Salvation Army Luncheon
• May 3, 2012

The Salvation Army Women’s Auxiliary of Washington, DC, held its 61st annual luncheon and fashion show at The Ritz-Carlton West End on Sept. 29. Jan Smith Donaldson and Cynthia Steele Vance emceed “The Elite of the 2010 Collections” from Saks Fifth Avenue, Chevy Chase, modeled by Veronica Valencia-Sarukhan, wife of the Ambassador of Mexico, and Ronit Ziswiler, wife of the Ambassador of Switzerland. Local personalities walking the runway included Kay Kendall, Bob Ryan and Philip Bermingham. Event Chair Faye Morrissette was optimistic that the event would reach its $150,000 goal. [gallery ids="99273,104405,104384,104401,104397,104389,104393" nav="thumbs"]

From Art to Email: A Brief History of Photography.
•

Since its inception, photography has been a fusion between science and the creative eye. The first permanent photograph was produced in 1826 by the French inventor Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. The term “photography,” from the Greek, means “drawing with light” because at first it was considered a drawing aid. Its first popular incarnation was the daguereotype in 1839, named for its inventor Louis Daguerre. Each daguerreotype was a one of a kind image on a polished silver plated sheet of copper. The format appealed to an emerging middle class, which could not afford expensive oil portaits.

In 1884, George Eastman of Rochester, NY invented film, which replaced the photographic plate; thus a photographer would no longer need to carry boxes of plates and toxic chemicals around. Four years later, Eastman’s Kodak camera went on the market with the slogan “You press the button, we do the rest”. Suddenly anyone could take a photograph and leave the complicated development process to others. Photography came to the mass-market in 1901 with the introduction of the Kodak Brownie; and continued to broaden its appeal in later years with the creation of the 35mm film format, color emulsions, the Kodak “Instamatic”, the Polaroid instant process, film cartridges and one hour photo kiosks.

The first digitally scanned photograph was produced in 1957 by Russell A. Kirsch, a computer pioneer at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The first such photo was set at 176 x 176 pixels. But the image quality of affordable digital cameras did not approach that of film until just recently. Manufacturers continue to push the envelope on chip design and image processing software, and storage costs continue to decline. Digital cameras are now as common as telephones, because they are often one and the same. The physical act of taking a picture has become highly automated, to the point where the most technology-challenged among us are capable of taking perfectly exposed and focused images, if perhaps not always artistic ones.

Digital photography has already had a profound effect on how people take and view photos. For dedicated hobbyists, digital is also about replacing the darkroom with the computer, and sharing those images with the world via the Internet. Learning any new skill involves trial and error, and the instant feedback that digital imaging provides cannot be underestimated. Mistakes can be instantly deleted, so the cost per image is no longer a concern. It is the difference between carefully firing a muzzle-loaded rifle versus blasting away with a machine gun. The latter requires less operational skill, but has a much greater chance of success.

The optical system in the modern camera works the same as that in the older cameras – using a lens with a variable diaphragm to focus light onto an image pickup device. The diaphragm and shutter admit the correct amount of light to the imager, but in the case of digital, the image pickup device is electronic rather than chemical. Basic rules of photography, like lighting and composition still apply, but the latest cameras have been liberating in the sense that one can devote that much more attention toward capturing the image and less on camera mechanics.

Trick Or Treat in Georgetown [Photo Gallery]
•

Halloween in Georgetown is always a fun evening.

Check out Philip Bermingham’s images from this years Halloween night in Georgetown. [gallery ids="110037,109947,109942,109937,109932,109927,109922,109917,109912,109907,109902,109897,109892,109887,109882,109877,109952,109957,110032,110027,110022,110017,110012,110007,110002,109997,109992,109987,109982,109977,109972,109967,109962,109872,109867,109777,109772,109767,109762,109757,109752,109747,109742,109737,110041,109732,110045,110049,109727,110053,109782,109787,109862,109857,109852,109847,109842,109837,109832,109827,109822,109817,109812,109807,109802,109797,109792,100353" nav="thumbs"]

Harman Center Gala
•

The Harman Center for the Arts Annual Gala celebrated Michael Kahn’s 25 years at the helm of the Shakespeare Theatre Company on Oct. 17 in over the top style, as was to be expected. The attendees were a Who’s Who of Washington from the Supreme Court to theater elite. The gala performance showcased the Broadway cast of West Side Story, the Joffrey Ballet and Denyce Graves among other memorable performances that included the actors of the Shakespeare Theatre Company wowing the house. Legendary appearances included Edward Albee, Pat Carroll, Chelsea Clinton, and Terrence McNally. The festivities continued as mimes guided guests to a post-performance gala dinner and frivolity at the National Building Museum. [gallery ids="100357,110057,110064,110061" nav="thumbs"]

D.C. Theater Gears up for the Holidays
•

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

No kidding, folks. Looking ahead just a little bit, you might want to brace yourself for Scrooges and Nutcrackers, coming up sooner than you think. We give thanks, and god bless us everyone.

Just to start you off, “A Christmas Carol” returns like clockwork to the Ford’s Theatre, beginning Nov. 18 and running through Dec. 31. This is the production adapted by Michael Wilson and starring acclaimed Washington actor Edward Gero, who can go from Shakespeare to Mamet to Scrooge in a heartbeat. Michael Baron directs. Click here for more information

At the Olney Theater, Dickens and Scrooge will also be on hand with “A Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story of Christmas,” performed by Paul Morella and adapted from Dickens’ original novella and reading tour. Dec. 13 through Jan. 1. Click here for more information and to buy tickets

Meanwhile, among many Nutcrackers for the season, you can count on the Washington Ballet and Septime Webre’s version to return to the Warner Theater for a nearly month-long run, Dec. 1 through 24, while the Kennedy Center will have the American Ballet Theatre’s version Dec. 8 through 11.

