Posts from the ‘Grantees’ Category

Apr 11

Writing and Imagination

Perusing the mighty universe of the internet one evening, I stumbled across a parody music video of the popular (and amazing) HBO show Game of Thrones. Snared by the catchy tune and the spectacle of a male queen of dragons, I wasn’t prepared for this interesting quote that ended the performance:

“Hollywood Cannot Live Up to the Power of Your Imagination”

At that point, I remembered that, although made nationally popular by television, Game of Thrones originated in the imagination of George R. R. Martin. And then I started thinking more about popular culture nowadays: The Hunger Games, Harry Potter, the highly anticipated The Great Gatsby—all of these cinematic blockbusters share the common ancestor of the written word and, consequently, the minds of authors. In a world where reading seems to have fallen to the wayside, writers and the imaginations they obsess over unveiling to us appear just as relevant and public as ever.

Anita Diamant, beloved author of The Red Tent and keynote speaker at the Twain House’s Writer’s Weekend

As a former English Major in college and an aspiring writer myself, I’ve always held a soft spot in my heart for the novel. As such, I feel privileged to live in Greater Hartford and to enjoy a heritage filled with American literary masters like Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe. At the same time, I’m excited that we honor that past by holding so many events and resources for writers to unravel, brainstorm and explore the depths of their ideas with their peers. For example, at the end of April, the Mark Twain House holds its 2^nd Annual Writers’ Weekend. This celebration of authors includes workshops, courses and talks with award-winning writers and playwrights from all over the country. For younger writers, the Twain House also holds the Write to the Point!: Nonfiction Writing studio in our nationally-recognized Neighborhood Studios teen arts apprenticeship program this summer. For a smaller, more engaging writing experience, there’s Syllable, a reading series for aspiring writers organized by theme, and Edgings & Inchings at Real Art Ways, a monthly poetry reading and open mic night.

If you’ve ever wanted to give writing a chance—to wield the difficult power of the pen (well, keyboard I guess, nowadays)—these events may be the kick-start you need to get your prose or verse pumping. Although the consumption of novels has expanded into more vehicles than just printed pages in today’s culture, their heart has remained the same—to bring us to different worlds, to bare human essence and emotion in front of our eyes and to challenge us to think differently about…well, everything really. And, in the end, isn’t that the objective of every form of art?

Jan 7

The Story of Hartford Prints!

If you haven’t heard of Hartford Prints! before, well, you should. On its face, it’s a small paper goods shop and studio on Arbor Street in Hartford run by the quirky Gale sisters—Hartford natives—that specializes in distinctive letterpress artwork and custom paper products for a variety of special occasions. The story of Hartford Prints!, though, illustrates how the Arts Council’s grant programs really can enact powerful cultural and economic change in our community.

GRANT DOLLARS AT WORK

Back in 2009, Addy Gale, the oldest sister of three, embarked on a mission—to find a way to express her passion for printmaking. In this spirit, Addy applied for funding through the Hartford Arts & Heritage Jobs Grant Program, managed by the Arts Council and funded by the City of Hartford. The grant program is designed to create and retain jobs, especially in the cultural sector, within the Capital City. And Addy, who grew up in Hartford’s historic West End, thought it was the perfect opportunity to set up shop and return to her roots.

Grant funding helped support her start-up costs and created the opportunity to offer students from Hartford Public High School part-time jobs learning the craft of letterpress. This apprenticeship program led to the production of art prints, greeting cards and blank books expressing the students’ love of Hartford. Their was then showcased throughout Hartford, including the inaugural exhibit of the Arts Council-managed 100 Pearl Street Gallery, as a way of promoting the local community through the arts.

When grant money was running out in March 2012, Addy joined forces with her two sisters, Callie and Rory, to re-envision Hartford Prints! as a for-profit letterpress studio that’s seen a tremendous amount of success.

From Addy’s original idea to celebrate and safeguard the art of letterpress printmaking emerged a local small business with a mission of arts entrepreneurship and a keen, eclectic vibe with a passion for the Gale sister’s hometown: Hartford. The Gale sisters and their innovative print shop prove the viability of using the arts to generate economic impact and support local jobs. Through arts education and active community engagement, Hartford Prints! is a model of a small business giving back.

