Arts & Society

Mary Bird • June 8, 2012

The Kalorama-based Sitar Arts Center, almost entirely funded through private charitable contributions, showcased its enthusiastic arts students at the Corcoran Gallery of Art May 2. Music, ballet, fashion design and a preview of this summer’s production of “Joseph’s Coat” were part of a special evening that raised $237,000 to support the center’s arts programs. More than 120 artists volunteer their time to teach and inspire at least 700 underserved young persons, as they explore and study visual and performing arts in an afterschool safe haven. [gallery ids="100804,124546,124496,124539,124505,124532,124513,124527,124521" nav="thumbs"]

Gary Tischler •

As fine as any summer day are the remaining offerings of the D.C. Jazz Festival which runs all over the city at various venues.

Of particular interest is today’s “Jazz Meets the Classics” event at the Kennedy Center which will also be a special concert with the presence of bassist Ron Carter and pianist Kenny Barron who will be honored with the festivals lifetime achievement award. They’ll be part of a concert by the Classical Jazz Quartet (with Stefon Harris and Lewis Nash) performing jazz interpretations of Bach, Chopin, Mozart, Rachmaninoff, Stravinsky and Tchaikovsky. Also on hand are 10-Grammy Award winner Paquito The super-talented new star Anat Cohen from Israel will be at the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, performing on clarinet and saxophone with her group on Thursday, June 7, 8 p.m., as part of the expansive Jazz in the Hoods series going on all over town.

In addition, you might want to check out “Jazz at the Hamilton,” running through June 10 with top-drawer performances every night that include the Roy Hargrove Quintet on June 6 and the Jimmy Heath Quintet and Antonio Hart Organ Trio tomorrow, June 5.

The Bohemian Cavern, part of the “Jazz in the ‘Hoods” program, will feature the Marcus Strickland Quintet June 8 and 9..

The Kennedy Center’s free Millennium Stage will include the Bohemian Caverns Jazz Orchestra June 5.

For a complete schedule of the remain events and concerts, including all “Jazz in the ‘Hoods” events, jazz at the Howard Theatre, the Capital/Bop DC Jazz Loft series, which includes a daylong mini-festival June 9, you should go to the D.C. Jazz Festival web site — www.DCjazzfest.org — and also check out Twitter, Face book, Flickr and Four Square.

Georgetowner • June 7, 2012

Washington is one of the social, fraternal cities in the world, it’s a town that’s full of associations, organizations, societies, orders, and institutions, networking across the city, holding meetings, honoring group efforts and individuals, good people all gathering together to make some differences here and there.

It is a kind of subterranean culture, a world whose citizens are continually active, but whose activities often go little noted in the larger world of the whole city. Yet, those meetings, those events and celebrations contain worlds of concern, feelings and talk and expressions and plans about things that matter to each and every one of us.

And so it was that you saw representatives of groups such as The Humanities Council of Washington DC, the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, attorneys, ambassadors, former diplomats, educators and an assortment of co-conspirators in the quest to come together on missions that raise awareness, that enrich the culture, that act as agents for changes and improvement in the community and world at large all gathered together at the Meridian International Center, whose title speaks for itself.

The occasion had a title: “Through the Eyes of a Child: Seeing a Just World”, which was the closing event for the Humanities Council’s “Live to Read” initiative which had spent weeks encouraging and helping Washingtonians, especially its young people, to read, centered around one book: “To Kill A Mockingbird,” the classic American coming-of age novel about a 1950s small southern town in Mississippi and the quietly heroic attorney who challenges his community to seek justice.

My guess is that the event—which featured people who knew each other and people who did not coming together purposefully—will not go viral on U Tube, nor make the front page of the Washington Post. It was a small thing, in terms of size, number of people, results. What was it about? Oh, race, justice, society, children, education, the haunted history of the United States, our personal memories about such matters, the echoes of matters rarely touched on or felt so deeply. It was a quiet thing, but parts of it rang loudly in the heart.

So: books were passed out, popcorn, and later portions of shrimp were consumed and the amenities of such things were observed. And then, people began to talk, and somehow, the whole thing became more than an exercise. Prominent people were duly noted: F. Scott Bolden, described as a “Washington super-lawyer”, joked that he was here to show that lawyers can be human, then shared announcing the Lawyers for Humanities Initiative with Joy Ford Austin, Executive Director of the Humanities Council of DC.