A Couple of Guys Named Othello and Othello and Iago and Iago

These days, we’re seeing two versions of Shakespeare’s classic tragedy about Othello, the great Moor general in Renaissance Venice, the passion of his life Desdemona, and Iago, perhaps the most despised villain in Shakespeare outside of Richard III. You can see what you can do with style and silence at the Synetic Theatre’s production now in the midst of a three-way run at its Crystal City space, or take in a more classic, wordier, sound-and-fury version at the Folger Theatre, directed by Robert Richmond, which has already been extended through Dec. 4.

Seriously, Folks

There’s serious drama afoot all over the region, beginning with a production of Arthur Miller’s “After the Fall,”his most revealing, autobiographical play about a playwright named Quentin and his tragic, glamorous wife Maggie (hello Miss Monroe). Jose Carrasquillo directs this rarely performed play, Mitchell Hebert stars as Quentin, and Gabriella Fernandez-Coffey is Maggie through Nov. 27.

At Arena Stage, history plays a big part in both Amy Freed’s “You, Nero” and Bill Cain’s “Equvicocation.” The latter concerns Shakespeare, the infamous Gunpowder Plot and the relationship between artists and kings. It comes from the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Cain’s play will run Nov. 18 through Jan. 1 with the cast of the original Oregon Shakespeare Festival production.

“You, Nero” is part of Arena’s American Voices New Play Institute, with Freed continuing to work on a play which first opened at South Coast Rep and Berkeley Rep in 2009. It makes its D.C. debut Nov. 25 and runs through Jan. 1. Danny Scheie stars as Nero, an emperor who may have been the first emperor-as-public-celebrity.

For one night only, you’ll have a chance to see one of the landmark plays of the 1980s and the tragedy of AIDs when Forum Theatre will stage a benefit performance of “The Normal Heart” by Larry Kramer, with an all-star cast of area actors including Holly Twyford, Mitchell Hebert, Will Gartshore, J. Fred Schiffman, Rick Hammerly, Michael Tolaydo and others at the Round House Theatre’s Silver Spring stage, where Forum is in residence on Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m.

Kevin Converses with Michael and Broadway Does Shakespeare

Star of the stage and screen Kevin Kline (“Sophie’s Choice”) will join Shakespeare Theatre Company Artistic Director Michael Kahn for the second installment in the Classic Conversations series at Sidney Harman Hall Nov. 28.

Speaking of the Shakespeare Theatre Company, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, the run will be short but the occasion sounds terrific, with a concert-style staging of “The Boys from Syracuse” with a book by David Ives (“The Heir Apparent”) hooked up to Rodgers and Hart’s classic score. “The Boys” is of course a Broadway musical version of “The Comedy of Errors” which features two sets of twins unaware of each other, the kids from Ephesus. Nov. 4 through 6.

Innocents At Risk Conjures Up Old Havana
•

Innocents At Risk and Airline Ambassadors hosted a Standup For Children Gala: An Evening in Old Havana on Oct. 19 at The Mayflower Hotel, which hails itself as “Washington’s Second Best Address.” Mike Walter emceed the program which included a video produced by Innocents At Risk, the internationally recognized nonprofit to stop the scourge of human trafficking founded by Deborah Sigmund in 2005. The evening was co-chaired by Nancy Rivard, who in 2009 brought additional support from Airline Ambassadors. Gabriela Ferrer and members of The Miami Sound Machine opened their performance with “How Can You Take Something that Does not Belong to You?” [gallery ids="100358,110062,110088,110084,110067,110080,110076,110072" nav="thumbs"]

Project Inspiration
•

The very definition of a non-profit is the opposite of many of the motives that drive most organizations. It is work for a cause, a right, a group, an enterprise to help and serve others: the sick, the hungry, the economically and culturally underserved or starved. People who work in non-profits hold up the mirror to those who don’t. The non-profit motive exists as an emblem of the spirit of charity, giving, helpfulness and empathy, creativity and caring.

As a photographer, Walter Grio believes in the spirit of the non-profit world. Whatever he shoots—be it a fashion show, a wedding, a portrait or a special events—he insists that he not be paid himself, but rather that his fee go toward a charity or non-profit organization.

He’s even made a name for what he does: it’s called “Shoot for Change,” and since 2007, he has raised over $85,000 by way of his philanthropic photo projects.

His latest project salutes a gallery of 15 Washington philanthropist and non-profit leaders, shining a little light and giving a little credit to the people who do a lot for a lot of people.

“In the course of some of the projects I’ve done, I’ve gotten to know a lot of these people and I really admire their spirits,” says Grio. “I thought it would be really fantastic to help celebrate what they do.”
Over several days of shooting, Grio, tried to bathe his subjects in the glamorous light of old Hollywood, at places like L2 Lounge in Georgetown and the Lisner-Louise-Dickson-Hurt Home in Chevy Chase.

The result is Project Inspiration, a special exhibition of Grio’s philanthropic people portraits, on display at the L2 Lounge on Nov. 16.

“I’ve been very lucky when it comes to my photography,” Grio says. “I was working and traveling in Europe when I was asked to shoot some people I had run into in Sweden, and they offered to pay me for the result. It opened up a world for me. In Washington, a lot of people have been helpful and responsive to the idea. This is giving back.”

The 15 groups and organizations represented in Project Inspiration occupy a wide range in the non-profit world of Washington: Red Cross; “Blessed Heaven,” which helps youths transitioning out of foster care; the non-profit Fashion Group International of Greater Washington; Washington Empowered Against Violence; Freedom in Creation; FAIR Girls; West Potomac Academy Fashion Design; The Kreeger Museum; Nova Salud; SOS Children’s Villages; Capital Breast Care Center; Global Partnerships; UN Foundation; the Lisner-Louise-Dickson-Hurt Home; and the Children’s Law Center.