Who would have thought—so much good for an entire community from “three sisters and a press.”

PICK YOUR PRINT CONTEST

The Arts Council would be nowhere without the support of those who believe in the power of the arts. Every year, we like to show our appreciation to our generous donors to the United Arts Campaign through thank you gifts, one of which being a Greater Hartford-inspired print for those who contribute $500 or more.

This year, we’re partnering with Hartford Prints! and giving YOU the say in the final piece of art. The Gale sisters prepared three possible concepts for this year’s artwork inspired by some of the most beloved public art pieces in the Capital City. You can vote on your favorite concept in our online poll. The design with the most votes will be commissioned for this year’s thank you gift.

The contest runs from January 7 to January 20 and the winner will be announced on January 23.

If you’d like to learn even more about Hartford Prints!, visit HartfordPrints.com. Also—be on the lookout s for spotlights on each print the next two weeks featuring insights from each sister about the design. Happy picking!

Nov 11

Why We Love Aetna Arts Week

Today kicks off one of our favorite arts events: Aetna Arts Week, a week-long celebration of arts, heritage and culture in and around the capital city. Each year, we present two arts weeks (one in the fall, one in the spring) sponsored by Aetna and made possible by your generous donations to our United Arts Campaign.

But why do we love Aetna Arts Week? Alright, sure. We love anything about the arts. But this program, in particular, serves a number of community needs—and helps strengthen our relationship with one of our most important corporate partners, Aetna.

Let me back it up again. Aetna has been a long-time supporter of the Arts Council (and of many of the organizations we represent). For about 10 years, they sponsored & helped produce Aetna First Thursday, an evening of jam-packed arts programming on the first Thursday of every month. A few years ago, we noticed the popularity of the ‘monthly funnel’ of arts events had started to wane; our organizations were running their own, wildly successful Thursday late-night activities, and we wanted to pilot a new, different program that both served the cultural community AND engaged our partnership with Aetna.

One of the biggest struggles we have here at the Arts Council is showing you—the community—all of the wonderful organizations, events & programs supported by United Arts. I mean, we fund nearly 150 different institutions and events each year! Working with Aetna, we came up with a new idea: instead of “First Thursday,” how about creating a week FULL of events from our grantee organizations. We’ll do it twice a year and use it as an opportunity to drive the public to the places we support, while getting them more engaged in the art itself.

Ta-Da! Aetna Arts Week was born.

To us, this is one of the best examples of an arts-business partnership. It helps the Arts Council provide free & low-cost community arts events, keeping art accessible to everyone. It showcases our United Arts operating support grantees, providing a “sample” or “tasting” of the wonderful programs they offer year-round. And, it allows Aetna the opportunity to continue to support the arts and get its employees more involved and engaged in the Greater Hartford community.

Win-win-win.

See the full line-up of Aetna Arts Week from this Courant article and on this blog.

Special thanks to Aetna (of course!) and to our operating support grantees who are offering an amazing line-up of programming. All of this wouldn’t be possible without the success of our United Arts Campaign, thanks to the generous support of our individual donors, corporate partners, foundations & government agencies.

Nov 7

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Celebrate Culture: Fall Aetna Arts Week 2012

Fall into Aetna Arts Week: November 11-17!

From the music you play on your iPod when you’re at the gym or in the car to the picturesque foliage autumn in New England sprouts each ear, art is all around every day. Amidst today’s increasingly hectic schedules consumed with deadlines, meetings and other obligations, the Arts Council is more determined than ever to encourage everyone to get out there and try something artsy and new.

That’s a big reason why we have chocked November 11-17 full of great artsy programming throughout Greater Hartford for Aetna Arts Week. Initiated a year and a half ago under the name United Arts Week, Aetna Arts Week, sponsored by (you guessed it) Aetna, highlights the wonderful organizations, events and activities funded by generous contributions to the Arts Council’s United Arts Campaign. In a nutshell, we create a menu of free and low-cost arts events throughout downtown Hartford to celebrate our local (and fantastic!) arts scene.

