Visiting Artist Residencies

November 12 – November 13, 2024

The BU Arts Initiative is excited to bring freelance creative director and photographer Jacob Webster to campus for a unique residency experience. Students will be able to learn about breaking into the industry and pursuing passions. This residency will include class visits, a lunch and learn digital editing workshop, and culminate in a creative career talk at Innovate@BU. The BU Arts Initiative will also host a small exhibition of his artwork outside our George Sherman Union office.

Events

Lunch n’ Learn with Jacob Webster
Tuesday, November 12th, 11:00 am • BUAI  Office, 775 Commonwealth Ave., Ste. 201

Join us for a light lunch with Artist-in-Residence Jacob Webster for a special talk on preparing for a photoshoot and working with clients. Please be sure to complete the form and information regarding dietary restrictions. 

Register Here

Fruition’s View: A Conversation with Jacob Webster
Tuesday, November 12th, 6-7:30 pm • Howard Thurman Center Event Space, 808 Commonwealth Ave.

Moderated by Dr. Alisa Prince, photographer, Jacob Webster, will discuss his journey and how his identity played a role in shaping the works that he has produced. 

Register Here

Permanence Through the Lens: An Artist Talk with Jacob Webster
Wednesday, November 13th, 6-7:30 pm • Innovate@BU, 730 Commonwealth Ave.

The BU Arts Initiative and Innovate@BU welcome photographer Jacob Webster as he comes to talk about developing a creative business and the steps necessary to build one’s brand. This engaging conversation will offer insight and advice to fellow creatives also interested in pursuing their passions.

Register Here

Jacob Webster: Fruition’s View
Exhibition – October 20th, 2024 – January 21st, 2025 •  775 Commonwealth Ave.

View a selection of works by Webster that demonstrate his variety of expertise. Works will be on display on the second floor of the George Sherman Union outside of the BU Arts Initiative Office. 

Artist bio

Jacob Webster is a freelance creative director and photographer with a decade of experience specializing in beauty and fashion photography. As a self-taught artist, Jacob embodies creativity, authenticity, and resilience. Working at the intersection of beauty, fashion, and culture, Jacob helps millennial creatives find their voice through image and content creation.

February 27 – March 1, 2025

February 29 – March 2, 2024

The Small Island, Big Song artist residency at Boston University explored the cultural connections of the vast ocean through the Austronesian migration.

Events

Our Shared Seafaring Heritage, Alive in Rhythm and Song
Thursday, February 29th, 6-7:30 pm • Howard Thurman Center Event Space, 808 Commonwealth Ave.

During the first segment of this lecture demonstration, presenters set the stage with geographical and historical background about these great oceanic migrations. The second segment consisted of conversation and musical demonstrations by Small Island, Big Song artists to showcase some of the cultural similarities their communities share across these vast ocean expanses. 

First Friday: Cooking Poulet Fafa – A Traditional Meal with Local Twists
Friday, March 1st, 3:30-6 pm • Demonstration Room 124, 808 Commonwealth Ave.

One of the most ancient human activities is cooking and sharing a meal. Through the time spent gathering ingredients and preparing the meal, conversations, and stories can erupt into laughter and song. It is such a natural activity that bonds people to one another and their natural environment. Together with Small Island Big Song artists, students shared in this process, making a traditional dish of Tahiti (French Polynesia) called Poulet Fafa. Co-sponsored by BU Food and Wine.

Small Island Big Song Concert
Saturday, March 2nd, 3-5 pm • Tsai Performance Center 685 Commonwealth Ave.

Small Island Big Song is a music, film, and performing arts project uniting the islands of the Pacific and Indian Ocean through artistic collaboration, a contemporary and relevant musical statement from a region that shares an ancient seafaring heritage and the impact of our changing sea.

Artist bios

Emlyn – Creole heritage, Mauritius • Songwriter & Performer
Featured on CNN, Emlyn is leading a wave of performers across the Indian Ocean proudly reclaiming their unique rhythms and cultural mix. Written with a reactive pen and sung in Mauritian Creole, her songs express her concerns for her island’s environment. Emlyn brings the infectious grooves of Sega with the sounds of her traditional frame drum, Ravann, which originated from the rhythms of African/Madagascan people during the slave trade. SIBS fell in love with Sega music during their field trips to Mauritius in 2016 and 2017 and was finally collaborating with Emlyn in 2020. She has been part of the album since and never misses a show! 

Songwriter & Performer • Putad – Amis heritage, Taiwan
Powerful, entrancing, and unapologetic are all words used to describe Putad’s engaging stage presence. In the proud spirit of her indigenous Amis heritage, Putad unites ancient vocal traditions with the raw energy of grunge, rock, and punk, as she and her brothers Wusang and Linken’s band Outlet Drift express. In the SIBS ensemble, she brings this energy, her soaring voice, and rock bass along with her coastal Amis ancestry and love for the ocean! SIBS met Putad through an online project Global Music Match in 2020. She has since become one of the feature artists on the album ‘Our Island’ and its tours across four continents.

Songwriter & Performer • Sammy – Merina heritage, Madagascar
Sammy followed his passion for Madagascar’s musical heritage by mastering and learning how to make the most of Madagascar’s instruments. His efforts came to the notice of the UK’s world music scene as his band ‘Tarika Sammy’ gained international recognition, becoming a regular on major festival stages and being acknowledged as one of the world’s “Best Ten Bands”, alongside U2, by TIME Magazine. SIBS met Sammy at his house during their inspiring field trips to Madagascar in 2016 & 2017. He’s featured in both albums and concert tours around the world since 2018.

Songwriter & Performer • Aremistic – Tahitian heritage, Tahiti (French Polynesia) 
Like the lively uplifting Tahitian rhythm he was named after, Aremistic’s music could have only come from one island, Tahiti. A natural fusion of the island’s cultural mix grounded in his Tahitian heritage, Aremistic’s songs and performances integrate traditional Polynesian instruments and rhythms with reggae, hip-hop, rock, folk, and pop sensibilities, often sung in Tahitian, French & English in one song. His recent performances at Aotearoa/New Zealand’s ‘Pasifika Festival’ and in Europe and the USA expanded his reputation as a voice for the Pacific Ocean.

Songwriter & Performer • Yuma Pawang – Atayal heritage, Taiwan
Yuma, a member of the Atayal tribe of Taiwan, is a multidisciplinary artist expressing her thoughts on “Atayal,” cultural preservation, transformation, essence, and social equity in film, music, painting, and performance. With Taiwan’s respected Minang performance group, she was invited by Indigenous nations of Northern Europe for a cultural exchange. This experience along with studying film performance made her aware of the significance of cultural practice in the context of Atayal life, where written language was historically limited. SIBS first met Yuma as a special guest for a SIBS concert in Taiwan in 2023, and she is now part of the family.

Songwriter & Performer • Airileke Ingram – Motu heritage, Papua New Guinea
Airileke grew up between the shores of both PNG and the Top End, Australia. Airileke is a musical pioneer and a sonic fighter for freedom traversing a timeless sonic globe without frontiers. He is a percussionist, producer, composer, activist, and, in the words of Britain’s Songlines magazine, “cause for celebration”. Airileke is a master drummer with one foot in the world of traditional drumming of Melanesia and his other in the modern world of beat production and hip-hop. Tim and Airileke have been long-time collaborators; they met up again during SIBS’s field trip to Papua New Guinea in 2016. His driving beats are featured in both SIBS albums.

Songwriter & Performer • Mea Joy Ingram – Motu heritage, Papua New Guinea & Australia
Mea comes from a long line of drummers and dancers. She was taught by her father, master percussionist Airileke Ingram in the tradition of Manus Garamut, Cook Island Pate, and Gabagaba Motu Mavaru. The Garamut drumming of PNG was traditionally an art form dominated by men, however Mea, having just turned 18, represents the new generation of female log drummers emerging from Oceania. 