Linda C. Mathes
CEO, American Red Cross of the National Capital Area

Mathes began her career with the Red Cross in Dallas, Texas in the early 1970s, and never looked back. But even while moving around the country with the world’s best-known humanitarian organization, Mathes has found time throughout the years to work and serve regularly within her community—a practice that hasn’t gone without notice. Since her CEO appointment in 1991, she has received a number of accolades for her efforts, including the DC Chamber of Commerce Business Leader of the Year Award in 1998, and a Washingtonian of the Year award in 2008.

Among her associations in the region, Mathes has served on the board of directors of Leadership Greater Washington, as co-chair of the Nonprofit Emergency Preparedness Task Force of Greater Washington, and as a member of the regional Human Service Working Group.

These days, Mathes is a member of the Board of Directors of the Fairfax County Chamber of Commerce and American Red Cross Retiree Association, the Nonprofit Roundtable of Greater Washington, the Emergency Preparedness Council of MWCOG, and Tiffany Circle. Mathes sets the bar as a community organizer and activist and serves as an inspiring model for a new era of public service.

Elizabeth Gore
Vice President of Global Partnerships, United Nations Foundation

Elizabeth Gore bridges the gap between international policy and community activism, connecting people, ideas and resources to help solve global problems to hyperlocal degrees. “I love leading the campaigns of the UN Foundation because we offer anyone the opportunity to think globally and act locally,” says Gore. “I think everyone, no matter what their station in life, has the opportunity to give back and save lives, whether donating a ten dollar bed net to protect a child in Africa from malaria or signing a petition to prevent a girl from being married at 10 years old.”

Growing up on a cattle ranch in Texas, Gore was the first in her family to go to college, and became inspired to advocate for a cause when a friend became pregnant and was forced to drop out of school because of its lack of campus childcare and support. From fighting for the rights of her fellow female students, Gore moved on to volunteer in the Peace Corps, where she wrote, received and managed a USAID grant to better the food availability and economic situation for the Chaco in Bolivia.

Gore has since spent her life working on behalf of the underserved, currently bolstering support for UN programs to direct large-scale partnerships with global corporations and organizations. She manages partnerships with members of the UN Foundation’s Global Entrepreneurs Council and with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and in 2008 was named by People as one of the top 100 Extraordinary Women. “Thanks to the internet, globalization and increased international travel, ‘helping thy neighbor’ has a new meaning,” she says. “A teenage girl in Texas can now interact with and learn about a teenage girl in Ethiopia. They can help each other, learn from each other, and ultimately be global leaders together. My passion is to provide the opportunities through the United Nations to make these connections.”

Susannah Fox
Director of Development, Capital Breast Care Center

Inspired to help those in need, and motivated by the death of her father from cancer, Susannah Fox has made a career advocating for the medically underserved and for cancer research, raising nearly $10 million to date. “Although I am neither a scientist nor do I have a medical mindset or degree, I hold other talents that enable me to raise awareness for breast cancer and help others to avoid the pain I have experienced. I love to build relationships with people and hear their stories.”

Hearing stories of people’s extraordinary battles propels Fox and her work. “The single mother who was recently laid off and has no health insurance, the woman who works multiple jobs to provide for her family or the woman with insurance who is scared and keeps putting off her mammogram because her own mother had breast cancer… These stories fuel my efforts and passion to raise funds to improve the lives of the people of the community.”

Fox’s skill and passion for relationship building and developing innovative ways to secure philanthropic funding has worked wonders for individuals and families battling illness and is a perfect match for the Capital Breast Care Center (CBCC). For the past three and a half years, Fox has held her position of Director of Development at CBCC, a community initiative of the Georgetown Lombardi Cancer Center.

L. Ward Orem
CEO, Lisner-Louise-Dickson-Hurt Home

The life’s work of L. Ward Orem on behalf of senior health care and support was never even a question. “How is it that what I have done for over 35 years can be viewed as anything other than just giving back to those who have so generously given to me?” he says. “I see my dad through my mind’s eye, doing his duty as a soldier in WWII and working for years as a Baltimore City cop, always encouraging me to do my best and to work to make a difference in this world… How could anyone not be moved to recognize the value in a human life, a human spirit, and the beauty of the journey?”

Hired by the Lisner-Louise-Dickson-Hurt Home in 1978, Orem has expanded its scope of service with the addition of a 60-bed state-of-the-art nursing facility. Through the Home, Orem successfully assimilated the residents of several other not-for-profit senior facilities in DC, blending the charitable missions of similar service providers with that of the Home. Ward has also served as a member of the Board of Directors of both St. Margaret’s School in Tappahannock, VA and St. John’s Community Services in Washington, DC.

There is no greater legacy for Ward than the knowledge that the Home will continue to advance its mission of providing extraordinary health and life care services to the elderly poor of the District of Columbia long after he is gone, continuing to empower them to live their lives to the fullest.

Susan Morchower Hargreaves
Administrator, Lisner-Louise-Dickson-Hurt Home

Susan Hargreaves is inspired by people. From her mother and father, to her husband and children, to the elderly residents at the the Lisner-Louise-Dickson-Hurt Home, her personal and professional vision includes hope for all seniors and for the continued success of the Home for generations to come.

It’s no surprise that Hargreaves has devoted herself to helping the elderly. “From an early age, I was inspired by my grandparents,” she says. “When I was with them, I felt loved, safe, and appreciated… They had incredible love and devotion for us and were generous with their wisdom and lessons to share.” It is Hargreaves’ life mission to give back the sense of love and security that she received from her grandparents.

Overseeing the day-to-day operations of the Home where she is charged with ensuring that low and modest income seniors from the District of Columbia receive the highest quality of health and life services available to them, Hargreaves has also served on the Board of the District of Columbia Health Care Association (DCHCA) in various capacities, and is the President Elect for 2013. Additionally, she served for six years on the Board of Sarah’s Circle, a charitable organization in Adams Morgan for independent seniors. She has been active on several task forces and committees which center around the needs of seniors in the community and the nation, including her current position as a National Administrator’s Board Reviewer and a member of the National Association of Social Workers.