Whether you fancy theater or visual arts, or just like to get that exclusive feeling through a behind the scenes tour, you’ll definitely find an event that’ll get your ART beating. Visit FeelYourArtBeat.com to view our full line-up of events at organizations like the Wadsworth, The Bushnell, Hartford Stage, TheaterWorks and more!

Help us brighten up downtown Hartford!

Each Aetna Arts week, we create an interactive and fun “temporary public art project” that downtown Hartford dwellers can take pART on their lunch break. Last spring, we featured performances by some of Greater Hartford’s best dance groups at “Dancing in the Street”; in the spring of 2011, we created an incredible water-soluble coloring-book-style mural in State House Square. This year, we’re illuminating Hartford through “Light up the Night,” a lighted walkway of lanterns created out of recyclable, renewable materials outside Connecticut’s Old State House

Under the artistic guidance of Anne Cubberly, we invite you to create a lantern with us at free workshops this Sunday from 11am-6pm at Hartford’s HodgePodge and Wednesday at 11am at Connecticut’s Old State House. The lanterns from those workshops will then be combined, strung and illuminated together by Cubberly outside Connecticut’s Old State House to complete the project

To keep up on this season’s Aetna Arts Week, check back here, FeelYourArtBeat.com or on our Facebook page for pictures, videos and testimonials. Come get your ART beating with us!

Oct 18

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The Sexy and Inspiring Venus in Fur at TheaterWorks

After eating my lunch, I love to stroll through downtown Hartford to refocus and reorganize my thoughts so I can tackle the rest of the afternoon in stride. Perhaps the effect of numerous creative writing courses throughout college on my brain, I can’t help but keep an eye and an ear out for interesting happenings or things on these journeys. Usually, this amounts to seeing a squirrel shimmy up a tree in Bushnell Park, or laughter erupting from outside a restaurant.

But this wasn’t the case when I had my first run-in with TheaterWork’s Venus in Fur poster on Pratt Street. If you haven’t seen it, imagine sexy legs adorned by fishnet stockings culminating with a single jet black heel on top of a man’s bare chest. To further the clearly S&M image, picture a whip gentling dangling from the woman’s left hand and a leather, steel-studded collar on the man’s throat. After nearly dropping my JoJo’s coffee, I knew I had to see this play to answer the pulsing question: WHAT IS THIS ABOUT???

Directed by Rob Ruggiero, TheaterWorks’ Interim Artistic Director, David Ives’ Venus in Fur follows Vanda, a gorgeous, although seemingly scatterbrained actress played by Liv Rooth, as she auditions for a theatric adaptation of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch’s Venus in Furs with Thomas, a condescending and slightly pretentious adaptor played by David Christopher Wells (sidebar: interestingly, Rooth and Wells are engaged in real life). Before heading to the theater, here are two key parts to Sacher-Masoch’s Venus in Furs that you should know: 1) the plot follows a man named Severin who is so infatuated with a woman, Wanda, that he asks her if he could be her slave, and 2) that the term “sadomasochism” derives from Sacher-Masoch’s name. In TheaterWorks accurate own description, the world of S&M certainly meets the world of theater head-on through Venus in Fur.

Of course, I knew none of this information when I walked to my seat that night. The first scene opened with Thomas talking to his fiancé on his phone, giving the audience some exposition. Seemingly from out of nowhere, however, burst in this blonde bombshell of a woman who went from fully clothed to leather corset, garters and panties in what felt like an instant. Attempting to audition in the S&M spirit of Thomas’ adaptation, the two then danced between reading the play to fighting with one another about sex, power and control for the rest of the performance, and sometimes not only with words.

Even if the subject matter and costuming may be out of your comfort zone, you need to see this play for Ives’ incredible manipulation of dialogue and character. Vanda, although ostensibly ditzy at the beginning of the play, enacts an entirely new personality when she begins auditioning as Wanda. Her voice changes from flighty to deep and sexy and her body and facial expressions transition from uncontrolled to exact. During multiple arguments Vanda holds with Thomas about the belittlement of women in the performance, Vanda manages to seamlessly transition and embody the heart of her argument in her next lines as Wanda. So, in the heat of fights, Vanda’s high-pitched voice transitions to the velvety, dulcet tones of Wanda as she makes her points with the actual lines of the play. As such, Thomas and Vanda’s actual feelings mix with those presented in Thomas’ constructed characters, which creates numerous complicated and rich symbolisms for the audience to dissect.

