Welcome Spring at ancient Walpurgis Fete, April 30, 8pm, FREE

Drive away Winter's darkness and welcome Spring's light. Walpurgis Nacht, an ancient festival celebrating the end of winter/darkness and the beginning of spring/light, was appropriated by the Catholic Church with the canonization of St. Wapurga in 870. In this site specific performance event directed by Michael Sommers, performers and audience move along the West Bank. There is no seating.
Audience will gather at the Amphitheater between Anderson and Ferguson Hall on the West Bank.
The festival will proceed at 8pm rain or shine.
No reservations necessary. https://events.umn.edu/025283

Costume Designer & Make-up Artist Tessie Bundick's work on Exhibit, opening April 6 at Hennepin History Museum

Associate faculty member Tessie Bundick, costume designer and make-up artist exhibits her work at the Hennepin History Museum in "The Enchanting Picture She has Painted: A Look at the Work of Hennepin County Artist Tessie Bundick." Bundick has designed costumes and make-up for feature films, theatre, and television. Powering famous faces, combing and arranging locks, and designing costumes, Bundick has worked with wide a wide variety of stars-- River Phoenix, Emmy Lou Harris, Garrison Keillor, Chet Atkins, the Everly Brothers, Jose Ferrar and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Opening April 6 at 6:00pm, this exhibit includes costumes, original photos, and personal correspondence with the artists.
The Hennepin History Museum is located at 2303 Third Avenue South, Minneapolis.
Admission is $5 for adults, $1 for seniors and persons under 18 years of age.

SPUNK AT PENUMBRA - See Alumni/Faculty work on display

SPUNK brings new blood and revives the Penumbra Theatre, writes the StarTribune. Patdro Harris directs this sensuous and witty journey through African American life at the dawn of the twentieth century. SPUNK, based on folklore collected by literary icon Zora Neale Hurston, features Keith Jamal Downing, T. Mychael Rambo(associate faculty), Mikell Sapp, Dennis W. Spears (associate faculty), Jevetta Steele and Austene Van, who bring to life this rich mixture of storytelling, dance and the blues. Costume design is by alum Amanda McGee , a recent MFA student and set design for SPUNK is by Lance Brockman. Penumbra's Artistic Director Lou Bellamy and Brockman are both recently retired faculty of the UMTAD. Don't miss seeing SPUNK which plays March 14 - April 7. For more info or to buy tickets, visit Penumbra's website.

Last chance to see scenic art exhibit on America's vaudeville era guest curated by Professor Lance Brockman at West Bank's Andersen Library through March 15

Theatres and vaudeville stages were the entertainment outlets that Americans sought before the days of movies, television, and the Internet. The University of Minnesota celebrates that bygone era with a new exhibit, titled "Creating the World for the Stage: 1893-1929 - An Exhibit of Scenic Sketches."

Painted renderings of backdrops, sketches and other artifacts from the Performing Arts Archives at the University of Minnesota Libraries are featured in the exhibit that explores the exotic worlds created by the scenic artists for both public theatres and private fraternal spaces of the Freemasons. The exhibit is guest curated by Professor Lance Brockman of the University's Department of Theatre Arts and Dance. Presently on view the exhibit concludes March 15, 2013 at the Elmer A. Andersen Library, West Bank of the Twin Cities Minneapolis campus and is free and open to the public.

The exhibit documents the backstage technical environment of the popular stage during the late-19th and early-20th centuries. The artifacts include original renderings and materials from Twin City Scenic Company, Great Western Stage Equipment Company, and the Holak Company.

The companies used these materials to market their painted drop scenery to public theatres across the country and later to fraternal organizations, such as the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry. Brockman said that the Freemasons use of theatre and set design in their degree rituals helped them to boost membership.

"What had once been recitation, previously, now becomes a lively and fun theatrical presentation - you can see how attractive this would be to potential members," Brockman said. "And as public theatre became less and less of a market for these scenic studios, the Freemasons became more and more of a market."

Brockman, who is retiring after 37 years, was instrumental in acquiring the collections for the University of Minnesota, beginning in 1983. His research into this period of set design, he said, was primarily to help him teach theatre students about the nearly lost craft of painted drop scenery.

