Sunday, February 26, 2006

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

Spare Time Not Wasted
Associated Artists

Price: Free
Manlius Village Library
Manlius Village Center, 1 Arkie Albanese Dr., Manlius

Works by Barbara Emmons and Judith Snedeker Jaquith.

Barbara Emmons works in acrylic, pen and ink, and watercolor. Judith Jaquith works mainly in watercolor, also oil pastel, pencil, and photography.

Asian Short Film Festival
Redhouse

Price: $7
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

A series of short films made by Asian artists or about Asian topics ranging from the nightmarish to the high comic. Shorts include the story of a Muslim boy finding help in India (The Little Terrorist), the animated re-telling of an old Chinese folk tale (Bright/Ming), a tale about surviving the American dream (Chinese Dream), and the story of Romeo and Juliet with a Bollywood twist (Library Majnu). The Asian Short Film Festival demonstrates that a well-made short film can tell a story as well - or better - than a full-length narrative. This program is part of Asian Cinevision's 2005-2006 National Festival Tour.

2006 Short Film Selections:

Chinese Dream by director Victor Quinaz
Indentured in a cramped, crowded and confined world, Country Boys life is an endless toil. Yet, his sweat breeds a dream that his overbearing boss cannot stifle. A moving portrait of one mans determination.
2004 winner San Francisco International Film Festival, BEST SHORT
USA, 2004, 17 min., color, Cantonese with English subtitles, documentary

Dastaar: Defending Sikh Identity by director Kevin Lee
Documenting a community's struggle against discrimination, the film begins by observing the simple, quiet act of putting on the dastaar, or turban. This daily ritual is imbued with the Sikh values of honor, discipline and faith, contrasting sharply with recent incidents of violence and discrimination against Sikh communities.
USA, 2005, 11 min., color, documentary

The Little Terrorist by director Ashvin Kumar
Based on a true story, the film follows a Pakistani Muslim boy who mistakenly crosses the mine-field strewn border into India and finds unexpected allies in a Hindu school teacher and his niece. When Indian soldiers search for the little terrorist, his allies must face their own prejudices and consider consequences versus conscience.
Nominee, 2005 Academy Awards, Best Live Action Short Film
Grand Prize Winner, 2005 Tehran International Short Film Festival
India, UK, 2004, 15 min., color, Hindi with English subtitles, narrative

Aunty G's by director Geeta Malik
The secret, double life of Dutiful Auntie Jis. Five South Asian ladies go through their everyday routines: making breakfast for their families, playing ball, and throwing back some beers.
USA, 2004, 6 min., color, narrative

Afternoon (Buoi Chieu) by director Kim Spurlock
A rainy afternoon. An unexpected guest. Drawn by her husband's grief and the desire to experience physical sensation, the spirit of the family matriarch comes calling.
USA, 2005, 10 min., color, English/Vietnamese with English subtitles, narrative

Spam-Ku: I Won A Haiku Contest About Spam by director Steven K. Tsuchida
Roy wins a poetry contest with his Spam haiku. The prize: A lifetime supply. Will his life change for the better or will it take a gooey turn?
USA, 2004, 5 min., color, narrative

Pol Pot's Birthday by director Talmage Cooley
After the fall of Phnom Penh in 1979, Pol Pot and his ruthless Khmer Rouge army spent the next decade retreating slowly towards Thailand. In 1985, the office staff of this brutal dictator attempt to throw a surprise birthday party for their boss.
2004 Sundance Film Festival
USA, 2004, 10 min., color, Khmer with English subtitle, narrative

Library Majnu by director Paul Awguwawela
A modern day Romeo and Juliet with a Bollywood twist. A college library, forbidden love and a meddling fathernothing that a little song and dance can't cure.
UK, 2005, 10 min., color, English/Hindi with English subtitles, narrative