Choreographer & Performer • Mathieu Joseph – Creole heritage, Mauritius
Mathieu has been a professional dancer and choreographer since the age of 14 when he was discovered breakdancing on the suburban streets of Port Louis, Mauritius by renowned choreographer Stephen Bongarçon. Quickly embedding himself in Bongarçon’s SRDance, his dedication earned him the gold medal for dance at “Les Jeux de la Francophonie” in 2009. This led to a succession of shows and companies, including choreographing “Di Sel”, a tribute to the salt workers of Mauritius which won the “Les Jeux de la Francophonie” in France in 2017. 

November 9 & 10, 2023

In partnership with African American & Black Diaspora Studies.

Events

November 9th • Howard Thurman Center, 808 Commonwealth Avenue. 

• 7:00 pm: Black Pastoral Reading 
• 7:30 pm:  Q&A
• 8:00 pm: Book Signing

November 10th • BU Arts Initiative Office, 775 Commonwealth Avenue.

2:00 – 5:00 pm: 1-on-1 Writers’ Workshop.  

Artist Bio

Ariana Benson (She/They) is a southern Black poet born in Norfolk, Virginia. Their debut collection, Black Pastoral (University of Georgia Press, 2023), won the 2022 Cave Canem Poetry Prize. Benson has received the Furious Flower Poetry Prize, the Porter House Review Poetry Prize, and the 2021 Graybeal-Gowen Prize for Virginia Poets. Benson is the winner of a 2023 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship. Her poems and essays appear or are forthcoming in Poetry magazine, Ploughshares, Poem-a-Day, The Yale Review, The Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. Benson is a proud alumna of Spelman College, where she facilitates creative writing and storytelling workshops for HBCU students. She strives to fashion vignettes of Blackness that speak to its infinite depth and richness in her writing.

April 24 – 28, 2023

In partnership with Meg Younger (Biology), BU Department of Biology, and the BU Center for Systems Neuroscience.

Events

Monday, April 24 – 6 pm to 8 pm. Manufacturing Scented Objects • Engineering Product Innovation Center (EPIC) Workshop (BU Students Only) at EPIC – 750 Commonwealth Ave.

Thursday, April 27 – 3:30 pm to 6 pm. Scentience: A Collection of Olfactory Expressions – Installation & Talk • First Floor – Center for Integrated Life Sciences and Engineering (CILSE) 610 Commonwealth Ave.

Guests explored the creative work of M Dougherty in this pop-up installation of olfactory art and then heard from the artist about their current and upcoming projects. 

Friday, April 28 – 12 pm to 1:30 pm. Out in STE(A)M Luncheon (BU Community Only) • Hillel House Room 227 – 213 Bay State Rd.

Additional co-sponsors: LGBTQIA+ Center for Faculty & Staff and oSTEM. With guests Karen Warkentin and Christopher Schmitt.

Artist Bio

M Dougherty is a nonbinary, multidisciplinary artist and researcher. With a rich background in many fields, they focus on psychophysical research and artwork which uses design to express the output of research. Raised in Los Angeles, in an epicenter of experimental olfaction, they often use scent to explore communication, memory, and interaction throughout their work. Equipped with a BA in Fine Arts from the USC and a Master’s in Interactive Media Arts from NYU Shanghai, M moves fluidly between artistic mediums in an attempt to better study the juxtaposition of technology and humanity. Their artistic practice originated in sculpture so consistently involves installation and personal interaction through the senses. This manifests in explorations of biomaterials, chemo-sensory information, and the design of wearable technologies that enhance humans’ relationship to scent.

About Olfactory Art

Olfactory art, also known as scent art, is a form of contemporary art that uses scents or odors as the primary medium to create immersive sensory experiences. While the intentional use and curation of fragrant materials is as old as humans, this genre has gained popularity in recent years due to the increasing awareness of the profound impact that scent can have on emotions, memories, and our perception of the world.

In olfactory art, scents are used in various forms of artistic expression. This expression can exist in perfume itself, but can also manifest in installations, sculptures, paintings, and interactive exhibitions. Artists in this field experiment with different scents and combinations, seeking to communicate diverse themes, perspectives, and histories through the sense of smell. Scent can convey information about a culture, a place, a person, health, a memory, or an emotion. In olfactory art, this information is translated in different ways to create an opportunity for the viewer to engage with the information on a deeper, more immersive level. 

Richard Axel and Linda Buck only just discovered human olfactory receptors in 1991, meaning the scientific field and our very understanding of this sense is incredibly young. Advancements in our understanding of human olfactory perception, odor materials, and the mechanism behind odor delivery allow artists to push this medium further and further. Some contemporary scent artists who are pushing the boundaries of this medium include Sissel Tolaas, Peter de Cupere, and Brian Goeltzenleuchter. Their works range from site-specific installations to perfumed exhibitions that invite the viewer to engage with the sense of smell in new and unexpected ways.

November 17 & 18, 2022

In collaboration with the African American & Black Diaspora Studies Program.

Events

Arts & Social Justice Panel
Thursday, November 17, 2022, 5:30 PM • Photonics Colloquium Rm# 906- 8 St. Mary’s St, Boston, MA

Marc Bamuthi Joseph and local activist artists Dzidzor and Anita Morson-Matra held a conversation on arts and social justice moderated by André de Quadros.

Dzidzor (Jee-Jaw) Azaglo is a Ga-Ewe folklore performing artist, who is paused and moved by Octavia E. Butler’s question, ‘What do we need to do now, to create the future that we want?’ She often echoes the words of Toni Morrison’s words and her father’s prayers as a guide to reach back into the past to lead us toward the present. Dzidzor uses the tool of storytelling, community archiving, and collaging sounds as a portal to transcend through time and space. Dzidzororganizes community art events and facilitates workshops around empowerment and strengthening the voice, she intentionally calls for the community to reach into the lessons of yesterday while honoring proverbs, poems, and prayers that challenge and lift us up.  Dzidzor is the founder of the Black Cotton Club and partners with Grubstreet, ICA Boston, and Boston Public Schools to teach creative empowerment workshops in Boston. Dzidzor is a candidate for a Masters in Theological Studies at Boston University and holds the role of a Community Archivist at Northeastern University. She is currently working on a listening and public art project entitled, ‘Wilderness’ with Crystal Bi.

Anita Morson-Matra (creative entrepreneur & founder of Baldwin in the Park, & Nubian Nights) is known to be a creative thinker who offers options to amplify programs’ impact through a number of lenses from creative place-keeping and care for social and mental health. Anita exhibits qualities of compassion and empathy that make her work so competent and emotionally resonant. She is an urban planner who brings genuine respect, a textured understanding of our history, and a focus on equity.

Dr. André de Quadros is a Professor of Music at Boston University with affiliations in African, African American, Asian, Jewish, and Muslim studies, prison education, and Antiracist Research. As an artist and human rights activist, he has worked in over 40 countries in the most diverse settings including professional ensembles, projects with prisons, psychosocial rehabilitation, refugees, and victims of torture and trauma. His work crosses race and mass incarceration, peacebuilding, forced migration, and Islamophobia. He directs choirs and choral projects in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, the United States, Israel and the Arab world, and the Mexico-US border. In 2019, he was a Distinguished Academic Visitor at the University of Cambridge.

BLACKBIRD, FLY
Friday, November 18, 2022 • 7:00 PM • Tsai Performance Center • 685 Commonwealth Ave.

BLACKBIRD, FLY is a live performance that weaves together an enduring tapestry of movement, narrative, music, and Haitian folklore to engage audiences in dialog about critical questions of our time. Steeped in a hip-hop aesthetic, this intimate duet between two preeminent sons of Haitian immigrants —composer/violinist DBR, and arts activist & spoken word artist Marc Bamuthi Joseph —unveils their life stories in search of their identity and role models, and explores universal themes of tolerance and inclusion.

This work is a culmination of DBR and BAMUTHI’s collaborations with Atlanta Ballet, Boston Children’s Chorus, the University of Houston, SF Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and Opera Philadelphia. In each of these communities, they have created and premiered new works offering myriad experiential arts education opportunities. Introspective yet uplifting, BLACKBIRD, FLY heightens our collective consciousness and sheds new light on the arts as a powerful tool for social and civic engagement.