Jenifer Gamble
Executive Director, Washington Empowered Against Violence

Dr. Jenifer Gamble found her calling at an early age. “When I was a sophomore in high school,” she says, “one of my teachers spoke to my class about her volunteerism as a hospital advocate for sexual assault victims. I remember thinking that being there through such a horrible process had to be one of the most important things you could ever do for someone.”

Since then, Gamble has worked to improve the lives of millions of people, fighting against gender-based violence and introducing legislation to improve our justice system.

Gamble has spent more than fourteen years in victim services, currently serving as the Executive Director of Washington Empowered Against Violence (WEAVE, formerly Women Empowered Against Violence) in Washington DC. WEAVE engages the metropolitan Washington DC community in the elimination of intimate partner abuse and gender-based violence through empowering, innovative and holistic services. WEAVE operates a 1.2 million dollar budget and provides long-term holistic legal and therapy services at no-cost to survivors, and engages the community through extensive training, outreach and education. Gamble has championed victim services around the United States, presenting at local, state and national conferences and forums throughout her career. “Bearing witness and accompanying a person through examinations, court appearances and counseling is a privileged and sacred position,” Gamble says. “It always seemed as though I would have a very impacting experience right about the time I was feeling disconnected.”

Elaine Mensah
Publicity Chair, Fashion Group International of Greater Washington, DC

The fashion industry and non-profit work is not a likely pair. In fact, to most people, they seem more like mutually exclusive entities. But not to Elaine Mensah. Her first experience bridging the two worlds came in 2007, when the non-profit organization Fashion Fights Poverty offered her the chance to raise awareness about ethical, sustainable and eco-friendly fashion.

For the next three years, Elaine served as Fashion Director & Vice-President of Production for Fashion Fights Poverty, in which she found great joy in showcasing emerging designers and stylists and mentoring students. Under her production, the organization was named Washington’s Top Fashion and Beauty Event by Biz Bash Magazine two years in a row. Elaine has also styled TV personalities including Jack Mackenroth of Project Runway Season 4 and The Bachelor’s Andrew Baldwin, as well as various campaigns for designer lookbooks, print editorials including Washington Life Magazine’s 2009 Holiday Issue, and in-store events for Macy’s Inc.

With The Fashion Group International of Greater Washington, she has maintained the group’s impeccable status as one of the most credible voices in all of fashion. “The organization’s reputation, record of success, and influence in the community is beyond inspiring,” she says. “FGI has allowed me to bring both of my worlds together. As an organization that is run by a board of volunteers and that raises money to support its members and the DC fashion community, I am constantly challenged to be innovative, creative, and philanthropic. In a city like Washington, DC, which is not necessarily viewed as a ‘fashion’ capital, [FGI] inspires me to push the boundaries of what’s possible and to understand, appreciate, and continue to develop my desire to give back.”

Andrew Briggs
President and Founder, Freedom in Creation

Andrew Briggs is an inspiration, plain and simple. Since college, he has devoted his life to social betterment and justice worldwide. Briggs graduated from Taylor University, having studied, served, and traveled to over twenty-five countries during his undergraduate years. From such exposure, his notion of social responsibility grew to encompass the global village.

Searching for a long-term cause to which to devote his efforts, Briggs learned about “Africa’s longest war” between the Lord’s Resistance Army and the Government of Uganda, whose destruction encompasses the displacement of nearly two million people and the abduction of sixty-five thousand child soldiers (which continues to this day in Congo). Above all, the oppression endured by the children of Northern Uganda caused him to undertake research in Northern Uganda and join hands with its people, and in 2007 he founded Freedom In Creation (FIC).

Through FIC, Briggs works to empower war-affected or at-risk communities through increased access to the therapeutic qualities of art, international education and fresh drinking water. By providing therapeutic art classes for at-risk children and exhibiting their artwork internationally, FIC raises funds to provide participating communities with water and educational infrastructure. Having taken part in the process, the children are credited with bringing the water and infrastructure projects to their communities.

“Faith, an understanding of the reciprocal blessings of service and cross-cultural conversations, and the importance of the voice of the artist inspired me to start the organization,” he says. On top of running FIC, Briggs has served as an artist, lecturer, panelist, and scholar-in-residence at embassies, universities, galleries, and with humanitarian organizations.

Kate Marie Grinold
Director of Development, FAIR Girls

In the United States, the average age of entry into forced prostitution is 13. Today, nearly 300,00 children are at risk of being exploited for sex, having experienced homelessness, abuse and extreme poverty. Kate Marie Gold has made it her life’s work to put an end to this hellacious trend. “A 13-year-old should be in school, safe, cared for and happy,” she says. “She should not be on the streets, alone, forgotten and bought and sold for sex. At FAIR Girls we believe that every girl deserves an investment and that given the opportunity, girls will grow into strong, happy, healthy women… More than anything, we believe in girls.”

As Director of Development at FAIR Girls, Grinold works to educate and empower girls against exploitation and human trafficking, and begin the process of recovery and self-determination of those who have suffered by providing them with tools, resources and love through therapeutic programs.

Grinold is a leader for change in Washington, DC. Named a 2011 Global Shaper by the World Economic Forum and one of Washington DC’s 250 most influential leaders under 40 three years in a row on Young & the Guest List (2009-2011)—among a list of other philanthropic and humanitarian honors—Grinold is one of the leading volunteers and activists in our community.

“Over the years, the resiliency and determination of young [girls] has continued to amaze me,” she says. “I have watched them go to college, find jobs and enter into healthy relationships. I have also seen the battles they face, swimming against a tide of violence, abuse and poverty. But their spunk and tenacity has shown me that while the road to recovery is long and difficult, there is no limit to what an empowered 13-year-old can achieve.”