The Way by director Qing Huang
Chinese ink painting has never looked more vivid and alluring. Qing Huang marries 3D computer animation with the aesthetic of traditional Chinese art to create a new, exciting media art form. Step into a world where peach blossoms morph into bamboo trees and carps leap out of the screen.
Australia, 2003, 7 min., color, animation

Bright (Ming) by director Qing Huang
Inspired by an age-old Chinese folktale, BRIGHT adds a new twist to how thunder and lightning came about in striking shadow puppet-style animation. Watch as Thunder God pursues Mother Lightning across the sky, and they unleash their powers in a mating dance.
Australia, 2004, 4 min., B/W & Color, animation

Missing by director Kit Hui
To find his missing girlfriend, Samuel follows a mysterious trail of words written on pieces of paper left in unlikely places. As he uncovers the mystery of her disappearance, he catches a haunting glimpse of New York City and realizes something unexpected.
2005 Cannes Film Festival Short Film Competition
2005 Tribeca Film Festival
USA, 2004, 14 min., color, narrative

The Boy With No Name
Encore Presentations
Tony Brown, conductor

Price: $12 regular, $10 students/seniors, $8 LeMoyne students and faculty
St. Clare Auditorium
Lodi and Isabella Streets, Syracuse

The story of a mentally challenged boy and his family. Mature themes. For more information, phone 315-952-4228.

Read a review!

Schubert's Winterreise
Syracuse University Setnor School of Music
David Steinau, tenor and Fred Karpoff, piano

Price: Free
Setnor Auditorium, Crouse College
Syracuse University, Syracuse

David Steinau, assistant professor of music at Susquehanna University, and Fred Karpoff, associate professor of piano and ensemble arts in SU's Setnor School of Music, will perform Schubert's song cycle Winterreise, the "Winter Journey" of poet Wilhelm Muller's "wanderer."

Parking is available in Irving Garage.

Stained Glass Series: A Haydn Celebration
Syracuse Symphony Orchestra
Daniel Hege, conductor
Featuring Julie Albers, cello

Price: $20 adults, $12 students
Crouse Hinds Concert Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

M. Haydn Symphony in D Major, P. 29
F. J. Haydn Cello Concerto No. 2 in D Major
F. J. Haydn Overture to Lo Speziale
F. J. Haydn Symphony No. 96, "The Miracle"

Rising Star Concert
Malmgren Concert Series
Featuring Jonathan Ryan, organ

Price: Free
Hendricks Chapel
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Music of J. S. Bach, Maurice Durufle, Louis Vierne, Herbert Howells, Petr Eben, and Charles Tournemire.

Jonathan Ryan received the second prize in the 2005 Arthur Poister National Organ Competition. Other competition awards include first prize in the Young Professional division of the 2004 Albert Schweitzer Organ Festival/USA, first prize in the third annual (2003) Augustana Arts-Reuter National Undergraduate Organ Competition in Denver, CO, both second prize and the audience prize in the 2004 Miami International Organ Competition in Miami, FL, and second prize in the 2004 Wells Competition for Young Organists in Lubbock, TX. Mr. Ryan serves as Director of Music and Choirmaster at St. Anne Roman Catholic Church, Rochester, NY.

Time Capsule and Falling for You
Armory Square Playwrights

Price: $5 regular, $4 students/seniors
Jazz Central
441 E. Washington St., Syracuse

As the one-act drama Time Capsule, by Peter Moller, opens, it's been more than 30 years since Charlie Daniels saw his childhood best friend Donald Baxter. By chance, Charlie, now a state trooper, stops Donald, a New York City lawyer, for speeding one night. Both discover more than the toys of their childhood in the time capsule tin can they buried in a back yard many years ago.

The 10-minute comedy Falling For You, by David Feldman, features Sally, an alien robot whose earthly job is to hook up the right man with the right woman -- as two 50s-somethings walking in a park discover to their surprise when Sally literally drops in on them. But Sally's plan almost goes awry because there is another woman in the picture, and because of the limitations of doing her job in just 10 minutes.