Artist Bios

BAMUTHI (Marc Bamuthi Joseph) is a 2017 TED Global Fellow, an inaugural recipient of the Guggenheim Social Practice initiative, and an honoree of the United States Artists Rockefeller Fellowship. Bamuthi’s opera libretto, We Shall Not Be Moved, was named one of 2017’s “Best Classical Music Performances” by The New York Times. His evening-length work created in collaboration with composer Daniel Bernard Roumain, “The Just and The Blind,” was commissioned by Carnegie Hall and premiered in a sold-out house at Carnegie in March 2019. His upcoming opera “Watch Night” is inspired by the forgiveness exhibited by the congregation of Emanuel AME church in Charleston, and will premiere at The Perelman Center in New York in 2023.

While engaging in a deeply fulfilling and successful artistic career, Bamuthi also proudly serves as Vice President and Artistic Director of Social Impact at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. He is in high demand for his creative approach to organizational design, brand development, and community mediation, and has been enlisted as a strategic partner or consultant for companies ranging from Coca-Cola to Carnegie Hall. His TED talk on linking sport to freedom design among immigrant youth has been viewed more than 1 million times and is a testament to his capacity to distill complex systems into accessible and poetic presentations. Bamuthi’s community development philosophy, called “The Creative Ecosystem”, has been implemented in dozens of cities across the United States and is the subject of several critical writings, including one of the seminal essays in “Cultural Transformations: Youth and Pedagogies of Possibility”, published by Harvard Education Press.

Bamuthi is the founding Program Director of the exemplary non-profit Youth Speaks and is a co-founder of Life is Living, a national series of one-day festivals that activate under-resourced parks and affirm peaceful urban life.  His essays have been published in Harvard Education Press; he has lectured at more than 200 colleges and has carried adjunct professorships at Stanford and Lehigh, among others.

DBR (Daniel Bernard Roumain) is a prolific and endlessly collaborative composer, performer, educator, and social entrepreneur. “About as omnivorous as a contemporary artist gets” (New York Times), DBR has worked with artists from Philip Glass to Bill T. Jones to Lady Gaga; appeared on NPR, American Idol, and ESPN; and has collaborated with the Sydney Opera House and the City of Burlington, Vermont. Acclaimed as a violinist and activist, DBR’s career spans more than two decades, earning commissions by venerable artists and institutions worldwide.

October 11-14, 2022

In partnership with BU School of Music. Also featured: David Guzman, Assistant Professor of Voice at BU; Michael Birenbaum Quintero, BU Associate Professor of Music and Chair, Musicology & Ethnomusicology; and Fabian Galon (Colombian tiple player and Berklee College of Music faculty). 

Events

Performance – Colombian Andean Music

Tuesday, October 11, 2022 • 7PM • BU College of Fine Arts Concert Hall, 855 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA
The BU community enjoyed the outstanding music of Colombian Trios Palos y Cuerdas Hermanos Saboya featuring vocals by David Guzman (BU Faculty). Trios Palos y Cuerdas Hermanos Saboya is one of the most versatile and prominent ensembles of the Colombian Andean music scene. Brothers Diego, Daniel, and Lucas are experienced composers and performers that have been recognized as one of the top instrumental trios in Colombia. According to Lauro Lisboa Garcia, festival choro jazz Jericoacoara, “combining two guitars and a bandola, the musicians performed the most exciting concert of the festival, bringing the beautiful music of the Andean region of Colombia … The performance of the trio was overwhelming and left us with the impression of having discovered something great.” Sit back, relax, and enjoy an evening of beautiful Colombian Andean music. 

Guitar Master Class

Wednesday, October 12, 2022 • 11AM – 12:30PM • BU College of Fine Arts, Marshall Rm 254, 855 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA
The BU community joined BU Arts Initiative for a guitar master class with brothers Diego, Daniel, and Lucas of Trios Palos Y Cuerdas Hermanos Saboya. Attendees learned about the music, instruments, and performance techniques of the Andean region of Colombia and more from these extraordinary musicians. 

Lecture/Recital Hosted by the BU Latin American Studies Program

Wednesday, October 12, 2022 • 4 – 5:30 PM • BU College of Fine Arts, Marshall Rm 254, 855 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA
The Latin American Studies program at BU invited the community to a special lecture with a performance by Trios Palos y Cuerdas Hermanos Saboya. 

Colombian Music Panel

Friday, October 14, 2022 • 4 -5:30 PM • Photonics Center Rm #906, 8 St. Mary’s Street, Boston, MA
The panel included Trios Palos y Cuerdas Hermanos Saboya; Fabian Gallon, Colombian tiple player and Berklee College of Music faculty; and Michael Birenbaum Quintero, BU Associate Professor of Music and Chair, Musicology & Ethnomusicology; for a discussion of Colombian music moderated by David Guzman, Assistant Professor of Voice at BU.

Fabian Gallon is an outstanding tiple player from Colombia. In 1987, he was featured as the first seat of tiple and a year later joined Trio Ancestro. He received distinguished awards such as Best Group Artist at many well-known Colombian festivals. He accompanied and recorded on numerous projects for other talented musicians such as Berklee graduates Marta Gomez and Luis Avila.  As a soloist, he won Best Interpreter of the New Millenium in his category. He released his first solo album in February of 2017, recorded in Boston MA. He has toured and performed across South and North America.

Michael Birenbaum Quintero, Associate Professor of Musicology & Ethnomusicology, Latin American Studies and African American Studies is author of Rites, Rights and Rhythms: A Genealogy of Musical Meaning in Colombia’s Black Pacific (Oxford UP, 2018).  His work, mostly focusing on black Colombians, examines the ways that blackness has been framed through music, states’ cultural policies and social movements’ cultural politics, black cosmopolitanism, vernacular uses of technology, musical circulation, ontological framings of music as practice or object, the politics of loudness, and ritual soundscapes.

David Guzman, BU Assistant Professor of Music, Voice is hailed by Tampa Bay Times as the “one to watch,” rising star, Colombian tenor. He is known for his exquisite tone and impeccable musicianship.  During the 2017 –2018 season, Guzman portrayed Orpheus in Orpheus in the Underworld in a return engagement with Western Plains Opera.  During the previous season, he performed as Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor with Heartbeat Opera and covered the role of Aureliano in Rossini’s Aureliano in Palmira at the Caramoor Center for Music and Arts. He holds a BA in Music Education from Universidad Pedagogica Nacional de Colombia, an MM in Voice Performance from Texas Christian University, and a DMA in Voice Performance from SUNY at Stony Brook. His recent CD release, Latin-American Art Songs, is the first result of his continuous research of forgotten Latin-American art song repertoire and performance practices.

Musician Biography

“Palos y Cuerdas” is considered one of the top Andean instrumental trios in Colombia, composing and performing representative music of the interior (Andean) region of their country (Bandola, Tiple, and Guitar). Frequently invited to international encounters, they have visited important stages in Panama, Russia, the United States, England, Holland, Germany, Luxembourg, France, Spain, Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Perú, Ecuador, and Venezuela. They have been soloists in orchestras such as the City of London Sinfonía; the Philharmonic of Bogotá and the National Symphony of Colombia under the direction of Andrés Orozco Estrada, Ricardo Jaramillo, Eduardo Carrizosa, and Leonardo Federico Hoyos. They develop an important activity as composers and their music is published on labels such as Naxos. They have 10 musical productions, several of them awarded by the Ministry of Culture of their country and considered the best recording of the year by specialized critics. They have performed concerts, albums, and projects with artists from different countries and genres. Their contact with various musical sources, including classical music, jazz, and traditional Colombian music, has led them to develop a very high level.