Yes, Venus in Fur will bring you out of your comfort zone and challenge your conceptions of sex and control. However, Venus in Fur will also make you laugh and inspire you to reinvestigate your opinions about fantasy and reality through an unforgettable performance with impeccable acting. If you’re one for the theater, this play is a can’t miss. And you know what,

Maybe we all could use some leather in our lives sometimes.

If you’d like to learn more about the play, check out TheaterWorks website, or reviews from the Hartford Courant.

Sep 26

Hartford Symphony Orchestra’s Beloved ARTini

Have you ever wondered how the art that surrounds you actually came to exist? I know I walk by the paintings behind my desk so frequently that I simply don’t stop and think about how they actually embody the finished products and efforts or an artist’s thoughts, minds and actions. Art’s a process—many times an all-encompassing, scrutinizing and difficult one.

In that train of thought, I reached out to the Hartford Symphony Orchestra to discuss the “ARTini,” or martini-inspired sculpture, its staff created for our upcoming ARTini event. Before the creative cocktail concoctions and the “ARTini” auction where guests can purchase the piece, I wanted to better understand the sculpture, how it came to be and why it’s important to the Symphony in general. Luckily, Katie Bonner, Manager of Public Relations & Special Projects, took some time to answer a few of these questions for me:

What inspired the Hartford Symphony to create its own ARTini sculpture for the event?

The centerpiece of the Hartford Symphony’s season this year is our LIFE Project, a multi-discipline music and art event dedicated to raising awareness about nature through the arts. At the heart of the project is LIFE: A Journey Through Time, a multimedia extravaganza for the senses featuring breathtaking photographs from National Geographic photographer Frans Lanting. His six-year journey to discover new insights about life on Earth will be musically choreographed with an elegant composition from Philip Glass. Led by HSO Music Director Carolyn Kuan, the HSO will perform LIFE: A Journey Through Time at The Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts on Saturday, April 27, 2013.

We used our ARTini sculpture as an opportunity to demonstrate visually how music and nature can have a symbiotic relationship. In our ARTini, the music from the base of the glass transitions and grows seamlessly into a flowering plant and thriving ecosystem. It also shows how music and the arts can help support a healthy environment.

How did the Symphony actually go about constructing its ARTini? What can you tell us about the creative process behind the piece?

After determining the overall look of our ARTini, we used a mix of Bach Cello Suite sheet music, paper maché, Elmer’s glue, watercolor paint, masking tape, glass beads, potting soil, moss, aloe plants, cacti and ferns. Aside from a few glued together fingers and paint spills, it was a painless process!

Art, as we know, is definitely a process. How has creating this ARTini affected the staff of the Symphony?

It took four of our staff members to create and assemble our ARTini: paper maché guru Laura Gonzalez; terrarium goddess Tracy Wu Fastenberg; paper cutter extraordinaire Sarah Hopkins; and myself. You might say we are a little overprotective of our ARTini…Buyer Beware: You might find four HSO staff members at your door with instructions on how to care for your living ARTini!

Many thanks to Katie and the Hartford Symphony Orchestra for taking the time to answer my questions. If you want to see the sculpture for yourself, head to ARTini this Thursday, Sept. 27 at 6pm at Hartford’s Union Station. Tickets are $40 and you can buy them online at LetsGoArts.org/ARTini. Hope to see you there!

Aug 23

Congratulations to The Mark Twain House & Museum: Still Revolutionary

The Connecticut public has spoken (and affirmed themselves as mustache aficionados). Earlier today (Aug 23, 2012), Governor Malloy announced that The Mark Twain House & Museum has been voted residents’ and visitors’ Fan-Favorite Still Revolutionary destination.