Shakespeare's R&J
Black Box Players
Rodney Hudson, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

The Syracuse University Drama Department will present Shakespeare's R&J, Joe Calarco's all-male adaptation of Shakespeare's most famous love story.

Unlike the traditional Renaissance setting of the tale, Shakespeare's R&J moves the action to modern day, when four students at an all-boys parochial school discover a forbidden copy of Romeo and Juliet. Eager for distraction from reciting their Latin verb conjugations, the boys soon begin performing the play. At first timid in exploring the passionate tale among their teenaged peers, the boys eventually lose their inhibitions and embody the story's characters with a palpable understanding of adolescent love - and lust.

Assistant Director Leslie Noble points out that the all-male cast of R&J relates directly to Romeo and Juliet's beginnings on the stage. "The Elizabethan idea of men playing all the roles coupled with the prep school setting was very compelling and set forth a series of meaty questions," Noble said. "How would the circumstances of their youth and upbringing - the military strictness, the rigid gender roles, the sexual repression, the adolescent innocence - affect the performance of Romeo and Juliet? And how would the act of performing this classic love story affect the boys? What a compelling staging challenge to tell both stories at once!"

To reserve tickets, phone 315-443-2102. The Black Box Theatre has a policy of open seating on a first come, first served basis.

Read a Review!

The Hilarious Hillbilly Massacre
Opening Night Productions
Bob Brown, director

Price: $22 ticket plus restaurant/bar charge depending on package chosen
Glen Loch Restaurant
4626 North St., Jamesville

The Birchbumble family, a wild and fun loving clan from deep in the hills of Tennessee, is having a family reunion and you, being a close relative, are invited! Everyone is promised a hog slappin' good time in this audience interactive murder mystery!

However, before the moonshine starts flowin', evil befalls the festivities. A barbaric IRS agent crashes the party and demands that the Birchbumbles pay all the back taxes they owe or the government will confiscate the premises immediately. The Birchbumbles don't take easily to threats, so the agent is bumped off. There's more murder and mayhem and lots of merriment as the evening progresses for the entire extended family  that means you! The Birchbumbles even stage their own auditions for a spot on Hee Haw. Talent like theirs must be seen to be believed!

Be sure to attend this long awaited reunion. It may be the last chance you have to party with
the IN-bred crowd.

Starring Bob Brown, Cathleen O'Brien, David Walker, Lynne Stanistreet, Becky Bottrill. Written by Peter DePietro, author of Clue, The Musical.

Reservations are necessary and can be made by calling the Glen Loch Restaurant at 315-469-6969.

There are two ways to enjoy your evening out:

The Complete Dinner Theatre Package includes show ticket and full gourmet dinner of your choosing off the Glen Loch Restaurant's delicious menu. Diners will be seated in the downstairs dining room and the meal prices will be determined by the regular restaurant menu. Those guests choosing to eat must be seated NO LATER than 6:30pm on Saturday evenings and 12:30pm for the Sunday Brunch. Cost: $22 theatre ticket plus cost of meal per person.

The Light Fare Theatre Package: In an agreement with the Glen Loch Restaurant, Opening Night Productions' patrons will no longer be required to purchase a meal with their theater ticket. The cost of the meal will be replaced by a $10 minimum bar/restaurant charge. This may be applied to appetizers, desserts, drinks and/or coffee. The total expense for tickets will be $32 per person.

Read a review!

Cats
Syracuse Civic Theatre

Price: $24 regular; $20 students/seniors; $16 children
Carrier Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Read a Review!

Intimate Apparel
Syracuse Stage
Timothy Douglas, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A century ago, playwright Lynn Nottage's grandmother made her way in New York by sewing intimate undergarments for wealthy white socialites and women whose socializing tended more to the mercenary. From this thread of family history, Nottage weaves the appealing and touching drama of Esther Mills, a 35-year-old African-American seamstress and spinster whose search for love leads her to chance romance with George, a young Barbadian working on the Panama Canal. This play is a lovely slice of a New York gone by peopled with rich characters, endearing friendships, and true to life relationships.

