The SHAPE of things to come: all weekend at Mondavi

The UC Davis program officially known as Science, Humanities and Arts: Process and Engagement is sponsoring the following productions:

'PASSAGE' is Thursday, March 10, 7:30 p.m., 8:30 p.m., Tickets $35 and under, Jackson Hall

Kinetech Arts combines the work of dancers, scientists and digital artists to create innovative and socially responsible performances. Its piece PASSAGE is an immersive experience that explores the relationship between entropy and time through dance, sound and video installations. The perpetual increase of disorder, or entropy, defines the one-way direction of time. PASSAGE embraces the transience and uncertainties of each moment—and the infinite future possibilities that are inevitably collapsed into memory as we pass through time.

About SHAPE

These performances are presented as part of SHAPE (Science, Humanities and Arts: Process and Engagement), an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation-funded program in which UC Davis students encounter the humanities, arts, and sciences integrated to express and examine the power each holds as a means of responding to our world.

Find more information and purchase tickets here. (Cost is $35 and under)

Dresher Davel Invented Instrument Duo at Mondavi Friday, Saturday

March 11, 7:30 p.m. and March 12, 7:30 p.m., Vanderhoef Studio Theatre

Performing live on a pair of huge invented musical instruments, the duo of acclaimed composer, performer & instrument inventor Paul Dresher and percussionist-extraordinaire Joel Davel consistently generates "an exciting sense of mystery and surprise." (Portland Press Herald) 

Playing the 15-foot Quadrachord or the 10-foot Hurdy Grande, and featuring Don Buchla’s magical Marimba Lumina and Lightning controller, Dresher and Davel create lush textures and rhythmically propulsive grooves that fascinate the ear and the eye. Exploring unique sound-colors amplified by live digital looping, this electro-acoustic duo creates complex sonic layers as rich as a full orchestra.  

Find more information and purchase tickets here. 

The Living Earth Show: ‘Music for Hard Times’ with the UC Davis Contemporary Improv Class

Thursday, March 10, 12:05-1 p.m., Free, a Shinkoskey Noon Concert, Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center

The program includes Danny Clay’s Music for Hard Times. Commissioned by the Living Earth Show as a sonic resource for those in need of comfort and calm, this work was created remotely by realizing a series of “calming strategies” and creating an interconnected work from the results.

Plus Sarah Hennies’s Growing Block, Laura Schwartz’s (B.A. ‘13) Idioms and Episode 8, and original works by ensemble members including RANT-titude, alla Robert Ashley.

• Proof of COVID vaccination or a negative COVID test will be required at the door. Please take a moment to read the latest information on attending our events.
• Direct link to the livestream.

Find more information and purchase tickets here. 

Student Chamber Ensembles and the UC Davis Percussion Ensemble

Student Chamber Ensembles, UC Davis Percussion Ensemble, and the Afrocuban Ensemble

 

Thursday, March 10, 2-3 p.m., Free, Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center

Program coordinated by Pete Nowlen, UC Davis lecturer in music, with the UC Davis Percussion Ensemble.

Chris Froh, director and UC Davis lecturer in music

• Proof of COVID vaccination or a negative COVID test will be required at the door. Please take a moment to read the latest information on attending our events.
• Direct link to the livestream.

Find more information and purchase tickets here.

Choruses of UC Davis: 'Chairo/Oscuro'

Friday, March 11, 7 p.m., $12 Students and Children / $24 Adults, Jackson Hall

The program is led by Erik Peregrine, director and UC Davis lecturer in music.

• Proof of COVID vaccination or a negative COVID test will be required at the door. Please take a moment to read the latest information on attending our events.
• Direct link to the livestream.

Find more information here.

Curating Black Rage and Black Utopias – Mike Henderson: Before the Fire, 1965-1985 

Thursday, March 10, 4 p.m., via Zoom

An exhibition opening January 2023 at the Manetti Shrem Museum, "Mike Henderson: Before the Fire, 1965-1985," will feature paintings and films by the UC Davis professor emeritus. These works depict scenes of anti-Black violence, heteromasculinity and abject social conditions as well as utopic visions, questions of self-making and formal narrative studies of painting and film. Henderson’s ambidextrous practice examined and offered new ideas about Black life in the visual languages of protest, Afro-futurism and surrealism. These works, which resolutely challenge the protocols and propriety of art-making in the 20th century, are both formally and politically striking as well as reflective of a past not so far away from our historical present.

Sampada Aranke and Dan Nadel will provide an overview of the exhibition, with an emphasis on their research and collaboration as curators working within a university setting. They will contextualize the exhibition in relation to artistic biography and other relevant exhibitions in similar frames. In all of his work, Henderson gives us ways of imagining the pains and pleasures of Black life that remain relevant and useful to contemporary audiences. Aranke and Nadel will examine how these images necessitate an ethics of looking, a conceptual apparatus that they believe Henderson's practice makes possible. Viewing these works offers a means to understanding our own subjectivity and personhood in relation to the artwork. 

Register for the online talk here.

Progressive musical work focuses on Native origins, water, Saturday

Saturday, March 12, 12-1:30 p.m.

