Monday, February 2, 2009

Gallery Exhibition: Works of James Watkins
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Ceramicist James Watkins throws elegant miniature cups, saucers and bowls, and double-walled cauldrons and jars, some of which are close to three feet high. He comes to his art with great sensitivity of touch that gives his works immense lyrical beauty.

The Golem: Visual Visitations
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

A major collective exhibit of seven world class artists titled "The Golem: Visual Visitations," inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' poem "El Golem." This is the third edition of a program that began in Prague in 2002 through the initiative of the Argentinean Embassy in that city, and it was introduced by the renowned poet Václav Havel, then President of the Czech Republic. A second version was later produced with tremendous success at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 2003, also introduced by then President of the country, Néstor Kirchner. Now the program travels to the United States for the first time to be shown exclusively at Syracuse University.

The Golem exhibit at The Point of Contact Gallery features original works especially commissioned for this exhibit, created by seven artists: from Argentina (Leandro Katz; Pedro Roth); Uruguay (Marta Chilindrón); Puerto Rico (Víctor Vázquez); Syracuse (Tom Sherman; Doug Dubois) and New York (Sarah Kipp). It combines photography, installation and video art.

A Goodly Heritage of Study: The Portfolio Club of Syracuse
Syracuse University Library Special Collections Research Center

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Displayed are the archives of a still-thriving women's study club that was formed in 1875 in Syracuse. The Portfolio Club exemplifies a post-Civil War movement in which many thousands of middle-class women came together to educate themselves in a society that restricted women's access to institutions of higher learning. This club began a few weeks after the Association for the Advancement of Women held a congress at the Wieting Opera House in downtown Syracuse. At these congresses, which took place in many American cities, Julia Ward Howe and other presenters encouraged women to form study clubs for self-culture.

Nine young women founded the Portfolio Club, with guidance from Mary Dana Hicks, their art teacher. Though they began with a focus on art, in the middle 1880s they expanded their scope to include literature, current events, history, performing arts and many other subjects. Members have always met regularly from October through April to read their papers on a topic assigned by each year's president.

Syracuse residents and those long associated with SU will recognize the married names of many past club members, such as Mrs. Donald Dey, Mrs. William Nottingham, Mrs. E.N. Westcott, and Mrs. Mildred Eggers. Among Portfolio guest speakers during the club's first several decades were Judge Charles Andrews, Dean George Fiske Comfort, Howard Lyman, professors Sawyer Falk and Irene Sargent, Paul Paine, Douglas Petit, Katherine Sibley, and SU Chancellor Charles Sims.

The exhibition, which emphasizes the years 1875-1950, includes annual program booklets, many of them finely crafted. Also on display are meeting minutes, clippings, photographs, film footage of a 1935 gathering and other club documents.

The Crane Show: Origami, Watercolor, and Oriental Brush Painting
Westcott Community Center

Price: Free
Westcott Community Center
Corner of Euclid Ave. and Westcott St., Syracuse

Works by Phil DeMocker and Ann Milner

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Gallery Exhibition: Works of James Watkins
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Ceramicist James Watkins throws elegant miniature cups, saucers and bowls, and double-walled cauldrons and jars, some of which are close to three feet high. He comes to his art with great sensitivity of touch that gives his works immense lyrical beauty.

The Golem: Visual Visitations
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

A major collective exhibit of seven world class artists titled "The Golem: Visual Visitations," inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' poem "El Golem." This is the third edition of a program that began in Prague in 2002 through the initiative of the Argentinean Embassy in that city, and it was introduced by the renowned poet Václav Havel, then President of the Czech Republic. A second version was later produced with tremendous success at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 2003, also introduced by then President of the country, Néstor Kirchner. Now the program travels to the United States for the first time to be shown exclusively at Syracuse University.

The Golem exhibit at The Point of Contact Gallery features original works especially commissioned for this exhibit, created by seven artists: from Argentina (Leandro Katz; Pedro Roth); Uruguay (Marta Chilindrón); Puerto Rico (Víctor Vázquez); Syracuse (Tom Sherman; Doug Dubois) and New York (Sarah Kipp). It combines photography, installation and video art.

A Goodly Heritage of Study: The Portfolio Club of Syracuse
Syracuse University Library Special Collections Research Center

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Displayed are the archives of a still-thriving women's study club that was formed in 1875 in Syracuse. The Portfolio Club exemplifies a post-Civil War movement in which many thousands of middle-class women came together to educate themselves in a society that restricted women's access to institutions of higher learning. This club began a few weeks after the Association for the Advancement of Women held a congress at the Wieting Opera House in downtown Syracuse. At these congresses, which took place in many American cities, Julia Ward Howe and other presenters encouraged women to form study clubs for self-culture.

Nine young women founded the Portfolio Club, with guidance from Mary Dana Hicks, their art teacher. Though they began with a focus on art, in the middle 1880s they expanded their scope to include literature, current events, history, performing arts and many other subjects. Members have always met regularly from October through April to read their papers on a topic assigned by each year's president.

Syracuse residents and those long associated with SU will recognize the married names of many past club members, such as Mrs. Donald Dey, Mrs. William Nottingham, Mrs. E.N. Westcott, and Mrs. Mildred Eggers. Among Portfolio guest speakers during the club's first several decades were Judge Charles Andrews, Dean George Fiske Comfort, Howard Lyman, professors Sawyer Falk and Irene Sargent, Paul Paine, Douglas Petit, Katherine Sibley, and SU Chancellor Charles Sims.

The exhibition, which emphasizes the years 1875-1950, includes annual program booklets, many of them finely crafted. Also on display are meeting minutes, clippings, photographs, film footage of a 1935 gathering and other club documents.

The Crane Show: Origami, Watercolor, and Oriental Brush Painting
Westcott Community Center

Price: Free
Westcott Community Center
Corner of Euclid Ave. and Westcott St., Syracuse

Works by Phil DeMocker and Ann Milner

Needle Art and Embroidered Stone
Edgewood Gallery

Edgewood Gallery
216 Tecumseh Rd., Syracuse

Needle art by members of the American Needlepoint Guild, and fine porcelain and stoneware by Sue Canizares.

Selections from the Dar-ul-Islam Historical Photograph Collection
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Contemporary Craft Masters
Community Folk Art Center

Price: Free
Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Contemporary Craft Masters" features the work of three artists who were featured on HGTV's "Modern Masters: African American Artisans" program in 2003. The featured artists, Espi Frazier, Hermon Futrell, and David MacDonald, are at the forefront of contemporary crafts and reflect the diverse and innovative palette of today's artists.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt
Syracuse University Art Museum

Price: Free
Syracuse University Art Museum, Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The exhibition brings together more than 80 engravings, vivid Orientalist paintings, decorative objects, and documents and letters made during General Napoleon Bonaparte's Egyptian Campaign of 1791-1801. While unsuccessful as a military campaign, the endeavor was extremely successful and a cultural expedition. Napoleon brought over 150 scholars with him and their investigations into the country's ancient and contemporary societies formed the foundation of modern Egyptology and were a major achievement. From the Dahesh Museum of Art.

Landscapes and Interiors: Works of Kianga Ford
The Warehouse Gallery

The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

In this solo exhibition, Los Angeles-Boston based artist Kianga Ford presents a set of installations with sound that explore the contemporary Syracuse landscape and the potential of its spaces to create communities out of relative strangers. The three zones of the exhibition transition from exterior landscapes to interior spaces, crossing between the spaces of the sacred and profane to re-create the dynamics of contemporary urbanity -- blending the deep interiors of the religious sanctuary with the VIP rooms of strip clubs, the food court with the bus stop.

Winter
LeMoyne College
Le Moyne College Chamber Orchestra
Featuring Todd Reynolds, electric violin; Bob Allen, tenor; Bill Ryan, guest composer

Price: $15 regular, $10 seniors, free for students and the LeMoyne community
Coyne Center for the Performing Arts
LeMoyne College, Syracuse

Guest violinist Todd Reynolds will be featured in Vivaldi's Winter and his own Outerboroughs for violin and laptop with video by Bill Morrison. Guest composer Bill Ryan will have his works Blurred and Drive performed. Tenor Bob Allen sings three of Schubert's Winterreise. Also on the bill are excerpts from Tschaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite and Piazzolla's Invierno Porteno.

The Concerto Grosso: Bach to Bloch
Syracuse Friends of Chamber Music

Price: $10 adult, $5 student, $20 family pass
Lincoln Middle School
1613 James St., Syracuse

In his magnificent Brandenburg Concerti, Johann Sebastian Bach combines string orchestra with various solo instruments -- violin, flute, oboe, and harpsichord. Hear members of the Syracuse Symphony and others perform these gems of contrapuntal music. The tuneful work by Ernest Block shows that this favorite Baroque form continues to inspire more contemporary composers.

