical reality TV show Clash of the Choirs, as part of a Christmas choir assem-bled by New Haven native Michael Bolton through an open audition process.

Sherrod recorded Bluesnsoulnrocknroll with producer Eric Lichter at Dirt Floor Studios in Chester. Sherrod credited Lichter with being “instrumental in making

sure this record got done properly.” They sought an organic sound, recording much of the material live and avoiding “anything that resembled over-production.”

The record’s title embraces the three related kinds of music Sherrod performs: blues, soul, and rock and roll. But the well-spring is the blues.

“It’s music with emotion. Blues has an emotional content that no other music — maybe opera — has,” Sherrod asserted. “Blues is the record of Jim Crow America. The emotion in it is something that is em-pathetic.

“Although the blues has gone from the African-American community to the white, middle-class community, I believe the emotion in it is universal,” Sherrod said. “Everyone knows trials and tribula-tions. Everyone wants to purge bad emo-tions.”

The emotion is what inspires Sherrod as a singer. But how does he keep his voice in shape singing such music? He told me that teaching vocal skills to others helps reinforce his fundamentals.

greg sherrod sings the blues

may 2015

The Arts Paper


Greg Sherrod. Image courtesy of the artist.

“I find that teaching my students helps me stay in tip-top shape. My voice is better and stronger than

when I was younger.” — Greg Sherrod

“I have a classical background. I studied with a lot of really great teachers,” Sherrod said. “I find that teaching my students helps me stay in tip-top shape. My voice is better and stronger than when I was younger.”

Those fundamentals came in handy when Sherrod auditioned for Clash of the Choirs on a dare. Although Bolton’s choir finished fourth out of five, Sherrod said he took a lot from the experience. Bolton was the celebrity face of the choir. But the nuts and bolts of arranging the music and coaching the singers were left to vocal handler Sheldon Becton, one of the best in the business.

“You get to study with this guy for a couple of weeks — they paid me for that!” enthused Sherrod. “He taught me how to use falsetto as my natural range. Before, I was strictly a belter. Now I can be more sensitive, when I want to be.”

The show also afforded Sherrod a glimpse into machinery of fame. “I got to see the amazing Oz behind the curtain — how big-TV works,” said Sherrod. “It’s all about getting people to bargain their lust for fame. Is it enough to be famous? Or do you want to have fame on your own terms? Is it OK with you to be famous and then let everybody pick all your songs, tell you what to wear and tell you who to be? Or would you rather be more holistic or more natural?”

It made Sherrod realize, “Fame isn’t important to me. In fact, I don’t think I’d like it.”

What he does like is performing music

for a wide range of audiences. As he sings in “Milford,” his experience growing up in the suburbs made him stronger.

“We play gigs for people from all walks of life because of the kind of music we play. We plays [shows] from the ghetto to the richest of the rich,” Sherrod said. He played the inauguration of Yale Univer-sity President Peter Salovey. “You have to know how to deal with all kinds of people and all kinds of situations or you won’t make any money.” n

may 2015

The Arts Paper


Young People’s Guide to the Orchestrabrubeck engages with public-school studentsdavid brensilverphotos courtesy of nhso

s of the first week of this month, Chris Brubeck will have worked with or performed for some 10,000 area

public-school students through his residency with the New Haven Symphony Orchestra. The collaboration began in late February and continues through the early part of this month with the multi-instrumentalist and compos-er joining the NHSO for a series of Young People’s Concerts featuring a program of American music.

Over the course of 10-or-so weeks, Bru-beck gave workshops in area schools and presented lectures around town. In March, he joined the NHSO at the Shubert Theater for a program called “Ansel Adams, Bernstein & Brubeck,” which featured Ansel Adams: Amer-ica, a work he composed with his father, the legendary jazz artist Dave Brubeck (images of Adams’ iconic images were projected onto a screen above the orchestra during the per-formance); his Concerto for Bass Trombone and Orchestra; the world premiere of Time Changes for Jazz Combo and Orchestra, which the NHSO commissioned; Leonard Bernstein’s Overture from Candide; and Duke Ellington’s Suite from The River.

This year’s NHSO’s Young People’s Con-certs, titled “Red, White & Brubeck,” were programmed to showcase works by Amer-ican composers, including Chris and Dave Brubeck, Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, and W.C. Handy.

In late February and early March, Brubeck spent a week at Wilbur Cross High School, observing students in various music classes and ensembles.

Ellen Maust, who supervises performing- and visual-arts programs in the New Haven Public Schools, said, “He was wonderful with them,” and that his presence in their music classes and rehearsals “made everything rele-vant for them.”

Talking about his experience at Wilbur Cross, Brubeck said, “I was really, really im-pressed by how good the music teachers were and how devoted they were, and how great a rapport they had with these kids.”

Jeremy Barnes is the school’s band director,

and Danielle Storey-Carson directs the choir. Of the students themselves, Brubeck said,

“They’re really engaged … music really turns them on.”

While he, too, was engaged with music by an early age, growing up in the musical environment that he did, Brubeck was raised in Wilton, Conn., where there’s less ethnic and economic diversity than there is in New Haven.

“I would guess that Wilbur Cross is a highly unusual school by anyone’s standards any-where,” he said, “because it’s really diverse and [has] a real mixture of backgrounds of kids that go there.”

The week he spent with students and teachers at Wilbur Cross reinforced for him that “arts programs are incredibly important” in terms of inspiring young people and mak-ing school an enjoyable experience. He was pleasantly surprised to observe some of the courses that he did, including a recording-arts class taught by Barnes.

Brubeck was also impressed to learn, while he’s been in town, about the Yale School of Music’s Music in Schools Initiative, which was

launched in 2007 with an endowment from the Yale College class of 1957 to support the music programs in New Haven Public Schools. Through the initiative, Yale School of Music students supplement the work that music teachers are doing in area public schools.

Brubeck also talked about El Sistema, the classical-music-focused social-action pro-gram in Venezuela that was designed in the 1970s by José Abreu to improve the lives of impoverished young people. It’s an incred-ible program that’s being implemented all over the world, including here in the United States, in part thanks to Gustavo Dudamel, the rock-star conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic who participated in the program in his native Venezuela and since 1999 has directed the now-famous Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra.

Among the other places Brubeck found promise during his time in and around New Haven was Guilford High School. After he and members of the NHSO identified the school as one to focus on with an eye to the above-mentioned commission, Brubeck vis-ited the school in October to listen to its jazz ensemble. Quickly, he singled out a quintet of young musicians — guitarist Michaeljohn Alio, trumpet player Joseph Boughton, drum-mer Liam Doolan, saxophonist Christopher Vanacore, and bassist Chris Worden — as the group for which he’d write Time Changes for Jazz Combo and Orchestra, a piece he “thought would be challenging but not impos-sible for them to play.”

Brubeck, the quintet from Guilford High School, and the NHSO premiered the work at the Shubert Theater in March.

“It was hard and it was challenging,” he said, “but they completely rose to it. I am so proud of how well they did.”

At the end of April, Brubeck returned to the area for the NHSO’s Young People’s Con-certs, and to do more school workshops and perform with students at Wilbur Cross High School, before his residency ends during the first week of this month.

Talking about the Young People’s Concerts, he pointed out how important it is to give kids a chance to hear an orchestra perform live.

“There is something very spiritual about hearing the music played by an orchestra,” he said.

Just as orchestras should be reaching out to young people to provide new cultural expe-riences, they also need to be doing so to en-gage young people who might be tomorrow’s ticket buyers or board members.

“As musicians, we need to invest in young people to make them more culturally minded,” Brubeck said.

The NHSO, clearly, is doing that, while simultaneously championing the music of American composers, an important piece of advocacy that hasn’t gone unnoticed by Brubeck.

“There’s always a pressure to make sure that you have people coming to concerts and putting fannies in the seats,” he said, pointing out that some concertgoers are ambivalent about hearing works by composers who aren’t yet dead.

Orchestras like the NHSO are doing im-portant work by programming pieces by American composers — including living ones like Brubeck — alongside works from the standard repertoire.

“New Haven is doing a really good job of having that attitude,” he said, adding, “William Boughton has been very fantastic and sup-portive and encouraging with me.”

Boughton has also embraced the integra-tion of jazz into the classical-music environ-ment, something that Brubeck’s “been doing for many, many years.”

“My father was one of the first guys to re-ally try to integrate jazz combos in front of an orchestra, and he did that with Leonard Bern-stein in the ’60s,” Brubeck said. “So I grew up thinking that that was quite possible and quite natural when it was a new wild and wacky thing to do at first. So I experienced that it’s quite feasible to do it and I’ve been doing it ever since.” n

A

Chris Brubeck (far right) with Wilbur Cross High School students and music teacher Jeremy Barnes (far left).

Chris Brubeck rehearses Time Changes with Guilford High School students Christopher Vanacore (saxophone), Joseph Boughton (trumpet), Michaeljohn Alio (guitar), Chris Worden (bass), and Liam Doolan (drums).

may 2015

The Arts Paper


A Moving Experience observing new haven ballet’s shared ability program

ken carlson

ebruary and March seem to bring snow every Saturday. One by one, the parents and their children trudge in

from the slush and icy walkways as dusk falls on Audubon Street. Some have driven more than 30 miles to be here. My wife and I are here with our daughter. All the kids walking in from the cold have special needs ranging from learning disabilities to physical challenges that make it a struggle to even walk. We have all come so they can join teenage members of the New Haven Ballet in the rehearsal studio and dance as part of organization’s Shared Ability Program.

Brad Roth is the group’s director and is responsible for the choreography. After the students pair up with the special-needs visitors they’ve gotten to know through weekly rehearsals, the teams warm up and go through a series of exercises. Roth moves actively among them, calling out suggestions and positive reinforcement over the music. Like an artist with a fresh canvas, he watches for the patterns that develop from the wide range of talent and challenges that his dancers possess — how their movements can be shaped organically — with the result fueling the crux of their performance as part of New Haven Ballet’s annual spring performance at Cooperative Arts and Humanities High School in May.

As a parent watching the rehears-als, I watch for special moments, not in far-reaching leaps and turns, but in subtle connections made between the dancers, as well as the joy they receive from this phys-ically expressive art form, and at times, the simple act of play. One moment, the focus is a gentle ballet-influenced gesture with their arms and hands reaching out with their fingertips. The next, it’s time to let loose and boogie to Pharrell Williams’ “Happy.”

The process is not always easy and ex-pectations need to be realistic. There are times when the kids with special needs get frustrated, get tired, need to take a moment before they return to the floor. At times, the New Haven Ballet students get confused by the direction their counter-parts have chosen, or lose their sense of give and take, or their focus in connecting with their partners. For all the romantic ideas a program like this offers, no one ever said performance was easy. It requires work, the ability to rebound from setbacks, and, especially in this atmosphere, pa-tience.

One of the intriguing facets of the pro-gram for Roth is the relationships that blos-som between the dancers and how those relationships are expressed on the stage.

