Although most arts events are virtual (again) regional arts venues keep coming up with new ideas. So, you can find here not only scheduled arts lectures but events as varied as a play and a ballet. Read on.
This blog compiled by 51ԹϺ Davis interns Michelle Villagomez and Hayley Morris
Art Studio visiting artist lecture series starts this week
This series is organized by the Department of Art and Art History and co-sponsored by the 51ԹϺ Davis College of Letters and Science and the Manetti Shrem Museum
Join artist Kyle Dunn in a virtual zoom event on Thursday, Dec. 3, 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. Register .
Defying categorical restraint, Kyle Dunn combines sculptural and painterly traditions, including bas-relief and trompe l’oeil, to express the vibrancy of the masculine emotional landscape not often represented in popular visual culture. Drawing upon a range of influences such as Italian cinema as well as horror and science fiction novels, Dunn’s contorted figures ache with emotional and physical desire. Reflecting on his proclivity for melodrama, Dunn notes, “There is a kind of humor and silliness to big emotions, at least when you are looking back and processing. Making paintings is a way for me to distill messy situations in my life down to something understandable.” Dunn lives and works in Queens, NY. He has had two solo exhibitions in New York at Sardine, 2017 and Thierry Goldberg Gallery, 2018 and has been included in group exhibitions at multiple sites.
Next Week, artist Rita Gonzalez will be visiting on Thursday, Dec. 10, 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Register .
Rita Gonzalez is the Terri and Michael Smooke Curator and Department Head of Contemporary Art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art where she has curated Phantom Sightings: Art after the Chicano Movement; Asco: Elite of the Obscure; Lost Line: Contemporary Art from the Collection; Agnés Varda in Californialand, In Production: Art and the Studio System, Christian Marclay: Sound Stories, among other exhibitions and programs. Gonzalez curated L.A. Exuberance: New Gifts by Artists, an exhibition that featured 60 gifts and marked the culmination of LACMA’s 50th anniversary year. From 1997–1999, she was the Lila Wallace Curatorial Fellow at the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego. She was on the curatorial team for Prospect 3 New Orleans and part of the curatorial teams for the first Current L.A. Biennial in 2016 and the Gwangju Bienale in 2018. Gonzalez was one of the 2018 Center for Curatorial Leadership Fellows.
African American music talk featured in 51ԹϺ Davis Valente Lecture Thursday
Musicologist , an associate professor at College of William & Mary, will give an online lecture Dec. 3, at 4 p.m. Murchison is editor of the Black Music Research Journal, and her research interests include music of the Harlem Renaissance and civil rights movement. .
Nutcracker by San Francisco Ballet online
Now through Dec. 31, $49, online. Purchase tickets .
The San Francisco Ballet is offering an interactive, virtual experience to replace their usual in-person season. Nutcracker Online features the high definition stream of the 2008 San Francisco Ballet and KQED Public Television in association with Thirteen/WNET New York’s co-production of Helgi Tomasson’s Nutcracker. For $49, you can watch SF Ballet’s Nutcracker stream in HD, tour their virtual opera house, send downloadable holiday snaps, enjoy historical highlights of San Francisco Ballet’s Nutcracker, and learn steps from the choreography.
To read more about the show, click .
SHAPE of Art and Science launches
SHAPE is a special project, funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, that links science and engineering, together with the arts and humanities in a new set of undergraduate courses. Each SHAPE course connects to an artist, whose work we will share with our public. The very first artist in the SHAPE program, in conjunction with Professors Dawn Sumner and Margaret Laurena Kemp’s course “Transforming Exclusion to Expression: Gender and Race in Climate Science," is Donna Sternberg & Dancers, whose performance of the original work The Vortex has been created specially as an online presentation.
The Vortex brings to life the emotional impact of scientists’ stories, through dance, spoken word and video. The scientists’ stories of difficulty and discovery take you on a moving journey that goes beyond the classic scientific norms of gender, race, or sexual orientation.
The Vortex emerged from the first art and science session of the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, a month-long retreat in the Santa Cruz Mountains, where choreographer Donna Sternberg met visual artist Meredith Tromble and 51ԹϺ Davis geobiologist Dawn Sumner who were working together on Dream Vortex, a virtual, interactive 3-D installation based on the dreams of researchers.
The free virtual performance will take place on Dec. 5, 7:30 p.m. View the performance . A live virtual question-and-answer session with the artists will take place immediately following the performance, moderated by 51ԹϺ Davis Professors Margaret Laurena Kemp and Dawn Sumner. You may submit questions during the performance or during the Q&A.
Choreographer: Donna Sternberg
Visual Arist: Meredith Tromble
Geobiologist: Dawn Summer
More information about the event on .
Davis Manor hosts annual Winter Bazaar
Davis Manor is hosting its annual Winter Bazaar this Sunday, Dec. 6, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. The event will be held outdoors on the “Naturehood” street mural at the corner of Duke and M streets. Masks are required and social distancing will be observed. The event will showcase local hand-crafted artwork, herbal remedies, and specialty treats.
Read more about the event . Read more from the City of Davis Arts and Cultural Affairs .
The Archive to Come features 51ԹϺ Davis professor
has produced “The Archive to Come,” an exhibition (online and in the gallery) of short time-based works that address questions of loss, memorialization, crisis, and re-invention, through the lens of contemporary networked culture and digital media. Professor of Art , along with curators Clark Buckner and Carla Gannis and numerous other artists, address fundamental questions about what we value and want to preserve as we work to recover from their ravages and build for the future.
Martin’s work, “Zoom Meetings with Myself,” are part of Screening 01: COVID-19 session and can be watched .
“The Archive to Come” runs through Dec. 17. If you wish to view “The Archive to Come” onsite, an appointment is required.
Coming up
Digital age drama staged in Theatre and Dance
The Department of Theatre and Dance presents this innovative contemporary drama spotlighting five students who struggle with their identities in the digital age. Free. The theatre production made for these times will be on the virtual stage Dec. 9, 10 and 12th from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. on all days. is a techno-thriller that begins when a young woman is raped at a fraternity and ends in a future where corporations promise a new body with the swipe of a screen.
This premiere of the online version of the play is a co-production with the American Music Theatre Project at Northwestern University. The play was written by Jacqueline Goldfinger, the Granada Aritist-in-Residence in the 51ԹϺ Davis Department of Theatre and Dance, and is co-directed by , assistant professor at 51ԹϺ Davis, and , assistant professor at Northwestern University. by entering your email.
DeYoung Museum closes its door again, but Virtual Wednesdays continue
Virtual Wednesdays at the Fine Arts Museums is free and takes place every Wednesday at 5 p.m. Engage virtually with the Fine Arts Museums as they work to build empathy and break stereotypes, supporting new ways of thinking about and engaging with art. Learn more about the programs .
To see past Virtual Wednesdays Program, go .
Next Week, The de Young Open: Artist Panel, hosted by curator Claudia Schmuckli, Dec. 9, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., free, via . Learn more