Ibert Deux Interludes
Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 4 in G Major
Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D Major
Bloch Concerto Grosso No. 1 for Strings with Piano Obligato

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Gallery Exhibition: Works of James Watkins
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Ceramicist James Watkins throws elegant miniature cups, saucers and bowls, and double-walled cauldrons and jars, some of which are close to three feet high. He comes to his art with great sensitivity of touch that gives his works immense lyrical beauty.

The Golem: Visual Visitations
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

A major collective exhibit of seven world class artists titled "The Golem: Visual Visitations," inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' poem "El Golem." This is the third edition of a program that began in Prague in 2002 through the initiative of the Argentinean Embassy in that city, and it was introduced by the renowned poet Václav Havel, then President of the Czech Republic. A second version was later produced with tremendous success at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 2003, also introduced by then President of the country, Néstor Kirchner. Now the program travels to the United States for the first time to be shown exclusively at Syracuse University.

The Golem exhibit at The Point of Contact Gallery features original works especially commissioned for this exhibit, created by seven artists: from Argentina (Leandro Katz; Pedro Roth); Uruguay (Marta Chilindrón); Puerto Rico (Víctor Vázquez); Syracuse (Tom Sherman; Doug Dubois) and New York (Sarah Kipp). It combines photography, installation and video art.

Arena Art Group Exhibit
Syracuse Technology Garden Gallery

Price: Free
Syracuse Technology Garden
235 Harrison St., Syracuse

Fun, wild, and experimental artwork by Rochester's Arena Art Group.

A Goodly Heritage of Study: The Portfolio Club of Syracuse
Syracuse University Library Special Collections Research Center

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Displayed are the archives of a still-thriving women's study club that was formed in 1875 in Syracuse. The Portfolio Club exemplifies a post-Civil War movement in which many thousands of middle-class women came together to educate themselves in a society that restricted women's access to institutions of higher learning. This club began a few weeks after the Association for the Advancement of Women held a congress at the Wieting Opera House in downtown Syracuse. At these congresses, which took place in many American cities, Julia Ward Howe and other presenters encouraged women to form study clubs for self-culture.

Nine young women founded the Portfolio Club, with guidance from Mary Dana Hicks, their art teacher. Though they began with a focus on art, in the middle 1880s they expanded their scope to include literature, current events, history, performing arts and many other subjects. Members have always met regularly from October through April to read their papers on a topic assigned by each year's president.

Syracuse residents and those long associated with SU will recognize the married names of many past club members, such as Mrs. Donald Dey, Mrs. William Nottingham, Mrs. E.N. Westcott, and Mrs. Mildred Eggers. Among Portfolio guest speakers during the club's first several decades were Judge Charles Andrews, Dean George Fiske Comfort, Howard Lyman, professors Sawyer Falk and Irene Sargent, Paul Paine, Douglas Petit, Katherine Sibley, and SU Chancellor Charles Sims.

The exhibition, which emphasizes the years 1875-1950, includes annual program booklets, many of them finely crafted. Also on display are meeting minutes, clippings, photographs, film footage of a 1935 gathering and other club documents.

The Crane Show: Origami, Watercolor, and Oriental Brush Painting
Westcott Community Center

Price: Free
Westcott Community Center
Corner of Euclid Ave. and Westcott St., Syracuse

Works by Phil DeMocker and Ann Milner

Needle Art and Embroidered Stone
Edgewood Gallery

Edgewood Gallery
216 Tecumseh Rd., Syracuse

Needle art by members of the American Needlepoint Guild, and fine porcelain and stoneware by Sue Canizares.

Contemporary Craft Masters
Community Folk Art Center

Price: Free
Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Contemporary Craft Masters" features the work of three artists who were featured on HGTV's "Modern Masters: African American Artisans" program in 2003. The featured artists, Espi Frazier, Hermon Futrell, and David MacDonald, are at the forefront of contemporary crafts and reflect the diverse and innovative palette of today's artists.

Selections from the Dar-ul-Islam Historical Photograph Collection
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.

A Local Black History Exhibit
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Exhibit presented by The Black History Preservationist Project, The Dunbar Association, The Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, Syracuse University South Side Initiative, A Community-University Partnership Project, and Umi & Associates Inc.

Thinkin' 'bout Lincoln
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Come celebrate Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday! Some very intriguing items belonging to our former President are on display.

Exploring History with Art: The Changing View—Landscapes
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Paintings from OHA's permanent collection

Inishlacken: the last parish
Redhouse

Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

Joan Lukas Rothenberg Gallery at Redhouse Arts Center is proud to be the first USA venue to present "Inishlacken; the last parish," curated by Rosie McGurran and Maeve Mulrennan. "Inishlacken; the last parish" is an exhibition that includes the work of 23 leading contemporary Irish artists.

Inishlacken Island, situated one mile off the west coast of County Galway, Ireland, is no longer inhabited; however, with the generosity of people who keep houses there, Rosie McGurran along with several other artists and curators have been able to create an Artists Residency (The Inishlacken Project) program on an annual basis. The Inishlacken Project aims to develop the spirit of friendship and creativity established by late Belfast artist Gerard Dillon during his time on the island. Artists are invited to visit Inishlacken and make work as a response to its unique environment and culture. Surviving on the island is much the same as it was in the '50s; it is an opportunity for artists to leave behind the 21st century and experience a way of life almost forgotten.

"Inishlacken; the last parish" exhibition is a collection of work made by selected artists who have made the journey to the island over the past seven years. Their responses to Inishlacken Island and its rich history are all highly individual. Photography, painting, installation, video, animation and printmaking make up the core of this exhibition. The diverse nature of this collection of artists and their work reflects the ever-changing landscape of an island floating between the embrace of the Twelve Bens mountain range and the watery wilderness of the Atlantic Ocean.

Artists include Aideen Barry, Eamon Colman, Cian Donnelly, Kathleen Furey, Phil Hession, Pearl Kinnear, Margaret Irwin, Gavin Lavelle, Dolores Lyne, Louise Manifold, Kate Moore, Jay Murphy, Susan McKeever, Rosie McGurran, Joseph McWilliams, Catherine McWilliams, Simon McWilliams, Mick O'Dea, Sean O'Flaithearta, Sioban Piercy, Jonathan Porter, Una Sealy, Caroline Wright.

Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt
Syracuse University Art Museum

Price: Free
Syracuse University Art Museum, Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The exhibition brings together more than 80 engravings, vivid Orientalist paintings, decorative objects, and documents and letters made during General Napoleon Bonaparte's Egyptian Campaign of 1791-1801. While unsuccessful as a military campaign, the endeavor was extremely successful and a cultural expedition. Napoleon brought over 150 scholars with him and their investigations into the country's ancient and contemporary societies formed the foundation of modern Egyptology and were a major achievement. From the Dahesh Museum of Art.

Landscapes and Interiors: Works of Kianga Ford
The Warehouse Gallery

The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

In this solo exhibition, Los Angeles-Boston based artist Kianga Ford presents a set of installations with sound that explore the contemporary Syracuse landscape and the potential of its spaces to create communities out of relative strangers. The three zones of the exhibition transition from exterior landscapes to interior spaces, crossing between the spaces of the sacred and profane to re-create the dynamics of contemporary urbanity -- blending the deep interiors of the religious sanctuary with the VIP rooms of strip clubs, the food court with the bus stop.

Voices of Diversity: Photographs by Lida Suchý
ArtRage Gallery

Price: Free
ArtRage Gallery
505 Hawley Ave., Syracuse

"Voices of Diversity" is a composite photographic portrait of the Syracuse Community Choir. Composed of more than 100 individual black and white images, it foregrounds the potential of art/singing as a powerful tool for fostering broad social inclusiveness and community building. This exhibit honors people who, as choir founder and director Karen Mihalyi says, seek to create a space in our community "that values all people, that sees everyone as important, that creates music... Where we find our voices, sing fully, and create beauty."

For more than 20 years, the Syracuse Community Choir has been an important voice in the Central New York community, actively promoting the ideas of social justice, peace and inclusiveness. The Choir is based on the idea that singing should be a vital part of the human experience and that everyone can sing. It is open to all people, from experienced musicians to those who have never sung. To involve all, the choir provides support such as brailling, transportation, large print words, tapes/CDs, childcare, separate teen and children's rehearsals and special help for all who want it.