Then Judith Terra, in her role as Chair of the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, read from one of the closing sections of “Mockingbird” in which Atticus Finch, having lost the case but not the cause, walked out of the courthouse, and his daughter, sitting high up with the communities black citizens was admonished to “Stand Up, your father is passing”. Terra recalled remembering this and her own father who had passed away the day after 9/11.

Katherine Estrada, a student at Raymond Elementary School, also read beautifully from the book. She was followed by a panel discussion on featuring Lorraine Henry, a Master Teacher in the Department of English at Howard University and Uzodinma Iweala, , a novel and son of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, of Nigeria, who was a leading candidate to become President of the World Bank. The discussion darted around concepts of narrative—how children inherit stories, for instance, but also create them—it touched on innocence and its loss, on books and reading and writing. Iweala , a Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard wrote the well-received novel “Beasts of No Nation” about child soldiers in Africa, and talked movingly about the power of narrative vis a vis children.

“To Kill a Mockingbird” is of course a book that it seems almost everyone has read, or seen in the form of the movie in which Gregory Peck was forever enshrined as the just lawyer Atticus Finch,the good man of decency. It still resonates, in this city, and elsewhere. One woman talked about the time of the assassination of JFK, when she was a first grade teacher in upstate New York, and how a black student stood up and said, “Now they will blame us for it.” A young teacher from Emerson Prep had come with some of her students, two from Viet Nam, another from Haiti.

The panel discussion was moderated by Sharon Wilkinson, the Diplomatic Advisor at the Meridian.

The usual things happened: old friends and acquaintances caught up, cards and e-mail addresses were exchanged. But a buzz remained, as if some important memories had been created, because serious, hopeful and urgent matters were discussed in a small place in Washington during an election year without politics being mentioned. Hearing Harper Lee’s words transcended the urgent desires of the town’s transient population to be elected or re-elected.

Here with these people and this time, the words of Atticus Finch and Scout resonated and stayed with you on the way home and you remembered them in the morning.

Gatherings like this are all around us, like words that matter. Check your e-mail. [gallery ids="100832,125737" nav="thumbs"]

Gary Tischler • May 17, 2012

A circus troupe sat in front of me at the 28th annual Helen Hayes Awards at the Warner Theatre April 23, or at least it felt like that.

At this annual bash and awards show for the Washington theater community, actors, designers, directors and entire companies become winners but somehow never losers. Unlike the Tonys, the Oscars or the Emmys, there’s nary a snide comment–certainly not on stage, but who knows what goes on in the bathrooms–or cause consciousness-raising, or political statements. Nevertheless, on Monday evening, there were politicians also on stage, reveling–can you believe it?–in the spotlight.

And there was the cast and company of Signature Theatre’s “Hairspray” (which starred D.C. cultural critic Robert Aubrey Davis as Edna), up for a number of awards, including outstanding resident musical ensemble. One member of said ensemble (she had suffered an injury during a performance of the show) was Kara Tameika Watkins, just dazzling in a red-gown-crutches ensemble which she brought off with remarkable aplomb, with a little help from her mom.

I was sitting right behind them in row Y in the back, and I asked Watkins’s mother, Sheila, if they had thought about what would happen if they would win. Mom shook her head and said, “She’ll be just fine.”

You know how this story ends.

Up on stage, a voice rings out: “And the outstanding ensemble, resident musical is….”

“Hairspray, Signature Theatre.”

They squealed, they yelled, they screamed, they jumped out of their seats, and, what, maybe 50, I don’t know exactly how many, struggled into the aisles as if they had just opened the doors at Walmart for the first hours of Christmas shopping. Right there in the middle, wielding and walking and, I thought, running with her crutches was the vision in red, Kara Tameika Watkins.

They were up there, hugging each other, jumping up and down. Davis, at the mike but not in costume, showered them with eloquence, erudition and theater love, as he thanked them for accepting him in their midst.

It was a Helen Hayes moment–and a “theatreWashington” moment–one of many that seem to become an instant part of the lore and legend of each and every one of the 28 awards nights, all but two of which I’ve attended. I am a lot older than the young Ms. Watkins, but for a shining moment I felt, if not just as young, a little less old.

“Hairspray” was a big winner that night–the show’s super-charged star Carolyn Cole got best actress kudos in a resident musical, and the show itself was named Best Resident Musical

But that noise in the back–including the very loud sound of “The Sound of Music” supporters, is always something that seems unique to these awards, and mark it as a celebration not a competition. Sure, you can grouse about the results, the judges, the critics, the ties, the process and make perfect sense while you propose restructuring plans.

