The Sembrich has announced its 2022 Summer Festival “Reimagining the Classics,” featuring transcriptions and arrangements of beloved classics, to rhapsodies and variations on themes of popular composers, will begin in June and run through early September. [Read more…] about Re-imagining the Classics: Sembrich’s 2022 Summer Festival
Arts
Macabre Mania From Charles Allan Gilbert to Andy Warhol
The ossuary under the church of Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini at Via Veneto in Rome houses the skulls and bones of some 4,000 former Capuchin monks who were interred there between 1631 and 1870. The dead were buried without coffin and later exhumed to make room for newly deceased. Their remains were transformed into “decorative designs.”
In the summer of 1867 Mark Twain visited the Capuchin Convent and recorded his observations of the crypt’s “picturesque horrors” in The Innocents Abroad. What the novelist witnessed were arches built of thigh bones; pyramids constructed of “grinning” skulls; and other structures made of shin and arm bones. Walls were decorated with frescoes showing vines produced of knotted vertebrae; tendrils made of sinews and tendons; and flowers formed of knee-caps and toe-nails. [Read more…] about Macabre Mania From Charles Allan Gilbert to Andy Warhol
Albany Film Festival Set for Saturday, April 2nd at UAlbany
The 2nd Annual Albany Film Festival – featuring a number of “bookish” events, and events that emphasize writing – will be presented by the NYS Writers Institute on Saturday, April 2nd, at the University at Albany.
The Albany Film Festival differs from most film festivals, which are usually multi-day events at various locations around a city. This is a very story-focused festival, with conversations about filmmakers as storytellers, book-to-film, writing vs. visual storytelling, screenwriting, criticism, and film history and biography. The emphasis is more on conversation and Q&A with guests than on screenings of full films. [Read more…] about Albany Film Festival Set for Saturday, April 2nd at UAlbany
The Late Horrid Massacre in King-Street (A Boston Massacre Poem)
“The 29th Regimt on Duty. A Quarrell between the soldiers & Inhabitants—The Bells—Rung—A Great Number Assembled in Kingstreet A Party of the 29th under the Command of Capt Preston fird on the People they killed five—wounded Several Others—particularly Mr. Edw Payne in his Right Arm—Capt Preston Bears a good Character—he was taken in the night & Committed also Seven more of the 29th—the Inhabitants are greatly enraged and not without Reason.” – Diary of John Rowe, 5 March 1770
Unlike the quote above, penned by an eventual Loyalist, stating the facts, the poem “A Verse Occasioned by the Late Horrid Massacre in King-Street” propagandizes the events of March 5th, 1770 in Boston when soldiers fired into a crowd of rioting Bostonians. The event is now known as the Boston Massacre. [Read more…] about The Late Horrid Massacre in King-Street (A Boston Massacre Poem)
Searching for Timbuctoo Documentary Showing in Peterboro
The Gerrit Smith Estate National Historical Landmark will hold its annual commemoration of Gerrit Smith’s birthday on Saturday, March 5th, with guest speaker Paul Miller and a showing of his film Searching for Timbuctoo.
In 2015 Miller began filming in Peterboro and Lake Placid to capture the history of Gerrit Smith’s 1846 “scheme of justice and benevolence” of giving 120,000 acres of land to 3000 Black Americans so that they would be eligible to vote in New York State. These land grants helped establish a pioneering Black settlement called Timbuctoo which is located near present day Lake Placid in North Elba, Essex County, NY. Timbuctoo brought abolitionists John Brown and Gerrit Smith together in their legacy fight against slavery. [Read more…] about Searching for Timbuctoo Documentary Showing in Peterboro
Behind the Scenes at The Gilded Age (Virtual Program)
The Historic Districts Council (HDC) will host a behind the scenes look at the extensive research and logistics involved in creating HBO’s The Gilded Age, on Tuesday, March 1st. [Read more…] about Behind the Scenes at The Gilded Age (Virtual Program)
NYC-Long Island Conservation Treatment Grants Available
The New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) and Greater Hudson Heritage Network (GHHN) have announced the Conservation Treatment Grant Program is now open. [Read more…] about NYC-Long Island Conservation Treatment Grants Available
Painter Hubert Vos’s ‘Exotic People’: Maastricht to Manhattan and Beyond
In spring 1905, painter Hubert Vos received a letter at his Manhattan residence from the Dutch Legation in Peking inquiring if he would be able and willing to travel to China and paint the portrait of a prominent official. The invitation was vague, but too tempting to refuse for a painter who had made the portraiture of racial types his specialty. [Read more…] about Painter Hubert Vos’s ‘Exotic People’: Maastricht to Manhattan and Beyond
Jazz and Friends National Day of Community Readings
The 7th Annual Jazz and Friends National Day of School and Community Readings will be held on Thursday, February 24th, both in person at the Saranac Lake Youth Center at 6 pm and virtually.
The Jazz & Friends National Day of School and Community Readings is an event that helps to promote a more inclusive educational environment for transgender, non-binary and gender expansive youth. Parents, caregivers, educators, students and community members across the country will join together to support and affirm that our youth can be who they are. [Read more…] about Jazz and Friends National Day of Community Readings
Poetry: “Gotcha One Donut!”
“Gotcha One Donut!”
I was deemed too young for the expedition.
My bro Matt was the leader by seniority. He
had eight years on me but only six on the
two Tommys, one Sennet and one Taylor,
Cub Schaefer, and John Hitchcock who lived
year-round on Edwards Hill Road, halfway
to the hamlet of Bakers Mills from our cabin. [Read more…] about Poetry: “Gotcha One Donut!”