Maggy François
Fashion Designs Director, West Potomac Academy Fashion Design

Maggy François believes in education through design. “The impact of educating through design is more than just creating clothing,” she says. “It is fashioning a way of life for young adults to express themselves and their ideas into tangible items. What they create in life can impact upon others, and as an individual they can influence a generation.”

With a career in event production that began over fifteen years ago and found her working with working closely with a community of top designers, François has been featured for her education and design work in The Washington Post, The Washington Examiner, BISNOW, and The Washington Times, to name a few. Teaching for fifteen years, she stands out among fellow educators for her design sensibilities and the ability to provide students with life-changing opportunities that prepare them for their futures, from internships to experience with professional designers, nonprofit organizations and business partnerships.

“Today’s youth are the future of the fashion and design industry,” François says. Being able to make young people feel like they are part of something that matters encourages me to push myself harder… [and] become a better and more visionary individual.”

Molly Huh
Head of Marketing and Public Relations, The Kreeger Museum

From an early age, Molly Huh’s passion for culture and art was deeply engrained. Fond memories of frequenting museums, historic sites and festivals with her grandparents made her realize the importance and wonder of cultural institutions in fostering a sense of interaction between parent and child, student and teacher, scholar and material, the public and their art.

Huh has been involved with non-profit museums, arts, and cultural organizations in Washington, DC for nearly a decade, with a focus on arts and education. At the Kreeger Museum, she has helps to plan a wide variety of enriching events for adults and children including Conversations at the Kreeger Museum, the first program of its kind, providing a forum for dialogue and connection for individuals living with Alzheimer’s disease and their caregivers.

Along with her work at the Kreeger, Huh regularly serves as a juror for the American Assocation of Museum’s MUSE Awards, which recognizes innovation and excellence in the field of art, and is a weekly volunteer at Inova Fairfax Hospital’s Ronald McDonald House.

“The Kreeger Museum is an institution which holds in its trust, for this generation and those that follow, masterpieces of art available to all,” Huh says. “I am constantly humbled and inspired to be a steward of the arts and hope that institutions such as The Kreeger will be available for my children… as a setting for cultural appreciation and interaction.”

Ellin Kao
Program Director and Co-Founder, NovaSalud, Inc.

Ellin Kao has spent over a decade working in international public health in Africa and Latin America, providing technical assistance to developing country health systems in HIV/AIDS/STD prevention and women’s reproductive health. “I spent the first ten years of my career in Africa and Latin America working with marginalized communities on improving health outcomes,” she says. “As a witness to the devastation of disease, HIV/AIDS’ devastation is the most socially pervasive. It takes away the most productive members of society. Men and women between the ages of 18 to 49 carry the weight of this disease. These are the mothers and fathers, sons and daughters who provide and care for the family and contribute to the economic productivity of society. Take away a large number of this group and what remains is the aged and young, most with very little financial means to support themselves.”

Kao first joined the fight against HIV/AIDS armed with only the belief that to work towards its awareness and prevention was a must. After spending time in Africa, however, she was shocked to come home to Washington, DC and find that its HIV infection rates were as high as in the developing countries that she had been serving.

She has since turned her efforts toward our community, conducting HIV/AIDS research at Children’s National Medical Center and providing HIV counseling and prevention education in Northern Virginia for Whitman Walker Clinic. She is also a member of a regional planning committee tasked to develop a regional HIV/AIDS prevention plan for Northern Virginia. “Public and private funding for HIV work has dwindled and further exacerbated by a tight economy,” Kao says. “But we are still here and working, and we will, one day, win the fight.”

Diane Lebson
Director, Major Gifts, SOS Children’s Villages, USA

In January of 2010, Diane Lebson had not even heard of SOS Children’s Village. But with the determination to work for an international children’s rights organization, she was drawn in by the soul of SOS, embodied in the lives of the nearly 80,000 orphaned and abandoned children it raises in over 130 countries around the world.

Today, SOS Children’s Villages is refuge for children whose lives have been torn about by modern tragedies like the recent earthquake in Haiti, horrific floods in Pakistan and famine in Somalia. “The moment I became Director of Major Gifts for this noble organization,” says Lebson, “I committed to serving as the voice for these little people, telling every corporation, foundation, individual who would listen about the heroic things these children had to do to merely survive.”

Diane has an established track record of accomplishment in non-profit brand management and fundraising. Prior to joining SOS Children’s Villages in March 2010, she ran a similar program as an executive with the Washington, DC office of the United Way, where she oversaw a 122% increase in major donor contributions as part of a significant rebranding initiative.

While she recently left the country with her husband, who took a position working for the government in Australia, Lebson continues to work as a consultant and remains a strong advocate for the work SOS Children’s Villages does to raise orphaned and abandoned children worldwide.

Judith Sandalow
Executive Director, Children’s Law Center

Judith Sandalow joined Children’s Law Center as Executive Director in January 2000. Under Ms. Sandalow’s leadership, CLC has grown from a staff of three to a staff of 75 and over 300 pro bono attorneys from 70 area law firms, who represent over 1,000 at-risk children in the District each year. She graduated from Yale Law School in 1990 and returned to the District of Columbia as a Juvenile Justice Fellow at Georgetown University Law Center.

After starting a juvenile clinic at DC Law Students in Court, she developed a successful criminal defense practice specializing in representation of juveniles charged with serious crimes. Ms. Sandalow is a foster and adoptive parent and a member of the board of directors of the Foster and Adoptive Parents Advocacy Center. She was a 2007 winner of the Meyer Foundation Exponent Award, which recognizes strong and effective nonprofit leaders with a track record of accomplishment. Ms. Sandalow also received the 2009 Outstanding Service Award from Positive Nature for her work on behalf of DC’s most vulnerable children and families. She is a member of the Leadership Washington class of 2004. She currently serves on the Advisory Board of the DC Fiscal Policy Institute.

Danielle Jennings
Executive Director, Blessed Haven, Inc.

Danielle Jennings formed Blessed Haven to prevent foster children from suffering the same fate that she did.