“I like it because it’s a two-way street,” Roth says. “The ones with disabilities don’t know a lot about dance, but the ones who are here two or three years pick up more and more. They’re so present, heartfelt, and not self-conscious; all these things we try to be when we dance. To be so present with the audience is what these kids bring right away.”

As Lisa Sanborn, New Haven Ballet’s

artistic director describes it, the Shared Ability Program is part of the organiza-tion’s community outreach mission.

Praising the work of her volunteering students, Sanborn says, “These kids [NHB students] are here early in the morning for technique class. Then they have rehears-als all afternoon. Then they stay every week until six because they want to do it.”

The program, which is in its seventh year, is administered by the ballet’s office manager, Ruth Barker, a former dancer.

“There is no other program like it,” Barker says. “We wanted it to be open so it [dance] could be enjoyed by every-body.”

As the rehearsal winds down, the special-needs dancers get a chance to spotlight the moves they’ve worked on with their partners. Applause rings out from the group, and from the parents. They say goodbye, put on their winter coats, and exchange a series of hugs. As a parent who has attended several of these rehearsals, I feel the pride of the work my daughter has put into it, and the happi-ness that goes with seeing her happy.

But I also think back to the end-of-year performance last May, when I was seated next to audience members who had no connection with this program, no day-in/day-out familiarity with it. I remember the hushed tones when the dancers took the stage. I remember the emotional reaction to the stand-out moments and the looks on the performers’ faces. And I remember the final bow being met by a powerful wall of applause and the tears the men and women in the audience shed in thanks for what had been shared. n

New Haven-based writer Ken Carlson wrote this piece in late March.

F

Photo by Jeffrey Kerekes, courtesy of New Haven Ballet.

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david brensilver

or 50 years, the Arts Council of Greater New Haven has existed to make the city a more culturally vibrant

place to live, work, visit, and create art. The organization began, effectively, as a develop-ment agency whose mission was to breathe life into a neighborhood and a city that was in an important period of transition under the watch of Mayor Richard Lee. In 1964, two ide-alistic Yale University students, Jon Jory and Harlan Kleiman, found help in the community to create Long Wharf Theatre and locate the organization in the New Haven Food Termi-nal. Meanwhile, downtown, the folks at and around Neighborhood Music School, which was then located in the Wooster Square neighborhood, and those at the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, who wanted to move from Woolsey Hall to a venue of their own, began thinking about finding new homes. Just as he did with the effort to launch Long Wharf Theatre, C. Newton Schenck III, a young law-yer at Wiggin and Dana who sat on the city’s development commission, got involved with the effort to find homes for Neighborhood Music School and the New Haven Sympho-ny Orchestra, whose supporters formed an organization to make that happen.

It’s worth mentioning that Schenck didn’t particularly think of himself as a champion of the arts — although he most certainly was. He was, as onetime Arts Council director Frances “Bitsie” Clark remembers, one who considered himself a bricks and mortar guy with a terrific interest in the postwar redevelopment of New Haven.

What is now Audubon Street was then a dying manufactur-ing center at a time when factories were fast becoming part of the city’s history, leaving blight as they became vacant and were torn down. It was a perfect spot, those involved with the newly formed Arts Council believed, for an arts center, a des-tination for those seeking culture and a home for existing arts organizations. Schenck pointed out, amid the dreaming, that a concrete plan was needed, and, with that advice followed, one was created. With funding and support from the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven (then the New Haven Foundation), the city, and the National Endowment from the Arts, the Arts Council became the agency through which Audubon Street would be developed as an area where people could live, work, create, and engage with the arts. Architect Charles Brewer was hired to make it happen.

While the symphony opted out of being part of the plan,

over concerns that the Farmington Canal Heritage Trail could bring rail service through the immediate area, Neighborhood Music School, in 1967, bought from the city (whose State Street Redevelopment Plan was created the following year) plots of land on the block. The departure of Congregation Mishkan Israel, which had moved to Ridge Road in Hamden in 1960, had left vacant the grand Span-ish Baroque building on the corner of Orange Street, which a newly established magnet school, ACES Educational Center for the Arts, renovated and moved into in 1972. That year, Creative Arts Workshop moved its operations from the basement of the Mishkan Israel building to a home of its own across the street, having originally oper-ated in the John Slade Ely House on Trumbull Street.

As quickly as things had developed since the Arts Council was formed in 1964, including the Arts Council’s purchase of the McLagon Foundry building (where the Arts Council and New Haven Symphony had offices) and the construction of public housing in the form of the Charles T. McQueeney Towers, plans to further develop the block to include a plaza, a parking garage, and other commercial and retail space slowed to a halt.

In a document prepared for current Arts Council Execu-tive Director Cynthia Clair when she arrived in New Haven in 2007, Clark wrote, “By 1974 the Audubon development began to experience serious setbacks. … The Arts Institu-tions were thriving on the street but the Council’s efforts to build its second phase of commercial development seemed to be seriously stalled. For the next seven years Audubon Street looked like a failure of grandiose urban planning. The parking garage never got built. The Lincoln Theater sat at the end of Lincoln Street gradually becom-ing a derelict building; the once grand plaza became a

Building a Cultural Community

F

Left to right: Newton Schenck, chair of the Audubon Development Committee, Richard Lee, Biagio (“Ben”) DiLieto, Frank Logue, and John Daniels, at the dedication of 70 Audubon St., in

summer 1990.

Before it was Audubon Arts on the Edge, the festival was known as Art on the Edge and

was originally part of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas program.

Left to right: Arts Council Director Bitsie Clark, Audubon Court developer George

Lawrence, the Fusco Corporation’s Lynn Fusco, Arts Council President Judith Bald-

win, and Arts Council Vice President Henry Harrison, with a model of Audubon Court.

The Arts Council

may 2015

The Arts Paper


concrete wasteland full of weeds and broken bollards and benches. The rest of the land on Audubon were potholed and muddy surface parking lots used by the Arts Schools’ faculties and administered by the Arts Council.”

During that period, Biagio “Ben” DiLieto, who succeeded Lee as mayor in 1980, having been elected in November 1979, sought to continue some of the initiatives undertaken by his predeces-sor. It was always part of the vision that the development of Audubon Street would create a revenue stream that would flow back to the Arts Council.

In 1983, Clark became the Arts Council’s director, a significant moment for the organization, whose board of directors at the time was chaired by Gerald Kagan. Two years later, Clark and the Arts Council began working with developer George Lawrence to finish the job of turning Audubon Street into a welcoming and thriving arts district. The Arts Council purchased city property on the block for $1 per square foot and Lawrence built the condominiums and parking garage that now sit on the north side of Audubon Street. While in 1996 the condominium association purchased the land on which those residences sit, the Arts Council still holds the lease for 55 Audubon St. (the office building and parking garage on the northeast cor-ner of Whitney Avenue and Audubon Street). The revenue from that land hold continues to support the Arts Council’s operating budget.

In the late 1980s, plans were con-ceived for a building at 70 Audubon St. that would house the Arts Council’s offices and Artspace. In 1990, those plans were realized, though they’d grown to include a home for the Community Foundation. Eventually, Artspace sold its piece of the building to the ECA, from which the New Haven Ballet rents space.

In the mid-1990s, with all the bricks and mortar finally in place, the Arts Council and representatives from Yale Uni-versity, the City of New Haven, the Community Foundation, and the business and philanthropic communities, embarked on an effort to assess the cultural climate and facilities of the Greater New Haven area, and to develop a strategy to strengthen the city’s arts sector. The consulting firm Wolf As-sociates was hired to create what would become A Regional Cultural Plan for Greater New Haven. The effort was largely ad-ministered by the Arts Council, which served as the fiduciary for the project, whose goal was “to build strategically upon our region’s significant base of arts and cultural offerings, in order to advance an ambitious economic agenda.” Originally, attorney Nan Birdwhistell was appointed director of the initia-tive, and Maryann Ott, who’d worked at United Illuminating, and Zannette Lewis, who worked at the International Festival of Arts & Ideas, served at the Arts Council as Regional Cul-tural Plan program directors. In the second year of the three-year project, Betty Monz, who’d been working at Creative Arts Workshop, was brought in to run the Regional Cultural Plan, which, on paper, was its own entity, administered by the Arts Council.

Monz said it was a “fun and vibrant time to be involved in the arts in New Haven,” and that, with regard to the city’s arts and cultural organizations, “we realized that the whole was greater than the sum of the parts.”

As important as it was for the city’s arts organizations, the Regional Cultural Plan was also a turning point for the Arts Council’s operations.

“The Regional Cultural Plan allowed the Arts Council to ad-equately staff itself,” Ott said. “It allowed the Arts Council to do the very much needed … cohesive development of services and support for the region’s artists and arts institutions and the neighborhood artists and arts institutions.”

The plan, in other words, gave the Arts Council resources with which to serve the creative community.

“It was kind of a glory time,” Ott said, adding that the ethos generated by the work “inspired the Arts Council staff to be as creative as they were called to (be).”

At the time, Ott said, “Bitsie’s personality was the Arts Council.” It was a period during which an “appreciation for the Arts Council’s role in the community was evolving.”

In 2002, Monz who’d been working since 2000 for the Arts Council on the Regional Cultural Plan, succeeded Clark as the organization’s executive director. It was Monz, Ott said, who secured a line item for the organization in the state budget.

“That was huge,” Ott said.A massively important part of the Regional Cultural Plan

was the establishment of the Greater New Haven Arts Stabi-lization Project, an initiative modeled on a national program that helped bolster the finances of eight local arts organi-zations (Creative Arts Workshop, Guilford Art Center, the International Festival of Arts & Ideas, Long Wharf Theatre, Neighborhood Music School, the New Haven Museum, the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, and the Shubert Theater) and helped them plan for better fiscal futures.

Launched in 2001, the Stabilization Project raised — thanks in large part to local arts champions Barbara Pearce and Sumner Crosby Jr. (who served as president of the Arts Coun-cil’s board of directors) — $5 million, including $2 million from

the state and $1 million from the Com-munity Foundation, which served as the seven-year program’s fiduciary agent.

“The Arts Council was basically in charge” of the Greater New Haven Arts Stabilization Project, Community Foun-dation President and CEO Will Ginsberg said.

In Monz’s words, the Stabilization Project was about “getting organiza-tions to think differently about how they programmed, how they served their audiences.”

The funds that were raised were par-celed out as working capital reserves to the eight aforementioned organizations as they met certain strategic goals. The program was a way of shoring up exist-ing organizations during a period when there was a sense that those institutions were in a chronic state of economic crisis. Ott pointed out that the capital reserves raised for those organizations came in handy during the recent reces-sion.

Today, the Community Foundation is continuing the spirit of that work and has developed a strategy to “bring the arts organizations back together again” and build on “the lessons of the Arts Stabilization Project,” Ginsberg said. The strategy’s focus, he said, is to help arts organizations develop and diversify audiences and address current financial challenges.

Clair, the Arts Council’s current exec-utive director, views the development of Audubon Street and the work the Arts Council did on the Regional Cultural Plan and the Greater New Haven Arts Stabi-

lization Project as “significant accomplishments that indicate the Arts Council’s leadership of the arts in New Haven.” Those efforts, she pointed out, were also responses to the needs of the arts community.