Lida Suchý's photographs have been widely exhibited in galleries and museums in the United States and Europe and published in LIFE Magazine, National Geographic, and GEO. Lida's photographs are in the collections of the George Eastman House, the Brooklyn Museum, Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and SF MoMA. Lida is a first-generation American born into a Ukrainian refugee family. She holds a BA from SUNY Albany, an MA from Syracuse University, and an MFA from Yale University School of Art.

Songs of Ourselves: The Uses of Poetry in America
Featuring Joan Shelley Rubin

Curtin Auditorium, Onondaga County Public Library
The Galleries of Syracuse, 447 S. Salina St., Syracuse

A professor of history at the University of Rochester, Joan Shelley Rubin is an American cultural and intellectual historian with a special interest in the history of books, reading and literary culture between 1880 and 1960. She is author of The Making of Middlebrow Culture (1992) and Songs of Ourselves: The Uses of Poetry in America (2007).

Sponsored by CNY READS and Syracuse University's Department of English.

Civic Morning Musicals
Kevin Moore and Katharine Ciarelli, piano four-hands

Price: Free
Hosmer Auditorium, Everson Museum
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Works by Schubert, Brahms, and others.

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Gallery Exhibition: Works of James Watkins
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Ceramicist James Watkins throws elegant miniature cups, saucers and bowls, and double-walled cauldrons and jars, some of which are close to three feet high. He comes to his art with great sensitivity of touch that gives his works immense lyrical beauty.

The Golem: Visual Visitations
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

A major collective exhibit of seven world class artists titled "The Golem: Visual Visitations," inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' poem "El Golem." This is the third edition of a program that began in Prague in 2002 through the initiative of the Argentinean Embassy in that city, and it was introduced by the renowned poet Václav Havel, then President of the Czech Republic. A second version was later produced with tremendous success at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 2003, also introduced by then President of the country, Néstor Kirchner. Now the program travels to the United States for the first time to be shown exclusively at Syracuse University.

The Golem exhibit at The Point of Contact Gallery features original works especially commissioned for this exhibit, created by seven artists: from Argentina (Leandro Katz; Pedro Roth); Uruguay (Marta Chilindrón); Puerto Rico (Víctor Vázquez); Syracuse (Tom Sherman; Doug Dubois) and New York (Sarah Kipp). It combines photography, installation and video art.

Arena Art Group Exhibit
Syracuse Technology Garden Gallery

Price: Free
Syracuse Technology Garden
235 Harrison St., Syracuse

Fun, wild, and experimental artwork by Rochester's Arena Art Group.

A Goodly Heritage of Study: The Portfolio Club of Syracuse
Syracuse University Library Special Collections Research Center

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Displayed are the archives of a still-thriving women's study club that was formed in 1875 in Syracuse. The Portfolio Club exemplifies a post-Civil War movement in which many thousands of middle-class women came together to educate themselves in a society that restricted women's access to institutions of higher learning. This club began a few weeks after the Association for the Advancement of Women held a congress at the Wieting Opera House in downtown Syracuse. At these congresses, which took place in many American cities, Julia Ward Howe and other presenters encouraged women to form study clubs for self-culture.

Nine young women founded the Portfolio Club, with guidance from Mary Dana Hicks, their art teacher. Though they began with a focus on art, in the middle 1880s they expanded their scope to include literature, current events, history, performing arts and many other subjects. Members have always met regularly from October through April to read their papers on a topic assigned by each year's president.

Syracuse residents and those long associated with SU will recognize the married names of many past club members, such as Mrs. Donald Dey, Mrs. William Nottingham, Mrs. E.N. Westcott, and Mrs. Mildred Eggers. Among Portfolio guest speakers during the club's first several decades were Judge Charles Andrews, Dean George Fiske Comfort, Howard Lyman, professors Sawyer Falk and Irene Sargent, Paul Paine, Douglas Petit, Katherine Sibley, and SU Chancellor Charles Sims.

The exhibition, which emphasizes the years 1875-1950, includes annual program booklets, many of them finely crafted. Also on display are meeting minutes, clippings, photographs, film footage of a 1935 gathering and other club documents.

The Crane Show: Origami, Watercolor, and Oriental Brush Painting
Westcott Community Center

Price: Free
Westcott Community Center
Corner of Euclid Ave. and Westcott St., Syracuse

Works by Phil DeMocker and Ann Milner

Needle Art and Embroidered Stone
Edgewood Gallery

Edgewood Gallery
216 Tecumseh Rd., Syracuse

Needle art by members of the American Needlepoint Guild, and fine porcelain and stoneware by Sue Canizares.

Selections from the Dar-ul-Islam Historical Photograph Collection
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Contemporary Craft Masters
Community Folk Art Center

Price: Free
Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Contemporary Craft Masters" features the work of three artists who were featured on HGTV's "Modern Masters: African American Artisans" program in 2003. The featured artists, Espi Frazier, Hermon Futrell, and David MacDonald, are at the forefront of contemporary crafts and reflect the diverse and innovative palette of today's artists.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Thinkin' 'bout Lincoln
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Come celebrate Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday! Some very intriguing items belonging to our former President are on display.

A Local Black History Exhibit
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Exhibit presented by The Black History Preservationist Project, The Dunbar Association, The Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, Syracuse University South Side Initiative, A Community-University Partnership Project, and Umi & Associates Inc.

Exploring History with Art: The Changing View—Landscapes
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Paintings from OHA's permanent collection

Inishlacken: the last parish
Redhouse

Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

Joan Lukas Rothenberg Gallery at Redhouse Arts Center is proud to be the first USA venue to present "Inishlacken; the last parish," curated by Rosie McGurran and Maeve Mulrennan. "Inishlacken; the last parish" is an exhibition that includes the work of 23 leading contemporary Irish artists.

Inishlacken Island, situated one mile off the west coast of County Galway, Ireland, is no longer inhabited; however, with the generosity of people who keep houses there, Rosie McGurran along with several other artists and curators have been able to create an Artists Residency (The Inishlacken Project) program on an annual basis. The Inishlacken Project aims to develop the spirit of friendship and creativity established by late Belfast artist Gerard Dillon during his time on the island. Artists are invited to visit Inishlacken and make work as a response to its unique environment and culture. Surviving on the island is much the same as it was in the '50s; it is an opportunity for artists to leave behind the 21st century and experience a way of life almost forgotten.

"Inishlacken; the last parish" exhibition is a collection of work made by selected artists who have made the journey to the island over the past seven years. Their responses to Inishlacken Island and its rich history are all highly individual. Photography, painting, installation, video, animation and printmaking make up the core of this exhibition. The diverse nature of this collection of artists and their work reflects the ever-changing landscape of an island floating between the embrace of the Twelve Bens mountain range and the watery wilderness of the Atlantic Ocean.

Artists include Aideen Barry, Eamon Colman, Cian Donnelly, Kathleen Furey, Phil Hession, Pearl Kinnear, Margaret Irwin, Gavin Lavelle, Dolores Lyne, Louise Manifold, Kate Moore, Jay Murphy, Susan McKeever, Rosie McGurran, Joseph McWilliams, Catherine McWilliams, Simon McWilliams, Mick O'Dea, Sean O'Flaithearta, Sioban Piercy, Jonathan Porter, Una Sealy, Caroline Wright.

Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt
Syracuse University Art Museum

Price: Free
Syracuse University Art Museum, Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Opening reception 5:00–7:00 pm.

The exhibition brings together more than 80 engravings, vivid Orientalist paintings, decorative objects, and documents and letters made during General Napoleon Bonaparte's Egyptian Campaign of 1791-1801. While unsuccessful as a military campaign, the endeavor was extremely successful and a cultural expedition. Napoleon brought over 150 scholars with him and their investigations into the country's ancient and contemporary societies formed the foundation of modern Egyptology and were a major achievement. From the Dahesh Museum of Art.

Stone Canoe III
Delavan Art Gallery

Delavan Art Gallery
501 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Works by artists in the third edition of Stone Canoe, a journal of arts and ideas from Upstate New York. Artists featured include Marianne Barcellona, Marty Blake, Lauren Bristol, Elaine R. Defibaugh, Sylvia de Swaan, Donna L. Emerson, Paul Farinacci, Lisbeth Firmin, John Fitzsimmons, Emily Fleisher, Bob Gates, Jon Gernon, Thomas Gokey, Fred Gonyea, Erica Harney and Aldo Lira. Also, David R. MacDonald, Jennifer Marsh, Lalit K. Masih, Deloss McGraw, Rebecca Murtaugh, Mary Nelson Zadrozny, Steven Pearlman, Stephan Phillips, Awenheeyoh Powless, Mark Robbins, Roger Shimomura, Nancy Sirkis, Yolanda Tooley, Gary Trento, Kim Waale, and Phil Young.