In Daniel’s interpretation you can hear the evolution of a century of the guitar, the melody in the bass registers (bordoneos) from the old guitarists such as Álvaro Romero, to the sophisticated and elegant sonority of the accompaniment designs of the school of the teacher Gentil Montaña and the guitar universal classic. Composer and arranger of Palos y Cuerdas. Diego Saboya is a virtuouso of the Bandola. The entire palette of resources to which an instrumentalist aspires is expressed in his work: speed, technical skill, and musicality in favor of art. In Diego’s sonority come together the precise pulsation, brightness, exuberance, and passion of the best performers in the history of the instrument. The tiple of Lucas, with all the attraction of his individuality, tells us secrets of the Colombian tradition. It is a transcendental but daily tiple, academic but passionate, a tiple thought from the City where everything is possible.

March 31 – April 6, 2022

In collaboration with BU School of Visual Arts, College of Fine Arts, and Indigenous Voices in the Americas. 

Events

Naal Tsoos Saní
Exhibition – March 31 to April 6 • Towne Gallery • Fenway Campus, 180 Riverway, Boston

This body of work was an extension of Dakota’s research on the Long Walk, focusing on the Navajo Treaty from 1868. A selection of 100 cochineal cyanotypes, collected from along the Long Walk, were set in a tabletop case, and arranged in a tight grid. The prints are living artifacts and connect to interviews Dakota recorded of Diné elders. A series of 25 lithographs hung along one of the walls, an aspect of Dakota’s research on the 1968 Treaty. Two sash belts were displayed on cases, alongside a second audio piece, a set of interviews of Diné women elders, narrated by Dakota.

This exhibit was funded in part by an Inclusion Catalyst Grant from BU Diversity & Inclusion.

Educators Workshop: Cultural Appropriation and the Intersections of Indigenous Design & Art
Sunday, April 3, 1:30 pm • The Earl Center for Learning and Innovation, 180 Riverway, Boston

A discussion with Dakota around developing tools and critical thinking challenging cultural appropriation of Indigenous art and design work. 

First Friday – Weaving & Wontons
Friday, April 1, 4:30-5:30 pm • BU College of Fine Arts First Student Floor Lounge (Rm 102) (BU Students Only)

The BU community gathered in the CFA Student Lounge for a weaving demonstration by Dakota Mace, a variety of weaving activities, and tasty wontons. 

BU School of Visual Arts Tuesday Night Lecture Series
Tuesday, April 5, 7:30-9 pm • 808 Commonwealth Ave. (Rm 410)

Hosted by the MFA programs in Painting, Sculpture, and Graphic Design at Boston University, the Tuesday Night Lecture Series brings practicing artists and curators to Boston University to present their work.

Artist Bio

Dakota Mace is a Diné photographer and textile artist who focuses on translating the language of Diné weaving history and beliefs through alternative photography techniques,  weaving, beadwork, and papermaking. She has also worked with numerous institutions and programs to develop dialogue on the importance of cultural appropriation concerning  Indigenous design work. Mace received her MA and MFA degrees in Photography and Textile Design at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her BFA in Photography from the Institute of American Indian Arts.  She is currently a lecturer in photography at UW–Madison and the photographer for the Center of Design and Material Culture. Her work as an artist and scholar has been exhibited nationally and internationally at various conferences and galleries. She has received numerous awards, including the 2020  Fellowship. Art Recipient, 2019 Women’s Forward Award, and the 2019 Wisconsin Triennial Recipient.

October 19-23, 2020

In collaboration with the BU Dance Program and The Dance Complex.

Events

Hip-Hop Dance Workshop with the Dance Complex
Monday, October 19 • 7-8PM 

Participants got to explore the physical movement elements of hip-hop culture, as Amirah taught the foundational movement styles of top rocking, breaking, popping, and tutting. Participants developed a better understanding and appreciation for hip-hop history and culture in the action-packed workshop.

Dance & Spirituality: Panel Discussion
Wednesday, October 21 • 4-5:30PM

As spirituality is explored in dance across cultures, we are honored to have had Amirah joined by Shreelina Ghosh (Assistant Professor, English, Gannon University), Ty Defoe (Writer and Interdisciplinary Artist), and Carrie Preston (Professor of English and Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality, and Director of Kilachand Honors College, Boston University) for this virtual panel discussion. 

Watch Panel

Lecture & Demonstration
Thursday, October 22 • 8:30-9:30PM 

Culminating her residency at BU, Amirah discussed the misconceptions about Islam and Muslim Women, and shared her personal experiences participating in hip-hop culture around the world and the reasons she began melding her Muslim and American identities in her work. She also shared a live performance of her work, including her work combining the poetry of Rumi with the sound design of Chicago DJ, Nevin S. Hersch, and the cinematography talents of Tunisian filmmaker, Ahmed Zaghbouni.

Artist Bios

About Amirah Sackett:
An internationally recognized hip-hop dancer, choreographer, and teacher, Amirah Sackett explores and embodies her Muslim American identity through combining hip-hop movement and Islamic themes. She is widely known for her creation of the choreography and performance group known as, “We’re Muslim, Don’t Panic”, which reached viral video fame after being featured on POPSUGAR Celebrity, The Huffington Post, AJ+, and Upworthy. Sackett was honored to be a TEDx speaker, guest lecturer at Harvard University, and a cultural diplomat with the U.S. State Department in Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Kuwait.

Spirituality & Dance Panelists:

Ty Defoe (Giizhig), Oneida and Ojibwe Nations, is an writer and interdisciplinary artist, and Grammy Award winner. Ty aspires to an interweaving approach to artistic projects with social justice, indigeneity, indiqueering, and environmentalism. Ty’s global cultural arts highlights: the Millennium celebration in Cairo, Egypt; Ankara, Turkey, International Music Festival; and Festival of World Cultures in Dubai. Awards: First American in the Arts, Global Indigenous Heritage Festival Award, a Robert Rauschenberg Artist in Residence, Jonathan Larson Award. Works created and authored: River of Stone, Red Pine, The Way They Lived, Ajijaak on Turtle Island, Hear Me Say My Name, among others. Ty is an artEquity facilitator, co-founder of Indigenous Direction (with Larissa FastHorse), member of All My Relations Collective—  Devised Theater Working Group at the Public Theater building GIZHIBAA GIIZHIG | Revolving Sky at Under the Radar’s Incoming!).  Publications: Casting a Movement, Pitkin Review, Thorny Locust Magazine, Howl Round, and Routledge Press. Degrees from CalArts, Goddard College, + NYU Tisch. Movement Direction: Mother Road,Dir. Bill Rauch (OSF), Manahatta, Dir. Laurie Woolery (OSF + Yale Rep), and Choreographer for Tracy Lett’s The Minutes (Broadway). Appeared on the Netflix show; Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and Broadway debut in Young Jean Lee’s Straight White Men, Dir. Anna Shapiro. Lives in NYC + loves the color clear. He|We, www.allmyrelations.earth, tydefoe.com

Shreelina Ghosh practiced the 2000- year old Odissi dance under eminent Odissi exponent, Guru Aloka Kanungo since the age of four. Shreelina has performed widely across India and the USA. Her choreographic work includes Panamami Buddham, Vayu: Visions of the Wind, Vyom: Mind of the Aether, and Shivaaradhana. She earned her PhD in Rhetoric and Writing from Michigan State University and is currently Assistant Professor of English and Director of Composition at Gannon University. Her research interests mostly center at the intersections of cultural and digital rhetorics, and performance. Her current research examines the use of technology as a tool of online and hybrid learning and explores the relationship between traditional and online pedagogic and performative practices.

Carrie Preston serves as Professor of English and Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies and the Arvind and Chandan Nandlal Kilachand Professor Director, Kilachand Honors College at Boston University. Her research and teaching interests include modernist literature, performance, and dance, feminist and queer theory, and transnational and postcolonial studies. Her book, Modernism’s Mythic Pose: Gender, Genre, Solo Performance, was released in Oxford University Press’s Modernist Literature and Culture Series in 2011 and received the De La Torre Bueno Prize in dance studies. She is currently working on a book called Participate! Race and Gender in the Audience for Interactive Theater.

September through December 2021

Ty Defoe was a Guest Resident Artist and co-creator of Patterns of Wind (Dec 3-5) in partnership with BU School of Theatre and the Indigenous Voices in the Americas.