The Arts Council has, over 50 years, existed to serve the needs of that community. For many years, it organized Audu-bon Arts on the Edge, a family-friendly event that grew out of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas. More recently, the Arts Council presented live performances on CT Transit buses as part of a program called Exact Change, organized an initia-tive, funded by the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, in which a group of local arts organizations focused on innovation strat-egies, and created a smart-phone application called ANDI (arts, nightlife, and dining information), which is available for download.

Today, the organization produces The Arts Paper (whose calendar section lists member organizations’ programs and events), advocates in Hartford for state support of the arts, and organizes exhibitions at a diverse collection of ven-ues. It hosts a monthly arts-focused radio show on WPKN and a monthly writers’ circle event, maintains an online community bulletin board and cultural database, awards community-engagement grants designed to encourage local artists and arts organizations to create accessible cultural experiences, and offers one-on-one advice to artists work-ing in and around the community. And each year, the Arts Council hosts the Arts Awards, a fundraising event at which members of the arts community are recognized for their extraordinary work.

What began as an effort to find new homes for a few arts organizations has turned into 50 years of promoting and supporting the Greater New Haven arts community. With regard to Audubon Street itself, Ginsberg said, “The vision of turning this into an arts district has come to task in an ex-traordinary fashion. It took a generation to do. It’s a fantastic story, and the Arts Council has been at the center of it.” n

To learn about the Arts Council’s programs, visit newhavenarts.org.

Arts Council of Greater New Haven staff showcases the soon-to-be completed New Haven Foundation Building. Left to Right: Bill Storandt,

BVA Associate Director; Soonil Chun, Treasurer; Elga Taylor, Secretary-Receptionist; Virginia Taylor, Health Plan Director; Marcy Schuck,

BVA Director; Mimsie Coleman, Publications Director; and Jack Fitzgerald, Editorial Assistant.

“The vision of turning this into an arts district has come to task in an

extraordinary fashion. It took a generation to do. It’s a fantastic story, and the Arts Council has

been at the center of it.”—Will Ginsberg

may 2015

The Arts Paper


80 Audubon St, New Haven • 203 562 4927 • creativeartsworkshop.org

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203-782-9038 | www.newhavenballet.org

Summersession

July 6–31

Summersession

Summer Arts Programs 2015

may 2015

The Arts Paper


Sculpture on the Threshold: An Inquiry into the Underlying Forms of Sculpture

Delivered by penelope curtis

Director of Tate Britain

April 16, 21, 23, 28, and 305:30 pm

Held at the Yale University Art Gallery and the Loria Center

Visit britishart.yale.edu for more information.

Supported by the Yale Center for British Art and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art

2015 paul mellon lectures

John Cheere, Sleeping Nymph (Ariadne), Stourhead, Wiltshire, late eighteenth century, painted lead, photo © National Trust/Paul Barkshire

Image: George Stubbs, A Lion Attacking a Horse, 1770. Oil on canvas. Yale University Art Gallery, Gift of the Yale University Art Gallery Associates

YALE UNIVERSIT Y ART GALLERYFree and open to the publicTues.–Fri. 10 am–5 pm | Thurs. until 8 pm (Sept.–June) | Sat.–Sun. 11 am–5 pm 1111 Chapel Street, New Haven, Connecticut | 203.432.0600 | artgallery.yale.edu

The Critique of ReasonThrough July 26, 2015

Romantic Art, 1760–1860

The first major collaborative exhibition between the Yale University Art Gallery and the Yale Center for British Art

matt reiniger

When I saw the catalog for Creative Arts Workshop’s spring offerings, I was intrigued by a workshop being taught on encaustic painting (also known as hot wax painting). I’m an artist, I paint, I thought, so why not try something a little different? I had seen some artwork featuring a painted medium with faces that rose from the canvas in sculpted relief, and I thought someone told me it was encaustic. I was in.

I began my adventure by trying something else new — trying to park during New Hav-en’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade. Shortly after an invigorating hike to Creative Arts Workshop, class instructor and encaustic artist Binnie Bi¬rstein gave the encaustic hopefuls a crash course in the medium.

Encaustic wax painting began with the Egyptians. The medium consists of wax bits mixed with pigments on an electric griddle, which becomes a color palette. It’s all about being hot. The brush should be hot, the wax is hot, obviously, and the board or surface of one’s picture should be warmed. You paint, and then you fuse the layers of wax with a hot air gun (not a hairdryer, which will blow too hard). You can build opaque layers and carve into them, or use transparent layers that blend the colors. Those are the basics. Of course there is much more. “I thought with

encaustic painting you could build up the wax for a sculptural effect,” I said to Birstein. She looked me in the eyes and said, “You can, but don’t look at me!” — I was breaking the rule I had just been told: not to look away while fusing layers with the hot air gun — “Let’s see if you can handle building up layers first.”

When you start something new, it can be both frustrating and liberating. On the one hand, you don’t know what you’re doing, and the results are unsure. But on the other, it’s just a playful experience. Since the whole thing is kind of a mess, you don’t have to worry about messing something up. Or at least that’s how my table mate Radhika saw it, and why she liked working in this new medium. “In acrylics or something else, I’m afraid to work in abstract, but with this I can loosen up, it doesn’t matter. I usually feel like I need to paint real things,” Radhika said.

I asked my other classmates if they had done encaustic before (none had) and why they were taking the class. Most were paint-ers, like me, who work in different mediums and were interested in trying something new. One hoped to integrate encaustic painting with her regular work for a hybrid effect.

Birstein said that working with encaustic is like painting with history, since its greatest effects come from exposing its many layers of color. In my first piece, a small square board to which I had been dutifully applying

layers of wax, the revelation of history through my cutting and melting wasn’t so pretty, but I sup-pose history can be muddy, too. Next we got to work on larger matte boards. This time I tried to marry my regular painting techniques with the new medium. With encaustic, there’s no blending color by brush on the surface. Once it’s down, it’s set, unless you work into it with heat, so it requires bold action. I laid down sweeping waves of green and blue with opaque white. I thought it was abstract, but then I realized something like a red dawn over a sea was coming out. There was even an in-teresting tactile effect of white where it bub-bled up over the previous layers. “You get that from doing cool on cool,” Birstein said, “but you didn’t know that.” At least the accidents were working in my favor this time.

Radhika had also created a larger work with sweeping lines of color. Birstein asked her about it and she said she didn’t know what she was doing. But when I looked at the picture just before the end of the workshop

I told her, “I know you said this is abstract, but that really looks like an island and a palm tree.”

“Yes, I know. I couldn’t help it. I drew the tree with the oil stick,” she said.

But by the time we shared our work she was rubbing out the tree with a paper towel, and the piece had once again attained an indeterminate sense of place and space. “I’d like to take another class,” she said, “and con-tinue to work on this piece.”

I believe she felt as I did, that encaustic was not just a new medium, but a chance to explore another part of oneself through art. n

Matt Reiniger is the Arts Council’s communications manager.

the ac sounds off on...

Exploring a New Mediumlearning about encaustic painting at caw

Matt with workshop instructor Binnie Birstein. Photo (detail) by Judy Sirota Rosenthal.

Classes & Workshops ACES Educational Center for the Arts 55 Audu-bon St., New Haven. 203-777-5451. aces.org/schools/eca. Creative Dramatics. Quality acting classes for kids and teens offered on Saturdays, through May. Ages 8-11 and 12-16 years. Call Ingrid Schaeffer, chair, theatre department, at 203-795-9011 or email [email protected] 9-10:30 a.m. and 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Please call or write for more information.

Connecticut Natural Science Illustrators Yale Peabody Museum Community Education Center, 230 West Campus Drive, Orange. 203-934-0878. ctnsi.com. Art Classes in Natural Science Illustration. We offer a wide range of courses from beginning drawing to mixed-media painting, botanical drawing, and plein air sketching at the West Campus Urban Farm. Visit website for more information. Mon-day-Saturday, 10 a.m. -4 p.m., May 31-August 25.

Creative Arts Workshop 80 Audubon St., New Haven. 203-562-4927. creativeartsworkshop.org. Spring Classes and Workshops. Creativity is in bloom! Explore your creative side with classes and workshops for adults and young people in book arts, design, drawing, painting, fiber, fashion, jewelry, photography, pottery, printmaking, and sculpture. The spring session runs through June 5. See the course brochure or visit the website for dates, times, and fees. Register online!

JCC of Greater New Haven 360 Amity Road, Woodbridge. 203-387-2522. jccnh.org.Brush and Bordeaux Painting Class. Join us in the JCC Living Room for a painting class, complete with wine and hors d’oeuvres, with local artist Betsy DeMarco. Call Anne Grant at 203-387-2522 x. 300 or email [email protected]. Wednesday, May 6, 7-9 p.m. $30/person.

Royal Scottish Country Dance Society Whitney Arts Center, 591 Whitney Ave., New Haven. 203-281-6591. rscdsnewhaven.org. Scottish Country Dancing. Enjoy dancing the social dances of Scotland. Come alone or with a friend. All dances taught. Wear soft-soled non-street shoes. Every Tuesday evening through May. $8 per evening. First night free. 7:45 – 10 p.m.

Studio Brodo 44 Via San Gemma Galgani, Borgo a Mozzano, LU Italy. 203-458-1720. studioborgoart.com. Painting in Tuscany. A dream vacation for painters. Connecticut artist Eileen Eder will take a small group of students to the beautiful historic city of Lucca, Italy. Studio Borgo will provide accommo-dations, workday lunches, all materials (except brushes), easels, and transportation to classes. Email [email protected]. May 25-June 6, May 20-25, and June 1-5. Visit studioborgoart.com/reservations for pricing.

Dance1-2 Friday-SaturdaySpring Dance Concert Student choreographers

present works created after a full year of dance composition studies. 8 p.m. Patricelli ’92 Theater, Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, 213 High St., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

3 Sunday Worlds of Dance Concert “Introduction to Dance” and beginning dance students perform works of various styles, including Bharata Natyam (South In-dian classical dance). 2 p.m. Crowell Concert Hall, Wesleyan Center for the Arts, 50 Wyllys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

9 SaturdayAnnie Sailer Dance Company and Chloe Carlson Works in-progress/contemporary dance series. 3 p.m. Trinity Lutheran Church, 292 Orange St. (at Wall), New Haven. Suggested donation: $10.

ExhibitionsArtspace 50 Orange St., New Haven. 203-772-2709. artspacenh.org. Vertical Reach: Political Protest and the Militant Aesthetic. An exhibition that uses the current po-litical climate in Eastern Europe as a framework to explore how acts of protest and assembly behave when presented as artistic practice. The show brings together socially engaged works by collec-tives and individuals from Russia, Poland Ukraine, and the United States. On view through May 2. Wednesday-Thursday, 12-6 p.m.; Friday-Satur-day, 12-8 p.m.