Landscapes and Interiors: Works of Kianga Ford
The Warehouse Gallery

The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

In this solo exhibition, Los Angeles-Boston based artist Kianga Ford presents a set of installations with sound that explore the contemporary Syracuse landscape and the potential of its spaces to create communities out of relative strangers. The three zones of the exhibition transition from exterior landscapes to interior spaces, crossing between the spaces of the sacred and profane to re-create the dynamics of contemporary urbanity -- blending the deep interiors of the religious sanctuary with the VIP rooms of strip clubs, the food court with the bus stop.

Voices of Diversity: Photographs by Lida Suchý
ArtRage Gallery

Price: Free
ArtRage Gallery
505 Hawley Ave., Syracuse

"Voices of Diversity" is a composite photographic portrait of the Syracuse Community Choir. Composed of more than 100 individual black and white images, it foregrounds the potential of art/singing as a powerful tool for fostering broad social inclusiveness and community building. This exhibit honors people who, as choir founder and director Karen Mihalyi says, seek to create a space in our community "that values all people, that sees everyone as important, that creates music... Where we find our voices, sing fully, and create beauty."

For more than 20 years, the Syracuse Community Choir has been an important voice in the Central New York community, actively promoting the ideas of social justice, peace and inclusiveness. The Choir is based on the idea that singing should be a vital part of the human experience and that everyone can sing. It is open to all people, from experienced musicians to those who have never sung. To involve all, the choir provides support such as brailling, transportation, large print words, tapes/CDs, childcare, separate teen and children's rehearsals and special help for all who want it.

Lida Suchý's photographs have been widely exhibited in galleries and museums in the United States and Europe and published in LIFE Magazine, National Geographic, and GEO. Lida's photographs are in the collections of the George Eastman House, the Brooklyn Museum, Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and SF MoMA. Lida is a first-generation American born into a Ukrainian refugee family. She holds a BA from SUNY Albany, an MA from Syracuse University, and an MFA from Yale University School of Art.

Piano at the Panasci
LeMoyne College
Featuring Jennifer Hayghe, piano

Price: $15 regular, $10 seniors, students free$15 regular, $10 seniors, free for students and the LeMoyne community
Panasci Family Chapel
LeMoyne College, Syracuse

Ithaca College faculty member Jennifer Hayghe will perform alongside Pebble Trio members Susan Waterbury, violin, and Elizabeth Simkin, cello, in an evening of beloved chamber music repertoire.

LeMoyne College
LeMoyne College Jazz Ensemble
Featuring Sam Newsome, saxophone

Price: $15 regular, $10 seniors, free for students and the LeMoyne community
Coyne Center for the Performing Arts
LeMoyne College, Syracuse

Join the Jazz Ensemble for a celebration of African-American History Month with guest soloist Sam Newsome, one of the world's great soprano saxophonists. Mr. Newsome will join the band on several numbers, and will also treat the audience to some of his own solo compositions.

The Sound of Murder
Acme Mystery Company

Price: $25.95 plus tax and gratuities (includes meal and show)
Spaghetti Warehouse
689 N. Clinton St., Syracuse

Inactive comedy murder mystery dinner theater. Up in the hills, a lonely goatherd has died, and the townsfolk, including Capt. Von Trumpp, begin to suspect that sweet young Maria is a serial killer.

Jesus Christ Superstar
Broadway in Syracuse
Featuring Ted Neeley

Landmark Theatre
362 S. Salina St., Syracuse

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

Friday, February 6, 2009

Gallery Exhibition: Works of James Watkins
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Ceramicist James Watkins throws elegant miniature cups, saucers and bowls, and double-walled cauldrons and jars, some of which are close to three feet high. He comes to his art with great sensitivity of touch that gives his works immense lyrical beauty.

The Golem: Visual Visitations
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

A major collective exhibit of seven world class artists titled "The Golem: Visual Visitations," inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' poem "El Golem." This is the third edition of a program that began in Prague in 2002 through the initiative of the Argentinean Embassy in that city, and it was introduced by the renowned poet Václav Havel, then President of the Czech Republic. A second version was later produced with tremendous success at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 2003, also introduced by then President of the country, Néstor Kirchner. Now the program travels to the United States for the first time to be shown exclusively at Syracuse University.

The Golem exhibit at The Point of Contact Gallery features original works especially commissioned for this exhibit, created by seven artists: from Argentina (Leandro Katz; Pedro Roth); Uruguay (Marta Chilindrón); Puerto Rico (Víctor Vázquez); Syracuse (Tom Sherman; Doug Dubois) and New York (Sarah Kipp). It combines photography, installation and video art.

Arena Art Group Exhibit
Syracuse Technology Garden Gallery

Price: Free
Syracuse Technology Garden
235 Harrison St., Syracuse

Fun, wild, and experimental artwork by Rochester's Arena Art Group.

A Goodly Heritage of Study: The Portfolio Club of Syracuse
Syracuse University Library Special Collections Research Center

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Displayed are the archives of a still-thriving women's study club that was formed in 1875 in Syracuse. The Portfolio Club exemplifies a post-Civil War movement in which many thousands of middle-class women came together to educate themselves in a society that restricted women's access to institutions of higher learning. This club began a few weeks after the Association for the Advancement of Women held a congress at the Wieting Opera House in downtown Syracuse. At these congresses, which took place in many American cities, Julia Ward Howe and other presenters encouraged women to form study clubs for self-culture.

Nine young women founded the Portfolio Club, with guidance from Mary Dana Hicks, their art teacher. Though they began with a focus on art, in the middle 1880s they expanded their scope to include literature, current events, history, performing arts and many other subjects. Members have always met regularly from October through April to read their papers on a topic assigned by each year's president.

Syracuse residents and those long associated with SU will recognize the married names of many past club members, such as Mrs. Donald Dey, Mrs. William Nottingham, Mrs. E.N. Westcott, and Mrs. Mildred Eggers. Among Portfolio guest speakers during the club's first several decades were Judge Charles Andrews, Dean George Fiske Comfort, Howard Lyman, professors Sawyer Falk and Irene Sargent, Paul Paine, Douglas Petit, Katherine Sibley, and SU Chancellor Charles Sims.

The exhibition, which emphasizes the years 1875-1950, includes annual program booklets, many of them finely crafted. Also on display are meeting minutes, clippings, photographs, film footage of a 1935 gathering and other club documents.

The Crane Show: Origami, Watercolor, and Oriental Brush Painting
Westcott Community Center

Price: Free
Westcott Community Center
Corner of Euclid Ave. and Westcott St., Syracuse

Works by Phil DeMocker and Ann Milner

Needle Art and Embroidered Stone
Edgewood Gallery

Edgewood Gallery
216 Tecumseh Rd., Syracuse

Needle art by members of the American Needlepoint Guild, and fine porcelain and stoneware by Sue Canizares.

Contemporary Craft Masters
Community Folk Art Center

Price: Free
Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Contemporary Craft Masters" features the work of three artists who were featured on HGTV's "Modern Masters: African American Artisans" program in 2003. The featured artists, Espi Frazier, Hermon Futrell, and David MacDonald, are at the forefront of contemporary crafts and reflect the diverse and innovative palette of today's artists.

Selections from the Dar-ul-Islam Historical Photograph Collection
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.

A Local Black History Exhibit
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Exhibit presented by The Black History Preservationist Project, The Dunbar Association, The Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, Syracuse University South Side Initiative, A Community-University Partnership Project, and Umi & Associates Inc.

Thinkin' 'bout Lincoln
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Come celebrate Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday! Some very intriguing items belonging to our former President are on display.

Exploring History with Art: The Changing View—Landscapes
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Paintings from OHA's permanent collection

Inishlacken: the last parish
Redhouse

Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

Joan Lukas Rothenberg Gallery at Redhouse Arts Center is proud to be the first USA venue to present "Inishlacken; the last parish," curated by Rosie McGurran and Maeve Mulrennan. "Inishlacken; the last parish" is an exhibition that includes the work of 23 leading contemporary Irish artists.

Inishlacken Island, situated one mile off the west coast of County Galway, Ireland, is no longer inhabited; however, with the generosity of people who keep houses there, Rosie McGurran along with several other artists and curators have been able to create an Artists Residency (The Inishlacken Project) program on an annual basis. The Inishlacken Project aims to develop the spirit of friendship and creativity established by late Belfast artist Gerard Dillon during his time on the island. Artists are invited to visit Inishlacken and make work as a response to its unique environment and culture. Surviving on the island is much the same as it was in the '50s; it is an opportunity for artists to leave behind the 21st century and experience a way of life almost forgotten.