This campaign, hosted on Connecticut’s Facebook page, encouraged Nutmeggers to vote for their favorite locations throughout the state. The prize for the winning organization? A feature in a digital ad spot, as well as in a short documentary video that will run online and on the state’s social media channels this autumn.

After 1,800 nominations in 160 different locations surfaced initially, 10 broke away from the crowd, hungry for the prestige and title of Connecticut’s Still Revolutionary location: Connecticut Historical Society, Coventry Regional Farmers Market at the Nathan Hale Homestead, Curtain Call, Inc., Harriet Beecher Stowe House, Hartford Stage, Hill-Stead Museum, Levitt Pavilion, New England Air Museum and Westport Country Playhouse.

At the end of these organizations’ social media and email campaigns, 12,000 voters emerged and elevated The Mark Twain House & Museum as the victor. Congratulations to the staff of the Twain House, as well as each participating organization throughout the entire campaign for their hard work and effort to show the incredibly array of amazing areas not only to Connecticut, but to the entire country.

Click here to read the full press release filled with quotes from the Governor, the Twain House and additional information about the entire contest.

Aug 13

The Spectacle and Magic of Breakdancing Shakespeare

William Shakespeare—two seemingly innocent names when strung together represent the bane of many high schoolers English careers. From the iambic pentameter to the early modern English syntax and word usage, Shakespeare can be just plain difficult. At the heart of this frustration rests a question that’s crossed everyone who has ever read Hamlet or Macbeth’s mind: why do we still read and perform this stuff? What makes Shakespeare so special? (And what’s with that weird doily thing around his neck in his portrait—seriously?)

As a Shakespeare aficionado, I think his true timelessness resides in his complex unraveling and brandishing of the essential mental and emotional human experience. Or, to put it in less English major speak, Shakespeare’s plays hit at the heart of essential human feeling and thought. And though Shakespeare’s writing embodies the language of an era, his plots, characters and themes resonate and relate to any time, thereby making his plays perfect for adaptation to different ages of history, cultures and, well, anything really.

Enter: Hartford Stage’s Neighborhood Studios Breakdancing Shakespeare production of Much Ado About Nothing, which I had the pleasure of seeing last week. Featuring 16 Neighborhood Studios teenage apprentices, I know what you’re thinking—Breakdancing and Shakespeare? Does that work? Lax those furrowed brows and doubts, because the answer is a resounding yes!

Above all through my eyes, Breakdancing Shakespeare managed to mix together original music with heart-stopping choreography while still binding everything together with Shakespeare’s lyrics, characters and themes. For instance, Much Ado About Nothing explores the need to remain critical of information sources, interrogating the classic dichotomies of honesty vs. deception and reality vs. fiction. Amidst the dance battles, headstands, flips and other impressive acrobatics performed by the entire cast, Breakdancing Shakespeare never lost site of this crucial theme, instead choosing the lines from the play’s original text that best exemplified this concept. Although I’m sure it must have been difficult for the adaptors, by accomplishing this feat clearly and crisply, they kept the heart of Shakespeare in their performance while still chocking it full of incredible spectacle—no easy task I’m sure, but certainly worthy of praise!

Another truly impressive feature about Breakdancing Shakespeare was the fact that the performance came together within such a short span of time. The Neighborhood Studios apprentices only had six (!) weeks to prepare each movement, song and line for this production. The apprentices, alongside the master teaching artists, must have had their hands full the entire time with each aspect of the incredibly multifaceted production. And being able to pull it off in such glorious fashion only speaks wonders to everyone’s talents and work ethics involved in Breakdancing Shakespeare.

Reflecting about this Neighborhood Studios program as a whole, Breakdancing Shakespeare not only helps teach teens about the wonders (and head tilts) of Shakespeare, but also leaves them with such a great experience about the work it takes to develop a career in the arts. Although I’m sure there were many falls (literally and symbolically) along the way, each apprentice surmounted the challenges of a professional theatrical production with personal style, humor and grace. Those experiences, hardships and triumphs can only help each apprentice with opportunities in any position later in their careers. And in my opinion, therein lies the true magic of all of our Neighborhood Studios programs.