Blue Z Coffee House 127 S. Main Street (Route 25), Newtown. 646-258-6912. Diane Pollack Monotypes. Works by Diane Pollack. On view May 8-May 28. Reception: Saturday, May 15, 4-6 p.m. Live jazz! Free to the public.

Congregation Beth Shalom Rodfe Zedek Gallery 55 East Kings Highway, Chester. 860-526-8920. PeterWnekPhoto.com. Soul of the Landscape. Arts Council member Peter Wnek presents Soul of the Landscape, an exhibi-tion of fine art photography celebrating the beauty and spirit of woodlands and waterways. On view May 8-July 28. Opening reception: June 7, 4-7 p.m. Event details available online. Free.

Davison Art Center Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, 301 High St., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa. Personal Recollections: Gifts from Robert Dannin and Jolie Stahl. Inspired by anthropological theories of gift-giving, Jolie Stahl and Robert Dannin recently donated a collection of 69 prints, photographs, and multiples to the Davison Art Center, which includes artwork from New York in the 1980s and 1990s, and iconic news photographs from the Magnum Photos cooperative. On view through May 24. Tuesday-Sunday, 12-4 p.m. Free.

Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery Wesleyan Univer-sity Center for the Arts, 283 Washington Terrace, Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa. Thesis Art Exhibition. Zilkha Gallery showcases the work of students from the class of 2015 in the Department of Art and Art History’s Art Studio Program. Each student is invited to select a single

As part of its Spring Jazz Series, Firehouse 12 presents For Living Lovers: Brandon Ross and Stomu Takeishi on May 30. Photo by Ralph Gibson.

may 2015

The Arts Paper


CALENDAR

A Body in Fukushima, a collection of images and video created by dancer-choreographer Eiko Otake (pictured in Fukushima in 2014) and photographer William Johnson, is on view at Wesleyan University’s College of East Asian Studies Gallery at

Mansfield Freeman Center through May 24. Photo by William Johnson, courtesy of Wesleyan University CFA.

work from his or her Senior Thesis Exhibition for this yearend showcase of drawing, painting, printmaking, photography, sculpture, mixed media, and architecture. On view through May 23. Tuesday-Sunday, 12-5 p.m. Free. Reception: May 23, 2-4 p.m.

Fred.Giampietro Gallery 1064 Chapel St., New Haven. 203-777-7760. giampietrogallery.com.Katherine Bradford. Opening reception: Friday, May

1, 6-8 p.m. On view through June 13. Monday-Sat-urday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m., or by appointment. Free.

Green Street Teaching and Learning Center Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, 51 Green St., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.Muslim Women’s Voices — A Photography Ex-hibition. The Muslim Coalition of Connecticut coordinates an exhibition of photography focused on Muslim women in America as part of “Muslim Women’s Voices at Wesleyan.” This exhibition showcases photographs that challenge stereo-types of Muslim American women and explores the diversity and complexity of this community. On view through May 29. Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. through May 8; Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. thereafter. Closed on Monday, May 25. Free. Guilford Art Center Gallery One, 411 Church St., Guilford. 203-453-5947. galleryoneCT.com. The Artists of Gallery One. Member and guest artists include Jill Vaughn, David Brown, Helen Cantrell (guest artist), Ashby Carlisle, Catherine Christiano, Bette Ellsworth, Mary Fussell, Gray Jacobik, Judith Barbour Osborne, T. Willie Raney, Diana Rogers, Victoria Sivigny, and Elizabeth Lockhart Taft (guest artist). On view April 24-May 9. Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Sunday, 12-4 p.m. Closing reception and artists talk: Satur-day, May 9, 2-4 p.m. Free. Teapots, Vessels, Flagons, and Flasks. Guilford Art Center is pleased to announce this juried exhi-bition of pourable containers made by contem-porary American artists. Juried by studio potter Hayne Bayless, this exhibit puts the spotlight on

creative and up-to-date renditions of these most traditional forms. Exhibit sponsored by The Spice & Tea Exchange. May 15-June 14. Opening recep-tion: May 15, 5-7 p.m. Monday-Friday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Sunday, 12-4 p.m. Admission is free.

JCC of Greater New Haven Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven, 360 Amity Road, Wood-bridge. 203-387-2522. jccnh.org.In the Shadows: A Photography Exhibit by Aviva Klein. This traveling photography is a portraiture exploration of agunot, also known as “chained women.” Agunot are women who have been un-able to procure a gett, or divorce document, from their husbands, so they cannot remarry. This is a serious issue in the Orthodox Jewish world. On

view May 4-July 30 during building hours. Recep-tion and Panel: Sydney Perry, Rachel Light, and exhibiting artist Aviva Klein will appear on a free panel to discuss the issues surrounding agunot, or “chained women,” on Monday, May 4, 7:30 p.m. Free.

Kehler Liddell Gallery 873 Whalley Ave., New Haven. 203-389-9555. kehlerliddell.com.Incipient Speciation. Will nature survive the evo-lution of the human race? Artists Rod Cook and Gar Waterman respond in this exhibition of pho-tography and sculpture. On view through May 3. Opening Reception: May 3, 3-6 p.m. Visit website or call for more information about this and upcom-ing shows. Free.

may 2015

The Arts Paper


Y institute of sacred music

Performances · Lectures and morePresenting

Great Organ Music at Yale · Yale CamerataYale Schola Cantorum · Yale Literature and Spirituality Series

and more

For latest calendar information call 203.432.5062 or visit ism.yale.edu

BEINECKE RENOVATIONThe Beinecke Library’s iconic building is

closing for renovations. The reading room

will close on Friday, May 8. The public

exhibition space will remain open through

Monday, May 18. The building will reopen

in September 2016.

A temporary reading room will open in the

Franke Family Reading Room in Sterling

Memorial Library on Tuesday, May 19.

For details and updates on the project’s

progress, visit [email protected]

Garrison Keillor appears at Southern Connecticut State

University’s John Lyman Center for the Performing Arts

on May 17. Photo by Andrew Harrer, Bloomberg News,

courtesy of the Lyman Center.

Knights of Columbus Museum 1 State St., New Haven. 203-865-0400. kofcmuseum.org.Answering the Call: Service and Charity in the Civil War. As America marks the 150th anniversary of the end of its Civil War, the Knights of Columbus Museum commemorates the event with an exhi-bition that features the involvement of Catholic soldiers, chaplains, and nurses during the four-year conflict. On view through September 20. Open daily, 10 a.m-5 p.m. Free admission and parking. Mansfield Freeman Center Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, 343 Washington Terrace, Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.A Body in Fukushima. A haunting series of color photographs and videos presented in a ground-breaking exhibition. Last year, dancer-choreog-rapher Eiko Otake and photographer-historian William Johnston followed abandoned train tracks through desolate stations into eerily vacant towns and fields in Fukushima. On view through May 24. Tuesday-Sunday, 12-4 p.m. Free.

New Haven Free Public Library Ives Main Branch, 133 Elm St., New Haven. 203-387-4933. nhfpl.org.Atlantic and Southwestern Rocks — Photography by Victoria Navin. “I have been taking photographs for many years, but it is only in the last few years that I have been able to give full rein to my enthusiasm for photography!” writes Victoria Navin. “Among my favorite subjects are trees, rocks and boulders, bodies of water, landscapes, and roof-scapes. On view through May 26. Monday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-8 p.m.; Friday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m Free and open to the public.

New Haven Museum 114 Whitney Ave., New Haven. 203-562-4183. newhavenmuseum.org.From Clocks to Lollipops: Made in New Haven. This exhibition at the New Haven Museum, highlights

an astonishing variety of goods that were, and some that still are, produced in the Elm City. Featuring more than 100 objects, advertisements, trade cards, and photographs, with a wide-ranging and sometimes humorous look at the products made in New Haven. On view through May 30. Open Monday-Saturday and the first Sunday of the month. Adults $4, seniors $3, students $2, those younger than 12 admitted free. An Artist at War: Deane Keller, New Haven’s Mon-uments Man. During WWII, Monuments Men — soldiers whose job it was to protect cultural heritage during wartime —were dispatched, for the first time. Deane Keller of New Haven was among them. The New Haven Museum presents a special exhibit celebrating Keller’s life and his contributions to the preservation of many of the world’s iconic works of art. On view through May 9. Visit website for dates and hours. Winfred Rembert: Amazing Grace. This is the first major retrospective of the work of New Haven resident Winfred Rembert, whose art on leather conveys his compelling personal narrative of joy and struggle during the tumultuous moments of the American civil rights movement. On view through June 21. Dates, hours and admission vary. See website for details. Paul Mellon Arts Center Choate Rosemary Hall, 332 Christian St., Wallingford. 203-697-2398. choate.edu/boxoffice.Student Artwork Exhibition Featuring Arts Concen-tration Seniors. On view through June 7. Artist re-ception: May 10, 4-5:30 p.m. Open daily, 9 a.m.-9 p.m., when school is in session. Free.

Senior Center of the Miller Memorial Library Hamden Public Library, 2901 Dixwell Ave., Ham-den. 203-287-2682. hamdenlibrary.org/miller.Stephany Cousins Retrospective. Her vivid, impres-

sionistic florals, portraits, and seascapes will be on view as well as a new series of abstracts enti-tled Jazz and the French Curve. A past president of the Hamden Art League, which is sponsoring the show, Cousins is also a member of Connecti-cut Women Artists, Connecticut Pastel Society, and the New Haven Paint and Clay Club. On view May 5-June 23. Monday-Friday, 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Free.

Whitney Humanities Center 53 Wall St., New Haven. 203-432-0670. yale.edu/whc/GalleryAtTheWhitney/current.html.Queer Migrations: Family, Identity, and Place. In this exhibit, photographer Sunil Gupta explores issues of cultural displacement or transposition, investi-gating the theme of individual identity as it exists within the broader context of social mores and conventions. Two pivotal bodies of photographs, “Homelands” (2001-2003) and “Mr. Malhotra’s Party” (2007-), are featured. On view through May 20. Monday-Wednesday, 3-5p.m. or by ap-pointment. Free.

Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History 170 Whitney Ave., New Haven. 203-432-5050. peabody.yale.edu/events/cretaceous-quintet.Samurai and the Culture of Japan’s Great Place. This exhibit brings to life the many-layered history of the samurai and those they ruled — a history full of drama and paradox. In the 1500s, samurai nearly destroyed the Japanese state during inces-sant wars. But, after 1615, they presided over 250 years of peace, the longest that any large society has ever known. On view through January 3, 2016. Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Sunday, 12-5 p.m. $5-$9. Yale University Koerner Center for Emeritus Faculty 149 Elm St. (2d floor), New Haven. 203-432-8227. Rosner Paintings and Print Exhibit. A retrospective exhibition of 30 water-color paintings and prints by Daniel E. Rosner, Yale University professor emeritus (chemical engineering). On view week-days (except May 18) through May 29. Phone ahead to avoid possible conflicts with occasional scheduled events. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Free admission.