"Inishlacken; the last parish" exhibition is a collection of work made by selected artists who have made the journey to the island over the past seven years. Their responses to Inishlacken Island and its rich history are all highly individual. Photography, painting, installation, video, animation and printmaking make up the core of this exhibition. The diverse nature of this collection of artists and their work reflects the ever-changing landscape of an island floating between the embrace of the Twelve Bens mountain range and the watery wilderness of the Atlantic Ocean.

Artists include Aideen Barry, Eamon Colman, Cian Donnelly, Kathleen Furey, Phil Hession, Pearl Kinnear, Margaret Irwin, Gavin Lavelle, Dolores Lyne, Louise Manifold, Kate Moore, Jay Murphy, Susan McKeever, Rosie McGurran, Joseph McWilliams, Catherine McWilliams, Simon McWilliams, Mick O'Dea, Sean O'Flaithearta, Sioban Piercy, Jonathan Porter, Una Sealy, Caroline Wright.

Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt
Syracuse University Art Museum

Price: Free
Syracuse University Art Museum, Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The exhibition brings together more than 80 engravings, vivid Orientalist paintings, decorative objects, and documents and letters made during General Napoleon Bonaparte's Egyptian Campaign of 1791-1801. While unsuccessful as a military campaign, the endeavor was extremely successful and a cultural expedition. Napoleon brought over 150 scholars with him and their investigations into the country's ancient and contemporary societies formed the foundation of modern Egyptology and were a major achievement. From the Dahesh Museum of Art.

Stone Canoe III
Delavan Art Gallery

Delavan Art Gallery
501 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Works by artists in the third edition of Stone Canoe, a journal of arts and ideas from Upstate New York. Artists featured include Marianne Barcellona, Marty Blake, Lauren Bristol, Elaine R. Defibaugh, Sylvia de Swaan, Donna L. Emerson, Paul Farinacci, Lisbeth Firmin, John Fitzsimmons, Emily Fleisher, Bob Gates, Jon Gernon, Thomas Gokey, Fred Gonyea, Erica Harney and Aldo Lira. Also, David R. MacDonald, Jennifer Marsh, Lalit K. Masih, Deloss McGraw, Rebecca Murtaugh, Mary Nelson Zadrozny, Steven Pearlman, Stephan Phillips, Awenheeyoh Powless, Mark Robbins, Roger Shimomura, Nancy Sirkis, Yolanda Tooley, Gary Trento, Kim Waale, and Phil Young.

Landscapes and Interiors: Works of Kianga Ford
The Warehouse Gallery

The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

In this solo exhibition, Los Angeles-Boston based artist Kianga Ford presents a set of installations with sound that explore the contemporary Syracuse landscape and the potential of its spaces to create communities out of relative strangers. The three zones of the exhibition transition from exterior landscapes to interior spaces, crossing between the spaces of the sacred and profane to re-create the dynamics of contemporary urbanity -- blending the deep interiors of the religious sanctuary with the VIP rooms of strip clubs, the food court with the bus stop.

Voices of Diversity: Photographs by Lida Suchý
ArtRage Gallery

Price: Free
ArtRage Gallery
505 Hawley Ave., Syracuse

"Voices of Diversity" is a composite photographic portrait of the Syracuse Community Choir. Composed of more than 100 individual black and white images, it foregrounds the potential of art/singing as a powerful tool for fostering broad social inclusiveness and community building. This exhibit honors people who, as choir founder and director Karen Mihalyi says, seek to create a space in our community "that values all people, that sees everyone as important, that creates music... Where we find our voices, sing fully, and create beauty."

For more than 20 years, the Syracuse Community Choir has been an important voice in the Central New York community, actively promoting the ideas of social justice, peace and inclusiveness. The Choir is based on the idea that singing should be a vital part of the human experience and that everyone can sing. It is open to all people, from experienced musicians to those who have never sung. To involve all, the choir provides support such as brailling, transportation, large print words, tapes/CDs, childcare, separate teen and children's rehearsals and special help for all who want it.

Lida Suchý's photographs have been widely exhibited in galleries and museums in the United States and Europe and published in LIFE Magazine, National Geographic, and GEO. Lida's photographs are in the collections of the George Eastman House, the Brooklyn Museum, Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and SF MoMA. Lida is a first-generation American born into a Ukrainian refugee family. She holds a BA from SUNY Albany, an MA from Syracuse University, and an MFA from Yale University School of Art.

FridayFLICS: Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till
ArtRage Gallery

Price: $5 suggested donation
ArtRage Gallery
505 Hawley Ave., Syracuse

A stunning slice of reality informs recent history in this documentary on the African-American boy who, in 1955, was brutally killed for whistling at a white woman. Includes never-before-seen testimony. (Directed by Keith Beauchamp, 2005)

Opening Night Lecture and Reception:
Everson Museum of Art
Featuring Susan Isaacs, curator

Price: $10 regular; members free
Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Join the Everson in celebrating the opening of two exhibitions, "50/50: Nancy Jurs" and "Anne Cofer: Concealed Objects." At 5:30 pm, art historian, J. Susan Isaacs, PhD, of Townson University in Maryland, and curator of "50/50: Nancy Jurs," will discuss the artist's interest in narrative and meaning in her work. Isaacs will also bring attention to the positive, uplifting and straightforward messages found in Jurs' art, which can also be humorous at the same time that is addresses serious subjects. From 6:00-8:00 pm, enjoy the exhibitions over hors d'oeuvres catered by Alto Cinco, live entertainment and cash bar.

Syracuse Symphony Orchestra Woodwind Quintet
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Storer Auditorium
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Lost Time
Folkus Project

May Memorial Unitarian Society
3800 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Featuring rich harmony singing, clean picking, and dazzling instrumentals, Lost Time has become a central part of the bluegrass scene in upstate New York. The band has a knack for presenting traditional and progressive bluegrass and acoustic music in a unique and entertaining style. Every tune is like a well-orchestrated dance where each member gets his chance to shine. Lost Time had its beginnings in the summer of 2000, when four long-time friends got together to play just for fun. They had known each other for over 20 years, and some had played in bands together, but never in this configuration. Right away, it was clear this would develop into something special; these were four mature musicians who know how to listen to each other. To represent the years that had passed before this discovery, they chose the name Lost Time and a hot bluegrass band was born.

Pops Series: Forbidden Broadway
Syracuse Symphony Orchestra
Catherine Stornetta, conductor

Crouse Hinds Concert Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

In this hilarious symphonic send-up, an award-winning cast of comic chameleons celebrates the biggest shows, pays homage to the brightest stars, and even pokes fun at the notorious flops that have had their magical moment in the lights of Broadway.

Read a review!

Poet Susan Deer Cloud
Downtown Writer's Center

Price: Free
YMCA Downtown
340 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Author of The Last Ceremony

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Appleseed Productions
Dustin M. Czarny, director

Price: $15 regular; $12 students/seniors
Atonement Lutheran Church
116 W. Glen Ave., Syracuse

All is orderly in Nurse Ratched's ward. The patients are sedated and confined into quiet dull routines. Everything is working smoothly, until Randle P. McMurphy shows up. A rebellious and charming convict, conning his way out of a lengthy prison sentence, McMurphy immediately takes over the ward and challenges authority at every turn. But McMurphy soon finds out how dangerous challenging authority can be when their power is absolute, and just how far they will go to keep it that way. By Dale Wasserman, based on the novel by Ken Kesey.

Read a Review!

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

New Play Workshop: Falling to Earth
Syracuse University Drama Department
Laura Josepher, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Falling to Earth, a new musical by SU alumni Tom Gualtieri and David Sisco, is a serio-comic retelling of the myth of Pygmalion and Galatea, set in ancient Cyprus, but filtered through a skewed, contemporary lens. The artist Pygmalion finds himself unable to finish a statue of Venus in time for the annual feast day. Frustrated by interference from both his lusty friend and a mysterious serving girl, Pygmalion turns his attention toward the statue and soon discovers that his creation has a life and story of her own. The appearance of a beautiful but neurotic goddess further complicates matters when she brings the statue to life. Soon all the characters, including the artists' creation, are forced to look deeper into themselves and let go of their once secure notions of life, love and self.

This will be a workshop performance of a work-in-progress.

Free tickets can be reserved by contacting Marie Kemp at mckemp@syr.edu.

The Way of the World
Syracuse University Drama Department
Malcolm Ingram, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Three hundred years ago, love, jealousy, revenge, and greed made the world go round. Today, not much has changed when it comes to matters of money and sex. It's just the way of the world, as William Congreve proves in his 1700 Restoration piece that's more of a soap opera than a play. At the heart of the production are young lovers Millamant and Mirabell, whose marriage everyone in society is against. Set in the rich salons of upper-class English society, this witty show highlights the foolish and often malicious tactics employed in issues of romance, marriage and social conventions. Can young love prevail in the end?