Fall 2019

In partnership with the Hariri Institute for Computing and Computational Science and Engineering, and BU Spark! with support from Innovate@BU and the School of Visual Arts, College of Fine Arts.

October 15-19, 2019

In partnership with the Activist Lab, School of Public Health (as part of a series of events at the School of Public Health recognizing 400 Years of Inequality).

Events

Performance Selections from THE MEDEA PROJECT: Theatre for Incarcerated Women – exploring issues specific to incarcerated women and women who are infected or affected by HIV.
Wednesday, October 16 at 5pm • Bakst Auditorium (BU School of Medicine), 72 East Concord Street, Building A

Dean’s Symposium – 400 Years of Inequality: Breaking the Cycle of Systemic Racism
Friday, October 18 at 8:30am-2:30pm • Session with Rhodessa: 1:15-2:30pm • Hiebert Lounge (BU School of Medicine), 72 East Concord Street

Artist Bio

RHODESSA JONES is the Co-Artistic Director of the San Francisco performance company Cultural Odyssey. She is an actress, teacher, director, and writer. Ms. Jones is also the Director of THE MEDEA PROJECT: Theater for Incarcerated Women and HIV Circle, which is a performance workshop designed to achieve personal and social transformation with incarcerated women and women living with HIV. Rhodessa currently is the Frank H.T. Rhodes Class of 1956 Visiting Professor at Cornell University. In December 2016 Rhodessa received a Theatre Bay Area Legacy Award presented to individuals that have made “extraordinary contributions to the Bay Area theatre community.” In the Fall of 2017, she was appointed by Dartmouth College to be the Montgomery Fellow, conducting a series of lectures and workshops across campus. Also in 2017, Rhodessa performed her acclaimed production, “FULLY AWAKE, FACING SEVENTY: HEAVEN BETTA BEA HONKY TONK!” at Dance Place in Washington DC, Carpetbag Theater in Knoxville, TN, and The National Black Theatre Festival. In 2018, Rhodessa was a guest at a number of colleges and universities including, extended residencies at the University of Southern California, University of Michigan, and the University of Pittsburgh as one of the preeminent artists working in the field of “art as social activism.” 

Press: In the Classroom: Amid Trauma, ‘Finding Their Own Voice’ – BU School of Public Health

April 2019

In partnership with BU College of General Studies

Three accomplished writers, Charlie Jane Anders (All the Birds in the Sky), Leigh Dana Jackson (24: Legacy) and Theodora Goss (World Fantasy Award winner & CAS, Senior Lecturer), shared their work and discussed developing engaging worlds and characters beyond the ordinary with the BU community. The conversation was moderated by Regina Hansen (CGS, Master Lecturer of Rhetoric).

November 4-10, 2018

In collaboration with Puppet Showplace Theater, BU School of Visual Arts, and named Provost Faculty Arts Fellow Felice Amato

Events

Afrofuturism Panel Discussion
Wednesday, November 7 at 7-9pm • College of Arts & Sciences (685 Commonwealth Avenue), Room B12

Tarish Pipkins, Barrington Edwards (Studio Vexer) and Joel Christian Gill (Associate Professor of Art, Visual Narrative and Chair of BU’s Visual Narrative Department) discussed futuristic literature, music, art, and more in the context of black history and culture. The discussion was moderated by Dominique Taylor (creator of The Storyscape).

Just Another Lynching: An American Horror Story
Thursday, November 8 & Friday, November 9 at 7pm • Puppet Showplace Theater (32 Station Street, Brookline)

Experience tale of a man who loved his family, but met an unfortunate end at the hands of racism. Puppeteer Tarish “Jeghetto” Pipkins joined forces with a cast of Boston-based puppeteers to confront haunting truths about our past, present, and future. Framed as a man’s eulogy to his lost friend, the play unfolds as a series of touching memories that refuse to be ignored. Jeghetto’s ghostly, large-scale puppets combine with extraordinary sound and projections, creating a space where contemporary audiences can reflect, bear witness, and engage in radical honesty.

How to Launch a Creative Business
Friday, November 9 at 10am-12pm • BUild Lab IDG Capital Student Innovation Center (730 Commonwealth Ave)

Have a creative idea for a business or startup, but haven’t figured out how to bring it to life? This workshop provided guidance to the BU community on launching a creative business. Tarish “Jeghetto” Pipkins, a world-renowned puppeteer, performer and educator, shared how he turned his passion into a thriving business. 

Bringing Puppets into the Special Ed Classroom
Friday, November 9 at 1-3pm • Wheelock College of Education (2 Silber Way), Room 250

Tarish Pipkins is an artist, performer, and educator with many years of experience in the classroom supporting students with special needs and emotional and behavioral challenges. In this discussion, Jeghetto discusses why puppets work and shared approaches to using the “high art of puppetry” to build social skills and foster success in school.

Puppet Making Workshop
Saturday, November 10 at 10am-1pm or 1-4pm • GSU Alley (775 Commonwealth Avenue), Lower Level

The BU community learned from a pro on how to make puppets!

BU Puppet Slam
Saturday, November 10 at 8pm • BU Central (775 Commonwealth Avenue), Lower Level

BU Central held performances from workshop participants and Jeghetto in a night full of fun.

Artist Bios

Tarish Pipkins a.k.a. Jeghetto, is a self taught artist and has been creating art from a very young age. In the late 90’s Tarish joined the BridgeSpotters Collective and became known for his live paintings and poetry. He was also a Barber for over 20 years. He moved to North Carolina in 2005 where he launched his career in Puppetry. There, he fine tuned his skills by doing street performances with his puppets. In 2008 he started working with Paperhand Puppet Intervention, an organization that uses diverse styles of puppetry and artistic expression to create works that inspire, promote social change and are deeply rewarding for all involved. He has built puppets and performed in several Paperhand productions. Most recently, Jeghetto had the pleasure to work with national recording artist, Missy Elliott on her music video, WTF (Where They From), controlling the Pharell puppet and doing some puppet building. He also worked on the Amazon Echo commercial featuring Missy Elliott and Alec Baldwin as puppets. Tarish is a former teacher at Just Right Academy, a private alternative school for children with special needs. Tarish is married and a proud father of five children. Jeghetto’s passion is promoting Oneness through the magic of Puppetry.

Barrington Edwards (Studio Vexer) is an artist, illustrator and educator. His company, Studio Vexer, develops art in the form of illustration, graphic design, interactive media and other forms of visual communication for the public. The studio emphasizes clear purposeful communication for all types of people. Studio Vexer’s team embraces the challenge of helping all who need a visual voice to clarify or best express ideas to enjoy visual communication so we can all hold a sense of ownership over our narratives.

Joel Christian Gill (Associate Professor of Art, Visual Narrative and Chair of BU’s Visual Narrative Department) is the chairman, CEO, president, director of development, majority and minority stock holder, manager, co-manager, regional manager, assistant to the regional manager,  receptionist, senior black correspondent and janitor of Strange Fruit Comics. He is the author/illustrator of 2 books from Fulcrum Publishing Strange Fruit vol I Uncelebrated Narratives from Black History May 2014 and Tales of the Talented Tenth Fall 2014. In his spare time he is a member of The Boston Comics Roundtable.  He received his MFA from Boston University and a BA from Roanoke College. His secret lair is behind a secret panel in the kitchen of his house (sold separately) in New Boston,  New Hampshire where he lives with his wife, four children a 2 talking dog and 2 psychic cats.

Dominique Taylor (Moderator) is the creator of The Storyscape, an innovative literary platform where readers can get the latest reviews and recommendations on contemporary literature with an unconventional approach. She is also the creator and host of PBS Digital Studios’ Read Awakening, a literary variety show pegged as the Reading Rainbow for millennials. She is currently gearing up for her year as a traveling bibliophile where she’ll be creating bookish content from the perspective of a global nomad. You can find her @storyscape on Twitter and Instagram and at ‘The Storyscape’ on YouTube and Facebook.