Read a Review!

A Midsummer Night's Dream
Syracuse University Drama Department
Lisa Anne Porter, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"The course of true love never did run smooth," but who knew it could be quite so chaotic? Certainly not the straight-laced, would-be lovers who flee to the woods where fairies (mis)rule, rude mechanicals play and order is certainly not the order of the day or night. One of the Bard's most beloved comedies, A Midsummer Night's Dream is Shakespeare's most delirious and comic look at love. Set in Athens, the main plot revolves around two sets of couples, Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius. Their entrance into the play's enchanted woods complicates the couples' romantic entanglements when they meet a band of fairies, including impish Puck, not to mention Bottom the weaver and his "rude mechanicals," who stumble into the action when they go into the same magical woods to rehearse a play that is very loosely (and comically) based on the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe. A Midsummer Night's Dream is an exploration of themes of love, dreams, and the creative imagination.

Read a review!

Moon Over Buffalo
Theatre '90

Price: $19 regular, $16 students/seniors, $12 children under 12
Empire Theater
New York State Fairgrounds, Geddes

Read a Review!

Monday, February 27, 2006

Scholastic Art Awards Exhibit
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Whitney Applied Technology Center
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

A vast exhibit of regional high school Scholastic Art Awards competition entries featuring multimedia, painting, photography and ceramics.

Visual Arts Showcase #55: Artists Create Artists
CNY Arts

Price: Free
WCNY
415 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

The exhibit highlights the work of Central New York's art teachers and their students.

Women Artists Invitational Art Show
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

[Fake] Fake Estates: Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates
Syracuse University School of Architecture

Price: Free
The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

An exhibition of recent work by Martin Hogue, assistant professor of architecture at SU. Hogue spent several months systematically canvassing Queens, NY for residual properties similar to the 14 parcels purchased there and documented by Matta-Clark in 1975. Best known for his spatially dynamic extractions of large sections of walls and floors from abandoned buildings, Matta-Clark, one of the most important American conceptual artists of the 1970s, purchased the Queens properties with the goal of highlighting neglected architectural environments that make up the urban and suburban fabric.

Hogue's exhibition includes drawings, collages and photographs that articulate moments when conventions for establishing the location and precise boundaries of a site produce a conceptual "excess of surveying," inviting speculation as to the value and purpose of land and revealing the conceptual potential of "real" sites, even small and unusable ones -- a 1/8-inch x 110-foot property, among others -- thought to lack architectural potential.

For more information, phone 315-443-2388 or email mcobrien@syr.edu.

Paid public parking is available on West Fayette Street, one block from the building.

East of Eden: Works of Pipo Nguyen-Duy
Light Work Gallery

Price: Free
Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The images in the exhibition illustrate Nguyen-duy's ability to capture the interaction between nature and humanity in stunning large-format color photographs. Nguyen-duy's photography stems from the traditional style of landscape painting. According to Jennie Hirsch, Hannah Seeger Davis Post-doctoral Fellow at Princeton University, his "reliance on the natural world as a theatrical apparatus uncovers collisions between nature and culture, past and present, in carefully crystallized visions that inscribe themselves onto classical Western visions of the (un)natural world." Nguyen-duy's photographs hold references to mythology and history, and capture a thought-provoking vision of the American landscape and people.

Nguyen-duy's photographic style has been greatly influenced by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Before the attacks, his work was more focused on the "back-story" of the landscapes he photographed, while his work now is focused more on reality and what is happening in the present. According to Stephen Borys, curator of Western art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, this work "shows us a landscape developing, changing, retreating and advancing -- a land of multiple hues and conditions."

Nguyen-duy is a photography professor at Oberlin College whose work has been exhibited nationwide. He has lectured at universities and museums throughout the United States, and he participated in Light Work's Artist-in-Residence Program in 2004. He has completed residencies in Vermont and France.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring work by transmedia students at Syracuse University.