Read a review!

Saturday, February 7, 2009

Stone Canoe III
Delavan Art Gallery

Delavan Art Gallery
501 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Works by artists in the third edition of Stone Canoe, a journal of arts and ideas from Upstate New York. Artists featured include Marianne Barcellona, Marty Blake, Lauren Bristol, Elaine R. Defibaugh, Sylvia de Swaan, Donna L. Emerson, Paul Farinacci, Lisbeth Firmin, John Fitzsimmons, Emily Fleisher, Bob Gates, Jon Gernon, Thomas Gokey, Fred Gonyea, Erica Harney and Aldo Lira. Also, David R. MacDonald, Jennifer Marsh, Lalit K. Masih, Deloss McGraw, Rebecca Murtaugh, Mary Nelson Zadrozny, Steven Pearlman, Stephan Phillips, Awenheeyoh Powless, Mark Robbins, Roger Shimomura, Nancy Sirkis, Yolanda Tooley, Gary Trento, Kim Waale, and Phil Young.

Needle Art and Embroidered Stone
Edgewood Gallery

Edgewood Gallery
216 Tecumseh Rd., Syracuse

Needle art by members of the American Needlepoint Guild, and fine porcelain and stoneware by Sue Canizares.

Anne Cofer: Concealed Objects
Everson Museum of Art

Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Anne Cofer's interest in materials and artistic processes is evident in "Concealed Objects," a provocative new site-specific installation created for her first museum solo exhibition at the Everson. Inspired by British artists such as Cornelia Parker and Rachel Whiteread, whose sculpture is at once unique and fleeting, Cofer creates objects that exist for a moment and place in time and then are recycled and reused for other projects. The installation designed for the Everson is composed of skirt forms constructed of cloth and wet clay suspended from the ceiling in grid fashion. The skirts, arranged in perfect harmony within the space that contains them, appear to float in contradiction to the heavy clay that pulls them downward. Each garment is cut from a Victorian-era dress pattern (ca. 1895), combined with wet clay and modeled by hand to capture every fold of the fabric as it cascades to the floor. The repetition of form and motion recalls the monotonous tasks of domestic chores that have existed for centuries without change. Cofer assigns new meaning to the found and recycled fabrics she chooses for the garments: the bed linens, table cloths, furniture upholstery, and well-worn clothing conceal the individual histories, memories and stories untold about their previous owners.

Anne Cofer was the recipient of the Best-of-Show Award given at the 2008 Everson Biennial exhibition.

50/50: Works of Nancy Jurs
Everson Museum of Art

Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Nancy Jurs juxtaposes her signature large-scale, hand-built ceramic sculptures with recent site-specific installations composed of ceramic, mixed-media and found objects. Throughout her 40-year career Jurs, a Rochester-based sculptor and ceramic artist, has produced an astounding body of work that largely addresses female power and strength. In 2003, Jurs completed the Armor Series, a grouping of six life-size armored torsos that present themselves with empowered determination. The stylized shells not only serve to protect the figures but to symbolize renewed confidence and strength in a post-9/11 world. "Undaunted" (2003), which is part of the Armor Series, was acquired by the Everson in 2004.

Also on view will be "Triad," a monumental 16-foot high sculpture composed of ceramic slabs that have been hand-built: cut, scraped, modeled, and stacked in three interacting totem-like structures. Triad will be prominently displayed in the Rosamond Gifford Sculpture Court.

Selections from the Dar-ul-Islam Historical Photograph Collection
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Contemporary Craft Masters
Community Folk Art Center

Price: Free
Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

There will be a panel discussion and reception 2:00-4:00 pm.

"Contemporary Craft Masters" features the work of three artists who were featured on HGTV's "Modern Masters: African American Artisans" program in 2003. The featured artists, Espi Frazier, Hermon Futrell, and David MacDonald, are at the forefront of contemporary crafts and reflect the diverse and innovative palette of today's artists.

Thinkin' 'bout Lincoln
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Come celebrate Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday! Some very intriguing items belonging to our former President are on display.

A Local Black History Exhibit
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Exhibit presented by The Black History Preservationist Project, The Dunbar Association, The Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, Syracuse University South Side Initiative, A Community-University Partnership Project, and Umi & Associates Inc.

Exploring History with Art: The Changing View—Landscapes
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Paintings from OHA's permanent collection

Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt
Syracuse University Art Museum

Price: Free
Syracuse University Art Museum, Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The exhibition brings together more than 80 engravings, vivid Orientalist paintings, decorative objects, and documents and letters made during General Napoleon Bonaparte's Egyptian Campaign of 1791-1801. While unsuccessful as a military campaign, the endeavor was extremely successful and a cultural expedition. Napoleon brought over 150 scholars with him and their investigations into the country's ancient and contemporary societies formed the foundation of modern Egyptology and were a major achievement. From the Dahesh Museum of Art.

Voices of Diversity: Photographs by Lida Suchý
ArtRage Gallery

Price: Free
ArtRage Gallery
505 Hawley Ave., Syracuse

"Voices of Diversity" is a composite photographic portrait of the Syracuse Community Choir. Composed of more than 100 individual black and white images, it foregrounds the potential of art/singing as a powerful tool for fostering broad social inclusiveness and community building. This exhibit honors people who, as choir founder and director Karen Mihalyi says, seek to create a space in our community "that values all people, that sees everyone as important, that creates music... Where we find our voices, sing fully, and create beauty."

For more than 20 years, the Syracuse Community Choir has been an important voice in the Central New York community, actively promoting the ideas of social justice, peace and inclusiveness. The Choir is based on the idea that singing should be a vital part of the human experience and that everyone can sing. It is open to all people, from experienced musicians to those who have never sung. To involve all, the choir provides support such as brailling, transportation, large print words, tapes/CDs, childcare, separate teen and children's rehearsals and special help for all who want it.

Lida Suchý's photographs have been widely exhibited in galleries and museums in the United States and Europe and published in LIFE Magazine, National Geographic, and GEO. Lida's photographs are in the collections of the George Eastman House, the Brooklyn Museum, Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris and SF MoMA. Lida is a first-generation American born into a Ukrainian refugee family. She holds a BA from SUNY Albany, an MA from Syracuse University, and an MFA from Yale University School of Art.

Landscapes and Interiors: Works of Kianga Ford
The Warehouse Gallery

The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

In this solo exhibition, Los Angeles-Boston based artist Kianga Ford presents a set of installations with sound that explore the contemporary Syracuse landscape and the potential of its spaces to create communities out of relative strangers. The three zones of the exhibition transition from exterior landscapes to interior spaces, crossing between the spaces of the sacred and profane to re-create the dynamics of contemporary urbanity -- blending the deep interiors of the religious sanctuary with the VIP rooms of strip clubs, the food court with the bus stop.

Panel Discussion and Reception
Community Folk Art Center

Price: Free
Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A reception and panel discussion about the artists' work and issues relevant to contemporary art, with Espi Frazier, Hermon Futrell, and David MacDonald, whose works are featured in the Contemporary Craft Masters exhibit.

Pops Series: Forbidden Broadway
Syracuse Symphony Orchestra
Catherine Stornetta, conductor

Crouse Hinds Concert Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

In this hilarious symphonic send-up, an award-winning cast of comic chameleons celebrates the biggest shows, pays homage to the brightest stars, and even pokes fun at the notorious flops that have had their magical moment in the lights of Broadway.

Read a review!

Carnaval del Mundo
Open Hand Theater
Featuring Dan Butterworth

Price: $8 adults, $6 children
International Mask and Puppet Museum
518 Prospect Ave., Syracuse

A wild and zany show from an A World of Puppets favorite! Dancing and cavorting marionettes and special effects with light and shadow inhabit this world of pure enchantment. Dan is one of America's leading puppeteers and an award-winning artist on video, film and television. The entertainment never stops!

Little Red Riding Hood
Magic Circle Children's Theatre

Price: $5
Spaghetti Warehouse
689 N. Clinton St., Syracuse

Interactive version of the children's classic.

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Appleseed Productions
Dustin M. Czarny, director

Price: $15 regular; $12 students/seniors
Atonement Lutheran Church
116 W. Glen Ave., Syracuse

All is orderly in Nurse Ratched's ward. The patients are sedated and confined into quiet dull routines. Everything is working smoothly, until Randle P. McMurphy shows up. A rebellious and charming convict, conning his way out of a lengthy prison sentence, McMurphy immediately takes over the ward and challenges authority at every turn. But McMurphy soon finds out how dangerous challenging authority can be when their power is absolute, and just how far they will go to keep it that way. By Dale Wasserman, based on the novel by Ken Kesey.