UC Davis Arboretum (various locations)

Spend Saturday afternoon in the arboretum and see a progressive journey of musical work performed, with contributions from UC Davis music and Native American Studies students who will explore California’s complicated relationship with water, drawing on Native origin stories in which water is an important player. It will be performed in several locations in the UC Davis Arboretum along Putah Creek. Tremble Staves by Diné/Navajo composer Raven Chacon will be a collaboration among the San Francisco music duo The Living Earth Show; Department of Native American Studies students who have written poems specific to the UC Davis performance; and several Department of Music student ensembles. Read more about this here. 

• Google map link to the beginning point.
• Free, tickets are not necessary.
• Parking is free on the weekends.
• Please note that this event takes place outdoors and features loud music at times. 
• Seating is not provided and audience members will need to walk to each location (each movement is in a different area in the arboretum).

Academy of St Martin in the Fields with Joshua Bell at Mondavi Saturday

Saturday, March 12, 7:30 p.m., Jackson Hall, Mondavi Center

The program features Gioachino Rossini: Overture to The Barber of Seville, Florence Price: Adoration, Antonin Dvořák: Violin Concerto in A Minor, Op. 53, Felix Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 4 in A Major, Op. 90 ("Italian").

The Academy of St Martin in the Fields is one of the world’s finest chamber orchestras, renowned for fresh, brilliant interpretations of the world’s greatest orchestral music.

Formed by Sir Neville Marriner in 1958 from a group of leading London musicians, the Academy gave its first performance in its namesake church in November 1959. Today the Academy is led by Music Director and virtuoso violinist Joshua Bell, retaining the collegiate spirit and flexibility of the original small, conductor-less ensemble which has become an Academy hallmark.

Find more information and purchase tickets here. 

Discover how a 1713 Huberman Stradivarius violin, stolen twice in its lifetime, now rests in the care of world famous violinist Joshua Bell. Passed through the hands of thieves, remaining hidden for 50 years, this violin is now played in concert halls worldwide. Read more here.

Site-Specific exhibition at Pacsat features alumni, faculty

Through March 26, Pacsat Headquarters, S Street, Sacramento

Many of the Sacramento region’s most influential artists including UC Davis professors and alumni are participating in a new site-specific exhibition in Sacramento is bringing together more than 30 artists to explore issues of urban space and community. Coordinates: Ice Pac is a series of temporary installations. Over thirty multi-disciplinary artists, pushing the boundaries of material and concept, transformed this .73-acre lot into immersive installations of vision, scope, and wit.  

The lot and structure will be demolished at the end of the exhibition.  

Among the contributing artists with UC Davis connections are Jodi Connelly (M.F.A. art studio, ‘18), Dan Tran (design, M.F.A., ‘22), Vincent Pacheco (M.F.A. art studio, ‘17), Jessica Wimbley (M.F.A. art studio, ‘05), Chaitra Bangalore (B.A., design), Jiayi Young (professor, design), Anna Davidson (M.F.A. art studio, ‘16), Billy Krimmel (Ph.D.ecology), Brenda Galvan (B.A. landscape architecture, ‘18), Caroline Larsen-Bircher (Ph.D. ecology), Haven Kiers (professor, human ecology), Robin Hill (professor, art studio), Muzi Li Rowe (M.F.A. art studio, ‘17), and Julia Couzens (M.F.A art studio, ‘90). Read more.

 Tickets are required for attendance and can be purchased here.

Coming up

Two exhibitions to open at the Gibson House and property in Woodland 

YoloArts will be hosting receptions for the opening of two exhibitions at the Gibson House and Property in Woodland on March 17. The Barn Gallery will feature the group exhibition, After Viola. Inside the Gibson House, Side-by-Side: Historic and Contemporary Ceramics will be unveiled.  

 Both shows are part of the 2022 National Council on Education for Ceramic Arts (NCECA) annual conference.

After Viola is a group exhibition at The Barn Gallery featuring the artwork of Bay Area artists who have come together to create new works in conversation with the archives of Viola Frey, the renowned California artist known for her colorful, robust, larger-than-life sculptures. The exhibition is in collaboration with the Artists’ Legacy Foundation.

 After Viola continues at The Barn Gallery through June 11. 

 Side-by-Side: Historic and Contemporary Ceramics includes artwork from earthenware to porcelain and invites visitors to look at items from the Yolo County Historical Collection through the lens of contemporary artists as they draw inspiration and reframe history through their work.

 Side-by-Side: Historic and Contemporary Ceramics continues at the Gibson House through June 24.  

The artist reception for both exhibitions will be hosted 5-9 p.m. Thursday, March 17. Music will be performed by jazz guitarist Jon Spivack. Light refreshments and wine will be available. 

The Barn Gallery and the Gibson House are located at 512 Gibson Road in Woodland. For more information contact YoloArts at 530-309-6464 or ya@yoloarts.org.

Hindustani Vocal Ensemble of UC Davis

Thursday, March 17, 1–2 p.m.
Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center

UC Davis Contemporary Improv ClassRita Sahai, director and UC Davis lecturer in music