April 9-13, 2018

Co-sponsored by the BU College of Arts & Science, the Department of Sociology, and the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program

Last Call is a multiracial collective of queer artists, activists, and archivists. Drawn together by the closing of the last remaining dyke bar, Last Call creates innovative, multi-platform performances, events, and digital media that document and interpret neglected queer history, creating connections between those who lived this history and those who have much at stake if it is forgotten. We conjure up intergenerational gathering places where the movement for queer liberation is carried forward.

Co-directors Bonnie Gabel and indee mitchell celebrated the launch of a podcast about experiences in Boston dyke bars and read a short reading from Alleged Lesbian Activities, a denim-clad, glitter-crusted, power-ballad eulogy for the American dyke bar. Weaving together oral history audio, theatrical stagings, and the queer traditions of cabaret and drag kinging, Alleged Lesbian Activities looks closely at our endangered legacy and invites audiences into new ways of engaging with and complicating LGBT history.

Event

Alleged Lesbian Activities: a performative lecture about New Orleans’ disappearing dyke bars
with Indee Mitchell and Bonnie Gabel, co-directors of LAST CALL
Thursday, April 12th at 7p.m. • BU Life Sciences & Engineering Building (24 Cummington Mall, Room B01)

Where did all the dyke bars go? Last Call Co-Directors Bonnie Gabel and Indee Mitchell shared their work documenting and interpreting the history of shuttered lesbian spaces in New Orleans, exploring what these spaces meant to the community that called them home, and what we lost when they went away. Last Call is a New Orleans-based ensemble that documents and interprets neglected queer history, creating connections between those who lived this history and those who have much at stake if it is lost. Alleged Lesbian Activities was created by Indee Mitchell, Bonnie Gabel, Nelle Mills, Bear Hebert, Hannah Pepper Cunningham and LAST CALL

The LAST CALL podcast was produced by Rachel Lee, Free Feral, and Peter Bowling

Alleged Lesbian Activities is supported by The MAP Fund, a program of Creative Capital, primarily supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Additional funds come from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Alleged Lesbian Activities is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation Fund/Forth Fund Project co-commissioned by the Theater Offensive in partnership with Clear Creek Creative, Mondo Bizarro, and NPN. Additional support comes from Platforms Fund, Alternate Roots, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, Junebug Productions, Dancing Grounds, the LGBT Community Center of New Orleans, and our community. The National Performance Network is our fiscal sponsor.

February – April 2018

In partnership with the Center for the Study of Asia and named Provost Faculty Arts Fellow Catherine Yeh

Events

Open Studio
Chat about filmmaking, camera work, storytelling, & more
Tuesday, February 20 at 4:30-6PM
Monday, March 26 at 4:30-6PM
School of Theology, Rm. 636 (745 Commonwealth Ave.

Screening & Discussion: Xu Xing’s documentary film Summary of Crimes (2013)
Thursday, March 29 at 7PM
Jacob Sleeper Auditorium (College of General Studies, 871 Commonwealth Ave.)

Much of what we know about China’s Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) concerns the experience of officials and intellectuals. Our understanding of these “ten years of turmoil,” which erupted more than fifty years ago, is therefore urban, with a focus on the China’s political and cultural elites. In his film “Summary of Crimes,” director Xu Xing tackles the question of what happened in the countryside and at the grassroots, in interviews with a group of peasants convicted as counterrevolutionaries during the Cultural Revolution. For many years these peasants had no way of articulating their past sufferings, nor did society at large have any way of accessing the way the Cultural Revolution marked their life courses.

“Summary of Crimes” runs 106 minutes in Chinese with English subtitles.

About XU Xing 徐星

XU Xing 徐星 is a prominent Chinese writer and documentary filmmaker. Often called ”The Chinese Jack Kerouac,” his works have consistently engaged with national and international issues of politics, power, and moral responsibility. At the same time these larger issues are always evoked through the lives of the common working people in China. We are delighted to announce that with support from the BU Arts Initiative and the BU Center for the Humanities, we have invited XU Xing to Boston University as BUCSA’s first incumbent of the Artist and Writer in Residence program. With this program we hope to provide opportunities for our students and faculty to interact with unusual and outstanding writers and artists as an interdisciplinary and cross-school collaborative experience.

Xu enjoyed his most prolific period as a writer during the 1980s and 1990s, and his books reached a broad international audience when they were translated into French, English and German. These works include “Variations Without a Theme” 无主题变奏 and “All That is Left is Yours ” 剩下的都属于你. In the early 1990s he migrated to Germany, staying in Heidelberg. After returning to his hometown Beijing, he began shooting documentary films. His work A Chronicle of My Cultural Revolution 我的文革编年史 (2009) was based on his personal experiences growing up in the Chinese Cultural Revolution. In his 2015 documentary Crime Summary 罪证摘要, Xu searches for peasants in Zhejiang who had been sentenced to up to 20 years in prison during the Cultural Revolution. His most recent work (2017) is his new film The Day of Reckoning 腊月三十日到来, which uses a heartbreaking love story between a husband and wife as a vehicle with which to confront the contortions of China’s political history since 1949.

Xu Xing will be in residence at Boston University from early February until late April. He will be co-teaching a film course with Prof. Cathy Yeh on the New Chinese documentary movement which began during the 1990s and continues until today. His films will be screened during the time he is at BU and he will offer several workshops on different aspects of documentary filmmaking. In addition to one public lecture at BU, he will be also be reaching out to the greater Boston community where he will be giving lectures and screenings of his films.

November 2 & 3, 2017

In partnership with BU Art Galleries and the BU Dance Program with funding from the National Dance Project – New England Foundation for the Arts

2125 Stanley Street is a performance installation exploring notions of home. Working with collaborators Margaret Paek and Loren Kiyoshi Dempster, choreographer, and dancer Dahlia Nayar examines “home” as an archaeological site where minimal artifacts offer points of departure for the re-imagination and reconstruction of domestic space. We excavate the every day and the mundane in search of a poetic consciousness. Household objects transform into potential sources of revelation and reflection. Basic tasks are infused with virtuosity and nostalgia. Fragmented lullabies and nursery rhymes create an evocative soundscape. Ultimately, the installation invites the audience into a home that unfolds through movement and sound, a home that exists in the present moment through intimate exchange, a home that is both familiar and yet cannot exactly be located.

2125 Stanley Street received a 2015 Best of Stage and Screen award from Downeast Magazine which noted “2125 Stanley Street gorgeously explores domesticity and notions of home using mops, laundry, and other domestic props in beautiful and unexpected ways.”

Events

• Thursday, November 2 at 7 pm. Performance at 808 Gallery
• Friday, November 3 at 8 pm. Performance at 808 Gallery

The presentation of 2125 Stanley Street was made possible by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Artist Bios

Dahlia Nayar’s multimedia work investigates the performance of the quiet and seeks unlikely sources of virtuosity. Her most recent work, 2125 Stanley Street, has been supported by a Vermont Performance Lab residency, a Bates Dance Festival New England Emerging Choreographer Residency, a National Dance Project Special Grant and a National Dance Project Touring Award for 2016-17. Stanley Street has been adapted for galleries, grange halls, a Buddhist church and other alternative spaces throughout the United States. Previously, Dahlia’s work has been selected and performed at venues including the Venice Biennale/Danza Venezia Showcase for Emerging Choreographers, Dance Place in Washington DC, the Next Stage Dance Residency at the Kelly Strayhorn Theater in Pittsburgh, the Center for Performance Research in Brooklyn, NY. In addition, her site specific projects have been performed at the National Botanical Gardens, the Kennedy Center and the Complejo Cultural, in Puebla, Mexico. She was a National Dance Project Regional Dance Lab artist in 2007. From 2008-2010, she received the Jacob Javits Fellowship during which time she received her MFA in Dance/Choreography from Hollins University. She has been a guest artist at several universities including: Salem State College, College of the Holy Cross, Long Island University in Brooklyn, Marymount Manhattan College, Duke University, Smith College and others.