Yale University Art Gallery 1111 Chapel Street, New Haven. 203-432-0600. britishart.yale.edu/exhibitions/ critique-reason-romantic-art-1760-18.The Critique of Reason: Romantic Art, 1760-1860. The first major collaborative exhibition between the Yale University Art Gallery and the Yale Cen-ter for British Art, The Critique of Reason offers an unprecedented opportunity to bring together treasures of the Romantic art movement from the collections of both museums. On view through July 26. Tuesday-Friday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m.; Thursday, 10 a.m.-8 p.m. (September–June); and Saturday–Sunday, 11 a.m.–5 p.m. Admission is free and open to the public.

Film 5 Tuesday Above and Beyond An excellent documentary by Nancy Spielberg about the American pilots who volunteered in Israel during the War of In-dependence and made a huge impact. Call Hil-ary Goldberg at 203-387-2424 x. 325 or email [email protected]. 7 p.m. Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven, JCC of Greater New Haven, 360 Amity Road, Wood-bridge. 203-387-2522. jewishnewhaven.org. 17 Sunday Havana Curveball Ezra Academy will present a Cuban-inspired dinner and a screening of the documentary. Call Anne Grant at 203-387-2522 x. 300 or email [email protected]. 6

p.m. Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven, JCC of Greater New Haven, 360 Amity Road, Woodbridge. jewishnewhaven.org.

Galas & Fundraisers 1 Friday May Day Soirée Celebrate a new era at Neigh-borhood Music School at our May Day Soirée, a community dance party for parents, young pro-fessionals, and their friends. Held in the Park of Arts behind NMS, the party features live music, beverages from local breweries and wineries, and great food from local restaurants such as Caseus and L’Orcio. Come meet Dan Gurvich, NMS’s new Executive Director! Contact Julius Stone, events and volunteer coordinator, at [email protected] or 203-624-5189, ext. 17. Neighborhood Music School, 100 Audubon St., New Haven. 203-624-5189. neighborhoodmusicschool.org.

3 Sunday The Afro-Semitic Experience, a Jazz Concert Benefitting Christian Community Action The Afro-Semitic Experience was co-founded by David Chevan, a professor at Southern Conndecti-cut State University and member of Congregation Mishkan Israel. It has been described by famed jazz critic Nate Hentoff as “a lyrically powerful fusion of Jewish and jazz souls on fire.” May 3. Christian Community Action, Inc., Unitarian Soci-ety of New Haven, 700 Hartford Turnpike, Ham-den. 203-777-7848. ccahelping.org.

8 Friday Black and White Gala Inspired by Truman Capote’s iconic “Party of the Century” at the Plaza Hotel in 1966, the Black and White Gala cele-brates elegance and style with signature cocktails, dinner and dancing, live music, and an auction. All proceeds will benefit Guilford Art Center’s education and community programs. Guilford Art Center, 411 Church St., Guilford. 203-453-5947. guilfordartcenter.org.

9 Saturday Full Steam Ahead: CAW’s 54th Anniversary Gala and Auction Join us starting at 5 p.m. to celebrate and support a vibrant future for Creative Arts Workshop! Call 203.562.4927 to purchase tickets today. Silver Sponsor: Northern Trust. Creative Arts Workshop, 80 Audubon St., New Haven. 203-562-4927. creativeartsworkshop.org.

Kids & Families

Chapel Haven 1040 Whalley Ave., New Haven. 203-432-2800. britishart.yale.edu/education/children-and-families.Exploring Artism. A free program for families with children who are 5 to 12 years of age, and on the autism spectrum. Participants learn to look and respond to artwork, engage in group conversa-tions, complete an art project, and more. Pre-reg-istration is required. May 16. 10:30 a.m.-12 p.m.

Elm City Dance Collective Connecticut Capoe-ira and Dance Center, 1175 State St., Suite 207, New Haven. 860-451-9421. elmcitydance.org/youth-camps. Creative Movement Workshop for Ages 7-10: Forces of Nature. Taught by professional ECDC company members, these creative movement workshops are designed for 7-10 year-olds and will focus on creative movement, improvisation, creation, and performance. We will focus on harnessing the characteristics of forces of nature to can help us create dance. Saturday, May 2, 2-3:15 p.m. $7 per class. Need-based free spaces available upon re-quest. Preregistration recommended. Email [email protected].

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Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Art Spiegelman presents a talk called “What the %@&*! Happened to Comics?” on May

14 at the JCC of Greater New Haven, as part of the organization’s Beckerman Lecture Series.

Photo by Enno Kapitza, Agentur Focus.

Creative Movement Workshops for Ages 10-13: Mak-ing a Creative Culture. These creative movement workshops are designed for 11-13 year-olds and will focus on creative movement, improvisation, creation and performance. We will focus on how to use improvisation as a tool for creating dance compositions. Saturday, May 2, 3:30-4:45 p.m. $7 per participant. Need-based free spaces available upon request. Preregistration recommended. Email [email protected].

Music 1 Friday Experimental Music for Vocal Quartet Four members of the New York Virtuoso Singers, under the direction of Harold Rosenbaum, will present a concert of new and recent music for voice by Wesleyan University graduate students and oth-ers. 8 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, Crowell Concert Hall, 50 Wyllys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

2 Saturday Wesleyan University Orchestra featuring Concerto Competition Winners The Wesleyan University Orchestra, under the direction of ad-junct assistant professor of music Nadya Potem-kina, presents a winning dish from October 2014’s

“à la carte” menus — the audience voted for Mod-est Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition —and the winners of the Wesleyan University Concerto Competition. 8 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, Crowell Concert Hall, 50 Wy-llys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

Harmonic Convergence: Another Octave Marks 25th Year Another Octave presents a concert featuring musical collaborations to celebrate our 25 years of making music together. Rousing pop faves to close jazz harmonies, quiet love ballads to treasures from Broadway stage. Same concert in Hamden on May 9 at 7 p.m. Unitarian Society of New Haven, 700 Hartford Turnpike, Hamden. $15-$30. Tickets available through website. Another Octave: Connecticut Women’s Chorus, Unity of Greater Hartford, 919 Ellington Road, South Windsor. 203-672-1919. anotheroctave.org.

3 Sunday “Middle Kingdom” in Middletown — A Night of Chinese Music The Chinese Music Ensemble presents its spring semester concert including music from traditional and contemporary rep-ertoire. Co-directed by graduate students Joy Lu and Ender Terwilliger. 7 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, World Music Hall, 40 Wyllys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

4 Monday Ebony Singers Spring Concert An evening of great gospel music by Wesleyan University’s Ebony Singers under the direction of Dr. Marichal Monts ’85 will sooth your soul and lift your spirits. 8 p.m. $7 general public; $6 senior citizens, Wes-leyan University faculty/staff/alumni, non-Wes-leyan students; $5 Wesleyan students. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, Crowell Concert Hall, 50 Wyllys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa. 5 Tuesday South Indian Voice and Solkattu Students of adjunct assistant professors of music B. Bala-subrahmaniyan and David Nelson will perform an annual recital of music from the Karnatak tradition of South India. Performances will fea-ture vocal and instrumental music, percussion, and solkattu (spoken rhythm). 7 p.m. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, World Music Hall, 40 Wyllys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

WesWinds Spring Concert The Wesleyan University Wind Ensemble, under the direction of John Spencer Camp Professor of Music Neely Bruce, performs an exciting array of pieces for winds and percussion. 8 p.m. Free. Wesleyan Uni-versity Center for the Arts, Crowell Concert Hall, 50 Wyllys Ave., Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

7 Thursday Annual Organ Romp The annual Organ Romp features wacky and wild programming: silly music, unlikely music to be played on the organ, new music, guest artists, and a themed costume suggestion — watch for the poster and come join the fun! 10 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, Memorial Chapel, 221 High St., Mid-dletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

8 Friday Great Organ Music at Yale: Martin Jean Mes-siaen: Meditations on the Mystery of the Holy Trinity. 7:30 p.m. Free. Yale Institute of Sacred Music, Christ Church Episcopal, 84 Broadway, New Haven. 203-432-5062. ism.yale.edu/event/great-organ-music-yale-martin-jean-0.

West African Drumming and Dance Con-cert An invigorating performance filled with the rhythms of West Africa, featuring choreographer Iddi Saaka and master drummer Abraham Adzen-yah with their students in three levels of “West African Dance” courses, plus guest artists. 3 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, CFA Courtyard, 283 Washington Terrace, Mid-dletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa. MUSC 220 Final Concert Final concert of elec-tronic and media works by students in Music 220, “Composing, Performing, and Listening to Experimental Music,” taught by Music Depart-

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The jazz trio Spectral (Darren Johnson, trumpet; Dave Rempis, saxophone; and Larry Ochs, saxophone) appears at Firehouse 12 on May 22as part of the venue’s Spring Jazz Series. Image courtesy of Firehouse 12.

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ment Chair, professor of music, and director of the Electronic Music and Recording Studios, Ronald Kuivila. 8 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Center for the Arts, CFA Hall, 287 Washington Terrace, Mid-dletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

9 Saturday Harmonic Convergence: Another Octave Marks 25 Years of Women Making Music Harmonic Convergence will feature rousing faves off pop charts, close jazz harmonies, quiet love ballads, and treasures from the Broadway stage. This is the eclectic mix that singers and our audience enjoy and have come to expect. The same concert will be presented at Unity of greater Hartford, 919 Elling-ton Road (Route 30) in South Windsor on May 2. 7 p.m. $15-$30. Tickets available through website. Another Octave: Connecticut Women’s Chorus, Unitarian Society of New Haven, 700 Hartford Turnpike, Hamden. 203-672-1919. anotheroctave.org.

10 Sunday Greater New Haven Youth Ensembles Winter Concert Neighborhood Music School’s Greater New Haven Youth Ensembles present a spring concert at Battell Chapel. All four auditioned ensembles — Concert Orchestra, Concert Band, Symphonic Wind Ensemble, and Youth Orchestra — will perform. Tickets are available for purchase at the door. 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. $10 adults, $5 seniors and children 12 and younger. Neighborhood Music School, Battell Chapel, Yale University, 400 College St., New Haven. 203-624-5189. neighborhoodmusicschool.org. Student Vocal Recital 2 p.m. Paul Mellon Arts Center Recital Hall, Choate Rosemary Hall, 332 Christian St., Wallingford. 203-697-2398. choate.edu/boxoffice.

13 Wednesday Jazz Department Recital Come hear Neighbor-hood Music School jazz students of all ages play for friends, family, and other students. 7:30 p.m. Free and open to the public. Neighborhood Music School Recital Hall, 400 College St., New Haven. 203-624-5189. neighborhoodmusicschool.org.