Digital Transitions: Selections from the Light Work Collection
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Photography Gallery
Schine Student Center, 306 University Ave., Syracuse

This diverse selection of work from the Light Work collection reflects important and dramatic changes in photography. It explores the new directions artists have taken in the brief period between 1990 and 2005. Many of these artists have experimented with digital techniques for the first time while working at Light Work. These images are hybrids of traditional and digital processes. Some artists go from analog to digital processes and even back to analog. Lines between the categories of analog or digital have been blurred and will continue to be. The boundaries will continue to dissolve and have less meaning.The classification of photograph, digital image, and new media will evolve and their definitions will change. This exhibition is a significant milestone at Light Work, as the first retrospective look at work by artists using various digital tools creatively. It is an enticing glimpse at digital photography's young history as we consider how new digital technologies redefine what photography can and will become.

Spare Time Not Wasted
Associated Artists

Price: Free
Manlius Village Library
Manlius Village Center, 1 Arkie Albanese Dr., Manlius

Works by Barbara Emmons and Judith Snedeker Jaquith.

Barbara Emmons works in acrylic, pen and ink, and watercolor. Judith Jaquith works mainly in watercolor, also oil pastel, pencil, and photography.

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

Scholastic Art Awards Exhibit
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Whitney Applied Technology Center
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

A vast exhibit of regional high school Scholastic Art Awards competition entries featuring multimedia, painting, photography and ceramics.

Visual Arts Showcase #55: Artists Create Artists
CNY Arts

Price: Free
WCNY
415 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

The exhibit highlights the work of Central New York's art teachers and their students.

Women Artists Invitational Art Show
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

[Fake] Fake Estates: Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates
Syracuse University School of Architecture

Price: Free
The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

An exhibition of recent work by Martin Hogue, assistant professor of architecture at SU. Hogue spent several months systematically canvassing Queens, NY for residual properties similar to the 14 parcels purchased there and documented by Matta-Clark in 1975. Best known for his spatially dynamic extractions of large sections of walls and floors from abandoned buildings, Matta-Clark, one of the most important American conceptual artists of the 1970s, purchased the Queens properties with the goal of highlighting neglected architectural environments that make up the urban and suburban fabric.

Hogue's exhibition includes drawings, collages and photographs that articulate moments when conventions for establishing the location and precise boundaries of a site produce a conceptual "excess of surveying," inviting speculation as to the value and purpose of land and revealing the conceptual potential of "real" sites, even small and unusable ones -- a 1/8-inch x 110-foot property, among others -- thought to lack architectural potential.

For more information, phone 315-443-2388 or email mcobrien@syr.edu.

Paid public parking is available on West Fayette Street, one block from the building.

I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective" will feature photographs taken by Wilkins through the years. Wilkins began taking photographs at age 10 and acquired her first camera at age 12 Since that time, she has documented several decades of local history and culture, focusing in particular on Syracuse's African American community. She says, "I feel that you view the world a little differently through a camera. It just makes life more interesting." Her lifelong passion for photography has been an inspiration to many, including her family members. "All my children are very aware of their surroundings because of the camera. They all take pictures," she says. Her son is a professional photographer with the Chicago Tribune. Wilkins adds, "I wish all children could have access to a camera of some sort, just to view the world a little differently." The exhibition will feature the people, places and events that have helped shape the local community through the years, as seen through the lens of one of Syracuse's most prolific photographers.

Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson" will feature recent works in a variety of media. Jones-Henderson has exhibited extensively both in the United States and internationally. He is one of the founding members of the AfriCOBRA collective. AfriCOBRA ("African Commune of Bad Relevant Artists") began in Chicago in the late 1960's as a group of visual, performing, and literary artists who sought to capture the vibrancy and spirit of African American urban life through elements found in traditional African art. Henderson is also a noted teacher, consultant and lecturer. He is currently the Executive Director of the Research Institute of African and African Diaspora Arts, Inc. in Roxbury, MA. He has studied at The Sorbonne in Paris, the Art Institute of Chicago, Northern Illinois University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring work by transmedia students at Syracuse University.