Margaret Paek is a New York based collaborative dance artist who sees dance as a life practice. A Lower Left associate since 2000, she is also influenced by her relationships with contact improvisation, gymnastics, Ensemble Thinking, Alexander Technique, projectLIMB, Dahlia Nayar, Deborah Hay, Barbara Dilley, musician/composer Loren Kiyoshi Dempster and their daughter. Margaret has also enjoyed creating with Stochastic Ensemble (co-founder,) projectLIMB, Team Djordjevich, BodyCartography, Keith Hennessy, Lionel Popkin, and Mary Overlie among others. Her work has been presented in Germany, Hungary, Mexico, Switzerland, across the U.S., and at New York venues including the Whitney Museum Biennial 2012, Judson Church, Danspace at St. Mark’s Church, and Joyce SoHo. As the practice of teaching is integral to her creative process, she is faculty at Movement Research, Marymount Manhattan and Manhattanville Colleges and has taught at festivals in Budapest, Berlin, Freiberg, and Stockholm. Margaret has authored articles for Contact Quarterly and learning to loveDANCE more. She is on the board of Marfa Live Arts and Movement Research’s Artist Advisory Council and received her MFA from Hollins University/ADF.

Loren Kiyoshi Dempster (composer) uses a combination of computer, electronics, cello and extended techniques to create and perform music. An active chamber musician, composer, and improviser he performs with the Dan Joseph Ensemble, Trio Triticali, and Left Hand Path among many others. Ever interested in the relationship of movement and sound, he has recently performed for choreographers Jonah Bokaer, Chris Ferris, Margaret Paek, and projectLIMB. Dempster toured often with Merce Cunningham Dance Company playing music for many pieces starting in April 1999 until December 2011. His performances for Interscape, which uses John Cage’s solo cello work “one eight” were described by the New York Times (04/01), “Dempster’s playing was outstanding, suggesting a one-man orchestra through texture that produced overlapping sounds that ranged from the jagged to a warm warbling.”

March 13-18, 2017

In partnership with Sargent College, Disability & Access Services, and the BU Dance Program

AXIS Dance Company exists to change the face of dance and disability through three pillars of activity: Artistry, Engagement, and Advocacy.  

AXIS Dance Company was founded in 1987 and has paved the way for a powerful contemporary dance form called physically integrated dance, which features dancers with and without disabilities. Nearing their 30th year, AXIS Dance Company recently announced Marc Brew as the new Artistic Director. Under the artistic direction of Judith Smith since 1997, AXIS’ list of collaborators includes Bill T. Jones, Stephen Petronio, Yvonne Rainer,  Ann Carlson, David Dorfman, Meredith Monk, Joan Jeanrenaud, and Fret Frith. AXIS has toured major dance venues and festivals in more than 100 cities nationwide as well as internationally to Europe and Russia. Their work has been honored with seven Isadora Duncan Dance Awards, and the company was featured twice on FOX TV’s So You Think You Can Dance.

“There is no more defiant a land that I can think of than AXIS. They showed me what dance could be.” Bill T Jones, Choreographer/MacArthur Fellow

“Audiences unaccustomed to seeing such inventive movement generated from what could be considered limitation may find themselves re-evaluating their own ideas of artistic perfection.” Lucia Maro, Chicago Tribune

EVENTS

Monday, March 13th, 1:00 – 5:30 pm
Symposium – Performing Arts and Disability: Leadership, Inclusion, and Training
Location: BU Hillel

Tuesday, March 14th, 12:30 – 2:00 pm
Fundamentals of Physically Integrated Dance
Location: FitRec L240

Wednesday, March 15th, 11:00 – 12:30 pm
Redefining Dance & Disability
Location: Hiebert Lounge (BU School of Medicine)

Wednesday, March 15th, 3:30 – 5:00 pm
Fundamentals of Physically Integrated Dance 
Location: FitRec L240

Thursday, March 16th, 7:00 – 8:30 pm
Physically Integrated Dance 
Location: FitRec L240

Saturday, March 18th, 8:00 pm
Public Performance
Location: BU Dance Theater (915 Commonwealth Ave, Boston)

March 25-31, 2016

In collaboration with the Women’s Gender & Sexuality Studies Program, the Center for the Study of Asia, and CAS English Department

Theatre Nohgaku is an international performance group devoted to sharing the beauty and power of the classical Japanese noh drama with English speaking audiences and performers. Noh, one of the oldest continuing stage arts, combines highly stylized dance, chant, music, mask, and costume with intense inner concentration and physical discipline. Theater Nohgaku performs traditional noh in Japanese and English translation and creates original works that combine noh’s performance techniques and modes of expression with twenty-first century concerns.

Events

Noh Music Performance/Discussion
Friday, March 25, 12 – 1 pm / Studio 167 -College of Fine Arts, 855 Commonwealth Ave.
Hosted by Marié Abe, Assistant Professor – Musicology, Ethnomusicology

Noh Movement Workshop
Friday, March 25, 4 – 6 pm / Studio 109 – College of Fine Arts, 855 Commonwealth Ave.
Hosted by Tamala Bakkensen, Lecturer – Movement

Lecture and Demonstration of Noh and Kyogen Performance Styles
Saturday, March 26, 2 – 3:30 pm / Concert Hall – College of Fine Arts, 855 Commonwealth Ave. 

Playwriting Workshop – Noh Style
Monday, March 28, 7 – 9 pm / Boston Playwrights’ Theatre, 949 Commonwealth Ave.
Hosted by Jacob Strautmann, Lecturer & Kate Snodgrass, Professor of Practice

Performance – Sumida River and Zahdi Dates and Poppies – with post-performance panel discussion on Trauma & the Arts
Wednesday, March 30, 6:30 pm / Tsai Performance Center – 685 Commonwealth Ave. 

Panelists include:

• Emily Burkes-Nossiter, MA – Drama therapist & psychotherapist
• Jaimie Gradus, DSc, MPH – Epidemiologist, Women’s Health Sciences Division, National Center for PTSD, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine and Assistant Professor of Epidemiology Boston University School of Public Health.
• Kenneth Harris – Recruiting Operations Officer, Military Science Department – BU Army ROTC
• Ellen Healy, Ph.D. – Clinical Psychologist, Training and Education Coordinator, VA CPT Training Program, Women’s Health Sciences Division, National Center for PTSD.
• Moderated by Carrie Preston, Ph.D. – Associate Professor, English Department – BU College of Arts & Sciences

Performance (High School)  Zahdi Dates and Poppies
Thursday, March 31, 10 a.m. / Tsai Performance Center – 685 Commonwealth Ave. 

Performance – Sumida River and Zahdi Dates and Poppies: 7 p.m. / Tsai Performance Center – 685 Commonwealth Ave. 

About the Plays

Zahdi Dates and Poppies (World Premiere) is a contemporary, masked, lyric, dance piece written by Carrie Preston, scored by David Crandall, and directed by Jubilith Moore in the noh style. This moving work adapts the poetic, musical, and performance styles of the ancient Japanese noh theater to explore a timeless concern: the impact of war on those who do the killing and their families. A US Marine fighter pilot is haunted by an insurgent he killed on a bombing raid in Zaidon, Iraq—a raid that also saved the life of a fellow Marine marksman. The pilot’s wife, despite her own deep antipathy to war, tries to support him as he struggles with the nightmares of combat trauma. Appearing in the pilot’s dreams, the ghost of the Iraqi insurgent mourns the loss of his life and the companionship of his own wife before achieving the release of forgiveness. While based on noh performance techniques, Zahdi Dates and Poppies expands the traditional idiom with flexible structure, innovative mask, costume and lighting design, and modified music and choreography that create a one-of-a-kind theatrical experience. Zahdi Dates and Poppies was developed with significant support from the Ko Festival.

Sumida River is an English-language translation and performance adaptation of Sumidagawa, one of the most popular and affecting pieces in the traditional noh repertory. Adapted and directed by Theatre Nohgaku’s Artistic Director Richard Emmert, it explores the deep bond between mother and child and the tragedy of loss. A ferryman on the Sumida River is about to take a traveler across, but they decide to wait for a madwoman following close behind. The woman arrives and tells how she is looking for her son who has been taken by slave traders. As they cross, they notice a crowd on the opposite bank conducting a Buddhist memorial service. The ferryman tells how a boy died a year earlier after having been left behind by slave traders. The woman realizes that the boy was her own son. The ferryman takes her to the grave. When she begins to recite prayers, the boy’s voice is heard from inside the grave. His ghost then appears to her but when she reaches out to touch him, he slips back into the grave and disappears, leaving only “sadness and sorrow.” This production features the main character in full noh costume and mask, and closely follows traditional performance practice to provide English-speaking audiences with an accessible glimpse into the world of noh, a stage art that has been continuously performed for more than 650 years.