15 Friday Student Instrumental Ensembles Concert 8 p.m. Free. Seymour St. John Chapel, 66 Curtis St., Wallingford. 203-697-2398. www.choate.edu/boxoffice

16 Saturday Renee B. Fisher Competition for Young Pia-nists — Winners’ Concert This concert features winners of the Renee B. Fisher Competition for Young Pianists, who all live or attend school in Connecticut. This includes winners in the elemen-tary/middle and high school divisions and best performances of commissioned works. The Fisher Competition aims to nurture the growth and devel-opment of young pianists. 7:30 p.m. Free and open to the public. Neighborhood Music School Recital Hall, 400 College St., New Haven. 203-624-5189. neighborhoodmusicschool.org. Music Haven Presents The Haven String Quar-tet is joined by special guests Michael Reynolds (Muir String Quartet) and violist Jesse Holstein (Providence String Quartet) to present the music of Mozart, Boccherini, and Schubert. Unitarian Society of New Haven 700 Hartford Turnpike, Hamden. Tickets available at musichavenct.org/concerts. 7:30 p.m. $20, $10 students, seniors and USNH members. 203-745-9030. musichavenct.org.

17 Sunday Student Choral Concert 7 p.m. Free. Seymour St. John Chapel, 66 Curtis St., Wallingford. 203-697-2398. choate.edu/boxoffice.

21 Thursday Music Haven Rush Hour Concert VI Wind down after work with a 40-minute show and a glass of

a wine. Explore Bach’s “Goldberg Variations for String Trio” (performed by Netta Hadari, Tina Lee Hadari, and Philip Boulanger) in a relaxed setting, and discover what makes the music brilliant. Admission: $8 ($5 students/seniors). 5:30 p.m. $Music Haven, 117 Whalley Ave., New Haven. 203-745-9030. musichavenct.org.

24 Sunday Student Instrumental Recital 3 p.m. Free. Paul Mellon Arts Center Recital Hall, Choate Rosemary Hall, 332 Christian St., Wallingford. 203-697-2398. choate.edu/boxoffice.

28 Thursday Classics Series: Cinematic Dances The New Haven Symphony Orchestra’s 121st season concludes with four memorable themes from the silver screen. 7:30 p.m. $15-$74, students $10, KidTix free with accompanying adult. Shubert Theater, 247 College St., New Haven. 203-865-0831. NewHavenSymphony.org.

30 Saturday Music Haven Presents: The Haven String Quartet The Haven String Quartet performs the music of J. S. Bach among sculpture installations by artist Susan Clinard. Proceeds benefit the Eli Whitney Museum Scholarships for the children of IRIS and Music Haven’s High School Fellowship. Suggested donation: $20. 7 p.m. Eli Whitney Barn, 916 Whit-ney Ave., New Haven. 203-745-9030. musichavenct.org.

31 Sunday Neighborhood Music School Rock Fest Please join us for performances from the NMS Rock En-sembles, as well as solo performances by NMS private-lesson students. Food and refreshments available for purchase. Plenty of room to dance! 2-5 p.m. Free and open to the public. The Space, 295 Treadwell St., Hamden. 203-624-5189. neighborhoodmusicschool.org.

Special Events9 Saturday Feet to the Fire — Riverfront Encounter An afternoon featuring live music, visual art installa-tions, plein air painting, a kids activity zone, envi-ronmental exhibits, and much more to bring you closer to the rich culture, history, and science of the Connecticut River. 12-5 p.m. Free. Harbor Drive, Middletown. 860-685-3355. wesleyan.edu/cfa.

ArtWalk The 18th annual ArtWalk Festival show-case hundreds of Connecticut talents on the streets of Westville. Performers will be showcases their talents alongside an array of live music, good food, and art vendors. A once-a-year event. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Free and open to all ages. 24 Fountain St., New Haven. 203-285-8539. westvillect.org.

12 Tuesday May Meeting and Artist Demonstration Oil painter Rita Curtis will demonstrate using Notan, a guiding principle of Eastern art and design, which focuses on the use of light and dark, positive and negative space, and recognizing the important identity of both shape and background. She studied at the Art Students’ League, at New York Univer-sity, and in Italy. Coffee and conversation at 7 p.m., brief business meeting at 7:15 p.m., artist’s demon-stration at 7:30 p.m. Free and open to the public. 2901 Dixwell Avenue, Hamden. 203-494-2316. hamdenartleague.com.

Talks & Tours5 Tuesday A Celebration of Silent Sounds Celebrate the writing excellence of students in Middletown Pub-lic Schools, grades six through 12, and hear their winning submissions of essays, short stories, and

poetry from the annual literary magazine Silent Sounds. 6:30 p.m. Free. Wesleyan University Cen-ter for the Arts, CFA Hall, 287 Washington Terrace, Middletown. 860-685-3355.

wesleyan.edu/cfa.

6 Wednesday Preservation Trust Lecture Author Colin M. Ca-plan will present “Romancing the Vernacular: Love and Loss in Preservation,” a talk about lost 19th century New Haven architecture. 5:30-7 p.m. Free and open to the public. The Graduate Club, 155 Elm St., New Haven. 203-562-5919. nhpt.org.

14 Thursday Beckerman Lecture Series: “What the %@&*! Happened to Comics?” Featuring Art Spiegelman, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Maus and “father of the modern graphic novel.” The Beckerman Lecture Series features significant presenters on contemporary topics that shape our world and community. 7:30 p.m. Tickets per lecture: $12 for JCC Members, $15 for non-members. JCC of Greater New Haven, 360 Amity Road, Woodbridge. 203-387-2522. jccnh.org/lecture-series.

TheaterCinderella Italiano! Award-winning Pantochino Productions presents this wildly wonderful musical version of the classic Cinderella story set in Italy, featuring a Godmother with an offer no one can refuse! Ba-da-bing, ba-da-boom, it’s a ball! Through

May 9. Visit website for show times. All seats $18 online, or $20 at the door. 40 Railroad Ave. South, Milford. 203-937-6206. pantochino.com.

Matilda the Musical The Tony Award-winning mu-sical tells the story of an extraordinary girl who dreams of a better life. Based on the beloved novel by Roald Dahl, Matilda has won 47 international awards and continues to thrill sold-out audiences of all ages. “Matilda is the best musical since The Lion King!”—Time Magazine. May 16-23. Visit web-site for show times. Price varies by seat location. Shubert Theater, 247 College St., New Haven. 203-562-5666. shubert.com.

New Haven Symphony Orchestra: Cinematic Dances The NHSO’s 121st season concludes with four memorable themes from the silver screen, fea-turing violinist Bella Hristova. May 28. 7:30 p.m. Shubert Theater, 247 College St., New Haven. 203-562-5666. shubert.com.

Hairspray A girl achieves her dream of performing on a TV dance show in 1960s Baltimore in this musical version of the 1988 John Waters film. In 2003, the Broadway production won eight out of 13 Tony nominations including best musical, and best performance for a lead actor and actress. It was produced by Choate alumni Tom Viertel ‘59. May 28-June 6. Visit website for show times. Adults $20, senior citizens 65 years and older and non-Choate students $15. 332 Christian St., Wall-ingford. 203-697-2398. choate.edu/boxoffice.

The Brentano String Quartet appears on May 13 in Morse Recital Hall, in Sprague Memorial Hall, as part of the Yale School

of Music’s Oneppo Chamber Music Series. Photo by Bob Handelman.

Call For Artists For The Shoe Fits: A Juried and Invitational Exhibition of Handmade American Shoes. Guilford Art Center, June 26-August 2. Entry Deadline: May 15. This exhibition will present contemporary handmade shoes by American craftsmen, devoted to what might be considered a “lost art” and cre-ating objects designed to be functional as well as beautiful. Open to U.S. residents. For more infor-mation visit guilfordartcenter.org.

Artists Smithtown Township Arts Council seeks entries for its 37th Annual Juried Fine Art exhibi-tion at the Mills Pond House Gallery, St. James, New York. Exhibit dates: June 27–July 22. Entry deadline: May 22. Open to local and national art-ists. Juror: David H. Reuss. Prospectus available at stacarts.org/exhibits, by calling (631) 862-6575, or sending email to [email protected]. $45/up to three entries. Cash prizes. A call for original artwork (drawing, painting, illustration, sculpture). No photography.

Artists For Arts Center Killingworth’s 2015-2016 Spectrum Gallery exhibits, including the October Autumn Arts Festival and Gallery Show. Seeking fine artists and artisans in all media. For artist submission, visit spectrumartgallery.org or email [email protected]. Spectrum Gal-lery and Store, 61 Main St., Centerbrook.

Artists Creative Arts Workshop is looking for an installation artist(s) for its annual August Installa-tion. This installation will be viewable through the two-story street-front windows of CAW’s Hilles Gallery during the month of August. Proposal sub-mission deadline: May 31. For guidelines and more information, please contact the Gallery Coordina-tor at CAW at 203-562-4927 or email [email protected].

Artists Smithtown Township Arts Council seeks entries for its 34th Annual Juried Photography Exhibition at the Mills Pond House Gallery. Entry deadline June 15. Exhibit Dates August 8-August 30. Open to local and national artists. Prospectus available at stacarts.org/exhibits.

Artists The Gallery Review Committee of The New Alliance Gallery at Gateway Community Col-lege is looking for artists to submit their resumes and images for possible exhibition in the 2015 and 2016 calendar years. Please send your resume and cover letter along with a DVD of no less than 20 and no more than 25 images to: Gallery Review Committee, Gateway Community College, 20 Church St., Room S329, New Haven.

Artists The Tiny Gallery: a very big opportunity for very small art. The Tiny Gallery is a premiere space for “micro” exhibitions in the historic Audubon Arts District, located within the lighted display “totem” outside Creative Arts Workshop, at 80 Audubon St., in New Haven. The Tiny Gal-lery is open to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Submissions will be considered on a rolling basis and should include a written proposal, artist statement, and images of artwork. Call 203-562-4927 x. 14, email [email protected], or visit creativeartsworkshop.org/tiny.

Artist Members Kehler Liddell Gallery in New Haven is seeking applications from new prospec-tive members. Visit kehlerliddell.com/membership for more information.

Photographers Are you a fan of photography? A program of the Arts Council of Greater New Haven, the Photo Arts Collective aims to cultivate and support a community of individuals who share an interest in photography through work-shops, lectures, exhibitions, portfolio reviews, group critiques, and special events. The Photo Arts Collective meets the first Thursday of each month at 7 p.m. at the Kehler Liddell Gallery, 873 Whalley Ave., New Haven.

Singers The award-winning Silk’n Sounds Chorus is looking for new members from the area. We invite women to join us at any of our rehearsals to learn more. We enjoy four part a cappella har-mony in the barbershop style, lively performances, and wonderful friendships. Rehearsals are every Tuesday from 6:30-9 p.m. at the Spring Glen United Church of Christ, 1825 Whitney Ave., in Hamden. Contact Lynn at 203 623-1276 for more information or visit silknsounds.org.

Volunteers Learn new skills, meet new people, and be part of a creative organization that gives to the community. Upcoming volunteer oppor-tunities: Jazz NightOut Concert at The Katharine Hepburn Cultural Arts Center in Old Saybrook and October Outdoor Autumn Arts Festival on the Madison Town Green. Teens are welcome and earn community-service credit. The Arts Center Killingworth is a non-profit arts organization. Visit artscenterkillingworth.org for more details or call 860-663-5593.