Read a Review!

Talking With
Simply New Theatre

Price: $20
BeVard Room, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

These extraordinary monologues, written by Jane Martin, received a standing ovation at Louisville's Actors Theatre. Idiosyncratic characters amuse, move, and frighten, always speaking from the depths of their souls. They include a baton twirler, a fundamentalist snake handler, an ex-rodeo rider and an actress willing to go to any length to get a job.

The show features Nora O'Dea, Judy Schmid, Katharine Gibson, Kate Huddleston, Rosemary Palladino-Leone, Binaifer Dabu, Katheryn Guyette, Kristi Grant, Jillian Dailey, Shannon Tompkins and Moe Harrington O'Neil.

Read a Review!

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

The Way of the World
Syracuse University Drama Department
Malcolm Ingram, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Three hundred years ago, love, jealousy, revenge, and greed made the world go round. Today, not much has changed when it comes to matters of money and sex. It's just the way of the world, as William Congreve proves in his 1700 Restoration piece that's more of a soap opera than a play. At the heart of the production are young lovers Millamant and Mirabell, whose marriage everyone in society is against. Set in the rich salons of upper-class English society, this witty show highlights the foolish and often malicious tactics employed in issues of romance, marriage and social conventions. Can young love prevail in the end?

Read a review!

New Play Workshop: Falling to Earth
Syracuse University Drama Department
Laura Josepher, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Falling to Earth, a new musical by SU alumni Tom Gualtieri and David Sisco, is a serio-comic retelling of the myth of Pygmalion and Galatea, set in ancient Cyprus, but filtered through a skewed, contemporary lens. The artist Pygmalion finds himself unable to finish a statue of Venus in time for the annual feast day. Frustrated by interference from both his lusty friend and a mysterious serving girl, Pygmalion turns his attention toward the statue and soon discovers that his creation has a life and story of her own. The appearance of a beautiful but neurotic goddess further complicates matters when she brings the statue to life. Soon all the characters, including the artists' creation, are forced to look deeper into themselves and let go of their once secure notions of life, love and self.

This will be a workshop performance of a work-in-progress.

Free tickets can be reserved by contacting Marie Kemp at mckemp@syr.edu.

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Observations East and West: Artists' Views of the Historic Erie Canal
Erie Canal Museum
Syracuse University College of Visual and Performing Arts

Price: Free
Erie Canal Museum
318 Erie Blvd. E., Syracuse

The exhibition will feature student work from professor Sarah McCoubrey's fall 2008 landscape painting class and will be matted, framed and installed by students in the Museum Studies program. The subject of the works is an exploration of the changing environment as impacted by the Erie Canal. To accomplish this, the class met weekly at a variety of locations along the Erie Canal including the more rural areas, through the suburbs, into the city, and at the Erie Canal Museum.

The choice of these sites represents more than 200 years of transition in the surrounding Syracuse community and illustrates the change in the living environment as the community evolved from a casual based transportation center into a major modern metropolitan city.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

A Local Black History Exhibit
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Exhibit presented by The Black History Preservationist Project, The Dunbar Association, The Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, Syracuse University South Side Initiative, A Community-University Partnership Project, and Umi & Associates Inc.

Thinkin' 'bout Lincoln
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Come celebrate Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday! Some very intriguing items belonging to our former President are on display.

Exploring History with Art: The Changing View—Landscapes
Onondaga Historical Association

Onondaga Historical Association
321 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Paintings from OHA's permanent collection

Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt
Syracuse University Art Museum

Price: Free
Syracuse University Art Museum, Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The exhibition brings together more than 80 engravings, vivid Orientalist paintings, decorative objects, and documents and letters made during General Napoleon Bonaparte's Egyptian Campaign of 1791-1801. While unsuccessful as a military campaign, the endeavor was extremely successful and a cultural expedition. Napoleon brought over 150 scholars with him and their investigations into the country's ancient and contemporary societies formed the foundation of modern Egyptology and were a major achievement. From the Dahesh Museum of Art.

50/50: Works of Nancy Jurs
Everson Museum of Art

Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Nancy Jurs juxtaposes her signature large-scale, hand-built ceramic sculptures with recent site-specific installations composed of ceramic, mixed-media and found objects. Throughout her 40-year career Jurs, a Rochester-based sculptor and ceramic artist, has produced an astounding body of work that largely addresses female power and strength. In 2003, Jurs completed the Armor Series, a grouping of six life-size armored torsos that present themselves with empowered determination. The stylized shells not only serve to protect the figures but to symbolize renewed confidence and strength in a post-9/11 world. "Undaunted" (2003), which is part of the Armor Series, was acquired by the Everson in 2004.

Also on view will be "Triad," a monumental 16-foot high sculpture composed of ceramic slabs that have been hand-built: cut, scraped, modeled, and stacked in three interacting totem-like structures. Triad will be prominently displayed in the Rosamond Gifford Sculpture Court.

Anne Cofer: Concealed Objects
Everson Museum of Art

Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Anne Cofer's interest in materials and artistic processes is evident in "Concealed Objects," a provocative new site-specific installation created for her first museum solo exhibition at the Everson. Inspired by British artists such as Cornelia Parker and Rachel Whiteread, whose sculpture is at once unique and fleeting, Cofer creates objects that exist for a moment and place in time and then are recycled and reused for other projects. The installation designed for the Everson is composed of skirt forms constructed of cloth and wet clay suspended from the ceiling in grid fashion. The skirts, arranged in perfect harmony within the space that contains them, appear to float in contradiction to the heavy clay that pulls them downward. Each garment is cut from a Victorian-era dress pattern (ca. 1895), combined with wet clay and modeled by hand to capture every fold of the fabric as it cascades to the floor. The repetition of form and motion recalls the monotonous tasks of domestic chores that have existed for centuries without change. Cofer assigns new meaning to the found and recycled fabrics she chooses for the garments: the bed linens, table cloths, furniture upholstery, and well-worn clothing conceal the individual histories, memories and stories untold about their previous owners.

Anne Cofer was the recipient of the Best-of-Show Award given at the 2008 Everson Biennial exhibition.

Film Series -- Zora Neale Hurston: Jump at the Sun
Everson Museum of Art

Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

Julia McKinstry, soprano
Fayetteville Free Library

Price: Free
Fayetteville Free Library
300 Orchard St., Fayetteville

Winter Concert
Onondaga Civic Symphony Orchestra
Erik Kibelsbeck, conductor
Featuring Mike Montero, violin

Price: $10 regular; $5 seniors
Atonement Lutheran Church
116 W. Glen Ave., Syracuse

Guest Ensemble: The Onondaga Youth String Ensemble, conducted by Michael Montero
Bach Komm, süsser Tod
Bach Violin Concerto in a minor, Michael Montero, violin
Bach Fugue in g minor, "Little" (combined with OYSE)
Sibelius Symphony No. 2

Black History Month Cabaret: The Very Thought of You
CNY Jazz Arts Foundation
Featuring Nicole Henry

Price: $25 regular; $20 donors; $10 students
Hotel Syracuse Persian Terrace
500 S. Warren St., Syracuse

Dynamic jazz chanteuse Nicole Henry returns to Syracuse for a reprise cabaret performance in the gorgeous and historic Persian Terrace of the Hotel Syracuse. She'll be performing songs just released on her third jazz CD, The Very Thought of You, which features love songs, including gems from the Great American Songbook. She continues to win awards and accolades around the world, now performing at clubs and festivals in Japan, Spain, London, Jamaica, Korea and Mexico. Her performance at the Jazz á Juan les Pins Festival in the south of France won her their Prix du Jury 2007 award as part of their international Révélations vocal jazz competition.

In the U.S., she's been featured in New York City at The Rainbow Room, Cotton Club, Lincoln Center, The Iridium, 55 Bar and Smalls, as well as at the Dakota Jazz Club in Minneapolis; Manchester Craftsmen's Guild in Pittsburgh; and in her hometown of Miami at Arturo Sandoval's, where she is a regular attraction.

Gourmet food stations are available at additional charge during the event and seating is limited to 200. Call CNY Jazz at 315-479-JAZZ (5299) for advance reservations and information on group tables.

Boston Brass
Malmgren Concert Series
Featuring Kola Owolabi, organ

Price: Free
Hendricks Chapel
Syracuse University, Syracuse

For this performance, the quintet will perform selections by Giovanni Gabrieli, Franz Liszt, Dizzy Gillespie, Pee Wee Ellis, Duke Ellington and Juan Tizol, both alone and accompanied by Syracuse University Organist Kola Owolabi.