East of Eden: Works of Pipo Nguyen-Duy
Light Work Gallery

Price: Free
Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The images in the exhibition illustrate Nguyen-duy's ability to capture the interaction between nature and humanity in stunning large-format color photographs. Nguyen-duy's photography stems from the traditional style of landscape painting. According to Jennie Hirsch, Hannah Seeger Davis Post-doctoral Fellow at Princeton University, his "reliance on the natural world as a theatrical apparatus uncovers collisions between nature and culture, past and present, in carefully crystallized visions that inscribe themselves onto classical Western visions of the (un)natural world." Nguyen-duy's photographs hold references to mythology and history, and capture a thought-provoking vision of the American landscape and people.

Nguyen-duy's photographic style has been greatly influenced by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Before the attacks, his work was more focused on the "back-story" of the landscapes he photographed, while his work now is focused more on reality and what is happening in the present. According to Stephen Borys, curator of Western art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, this work "shows us a landscape developing, changing, retreating and advancing -- a land of multiple hues and conditions."

Nguyen-duy is a photography professor at Oberlin College whose work has been exhibited nationwide. He has lectured at universities and museums throughout the United States, and he participated in Light Work's Artist-in-Residence Program in 2004. He has completed residencies in Vermont and France.

Digital Transitions: Selections from the Light Work Collection
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Photography Gallery
Schine Student Center, 306 University Ave., Syracuse

This diverse selection of work from the Light Work collection reflects important and dramatic changes in photography. It explores the new directions artists have taken in the brief period between 1990 and 2005. Many of these artists have experimented with digital techniques for the first time while working at Light Work. These images are hybrids of traditional and digital processes. Some artists go from analog to digital processes and even back to analog. Lines between the categories of analog or digital have been blurred and will continue to be. The boundaries will continue to dissolve and have less meaning.The classification of photograph, digital image, and new media will evolve and their definitions will change. This exhibition is a significant milestone at Light Work, as the first retrospective look at work by artists using various digital tools creatively. It is an enticing glimpse at digital photography's young history as we consider how new digital technologies redefine what photography can and will become.

Spare Time Not Wasted
Associated Artists

Price: Free
Manlius Village Library
Manlius Village Center, 1 Arkie Albanese Dr., Manlius

Works by Barbara Emmons and Judith Snedeker Jaquith.

Barbara Emmons works in acrylic, pen and ink, and watercolor. Judith Jaquith works mainly in watercolor, also oil pastel, pencil, and photography.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Gallery Talk
Lowe Art Gallery
Featuring Murray Tinkelman, curator of Favorite Flix and professor of Illustration, School of Art and Design

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Asian Short Film Festival
Redhouse

Price: $7
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

A series of short films made by Asian artists or about Asian topics ranging from the nightmarish to the high comic. Shorts include the story of a Muslim boy finding help in India (The Little Terrorist), the animated re-telling of an old Chinese folk tale (Bright/Ming), a tale about surviving the American dream (Chinese Dream), and the story of Romeo and Juliet with a Bollywood twist (Library Majnu). The Asian Short Film Festival demonstrates that a well-made short film can tell a story as well - or better - than a full-length narrative. This program is part of Asian Cinevision's 2005-2006 National Festival Tour.