Volunteers Volunteers are a vital part of Artspace’s operation. Volunteering with Artspace is a great way to support the organization, meet new people, and develop new skills. Our volun-teers provide a service that is invaluable to making Artspace function smoothly. We simply couldn’t operate without the tremendous support of our volunteers. To find out more about volunteer opportunities, please contact Grey Freeman at [email protected].

Services Art Consulting Services Support your creativity! Low-cost service offers in-depth artwork analy-sis, writing, and editing services by former arts newspaper editor, current art director of the New

Haven Free Public Library, and independent curator of many venues. Call Johnes Ruta at 203-387-4933, visit azothgallery.com, or send email to [email protected].

Art Installation Specialists, LLC An art-handling company serving homeowners, art profession-als, offices, galleries, and museums. We offer packing, long-distance or local shipping, and in-stallation of paintings, mirrors, plaques, signage, tapestries, and sculpture, as well as framing, pedestals, exhibit design, and conservation. Con-tact Paul Cofrancesco at 203-752-8260, Gabriel Da Silva at 203-982-3050, email [email protected], or visit artinstallationspecialistsllc.com.

Art Supplies For Sale Artist downsizing: For sale: stretchers, primed and unprimed canvas rolls, stretched canvases, frames, glass, studio furniture, huge beautiful paper, and more. Please contact [email protected] Formerly Bethany Art Studio, now located in Hamden.

Birthday Parties Did you know that Creative Arts Workshop is available for birthday parties? Have your birthday party in an art studio. CAW faculty members will lead the party in arts or crafts projects, lasting approximately 1 1/2 hours, leaving time for cake, presents, and memo-ry-making. Choose from a variety of themes and projects. For more information or to schedule a party, call the office at 562-4927. A fantastic idea for children of all ages.

Chair Repair We can fix your worn-out chair seats if they are cane, rush, Danish cord, Shaker Tape, or other woven types! Celebrating our 25th year! Work is done by artisans at The Associa-tion of Artisans to Cane, a project of Marrakech, Inc., a private nonprofit organization that pro-vides services for people with disabilities. Open Monday-Thursday, 8 a.m,-4 p.m. 203-776-6310.

Japanese Shoji Screens Designed for Connecti-cut homes. Custom built for windows, doorways, or freestanding display, they allow beautiful fil-tered light to pass through while insulating. For a free quote, contact Phillip Chambers at 203-888-4937 or email [email protected].

Modern Dance Instruction Modern dance classes based on the Hawkins technique taught by Annie Sailer. Intermediate level, young, and mature dancers welcome! Visit anniesailer.com. Classes offered Mondays, 6-7:30 p.m., and Thursdays, 4:15-5:45 p.m., through May 28. $15 per class. Trinity Lutheran Church, 292 Orange St., New Haven. 347-306-7660. [email protected].

Private Art Instruction For adults and children. Learn in a working artist’s studio. Ideal for artists, home-schooled youngsters, and those with spe-cial needs. Portfolio preparation offered. Draw, paint, print, and make collage in a spacious light-filled studio at Erector Square in New Haven. Relaxed and professional. I can also come to you. Lessons created to suit individual. References available. Email [email protected]. 315 Peck St., New Haven. 203-675-1105. lizpagano.com.

Professional Art Installation For residential and commercial work. More than 17 years’ experi-ence in museums, galleries, hospitals, and homes in New York City, Providence, New Haven, Ches-ter, and elsewhere. Rate is $30 an hour, no job too small or large. Call Mark at 203-772-4270 or send email to [email protected]. More informa-tion and examples at ctartinstall.com.

Web Services Startup business solutions. Cre-ative, sleek Web design by art curator for art, design, architectural, and small-business sites. Twenty-five years’ experience in database, logistics, and engineering applications. Will cre-ate and maintain any kind of website. Hosting provided. Call 203-387-4933, visit azothgallery.com, or send email to [email protected].

Writing Workshops The Company of Writers is a new creative community for writers of all ages and levels of experience. We offer prose and poetry workshops, in-person and online ser-vices, a summer writers’ conference for teens, and a manuscript consultancy for book-length material. All our faculty are published authors, and many are teachers, editors, or publishers. Course descriptions available online at companyofwriters.net, or by contacting Terry at 203-676-7133. We all have a story to tell. What’s yours?

Space Artist Studio West Cove Studio and Gallery offers work space with two large Charles Brand intaglio etching presses, lithography press, and stainless-steel work station. Workshops and technical support available. Ample display area for shows. Membership: $75 per month. 30 Elm St., West Haven. Call 609-638-8501 or visit westcovestudio.com.

Live/Work Space ArLoW (Arts Lofts West). Fabulous lofts in New Haven’s first artist-hous-ing development. The units contain high ceilings with flexible options for living and working spaces. Great natural light and interior spaces. Please contact Lynn Calabrese c/o Wm. M. Hotchkiss, management agent, at 203-772-3200 x. 20 for a rental application.

Studio Space Thirteen-thousand square feet of undeveloped studio space available in old mill brick building on New Haven harbor. Conve-niently located one minute off I-95, Exit 44 in West Haven. Owners willing to subdivide. Call 609-638-8501.

Studio Space Branford Center. Artist Co-Op, 1229 Main St. Sixteen-hundred square feet of retail space on historic Main Street in down-town Branford. Total turnkey co-op space for up to five artists. Unique space includes two overhead garage doors and storage. In addition there will be a “pop up” space that will allow for a four-month rotation of space throughout the year. Tremendous visibility, strategically located at three-way traffic signal. Pricing includes Internet, POS, Facebook, and website. Pricing starts at $495 per month.

The Arts Council provides the job and bulletin board listings as a service to our membership and is not responsible for the content or deadlines.

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BULLETIN BOARD

JobsPlease visit newhavenarts.org for up-to-datelocal employment opportunities in the arts.

The deadline for advertisements and calendar listings for the June 2015 edition of The Arts Paper is: Monday, April 27, at 5 p.m. Future deadlines are as follows:July-August: Tuesday, May 26, 5 p.m.September: Monday, July 27, 5 p.m.October: Monday, August 31, 5 p.m.November: Monday, September 28, 5 p.m.December: Monday, October 26, 5 p.m. Calendar listings are for Arts Council members only and should be submitted online at newhavenarts.org. Arts Coun-cil members can request a username and password by sending an e-mail to [email protected]. The Arts Council’s online calendar includes list-ings for programs and events taking place within 12 months of the current date. Listings submitted by the calen-dar deadline are included on a monthly basis in The Arts Paper.

The Arts Paper advertising and calendar

deadlines

lucy gellman

n September 13, 1983, Joel Schiavone stood outside the long-expired Roger Sherman Theater, shrugging off an

early fall breeze as he waited for New Haven Mayor Biagio (“Ben”) DiLieto to make a big announcement.

He shifted from foot to foot. DiLieto was late. The performance would have to get un-derway without the guest of honor.

“Welcome,” he said motioning to the building behind him, “to the greatest show on earth.”

With these words, recorded by the New Haven Register, Schiavone unveiled his grand plans for the Palace Theater, for which ground was officially broken in the fall of 1983. Erected on the same premises that had held, since New Haven’s founding in 1638, the Rev-erend William Hooke’s home in the 1640s, Naphtali Daggett’s residence in1772, the Col-lege Street Congregational Church in 1848, a lecture hall for Yale University students, and the ill-fated Rialto and Roger Sherman movie theaters, the newly-conceived building prom-ised something novel and entirely different: a 2,000-seat, multi-genre music venue that would pull talent –– and audiences –– from around the state, the country, and the world.

Readers who have lived in New Haven since the 1980s or walked the well-tread

stretch of College Street between Chapel and Crown streets already know that this story did not end particularly well. From its groundbreaking, the Palace seemed to be on track: renovations garnered DiLieto’s blessing and the city’s praise. Naysayers were rebuffed with Schiavone’s hyper-organized plan to open in exactly 12 months, which came to fru-ition with a musical revival of Gigi and open-ing gala that featured Marvin Hamlisch and Peter Allen in September 1984. Profits poured in. Talent did too: Upcoming acts, booked by media guru and Palace Vice President Ed Yoe, looked good. In late, 1984 the New Haven Symphony Orchestra considered moving its activities and operations there permanently, seeming to suggest a bright and prosperous future for the venue.

But behind the scenes there were prob-lems. In a building that has had so many lives, perhaps there are bound to be. From its opening gala, the Palace seemed doomed by its neighbor across the street; Reporters in the New Haven Register warned that the “Shu-bert-Palace duel could wound downtown,” adding headlines like “Is this town big enough for both the Shubert and the Palace?” to their growing list of speculations about the down-town business. Community members inter-rupted city development meetings to warn that the two theaters, if allowed to continue coexisting, would destroy each other. Even

Schiavone, whose Septem-ber 18 gala had conflicted with the beginning of the Shubert’s fall season, re-ported that members of the Shubert’s board were sur-reptitiously attempting to close the Palace with their own interests in mind.

He was, of course, partly right. Despite its theoretical distance from the Shubert — one booked large musi-cal acts, the other staged plays, one was intended for a state audience, the other local, and so forth — the Palace struggled. After a string of failed attempts to stay open, it closed its doors in the 1990s, sitting dark under the auspices of the New Haven Center for Performing Arts Inc. (NHCPA) for many years, awaiting a next move.

And then, in January of this year, that move came: It was announced that the long-dead Palace would live again as the College Street Music Hall, reborn and reimagined as the picture of musical health. The change comes grace à heroic efforts by Mayor Toni Harp, economic chief Matthew Nemerson, New Haven’s chief of cultural affairs Andy Wolf, Premiere Con-certs’ head Keith Mahler, and NHCPA Pres-ident Elissa Getto, who sees it as “building a building for the future … and the present.”

Coming from two very different back-grounds, Mahler and Getto are a dream team of sorts, working in near perfect harmony with each other to make sure that the hall is ready to go –– and will have a long, prosper-ous life –– starting at the beginning of May.

“It’s very exciting,” said Getto. “It seems to me that at this point in my career in life, to be involved in a project such as this, to be able to improve the arts and entertainment scene is fabulous. The more I learn, the more excited I am. There’s nothing more important to me than being able to collaborate in a noncom-petitive setting and we’re looking forward to being one of those great community partners.

“My whole life has been involved in music ... Coming through this, I have changed as a lover and a consumer of the arts. I’m a lifelong learner. I love the fact that I’m getting to know a whole new city in Connecticut,” she said. “New Haven is a major player in the state and in the region. Whether you talk about educa-tional positions or arts organizations, this is what makes this a very interesting commu-nity for me –– being part of something that’s going to make it an even better city. Who would not be intrigued with that possibility?”

Since the project was announced and fi-nalized by the city on January 9, the two have worked at breakneck speed on the theater starting at its literal foundation, which Getto described as having “very good bones.” By late March, when I caught up with them, the renovation was almost done, and they could envision the space fully: a theater that will boast a tiered orchestra level without

permanent seats, leaving room for chairs and banquet tables, as well as standing room for popular acts. Getto bubbled about the hall’s potential as a gathering place for community members; Mahler was more interested in the image of concert after concert, minds and hearts electrified at the variety of music the hall offers each week. Envision it, he urged me: a room packed with whistling, delighted bodies, leaning in to listen at one concert and rocking out at the next.