But the night isn’t about making sense. It’s about theater, which hardly ever makes perfect sense–oh, that nicely made play–but beats with the fever of heart, soul and imagination, and in this case, about a community.

“I don’t know, it hardly seems so local any more,” I heard somebody say in the street. “It’s getting a little big.”

Well, here’s a scoop: Washington’s theater world has indeed gotten bigger with 805 productions, 84 theaters, 9,903 performances and 2,261,509 audience members, according to the stats in the program. These numbers do not include dozens, maybe hundreds of critics, writers and freeloaders who have the audacity to take their tickets and still feel free to complain about what they’ve seen.

But I don’t think it has gotten too big for its britches, not even, and especially during the course of the Helen Hayes Awards. There are always ghosts in the house, puns in the air, and all these people to thank. If the first words spoken by a recipient was, “Wow” (I think it was Mark Acito, author of “Birds of a Feather” at the rising Hub Theatre in Virginia), it was not the last time the word was heard. It was topped only by the all-purpose “amazing,” a word–like “dude”–which should be retired or at least allowed to be used only once by each winner.

At these awards there are always luminaries who are honored and present for their star power–in the past we have had everyone from Angela Lansbury to Derek Jacoby. This year, we had Kevin Spacey.

Spacey was the recipient of the Helen Hayes Tribute–sponsored by Washington uber-theater benefactor and philantropist Jaylee Mead–and the man knows how to put on a show.

Spacey has roots here, as he acknowledged, but more than that he is one of those stage actors who became a big movie star (two Oscars), but never abandoned the stage, supporting young actors and now being the American head of the classic Old Vic in London.

He’s also an FOB–Friend of Bill–former President Bill Clinton who showed up in the form of a video tribute to Spacey. Spacey could have done it himself–he gave a wicked, thickly corn-pone accented impression of Clinton.

We remember Spacey here at the early stages of his stage career: awkwardly as the son to Liv Ullman’s mother in Ibsen’s “Ghosts” at the Kennedy Center (“My first Broadway play,” he said.); splendidly as the son to Colleen Dewhurst’s actress mother in Peter Sellars’s pitch-perfect “A Seagull” at the Kennedy Center; superbly as the son to Jack Lemmon’s father in Jason Miller’s strange version of O’Neill’s “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” at the National Theatre; and winningly as the mobster uncle in Neil Simon’s “Lost In Yonkers.”

Spacey–he won Oscars for “The Usual Suspects” and “American Beauty”–was mindful of giving back. “I learned that from Lemmon, my mentor, my friend,” he said.

He was eloquent, funny, inspiring and profane–he managed to drop the F-word not once but twice, tying Robin Williams’s old record from the Mark Twain Awards, or maybe not.

The F word is easy. Pronouncing the names of many of the Synetic Theater performers and artists of the theatre company which specializes in a form of silent and action theatre created by the company’s directors Irina and Paata Tsikurishvili is not so easy, nor is spelling them. Nevertheless, the company’s production of “King Lear” (silent Shakespeare) won several awards, including outstanding ensemble.

There were outsiders here: elected officials and media types like Ward 2 Council member Jack Evans, who read the city-council official proclamation for theatreWashington’s theater week, D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett and MSNBC’s Chris Matthews.

But mostly, there were these our players, our magic makers, such as Mitchell Hebert, who won best actor for Theater J’s quasi-Arthur Miller substitute in “All Fall Down,” Ted van Griethuysen, for “Dogberry,” praising his comrade-in-arms Floyd King. “Ruined,” the great play at Arena grabbed only one award, but it was the one that really counts — “outstanding resident play.” Adventure Theater under Michael Bobbitt continued its amazing rise with several awards. Holly Twyford was singing and hoofing her heart out. There were the ghosts of Helen Hayes and James MacArthur.

And, of course, the girl in red, her mom, all the kids screaming and yelling their hearts out. [gallery ids="100754,122616,122599,122612,122607" nav="thumbs"]

Jeff Malet •

The Washington Savoyards, the professional light opera company, begin their 40th Season performing the music of the celebrated team of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II to positive reviews at the Atlas Theater in Washington DC. Performances continue thru May 6. For information about performance times and ticket prices, visit the Savoyards website at http://www.savoyards.org/

The careers of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II parallel the coming of age of the American Musical Theater. From their first collaboration, Oklahoma! in 1943, to Carousel, South Pacific, Flower Drum Song, Cinderella and the Sound of Music, the pair continued to break new ground with innovative plots and exotic settings. Prior to Oklahoma, most hit shows were essentially vehicles to showcase the talents of its stars. They had little serious to say and there was no need to integrate the songs, dances, comedy routines and the spectacular chorus girl numbers. In “Oklahoma!” the musical found a new form. This “integrated musical” marked a revolution in American theater. “Oklahoma!” was the complete synthesis of music, libretto, lyrics, dancing and staging.