From exciting classical arrangements to breathtaking vocal harmony to burning jazz standards, the Boston Brass achieves new levels in brass performance while treating audiences to a unique musical experience. The quintet performs more than 100 concerts annually around the world and has conducted master classes at colleges and universities around the country, including SU. The quintet is Jeff Conner (trumpet), Andrew Hitz (tuba), Lance LaDuke (trombone/euphonium), J.D. Shaw (French horn), and Jose Sibaja (trumpet).

Parking is available in the Irving Garage and in the University's West lots.

Kitka Women's Vocal Ensemble in Concert

Price: $15 at the door; advance sale: $12 regular, $10 seniors
Park Central Presbyterian Church
504 E. Fayette St., Syracuse

Kitka, the San Francisco Bay Area's internationally acclaimed women's vocal ensemble, presents a concert of traditional and contemporary music from Eastern Europe and beyond.

Singing in more than a dozen different languages, including Albanian, Armenian, Bulgarian, Croatian, Hebrew, Hungarian, Georgian, Macedonian, Russian, and Ukrainian, Kitka is an ensemble that brings an engaging contemporary perspective to centuries-old vocal traditions. From strident chants sung in the elemental village style to complex contemporary arrangements inspired by ancient extended vocal techniques, Kitka's repertoire explores the stunning dissonances, odd-metered rhythms, intricate ornamentation, lush harmonies, and resonant strength of Balkan, Slavic, and Caucasian women's vocal music.

For reservations, phone 315-475-1677 or email office@parkcentralchurch.org. There is a $3 discount for those who purchase tickets to the world premiere of Richard Einhorn's The Origin at SUNY Oswego on Feb. 6 or 7.

Graduate Violin Recital
Syracuse University Setnor School of Music
Featuring Meredith Laing

Price: Free
Setnor Auditorium, Crouse College
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Meredith Laing, a graduate music performance student, will perform works by Antonin Dvorak, Arvo Part, Johannes Brahms, Edward Elgar and Alexander Glazunov.

For more information, contact the Setnor School at 315-443-2191.

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

The Way of the World
Syracuse University Drama Department
Malcolm Ingram, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Three hundred years ago, love, jealousy, revenge, and greed made the world go round. Today, not much has changed when it comes to matters of money and sex. It's just the way of the world, as William Congreve proves in his 1700 Restoration piece that's more of a soap opera than a play. At the heart of the production are young lovers Millamant and Mirabell, whose marriage everyone in society is against. Set in the rich salons of upper-class English society, this witty show highlights the foolish and often malicious tactics employed in issues of romance, marriage and social conventions. Can young love prevail in the end?

Read a review!

New Play Workshop: Falling to Earth
Syracuse University Drama Department
Laura Josepher, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Falling to Earth, a new musical by SU alumni Tom Gualtieri and David Sisco, is a serio-comic retelling of the myth of Pygmalion and Galatea, set in ancient Cyprus, but filtered through a skewed, contemporary lens. The artist Pygmalion finds himself unable to finish a statue of Venus in time for the annual feast day. Frustrated by interference from both his lusty friend and a mysterious serving girl, Pygmalion turns his attention toward the statue and soon discovers that his creation has a life and story of her own. The appearance of a beautiful but neurotic goddess further complicates matters when she brings the statue to life. Soon all the characters, including the artists' creation, are forced to look deeper into themselves and let go of their once secure notions of life, love and self.

This will be a workshop performance of a work-in-progress.

Free tickets can be reserved by contacting Marie Kemp at mckemp@syr.edu.

Putting It Together
Syracuse Stage
Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Conceived by Stephen Sondheim and Julia McKenzie as a musical review, Putting It Together showcases 30 of Sondheim's most beloved songs from such musicals as Sunday in the Park with George, Assassins, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd and others. A swanky Manhattan cocktail party provides the setting for a cast of five who use Sondheim's exquisite songs to examine the ups and downs of two relationships. The stellar cast of Broadway performers includes Tony Award-winners Lillias White and Chuck Cooper (Best Actress and Best Actor in The Life, 1997), Tyler Hanes (Broadway's A Chorus Line, Sweet Charity and Hairspray), Andre Ward (Xanadu, The Producers) and Stephanie Youell (Curtains).

Read a Review!

Monday, February 9, 2009

Gallery Exhibition: Works of James Watkins
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

Ceramicist James Watkins throws elegant miniature cups, saucers and bowls, and double-walled cauldrons and jars, some of which are close to three feet high. He comes to his art with great sensitivity of touch that gives his works immense lyrical beauty.

The Golem: Visual Visitations
Point of Contact Gallery

Price: Free
Point of Contact Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

A major collective exhibit of seven world class artists titled "The Golem: Visual Visitations," inspired by Jorge Luis Borges' poem "El Golem." This is the third edition of a program that began in Prague in 2002 through the initiative of the Argentinean Embassy in that city, and it was introduced by the renowned poet Václav Havel, then President of the Czech Republic. A second version was later produced with tremendous success at the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires in 2003, also introduced by then President of the country, Néstor Kirchner. Now the program travels to the United States for the first time to be shown exclusively at Syracuse University.

The Golem exhibit at The Point of Contact Gallery features original works especially commissioned for this exhibit, created by seven artists: from Argentina (Leandro Katz; Pedro Roth); Uruguay (Marta Chilindrón); Puerto Rico (Víctor Vázquez); Syracuse (Tom Sherman; Doug Dubois) and New York (Sarah Kipp). It combines photography, installation and video art.

Arena Art Group Exhibit
Syracuse Technology Garden Gallery

Price: Free
Syracuse Technology Garden
235 Harrison St., Syracuse

Fun, wild, and experimental artwork by Rochester's Arena Art Group.

A Goodly Heritage of Study: The Portfolio Club of Syracuse
Syracuse University Library Special Collections Research Center

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Displayed are the archives of a still-thriving women's study club that was formed in 1875 in Syracuse. The Portfolio Club exemplifies a post-Civil War movement in which many thousands of middle-class women came together to educate themselves in a society that restricted women's access to institutions of higher learning. This club began a few weeks after the Association for the Advancement of Women held a congress at the Wieting Opera House in downtown Syracuse. At these congresses, which took place in many American cities, Julia Ward Howe and other presenters encouraged women to form study clubs for self-culture.

Nine young women founded the Portfolio Club, with guidance from Mary Dana Hicks, their art teacher. Though they began with a focus on art, in the middle 1880s they expanded their scope to include literature, current events, history, performing arts and many other subjects. Members have always met regularly from October through April to read their papers on a topic assigned by each year's president.

Syracuse residents and those long associated with SU will recognize the married names of many past club members, such as Mrs. Donald Dey, Mrs. William Nottingham, Mrs. E.N. Westcott, and Mrs. Mildred Eggers. Among Portfolio guest speakers during the club's first several decades were Judge Charles Andrews, Dean George Fiske Comfort, Howard Lyman, professors Sawyer Falk and Irene Sargent, Paul Paine, Douglas Petit, Katherine Sibley, and SU Chancellor Charles Sims.

The exhibition, which emphasizes the years 1875-1950, includes annual program booklets, many of them finely crafted. Also on display are meeting minutes, clippings, photographs, film footage of a 1935 gathering and other club documents.

The Crane Show: Origami, Watercolor, and Oriental Brush Painting
Westcott Community Center

Price: Free
Westcott Community Center
Corner of Euclid Ave. and Westcott St., Syracuse

Works by Phil DeMocker and Ann Milner

Observations East and West: Artists' Views of the Historic Erie Canal
Erie Canal Museum
Syracuse University College of Visual and Performing Arts

Price: Free
Erie Canal Museum
318 Erie Blvd. E., Syracuse

The exhibition will feature student work from professor Sarah McCoubrey's fall 2008 landscape painting class and will be matted, framed and installed by students in the Museum Studies program. The subject of the works is an exploration of the changing environment as impacted by the Erie Canal. To accomplish this, the class met weekly at a variety of locations along the Erie Canal including the more rural areas, through the suburbs, into the city, and at the Erie Canal Museum.

The choice of these sites represents more than 200 years of transition in the surrounding Syracuse community and illustrates the change in the living environment as the community evolved from a casual based transportation center into a major modern metropolitan city.

Prosthesis: Ambivalence -- Works by Ellen Garvens
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

In "Prosthesis," Ellen Garvens' photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens' Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from her Constructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of the humans who carry out that conflict. The photo-based sculptures from Garvens' body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Light Work Gallery
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Transmedia Photography Annual features photographs by Transmedia undergraduate students at Syracuse University.