October 5-8, 2015

In partnership with BU Dance Program

“Outstanding Emerging Choreographer” New York Dance and Performance Award (Bessie) nominee, Jennifer Weber is the artistic director of theatrical hip-hop theatre company, Decadancetheatre, Weber’s work has toured across the US, UK, Japan and France in venues such as Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, The Apollo, The Kennedy Center, London’s Southbank Center, The Everyman in Liverpool, New York City Center, San Francisco Hip-Hop Dance Festival, and Bumbershoot in Seattle. She has also choreographed for the NBA’s Miami Heat, American Express, Uber, Ulta, L’Oreal Matrix, Reebok, Bloomberg, Philosophy, Marc Jacobs, CK1 and UK TV show, Blue Peter. Recently she choreographed the US Premier of Bryony Lavery’s Stockholm at Stageworks/Hudson, Trouble, A New Rock Musical at NYMF and James Brown–Get On the Good Foot for The Apollo Theater with director Otis Sallid and assisted Tony Award winner George Faison (The Wiz) on the Sankofa Dance Project. Currently, Weber is the director and choreographer of The Hip Hop Nutcracker, which will tour the US in the 2015 holiday season. Weber holds a BA in Communications (Cum Laude) from the University of Pennsylvania and is a member of Lincoln Center Director’s Lab.

Events

Thursday, October 8 at 9 pm
Attendees saw BU dancers choreographed by Jenn, and a performance of Decadancetheatre‘s “A Hollywood Classic” at the BU Dance Theatre – 915 Commonwealth Ave (Buick St. Doors)

All BU students were invited to attend one or more of Jennifer’s guest-taught classes at Fitrec.

Monday, 10/5
2-3:30pm – Beginning Jazz
3:30-5pm – High Intermediate Modern/Contemporary

Tuesday, 10/6
9:30-10:20am – Hip Hop
10:30-11:20am – Hip Hop
12:30-2pm – Lo Int. Jazz

Wednesday, 10/7
10-10:50am – CardioJazz
11-11:50am – CardioJazz
5-6pm – AfroJazz

Thursday, 10/8
11am-12:30pm – Hi Int Jazz (FitRec L137)
4-5:30pm – Low Intermediate Modern
7-8:30pm – Class & structured improvisation for Dance Theatre Group & guests
9-10pm – Informal Performance in the Boston University Dance Theater

March 23-27, 2015

In partnership with BU Musicology and Ethnomusicology, the African Studies Program, with funding from the New England Foundation for the Arts, and named inaugural Provost Faculty Arts Fellow Marié Abe. 

The Nile Project was conceived by Egyptian ethnomusicologist Mina Girgis and Ethiopian American singer Meklit Hadero in 2011. Their mission is to “educate, inspire, and empower the citizens of the Nile basin to foster the sustainability of the Nile River’s ecosystem.” The main component of the project is music; they are working to approach the issues of water politics and cultural conflict in the area through musical collaboration. The Nile Project, consisting of a dozen musicians from every country bordering the Nile River, primarily takes place in North Africa (they held their first meeting and concert in Aswan, Cairo, Addis Ababa, and Kampala); but the musicians will be touring through the US to share the fruit of their 3-year long collaboration at universities as well as the Lincoln Center and the Smithsonian Institute in 2015-2016. BU was their first stop in their New England tour.

The Nile Project’s first recording Aswan was named among NPR’s Top Must-Hear International albums of 2013: “the results are joyous and even raucous…you can hear just how much fun the crowd is having — and how tight the band is, even as their instrumental multitudes adeptly combine everything from Indigenous instruments like the Ugandan adungu lyre to saxophone and bass.”

Events

Residency activities included eight class visits, a performance for local middle school children, a music education workshop, events with the African Students Organization and the BU Art Galleries, plus the events listed below. 

Lecture Demonstration: Musics of The Nile
Tuesday, 3/24 at 3:30-5:00 p.m.
College of Fine Arts Concert Hall – 855 Commonwealth Ave.
Members of the Nile Project and the Musical Director Miles Jay offered a hands-on workshop to demonstrate the variety of instruments, musical styles, and rhythmic and modal systems from the countries represented in the Nile Project.

Discussion Panel: Arts & Social Engagement
Tuesday, 3/24 at 5:15-7:00 p.m.
College of Fine Arts Concert Hall – 855 Commonwealth Ave.
This panel discussed the role of the arts and civic engagement with a particular focus on music and environmental issues. Key questions will include: How do we see the intersection of creative arts, activism, and the environmental issues we face today? What are the possibilities and limitations of creative arts as a critical response to environmental issues? What are the ways in which scientists, artists, activists, and scholars can work together to productively address their shared concerns? What models have worked, and what have not? What do new modes of creative social engagements look like?

Panelists include

• Grisha Coleman (Assistant Professor, ASU)
• DJ Spooky (Composer, artist & writer)
• Nathan Phillips (Professor, BU)
• Mina Girgis (CEO & President, The  Nile Project
• Moderated by: Marie Abe (Professor, BU)

Dignity: Tribes in Transition
Tuesday, 3/24, BU Art Galleries extended hours (until 8 pm)

The Nile Project Performance
Thursday, 3/26 at 7:00 p.m.
Tsai Performance Center – 685 Commonwealth Ave.

Discussion Panel: Water Politics in the Nile Basin
Friday, 3/27 at 3-4 p.m.
The Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future – 67 Bay State Rd.

Experts in the Nile River and water politics discussed the challenges and political realities of managing and protecting the resources of the Nile River.

Panelists included Jessica Barnes (Assistant Professor, USC), Farouk El-Baz (Director of the Center for Remote Sensing, BU), James McCann (Associate Director of African Studies Center, BU), & Mina Girgis (CEO & President, The Nile Project). Moderated by: Anthony Janetos (Director, Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future)

The Nile Project Performance (Presented by World Music/CRASHarts)
Friday, 3/27 at 8pm
Tsai Performance Center – 685 Commonwealth Ave.

Co-Sponsored by:

• African Studies Center
• College of Fine Arts School of Music
• World Music/CRASHarts

Funded in part by the Expeditions program of the New England Foundation for the Arts, made possible with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, with additional support from the six New England state arts agencies.

 Other Partners include: 

• The Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future
• Middle Eastern and North African Program
• Department of Musicology and Ethnomusicology
• Department of Music Education
• Department of Earth and Environment
• BU African Students Organization
• Global Programs
• Sustainability@BU
• BU Art Galleries

November 6 & 7, 2014

In partnership with the Center for the Study of Europe and the Goethe Institute Boston

Events

Remembering the Fall of the Berlin Wall
November 6 & 7, 2014
Events featured the award-winning German filmmaker, author, and cultural nomad Marten Persiel

Thursday, November 6 at 5 pm – Pardee School of Global Studies, 121 Bay State Road
“Lost in Unification” – A Panel Discussion on post-Cold War Eastern Europe featuring: Marten Persiel, featured artist; Agata Pyzik, author of Poor but Sexy: Culture Clashes in Europe East and West; Igor Lukes, Professor of History & International Relations at Boston University and Honorary Consul General of the Czech Republic

Friday, November 7 at 5 pm – Cummington Mall
“Jump the Wall” – High Ollie skateboard contest with Thuro Skate Shop. The Boston and BU Skateboarding community did a unique tribute to the fall of the Berlin wall.

Friday, November 7 at 7 pm – COM 101
“This Ain’t California” – Screening of Marten Persiel’s multiple award-winning film on skater subculture in the GDR
Co-presented by Cinematheque, College of Communication.