The heart of every R&H show are of course the songs, many of which became American standards, including the title song of this production which was written for the movie musical “State Fair”. This Savoyards musical review includes many of R&H’s well know tunes, mixed in with some relatively obscure gems from lesser know works such as Me and Juliet, Allegro and Pipe Dream. The cast of three women and two men includes Scott Russell, Emily Levey, Nick Lehan, Dorea Schmidt and Maria Egler.

View our photos of the show by clicking on the photo icons below.

View additional photos by clicking here. [gallery ids="102445,121333,121276,121338,121320,121284,121291,121297,121305,121327,121345,121350,121269,121261,121181,121189,121197,121204,121211,121218,121225,121233,121240,121247,121254,121312" nav="thumbs"]

Ari Post •

The Georgetown galleries on Book Hill are one of the few remaining true gallery clusters in the city. Meandering along a few blocks of Wisconsin Ave., we are surrounded by art, free to walk into galleries that call to us from their vibrant window displays. This group of galleries offers us a great variety of works to explore, from renowned glasswork to classic landscapes and the contemporary and avant-garde. Here’s a look at what’s happening on Book Hill. For more information on the Georgetown Galleries on Book Hill, visit GeorgetownGalleries.com.

Addison/Ripley Fine Art
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Washington artist Isabel Manalo is a painter who has taught at American University’s art department for ten years, as well as shown locally, nationally and internationally throughout her career. “Bits of Elsewhere” is Manalo’s third exhibition with Addison Ripley, and the new work follows her ongoing pursuit of capturing memory and the tenuous, ethereal uncertainty of human nature. Her mixed media works mix paints and photographs with unprecedented subtlety and grace—it’s hard not to be moved by their pulsing, expansive nature. March 10 – April 14.

1670 Wisconsin Ave. NW. AddisonRipleyFineArt.com

Heiner Contemporary
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Through March 3, the collages, sketchbooks, prints and installations of Austin Thomas turn Heiner Contemporary into a center of social and artistic discourse. Thomas’s centerpiece for the exhibit, an interactive desk and workspace, engages visitors to talk, read, draw, think, and listen. The show will close with an artist discussion on March 3 at 4 p.m. On March 10, Heiner Contemporary will open its next exhibition, titled: “Avery Lawrence is Moving a Tree and Arranging Suitcases.” Details are still trickling in, but if the title alone doesn’t get your attention, what will?

1675 Wisconsin Ave. NW. HeinerContemporary.com

Maurine Littleton Gallery
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Renowned Seattle-based glass artist Ginny Ruffner will open an exhibit of her work on February 29, in conjunction with a screening of an award-winning documentary of the artist’s life and work at the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery on the same day. The film will be screened at noon, followed by a gallery event at 2 p.m., where the artist will be in attendance. Ruffner’s works are constantly evolving “visual thought experiments,” and her glass sculptures and drawings turn life’s daily props and occurrences into remarkable visual experiences.

1667 Wisconsin Ave. NW. LitteltonGallery.comhttp://www.littletongallery.com/)

Susan Calloway Fine Arts
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Local interior designer Andrew Law will employ his craft and eye for refined, classic and approachable design to “create a room” in Susan Calloway Fine Arts’ already gorgeous and comfortable gallery, pulling from contemporary artworks, antique paintings and prints from the gallery’s private collection. The collaboration, “At the Crossroads: Art + (Interior) Design,” pursues a common and important objective of enhancing design and lifestyle with art, and offering a platform for beauty in our daily lives. March 2 – March 17.

1643 Wisconsin Ave. NW. CallowayArt.com

Galerie Blue Square
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Two series of works by Russian-born artist Yevgeniy Fiks will open with a public reception on March 3, from 4 – 7 p.m., and continue through April 14. Fiks explores historical, communist threads in his conceptual works and projects, presenting the cultural, Post-Soviet practice of “making the absurd seem normal, at the same time the West is seduced and implicated in it.” His latest series, “Magnitogorsk Guide to the National Gallery of Art,” will be on view, and a “performance” tour at the National Gallery of Art on March 24 accompanies the exhibit.