"The exhibit shows people that we have the collections and it's also a great resource for scenic artists," said Peter Baker, a theatre arts student who assisted Brockman with the design and installation of the exhibit. "The art of painting these drops was never really passed down. It sort of died off. But having the sketches and being able to look at the extant work, you can actually pick out how they did it, how they painted it. It becomes a resource, not only for the historical context, but the practice itself - the art, as well as the artifact."

Theatre arts student Nicky Rodriguez assisted Brockman with the exhibit curation.

Gallery hours are 8:30 a.m. to 4:15 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, and Friday; and 8:30 a.m. to 6:45 p.m. on Wednesday and Thursday. For more information, go to z.umn.edu/stage. All images are available online at lib.umn.edu/scrbm/paa/scenery.

Alums Faye Price and Noel Raymond honored as MPR's ART HEROES

U of M Theatre alums Faye Price and Noel Raymond, are honored as "Art Heroes" and are featured on Minnesota Public Radio news for their spirited leadership and clear artistic vision of Pillsbury House and Theatre, located on Chicago Avenue in Minneapolis.

As co-artistic directors, Price and Raymond face many challenges reports MPR. "It's in a neighborhood which has sometimes had a reputation for crime as much as creativity. It's a professional theater company in a community center that suffers from the low expectations assigned to a 'community theater.' And its budget took a beating in the recession."

Price ruminated on all three issues recently as actors ran through their lines on Pillsbury's stage for a remount of the play, Buzzer. It's a provocative piece that's typical Pillsbury fare, highlighting issues of race, class and friction related to urban gentrification. The play got rave reviews last year, and it's now remounted at the Guthrie Theater, and co-artistic director Price sees challenge ahead.

"I can't begin to tell you how many people think that, because we're in a neighborhood center, because we're in this neighborhood in particular, that if you come to see a play here your expectations shouldn't be very high," she said. "That's what people expect, and we always change their minds."

Read more of Marianne Comb's news feature on Art Heroes Faye Price and Noel Raymond.

Dance Prof Rachmi Diyah Larasati authors "The Dance That Makes You Vanish"

Theatre Arts & Dance professor, Rachmi Diyah Larasati has written Dance That Makes You Vanish: Cultural Reconstruction in Post -Genocide Indonesia. Published by the University of Minnesota Press in March, the new work explores the transformation of dance form in the highly charged political repression in her native homeland during the 1960s.

Indonesian court dance, a purportedly pure and untouched tradition, is famed throughout the world for its sublime calm and stillness. Yet this unyieldingly peaceful surface conceals a time of political repression and mass killing. Between 1965 and 1966, some one million Indonesians--including a large percentage of the country's musicians, artists, and dancers--were killed, arrested, or disappeared as Suharto established a virtual dictatorship that ruled for the next thirty years.

In The Dance That Makes You Vanish, an examination of the relationship between female dancers and the Indonesian state since 1965, Rachmi Diyah Larasati elucidates the Suharto regime's dual-edged strategy: persecuting and killing performers perceived as communist or left leaning while simultaneously producing and deploying "replicas"--new bodies trained to standardize and unify the "unruly" movements and voices of those vanished--as idealized representatives of Indonesia's cultural elegance and composure in bowing to autocratic rule. Analyzing this history, Larasati shows how the Suharto regime's obsessive attempts to control and harness Indonesian dance for its own political ends have functioned as both smoke screen and smoke signal, inadvertently drawing attention to the site of state violence and criminality by constantly pointing out the "perfection" of the mask that covers it.

Reflecting on her own experiences as an Indonesian national troupe dancer from a family of persecuted female dancers and activists, Larasati brings to life a powerful, multifaceted investigation of the pervasive use of culture as a vehicle for state repression and the global mass-marketing of national identity.

Rachmi Diyah Larasati is assistant professor of cultural theory, critical studies, and dance history in the department of Theatre Arts & Dance at the University of Minnesota. She also holds an affiliate graduate faculty position there in the Department of Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies and is a former guest faculty at the Brown University Critical Global Humanities Research Institute.