Jennings is one of the approximately 495,000 adults that grew up as a foster child. At the age of 15, already suffering from a tumultuous childhood, she was moved into a teen shelter while the courts determined her future. She was put into a home with a permanent rotation of at least three other girls at a given time, where she was treated as a housekeeper and servant, and was made to sleep in the mildewed basement. “We were…only allowed on the main level to clean,” she says. “Failure to comply resulted in being beaten.”

Fortunately, Jennings was rescued by her godmother and finally found a loving, nurturing family that nursed her soul and heart back to health.

Now grown, she devotes her life to making sure orphans and foster children have loving homes to grow up in. “As a foster child you are a number…a case,” Jennings says. “Every person deserves to feel loved, supported and empowered, regardless of their history… That is what Blessed Haven does.”

Blessed Haven is a family, Jennings says, with an inexhaustible network of individuals in the community that love and support foster youth and alumni. As Executive Director, she actively mentors foster youth and young adults not only in the DC area, but nationwide through various partnerships across the country. Blessed Haven’s programs include physical, emotional, spiritual and financial wellness, and provide career and educational programs.

Jennings’ heart lies with the youth in these demographics, and she works tirelessly to show that “foster” truly does mean “family.” These otherwise forgotten youth have a family in Jennings.

[gallery ids="100359,110077,110089,110082,110086" nav="thumbs"]

George Stevens Jr.: the Man behind the Kennedy Center Honors
•

Talking with George Stevens, Jr. in his wonderland office at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on a mid-November afternoon, you’d hardly know it was only two weeks until the annual national cultural fete and red-carpet extravaganza that is called the 34th Annual Kennedy Center Honors.

It was quiet at the Center, sun drenching the Hall of Nations foyer and Stevens ushering me in to his office, a remarkable place full of old movie posters, lots of Emmys and other awards, volumes of scripts and scrapbooks. Casually dressed in a blue sweater and slacks, he immediately takes you on a quick little tour of the walls and turns you into a gawker as you stare at a poster for “Shane,” a drawing of his father, the Oscar-winning film director George Stevens in a poker game with his friends, a poster for “The More the Merrier,” a 1940s more-or-less screwball comedy featuring Jean Arthur and Joel McCrea, a future star of gritty cowboy movies.

The office is best described as a vibrant display of the professional lives of Stevens Senior and Stevens Junior, which, taken together, are examples of lives lived that purposefully made a difference.
And we haven’t even talked about the Kennedy Center Honors, which this year, with all the usual glitz, glitter and presidential presence, will be bestowed upon Actress Meryl Streep, the phenomenal cellist Yo-Yo Ma, legendary Broadway chanteuse Barbara Cook, jazz original Sonny Rollins and singer Neil Diamond on Dec. 4 at the Opera House.

It all began in 1978 with honors to Marian Anderson, Fred Astaire, George Balanchine, Richard Rodgers and Arthur Rubinstein, and Stevens tells you a story about the audience jumping to its feet after seeing 1939 footage of Anderson singing at the Lincoln Memorial, having been denied use of Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution.

It isn’t just that Stevens is and has been the producer of the Honors, both the live event at the Opera House and the CBS television show that is derived from it (to be aired Dec. 27 at 9 p.m.) It’s that basically, the Honors were his idea, inspired very much by the words of President John F. Kennedy, which can be found carved on the wall of the center.

“Well, it came out of a conversation with Roger Stevens [founding chairman of the Kennedy Center; no relation] back in 1974, and I suggested that the center really needed its own event,” Stevens said. “Roger asked if I had any ideas. And I did. I said that the center should have an event that honored the great figures in the performing arts. A lot had to be done, but that was the basic idea.”

It was more than that of course; it was about the very idea of the Kennedy Center itself and its basic tenets as expressed by Kennedy himself in a 1963 speech at Amherst. “That statement where he said ‘I look forward to an America that is not afraid of grace and beauty . . . I look forward to an America that will reward achievement in the arts as we reward achievement in business and statecraft.’”
Stevens allows that he has some influences on the choice—made by the Kennedy Center’s board of trustees but also national cultural figures, previous winners and others. The proceedings are, of course, secret, but Stevens adds, “I like to think I have considerable input.”

Also secret are the surprises that come with the night’s entertainment and special guests, like the outburst of talent that included Oprah Winfrey and Beyoncé honoring Tina Turner in 2006, or Jessica Simpson leading a star-studded array of female country superstars honoring Dolly Parton in 2008.
So is Margaret Thatcher coming for the Meryl Streep honors? “I don’t know about that,” Stevens said. “But there will be surprises.”

It’s fair to say that Stevens is a historically serious man. Being the founder of the Kennedy Center Honors is no small thing, but it’s not the only thing. There’s a note of serendipity that runs through his life and career, a kind of story with a theme about the value of culture as a way of moving hearts and minds. The Honors—an occasion for pomp and circumstances and rolling of red carpets—are nevertheless a celebration of the lifetime achievements and careers of legendary, giant-sized figures.
He has always said that the Honors are really two shows—the one that is staged in front of a stellar audience of 2,000 or so at the Opera House and the one that’s created to become a television show for the whole world.

“It’s quiet today,” he said. “But the week of the Honors—when the performers and the honorees fly in, the week of the dinners, the rehearsals, the logistics, and all the people you have to deal with, that’s still pretty intense, for me, and everyone else. It’s always thrilling; it’s always exciting, an honor and really hard work.”

For the past several years, Stevens, has worked with his son Michael as co-producer, on the Honors show and the “Christmas in Washington” yearly production. “Michael brings his own perspectives to this, his tastes, his knowledge, what he knows about music and the whole world of arts, the people he knows.

“And yes, it is very, very gratifying to work with Michael, for me, as a producer, in terms of the history of this enterprise, but also the family history. It means a lot to me as a father, and I have to tell you how important his contribution is to accomplishing what we do.”