All in all, I had a blast going to see the production. Kudos to the staff and apprentices that made it all possible. And I would guess Shakespeare, although confused, would be proud of the production, as well.

(All photos courtesy of The Defining Photo, LLC)

Aug 1

Spotlight On: Snap! Photography

Ten Neighborhood Studios apprentices from all over the Greater Hartford area came together this summer for the Snap! Photography program hosted by the Amistad Center for Art and Culture at the Wadsworth Atheneum. Their Master Teaching Artist, Caleb Portfolio, and his assistant, Molly McGuire, have been teaching them the magic of photography for the past four weeks. On the first day, while getting to know each other, the apprentices took portraits of each other with black and white film. During the week, Caleb showed the apprentices how to shoot, expose, develop, and print their pictures, all while exploring downtown Hartford.

Throughout the next few weeks, the Snap! apprentices have “taken their cameras for a walk,” searching for inspiration through their lenses. They have been mastering photography elements such as composition and depth of field in order to have more control over the pictures they take. Inside the studio, the apprentices have access to studio lights and backdrops, which create a very different shooting environment. In between shoots, they also have access to a film scanner and editing software like Photoshop, along with a complete darkroom setup (in a tiny closet, but it gets the job done!)

The apprentices are also getting a “behind the scenes” tour of the Wadsworth Atheneum, getting a chance to meet with talented staff members like Allen Phillips, Manager of Imaging and Publications, John Teahan, Librarian and Curator of Special Book Collections, and Alona Wilson, Assistant Director and Curator of the Amistad Center. Each week they are being exposed to not only the process of art making, but also what goes into actually running an art institution.

This year the theme for the studio is “Collective Memories.” Each apprentice is being charged with the task of developing a small body of work based on that overall theme. Some apprentices are looking into their past and exploring relationships with relatives that have passed away, while others are examining the idea of forgetfulness and faded memories. The final exhibition will include black and white and digital prints that the apprentices will curate and hang in the Wadsworth’s Hartford Courant Room.

The Exhibition opens on Thursday August 2 at 5:00pm at the Wadsworth Atheneum. Admission is $5 or FREE for members. We would love to have you all come and visit and celebrate our group’s amazing achievement. Thanks go out to all of our sponsors for their generosity and making this program possible.

Jul 25

Spotlight On: Artists Collective’s Youth Jazz Orchestra & Performing Dance Ensemble

For six weeks this summer, twenty apprentices are enrolled in the Artists Collective’s two Neighborhood Studios programs: Youth Jazz Orchestra and Performing Dance Ensemble. Artists Collective is the only arts and heritage organization to host two studios in the same space.

Apprentices of the Youth Jazz Orchestra are being exposed to the history of jazz and African American music. They are learning concepts of improvisation and the art of composition, and arranging for a big band. They receive instruction in music theory, scales, portal harmony and other techniques. Apprentices also benefit from smaller ensemble groups where they can perfect their craft with the guidance of instructors and peers. One member of the orchestra in particular is an aspiring vocalist. She is diligently working on and mastering classic jazz standards, as well as harmony for a smaller vocal ensemble. The Artists Collective Youth Jazz Orchestra is under the direction of Master Artist-in-Residence, René McLean, and Music Coordinator, Obie Gereau.

In Performing Dance Ensemble, apprentices are learning a broad spectrum of dance techniques, in addition to the cultural influences that developed and derived from these forms through concentration on body mechanics. Innovative and improvisational choreography have also been an integral part of dance compositions for the final performances. Film is also being incorporated in dance workshops to document the dancer’s growth during the six-week program. The Artists Collective Performing Ensemble is under the direction of Jolette Creary, Dance Coordinator, and Aqiida Gilbert, Rite of Passage Program Coordinator.

Apprentices of the Youth Jazz Orchestra and Dance Department will demonstrate and collaborate on performance pieces, while exploring their artistic expression for the final performances. This year’s production, entitled “The Color of Love,” will take place on Wednesday, August 8, and Thursday, 9 at 6:30 pm at the Artists Collective, 1200 Albany Avenue, Hartford. Call 860-527-3205 for ticket information.