Get the Book!

Sweet Revenge! to thrill Minnesota Centennial Showboat summer audiences, opening June 13, 2013

St. Paul, Minn. - The University of Minnesota and the Minnesota Centennial Showboat announced today plans to present SWEET REVENGE!, an action-packed tale of high adventure, June 13- August 24 to be performed aboard the famous boat that last summer drew nearly 11,000 visitors to Harriet Island, downtown St. Paul.

In SWEET REVENGE! (or No Mother to Guide Her) by Lillian Mortimer, Ralph, the repentant criminal steals the heart of a farmer's daughter only to have con man Livingstone claim her for his own. Split second escapes and skin-of-the-teeth rescues abound as criminals seasoned on the wicked streets of New York City prey on a community of country folks. Caught in a desperate web of deceit, secret lovers must battle to overcome powerful forces to escape. PETER MOORE and VERN SUTTON, the dynamic duo of that scored Showboat hits The Vampire! and The Demon Barber of Fleet Street join forces once again for this one-of-a-kind evening of family entertainment juxtaposing this classic American melodrama with song and dance routines.

When asked what can audiences expect in SWEET REVENGE!, director Moore quipped, "Crooked cops, a down-on-his-luck good guy, a big-city con artist, a killer and his side kick, a heroine caught in his evil clutches, plus a nasty whiskey-swilling granny... and oh, did I mention a raging storm complete with tornado that strikes on stage? What more could you expect from a night at the theater? And where else but on the Showboat can you cheer on the hero and hiss the bad guy?" Reviewing a recent revival of this 1905 melodrama, the New York Times commented, "If this brave tale of death, seduction, deceit, betrayal, and poetic justice cannot make you happy, you are in grave peril."

The Showboat also prides itself as home to olios, vintage musical interludes featuring song and dance. Spiced with fun gimmicks, colorful costumes and surprises, these tuneful crowd- pleasers are straight from the golden days of vaudeville. The Minnesota Opera veteran, maestro Vern Sutton returns to "direct with a sharp eye these musical vignettes...some poignant, some naughty" (St. Paul Pioneer Press) underscoring the evening's fun.

Docked on the banks of the mighty Mississippi at Harriet Island in beautiful downtown St. Paul, the Showboat offers welcoming public spaces, bars and a beautiful upper deck lounge with spectacular views of the city's skyline. Visitors stroll along embankments with wide green lawns shaded by towering cottonwoods as they step aboard. The Centennial Showboat - a floating palace with a fully air-conditioned 200 seat theater is styled after a vaudeville house, complete with painted scenery, footlights and nineteenth-century stage magic.

Owned by the University of Minnesota since 1958, the Minnesota Centennial Showboat proudly presents SWEET REVENGE for this 55th summer of fun and laughter. Visitors last year found "a perfect summer evening" for a first date or family outing. Tour groups, reunions, employee gatherings enjoy special rates. Unsolicited comments by one audience member sum up the response of many. "A talented cast of singers and actors kept me laughing and entertained the whole night...I'm going again and taking others with me." Convenient FREE parking for cars and busses is available. Arrive by bike on the Lilydale Trail or by boat and dock for FREE on the island. The University of Minnesota Centennial Showboat is completely accessible.

SWEET REVENGE! performs 2:30 pm matinees every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday: and evenings at 8:00pm Tuesday through Saturdays June 13- August 24, 2013. Thursday nights feature post-show Talk/Backs, informal Q & A sessions with cast members. Ask about Family Fun Special rates for Friday nights and Saturday matinees. Discounts for students with valid ID, seniors 62+ and groups rates for 15 or more are available. Reserve tickets ($23-$25) by calling 651.227.1100 or by visiting www.showboat.umn.edu. for more information.

FACTS
What: SWEET REVENGE! with Musical Olios aboard Minnesota Centennial Showboat
When: June 13- August 24, 2013
Where: downtown St. Paul, Minnesota Harriet Island, docked on the mighty Mississippi
Tickets: $23.00-$25.00 showboat.umn.edu or call direct 651-227-1100; ask about
rates for students, seniors, groups 15+ and Family Fun specials.