Stevens has become with the years a kind of cultural icon in this city. He, his wife Elizabeth and his family have been Georgetown residents for decades on Avon Place. In interviews, in a recent roundtable talk on “Creativity in America” at the Aspen Institute, and in person Stevens always comes across as a serious man, without getting within a continent’s distance of becoming pompous or overbearing. He is one of the most accessible of public figures, one of the least “me-me” men you’ll encounter.

He’s led a big life in the big, wide world — son of legendary Hollywood director George Stevens, working on major movie sets, a JFK “New Frontiersman” working to produce documentaries for Edward R. Murrow when he headed the U.S. Information Agency, founder of the American Film Institute, leading film conservation and preservation, founder and co-producer of the Kennedy Center Honors, film director and producer (“A Filmmaker’s Journey,” “The Murder of Mary Phagan”) playwright (“Thurgood”) and author of “Conversations with the Great Moviemakers of Hollywood’s Golden Age at the American Film Institute”). In October, President Barack Obama named Stevens co-chairman of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities.

That’s by way of roll-the-credits bona fides. In some circles, he’s even been described as “Hollywood royalty.”

“What do I think of that?” he says. “I think it’s mostly B-S.”

The truth of the matter is that he came to do what he’s done honestly: lots of hard work, the obvious ability to lead and a passionate, creative urge to be an advocate for culture, not only for its own sake but also for social change and justice.

“We didn’t have anything like the Kennedy Center Honors, and so we have celebrated all sorts of performance excellence,” he said. “And it changed with time, sure. More and more, we all realized the importance of popular culture, and it became a part of the mix: I think Bob Dylan was the first figure of that sort to become an honoree, but not the last.”

Stevens admits working on the Honors enriched him. “I’m a film guy,” he said, “that’s my experience, my comfort zone. So, being around these huge, legendary figures in dance, opera, music, that was an enormously rewarding experience for me.”

That seriousness of purpose, that liberality of spirit and focus, comes in part from his father. Making the documentary “A Film Directors Journey” set Stevens on his own creative path, much like his father’s two-year experience of World War II turned him into a man with a mission that resulted in the great American trilogy, “Shane,” “A Place in the Sun” and “Giant.” With Stevens Jr., the documentary on his father was followed by films about “The Murder of Mary Phagan,” “Separate but Equal” and the play “Thurgood” among other projects.

There are rows of scripts for each Kennedy Center Honors in his office, and each five-minute plus film about each honoree, not to mention scrapbooks and photographs for the AFI Lifetime Achievement Awards, which he has also produced. It’s dangerous being in that office; you get lost in it, so many scenes from movies start running through your head, so many stories.

You can imagine the Stevens spending hours here without ever being alone.

“It’s been 34 years since then,” he said. “I feel more creative, fuller of ideas than ever.” Proof: he’s about to finish a documentary about the Washington Post editorial cartoonist Herb Block, and a second set of “Conversations with Great American Directors” are coming out.

Of necessity, life and death and all that make for omissions on the Honors list. One obvious one is, of course, George Stevens, Sr., who died in 1975. You don’t ask, but chances are he would have been a cinch.

Speaking in public like the recent Aspen Institute or in interviews, Stevens often tells the story about being with his father after he had won the Oscar for Best Director for “A Place in the Sun.”

“He said to me ‘We’ll know how good it really is 20 or 30 years from now.’”

Stevens thinks it holds up, 50 plus years later. It’s an American classic. But Stevens’ life, adding up the accomplishments and their meaning, also hold up with time. The son, in this case, also rises to the occasion.

Kennedy Center Honorees

It’s star power week in Washington. This is the week of the 34th Annual Kennedy Center Honors, which means that among us will be five of the nation’s finest, most enduring and sparkling legends and stars of the performing arts.

Meryl Streep, touted as the most awarded and award-nominated actress ever, will be honored again this year. Her record: 45 film roles, 16 Oscar nominations and two wins, 25 Golden Globes and so on.

Yo-Yo Ma’s selection casts him in the shadows of the major classical music performers who formed a large number of the honorees in the early years of the Kennedy Center Honors. But to say he is a classical musician is to miss the pioneer, the genre-bender and the passionate cellist which he truly is. He has recorded 75 Sony Albums and has collaborated with the likes of Paquito Rivera, Renee Fleming, Dave Brubeck, Bobby McFerrin and James Taylor.

Sonny Rollins, the oldest among the honorees at 81, is one of the last of the old giants of bee-bop and improvisatory jazz on the saxophone, or anything else, as well as being a gifted composer. As he put it when he received the National Medal of Arts in March of this year, “I accept on behalf of the gods of our music.”

Barbara Cook may be, as Alistair Macaulay of the Financial Times says, “The greatest singer in the world,” but she’s actually a little more than that. She cut her singing teeth in the 1950s on national tours of “Oklahoma,” and “Carousel” and hit all the notes in the Leonard Bernstein’s “Candide.” Her career almost six decades: it’s so rich that it seems too short.

Neil Diamond has been around a long time too, and sometimes we forget that. Sixty-types remember all the big hits, forgetting that he also wrote the score to “Jonathan Livingstone Seagull,” wrote “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” for Barbra Streisand and starred in a version of “The Jazz Singer.” He’s in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame, and, according to Paul Simon, was once known as the Jewish Elvis Presley. Go figure.

The Gala Kennedy Center Honors performance will take place Dec. 4, co-produced by George Stevens Jr. and Michael Stevens, at the Opera House where the honorees will be saluted by performers, their peers, the powerful and the president. The Honors Gala will be broadcast on CBS Dec. 27 at 9 p.m.