1662 33rd St. NW. GalerieBlueSquare.com

Neptune Fine Art
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Gallery Director Chris Neptune, recently moved into DC from New York, specializes in Modern and Contemporary art. With an extensive collection of artists ranging from contemporary masters such as Mel Bochner (now on view in the Tower of the National Gallery) and Alex Katz, to the timeless works of the Cubists and Impressionists, Neptune Fine Art has work to suit anyone’s palette. Opening April 21, “On Paper: Picasso & Matisse” offers a look into the drawings and prints of these renowned artists, who had a history of healthy competition with each other.

1662 33rd St. NW. NeptuneFineArt.com

Robert Brown Gallery
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Formerly on R St. near Dupont Circle, gallerist Robert Brown specializes in 20th century and contemporary works, as well as rare Chinese advertising posters from the early 1900s and Chinese antiques. Currently on display are works by prominent DC-based artist Linn Meyers, who has been commissioned in the recent past by The Phillips Collection, as well as William Kentridge (South Africa) and Oleg Kudryashov (Russia), two of the most significant living printmakers who were exhibited together at The Kreeger Museum in 2009. This is an exhibit for contemporary and historically minded viewers, and one you don’t want to miss.

1662 33rd St. NW. RobertBrownGallery.com [gallery ids="100501,118157,118151,118145,118125,118140,118133" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

On Apr. 11, Ris restaurant hosted a media sneak peek of a multi-day event celebrating Iceland and its cuisine, spearheaded by award-winning chef Thrainn Fryr. Newly appointed Ambassador Gudmundur A. Stefansson quipped that, following an economic setback, Iceland was “getting out of the woods.” He went on to share that it was no surprise as Iceland has no woods. Ris featured a menu that included a “Reykjavik 101” cocktail that no doubt inspired the imbibers to hop on Icelandair for a dip in the geothermal Blue Lagoon. [gallery ids="100743,121628,121599,121623,121609,121617" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Down the rabbit hole took on new meaning with the pirouetting enchantress Maki Onuki as Alice, a slinky Red Queen, seductive Cheshire Cat, aerial bicycling Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, elegant white rabbit, beguiling piglets and hedgehogs and every possible imaginative detail as Septime Webre debuted his take on Alice at the Kennedy Center on Apr. 12. The after party at the Oriental Mandarin was a true love fest as Webre acknowledged his creative team, front and foremost composer Mathew Pierce, Cirque du Soleil costumer Liz Vanda, set designer James Kronzer and puppet maker Eric J.VanWyk. [gallery ids="100744,121648,121641,121663,121633,121668,121626,121675,121681,121655" nav="thumbs"]

Michelle Kingston •

With over 30 years of experience, Luigi Parasmo opened his own namesake salon in Georgetown last week. Parasmo, who was born in Rome, Italy, has styled for iconic brands such as Valentino, Armani, D&G, and Versace during Fashion Week Milan, and Tory Burch and Thyphoon at Fashion Week New York. He has lived in D.C. for 20 years now and has previously worked at Watergate, Erin Gomez and Toka Salon. [gallery ids="100746,121704,121686,121699,121694" nav="thumbs"]

Jeff Malet •

The Washington Humane Society’s 6th Annual Fashion for Paws took place at the National Building Museum in Washington D.C. on April 14 2012, featuring fundraising models who agreed to raise a minimum of $5000 in the weeks leading up to the event. Opening the event were custom made designs by the Fashion Institute of Design and Marketing’s 2012 Debut Class. Several of FIDM’s top design students were asked to create a custom couture outfit exclusively for the Fashion for Paws show to match their line that was recently showcased in Los Angelas at FIDM’s annual Debut Gala. Five students were asked to take on the challenge of creating one-of-a-kind, high fashioned garments for models and then a matching outfit for some of Fashion for Paws much loved “model” dogs to wear down the runway. These custom creations were designed and made completely by the students from the Debut 2012 group.

View our photos of the event plus a behind the scenes look at the FIDM designs by clicking on the icons below. (All photos by Jeff Malet) [gallery ids="122184,122033,122025,122016,122007,121998,121989,121978,121969,121961,121953,121943,121934,122042,122050,122058,122175,122166,122157,122148,122136,122124,122112,122103,122094,122086,122077,122067,121926,121919,121773,121765,121756,121747,121738,121729,122197,121720,122207,122219,121709,122228,121782,121791,121799,121909,121901,121889,121881,121872,121861,121853,121844,121835,121826,121817,121809,100748" nav="thumbs"]