Author: Kara McVey and Rebecca Rodriguez
In celebration of the season, Occidental is hosting the first annual Spring Arts Festival, an event that aims to recommit the college to the development of artistic enterprise. President Veitch and a small collection of professors initiated the festival to promote a stronger relationship between the arts and media programs of Oxy and our surrounding community.
The festival starts today, April 21, with a performance in the Alumni Gym dance studio. A number of students and faculty will premiere newly choreographed dances in tap, folk, Afro-Caribbean and other disciplines.
The art history and the visual arts department’s three honors candidates will present their senior compositions at the festival. The symposium will include projects by senior film students Madison Murphy and Carrie Meggs, and art history student Laura Rips. The presentations will be held on Thursday, April 22 at 4:30 p.m. in Fowler 302.
On Friday, April 23, Keck Theater will host another production of Shakespeare’s “Richard II,” which premiered last week. The play was directed and adapted to the World War I period by theater professor John Bouchard.
Film professor Broderick Fox connected 10 documentary students with 10 international artists who work with L.A. Freewaves, an organization founded by artist Anne Bray, to produce and distribute original works of new media. Oxy students and Freewaves artists have created eight media booths that focus on different topics. Beginning at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, “Oxy Freewaves” will be set up for passersby to explore.
Remsen Bird Artist in Residence Lawrence Weschler is examining the relationship between science and art in an all-day “Wonder Cabinet” on Saturday, April 24. Starting at 10 a.m. in Thorne Hall, the “Wonder Cabinet” will entail a series of lectures and presentations by speakers including Academy Award-winning film editor Walter Murch, artist Lauren Redniss, magician Ricky Jay and Academy Award-winning documentarian Jessica Yu.
On Sunday, April 25, from 3:30 to 7 p.m., faculty and students will present new original musical compositions in Bird Studio. Later that day, the release of Feast, Oxy’s annual arts and literature magazine, will mark the last Spring Arts Festival event. At 5 p.m. in the Mullin Sculpture Studio gallery, Feast editors will hand out newly printed editions of the magazine while artists show their original pieces and poets and fiction writers read their published work.
In President Veitch’s October Inaugural Address, he said, “Los Angeles is a city of artistic ferment, and Occidental should and will contribute to that ferment.” With the new Spring Arts Festival, the college has moved further toward his goal.
This article has been archived, for more requests please contact us via the support system.