[gallery ids="100400,113228,113187,113219,113212,113197,113205" nav="thumbs"]

‘Amazing!’ Mel Bochner in the Tower
•

An art professor once gave me a great piece of advice: “Whenever you look at a work of art,” he said, “always ask yourself one question: What is it?” It is with this unimpressive mantra that I walk into every museum and approach every exhibit. For whether I am looking at a Titian mural (a portrait) or one of David Smith’s twisting metal sculptures (an abstract), this process helps me define the parameters of the artwork and experience things evenly and honestly. But entering the Tower of the National Gallery of Art to see the recent exhibition of Mel Bochner, I was at a loss for definition. Ironically enough, it was a room full of words.

In the mid- to late 1960s, Bochner created a series of portraits of friends and colleagues using only words written on paper, assembled and organized largely through studying Roget’s Thesaurus. One of the founding fathers of conceptual art, Bochner has spent his career questioning the nature of the art object, focusing on process, perception and idea over—and often in lieu of—the usual conclusion of artistic practice: a physical work of art.

For example, his Measurement series used black tape to make measurements directly onto walls, effectively making large-scale diagrams of the rooms in which they were installed. But through making and compiling words, Bochner found a depth, eloquence and historical context uniquely suited to his palette—and what he perhaps never found in the standard definition of painting. Bochner would not paint a portrait. He would paint: “Portrait, Depiction, Archetype, Likeness, Model, Effigy.”

“The thing about English that’s so fascinating as a language is its ultimate flexibility,” Bochner says. “One thing about the thesaurus is that they always add words but rarely eliminate things. So you get an archeology of language.”

This is the foundation of Bochner’s recent work, a rather idiosyncratic history of English. His earlier words-based works were meant to be portraits, as well as erudite studies in the flaws, redundant coextensions and contradictions of English. His new work, the primary focus of this exhibition, has taken the form of borderline social activism, revealing an ever-evolving lexicon where “Amazing” is replaced by “OMG,” and “Screw the Pooch” has eclipsed “Perish.” It also reveals more than a few of the artist’s bugbears, philosophical and moral uncertainties, and the result is a remarkably naked, honest and fulfilling experience.

It had been over 30 years since Bochner made—or even looked at—his initial thesaurus series. But when he reexamined the drawings for a retrospective of his work at Yale in 1995, “My response was, there’s probably more juice in that lemon—probably worth another squeeze.”

The first new word-works he made were revisited portraits of Eva Hesse and Robert Smithson (both the originals and the revisited portraits are on view in the exhibition). “The earlier ones have the certitude of my youth—black ink, no mistakes,” Bochner says. “And I couldn’t go back to that anymore, it’s not my attitude toward life. So I redid them with charcoal and kept erasing and reworking and it formed a kind of bridge.”

But, as it seems, Bochner’s “attitude toward life” rapidly took to the forefront of his new work, evolving it from portraiture of the individual to portraiture of time, place and sentiment. The headlining diptychs of the exhibition, “Master of the Universe,” “Oh Well,” “Amazing!” and “Babble” are monumental paintings over eight feet tall, painted in crass neon hues with a bubbly Comic Sans-type font.

“These paintings are my response to everything I see around me,” he says. “They address the disillusion of language in terms of contemporary discourse. I look at this as basically an inarticulate expression of the underlying contradictions of the systems we live in, with a lack of articulate consciousness. And maybe it’s an educational deficit.”

The political edge of these pieces is hard to ignore. “It was very important to me to have that painting, ‘Master of the Universe,’ in Washington,” he says. “And I hope that people get, without my having to explain, the sociocultural undertones of that painting next to the other painting, ‘Oh Well.’”

“I long ago gave up on the idea that art can change capitalism,” Bochner says. “But anything that can bring people to greater consciousness about their own experience is positive and, I believe, a step in the right direction.

For instance, it is no coincidence that his painting “Amazing” begins with the words Amazing and Awesome—biblical words with which the Old Testament denoted God’s power—and then runs through the chronology of evermore contemporary exclamations, until concluding like a fart with OMG. The Awesome becomes more of a self-involved hyperbole than anything worthy of real rejoice.

“I want the paintings to be part of a conversation, a discourse,” he says. “Otherwise, why use language? The best quote I know about this is from Nietzsche: ‘We write not only to be understood, but also to be misunderstood.’ And that’s really it. To be misunderstood is to carry forth the conversation. It’s to raise questions, create arguments and disagreements. That’s basically what philosophy is. People misunderstanding each other.”

For a lifelong conceptual artist, Bochner’s new work is uncharacteristically ubiquitous, and it dances oddly around abstract expressionism and pop art. On the one hand, in answer to my self-imposed question, What is it? the answer could not be more tangible or concrete. It is words. Just like Warhol’s soup cans or Van Gogh’s purple irises, the work is inert. But a series of words cannot help but be read and, just as in abstraction, the interpretations can spin out endlessly and wildly. To quote theorist and critic Frederic Jameson, “The work…is taken as a clue or symptom for some vaster reality which replaces it as its ultimate truth.” The beauty of Bochner’s exhibition runs synonymous to the crudity of daily American life: we are free to pay as much or as little attention as we please, but there’s no denying the harsh reality before us, displayed in bold bright colors across the walls of our consciousness.

Mel Bochner’s Thesaurus Works are on view at the National Gallery through April 8, 2012. For more information visit Nga.gov/Exhibitions [gallery ids="100403,113248,113239,113233,113227" nav="thumbs"]

Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington Holiday Party
•

The Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington (RAMW) hosted a holiday party on Nov. 28 at Watershed, which renowned restaurateurs Todd and Ellen Kassoff Gray opened last April in NoMa’s Hilton Garden Inn. The restaurant showcases the bounty of the Eastern Seaboard. The warm evening meant that guests could congregate on the outdoor patio to feast on abundant freshly shucked oysters. Watershed helps support a collective of East Coast fishermen as well as the Oyster Shell Alliance Program, which recycles oyster shells in the Chesapeake Bay for reforesting. Since 1920, RAMW has represented and promoted the foodservice industry in our area through education, government relations and socio-professional activities. [gallery ids="100418,113487,113541,113497,113533,113507,113525,113517" nav="thumbs"]