It’s an image they — and the city — are hoping will be long-lasting. With perfor-mances by The Machine and the Hartford Symphony Orchestra (May 1), Lyle Lovett and John Hiatt (May 2), and Polaris and Mates of State (May 9) in its first two weeks, the Music Hall’s programming certainly seems to reflect Schiavone’s ambition to cater to a range of tastes. To that end, the venue needed a new personality.

“We needed a name that would reflect the full scope of all things we want to do,” Schiavone said. “We’re going to do so many things here, from rock and roll to symphony. We wanted something with a sense of here and now.”

Mahler is quick to pull away from the Pal-ace in conversation, though. He has never, and may never, used “the greatest show on earth” to describe what’s coming. He thinks it’s something different. Something palpably new.

“I don’t deal with history, I deal with the future,” he said. He was driving home from a morning in the theater; the radio played softly in the background. “The Palace was a wonderful music house with different tenor at a different time. College Street Music Hall is going to have a whole new vibe. The sound system is going to be beyond belief. There’s real rock n’ roll lighting. It’s the real deal. It’s going to be unbelievable." n860.241.6796

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may 2015

The Arts Paper


College Street Music Hall Opens its Doors

College Street Music Hall. Photo by Amanda May Aruani.

O

member organizations & partners

The Arts Paper

• may 2015 artnhv.com • 19

Arts & Cultural Organizations

A Broken Umbrella Theatre abrokenumbrella.org, 203-868-0428

ACES Educational Center for the Artsaces.k12.ct.us203-777-5451

Alyla Suzuki Early Childhood Music Educationalylasuzuki.com203-239-6026

American Guild of Organistssacredmusicct.org

Another Octave - CT Women’s Chorus

anotheroctave.org

ARTFARMart-farm.org

Arts Center Killingworthartscenterkillingworth.org860-663-5593

Arts for Learning Connecticutwww.aflct.org

Artspaceartspacenh.org203-772-2709

Artsplace: Cheshire Performing & Fine Artcpfa-artsplace.org203-272-2787

Bethesda Music Seriesbethesdanewhaven.org203-787-2346

Blackfriars Repertory Theatreblackfriarsrep.com

Branford Folk Music Societyfolknotes.org/branfordfolk

Center for Independent Studycistudy.homestead.com

Chestnut Hill Concertschestnuthillconcerts.org203-245-5736

The Choirs of Trinity Church on the Greentrinitynewhaven.org

City Gallerycity-gallery.org203-782-2489

Civic Orchestra of New Havenconh.org

Classical Contemporary Ballet Theatre

ccbtballettheatre.org

Connecticut Dance Alliancectdanceall.com

Connecticut Gay Men’s Chorusctgmc.org800-644-cgmc

Connecticut Natural Science Illustratorsctnsi.com203-934-0878

Creative Arts Workshopcreativeartsworkshop.org203-562-4927

Creative Concerts203-795-3365

CT Folkctfolk.com

DaSilva Gallerygabrieldasilvagallery.com203-387-2539

Elm City Dance Collectiveelmcitydance.org

Elm Shakespeare Companyelmshakespeare.org203-874-0801

Encore Music Creationsencoremusiccreations.com

Firehouse 12firehouse12.com203-785-0468

Gallery One CTgalleryonect.com

Greater New Haven Community Chorus

gnhcc.org203-624-1979

Guilford Art Centerguilfordartcenter.org203-453-5947

Guitartown CT Productionsguitartownct.com203-430-6020

Hamden Art Leaguehamdenartleague.com 203-494-2316

Hamden Arts Commissionhamdenartscommission.org 203-287-2546

Hillhouse Opera Companyhillhouseoperacompany.org203-464-2683

Hopkins Schoolhopkins.edu

Hugo Kauder Societyhugokauder.org

The Institute Libraryinstitutelibrary.org

International Festival of Arts & Ideas

artidea.org

International Silat Federation of America & Indonesia

isfnewhaven.org

John Slade Ely Houseelyhouse.org 203-624-8055

Kehler Liddell Gallerykehlerliddell.com

Knights of Columbus Museumkofcmuseum.org

Legacy Theatrelegacytheatrect.org

Linda S. Marino Artlindasmarinoart.com

Long Wharf Theatrelongwharf.org203-787-4282

Lyman Center at SCSUwww.lyman.southernct.edu

Madison Art Societymadisonartsociety.blogspot.com860-399-6116

Madison Lyric Stagemadisonlyricstage.org

Make Havenmakehaven.org

Marrakech, Inc./Association of Artisans to Cane

marrakechinc.org

Meet the Artists and Artisansmeettheartistsandartisans.com203-874-5672

Milford Fine Arts Councilmilfordarts.org203-878-6647

Music Havenmusichavenct.org203-215-4574

Music Mountainmusicmountain.com860-824-7126

Musical Folkmusicalfolk.com

Neighborhood Music Schoolneighborhoodmusicschool.org203-624-5189

New England Festival of Ibero American Cinema

nefiac.com

New Haven Balletnewhavenballet.org203-782-9038

New Haven Choralenewhavenchorale.org203-776-7664

New Haven Free Public Librarynhfpl.org203-946-8835

New Haven Oratorio Choirnhoratoriochoir.org

New Haven Museum newhavenmuseum.org203-562-4183

New Haven Paint and Clay Clubnewhavenpaintandclayclub.org203-288-6590

New Haven Preservation Trustnhpt.org

New Haven Symphony Orchestranewhavensymphony.org203-865-0831

New Haven Theater Companynewhaventheatercompany.com

One True Paletteonetruepalette.com

Orchestra New Englandorchestranewengland.org203-777-4690

Pantochino Productionspantochino.com

Paul Mellon Arts Centerchoate.edu/artscenter

Play with Graceplaywithgrace.com

Reynolds Fine Artreynoldsfineart.com

Royal Scottish Country Dance Society, New Haven Branchnhrscds.org

Shoreline Arts Alliance shorelinearts.org203-453-3890

Shubert Theatershubert.com203-562-5666

Silk n’ Soundssilknsounds.org

Silk Road Art Gallerysilkroadartnewhaven.com

Susan Powell Fine Art 203-318-0616susanpowellfineart.com

Site Projectssiteprojects.org

The Second Movementsecondmovementseries.org

Theater Department at SCSU/Crescent Players

southernct.edu/theater

University Glee Club of New Haven

universitygleeclub.org

Wesleyan University Center for the Artswesleyan.edu/cfa

West Cove Studio & Gallerywestcovestudio.com 609-638-8501

Whitney Arts Center203-773-3033

Whitney Humanities Centeryale.edu/whc

Yale Cabaretyalecabaret.org203-432-1566

Yale Center for British Artyale.edu/ycba

Yale Institute of Sacred Musicyale.edu.ism203-432-5180

Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History

peabody.yale.edu

Yale Repertory Theatreyalerep.org203-432-1234

Yale University Art Gallerywww.artgallery.yale.edu

Yale University Bandsyale.edu/yaleband203-432-4111

Creative Businesses

Access Audio-Visual Systems203-287-1907accessaudiovisual.com

Best Video 203-287-9286 bestvideo.com

Blue Plate Radio203-500-0700blueplateradio.com

Fairhaven Furniturefairhaven-furniture.com203-776-3099

Foundry Music Companywww.foundrymusicco.com

The Funky Monkey Café & Gallerythefunkymonkeycafe.com

Hull’s Art Supply and Framinghullsnewhaven.com203-865-4855

Toad’s Placetoadsplace.com

Community Partners

Department of Arts Culture & Tourism, City of New Havencityofnewhaven.com203-946-8378

DECD/CT Office of the Artscultureandtourism.org860-256-2800

Fractured Atlasfracturedatlas.org

JCC of Greater New Havenjccnh.org

Overseas Ministries Study Centeromsc.org

Town Green Special Services District

infonewhaven.com

Visit New Havenvisitnewhaven.com

Perspectives … Gallery at Whitney CenterLocation: 200 Leeder Hill Drive, South Entrance, HamdenHours: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 4-7 p.m. & Saturdays, 1-4 p.m.

Side by Side Multimedia exhibition featuring works by regional teachers and high school studentsCurated by Debbie Hesse and Steven Olsen

Dates: ?-?Public Reception: Saturday, May 2, 3-5 p.m.

Sumner McKnight Crosby Jr. Gallery Location: The Arts Council of Greater New Haven, 70 Audubon St., 2nd Floor, New HavenHours: Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m.

Konbersu PintaduPainted conversations from the diasporaCurated by Debbie Hesse and Jose Monteiro

Dates: May 1-June 15Reception: Friday, May 1, 5-7 p.m.

Advice from the ACLocation: Citizens Television, 843 State St., New HavenDate: Thursday, May 7, 1-4 p.m.Need help finding exhibition space/opportunities, performance/rehearsal space or developing new ways to promote your work or creative event? Debbie Hesse, the Arts Council’s director of artist services and programs, will be available for one-on-one consultations. To schedule an appointment call (203) 772-2788.

Photo Arts CollectiveThe Photo Arts Collective is an Arts Council program that aims to cul-tivate and support a community of individuals who share an interest in photography, through workshops, lectures, exhibitions, portfolio re-views, group critiques, and events. The Photo Arts Collective meets the first Thursday of the month at the Kehler Liddell Gallery, 873 Whitney Ave., New Haven, at 7 p.m. To learn more, send email to [email protected].

Arts On AirNext Show: May 18, 12-1 p.m. on WPKN 89.5FM and streaming at wpkn.orgListen to the Arts Council’s Arts On Air broadcast every third Monday of the month during WPKN’s Community Programing Hour. Hosted by Matt Reiniger, the Arts Council’s communications manager, Arts On Air engages in conversations with local artists and arts organizations. Links to past episodes are available at artnhv.com/on-air.

Writers’ CircleDate: Thursday, May 28, 5:30 p.m.Location: Arts Council of Greater New Haven, 70 Audubon St. 2nd floor, New HavenVisit newhavenarts.org and the Arts Council’s Facebook page for details about the next Writers’ Circle session.

Arts on the EdgeFamilies and children of all ages are invited to join us on Audubon Street for our annual Audubon Arts on the Edge! Arts on the Edge is an after-noon of free, family-oriented music, dance, performances, arts and craft activities and more. Save the Date: Saturday, June X, 12-5 p.m., rain or shine

For more information on these events and more visit newhavenarts.org or check out our mobile events calendar using the Arts, Nightlife, Dining & Information (ANDI) app for smartphones.

arts council programs

Sumner McKnight Crosby Jr. Gallery. Dudu Rodrigues.

The Arts Paper

Perspectives ... Gallery at Whitney Center. Jack Cheng Cheng.

The Arts Council

Perspectives ... Gallery at Whitney Center. Francois Poisson.

Sumner McKnight Crosby Jr. Gallery. Tutu Sousa.

Children’s book author Author Deborah Freedman shares insights during a Writers’ Circle event in March.

the arts paper may 2015

Documents