2006 Short Film Selections:

Chinese Dream by director Victor Quinaz
Indentured in a cramped, crowded and confined world, Country Boys life is an endless toil. Yet, his sweat breeds a dream that his overbearing boss cannot stifle. A moving portrait of one mans determination.
2004 winner San Francisco International Film Festival, BEST SHORT
USA, 2004, 17 min., color, Cantonese with English subtitles, documentary

Dastaar: Defending Sikh Identity by director Kevin Lee
Documenting a community's struggle against discrimination, the film begins by observing the simple, quiet act of putting on the dastaar, or turban. This daily ritual is imbued with the Sikh values of honor, discipline and faith, contrasting sharply with recent incidents of violence and discrimination against Sikh communities.
USA, 2005, 11 min., color, documentary

The Little Terrorist by director Ashvin Kumar
Based on a true story, the film follows a Pakistani Muslim boy who mistakenly crosses the mine-field strewn border into India and finds unexpected allies in a Hindu school teacher and his niece. When Indian soldiers search for the little terrorist, his allies must face their own prejudices and consider consequences versus conscience.
Nominee, 2005 Academy Awards, Best Live Action Short Film
Grand Prize Winner, 2005 Tehran International Short Film Festival
India, UK, 2004, 15 min., color, Hindi with English subtitles, narrative

Aunty G's by director Geeta Malik
The secret, double life of Dutiful Auntie Jis. Five South Asian ladies go through their everyday routines: making breakfast for their families, playing ball, and throwing back some beers.
USA, 2004, 6 min., color, narrative

Afternoon (Buoi Chieu) by director Kim Spurlock
A rainy afternoon. An unexpected guest. Drawn by her husband's grief and the desire to experience physical sensation, the spirit of the family matriarch comes calling.
USA, 2005, 10 min., color, English/Vietnamese with English subtitles, narrative

Spam-Ku: I Won A Haiku Contest About Spam by director Steven K. Tsuchida
Roy wins a poetry contest with his Spam haiku. The prize: A lifetime supply. Will his life change for the better or will it take a gooey turn?
USA, 2004, 5 min., color, narrative

Pol Pot's Birthday by director Talmage Cooley
After the fall of Phnom Penh in 1979, Pol Pot and his ruthless Khmer Rouge army spent the next decade retreating slowly towards Thailand. In 1985, the office staff of this brutal dictator attempt to throw a surprise birthday party for their boss.
2004 Sundance Film Festival
USA, 2004, 10 min., color, Khmer with English subtitle, narrative

Library Majnu by director Paul Awguwawela
A modern day Romeo and Juliet with a Bollywood twist. A college library, forbidden love and a meddling fathernothing that a little song and dance can't cure.
UK, 2005, 10 min., color, English/Hindi with English subtitles, narrative

The Way by director Qing Huang
Chinese ink painting has never looked more vivid and alluring. Qing Huang marries 3D computer animation with the aesthetic of traditional Chinese art to create a new, exciting media art form. Step into a world where peach blossoms morph into bamboo trees and carps leap out of the screen.
Australia, 2003, 7 min., color, animation

Bright (Ming) by director Qing Huang
Inspired by an age-old Chinese folktale, BRIGHT adds a new twist to how thunder and lightning came about in striking shadow puppet-style animation. Watch as Thunder God pursues Mother Lightning across the sky, and they unleash their powers in a mating dance.
Australia, 2004, 4 min., B/W & Color, animation

Missing by director Kit Hui
To find his missing girlfriend, Samuel follows a mysterious trail of words written on pieces of paper left in unlikely places. As he uncovers the mystery of her disappearance, he catches a haunting glimpse of New York City and realizes something unexpected.
2005 Cannes Film Festival Short Film Competition
2005 Tribeca Film Festival
USA, 2004, 14 min., color, narrative

Nora
CNY-Irish American Cultural Institute MacKillop Film Series

Price: $7 regular; free for LeMoyne students, faculty, and staff; free for James Joyce Club members
Grewen Auditorium
LeMoyne College, Syracuse

On the life of Nora Joyce, adapted from the Brenda Maddox biography, with Ewan McGregor and Susan Lynch, 1999.

Alan Singer, visiting artist
Syracuse University School of Art and Design

Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Alan Singer is a painter, printmaker, lecturer, and educator living in upstate New York. Born in New York City in 1950 to a family of artists and designers, Alan began exhibiting his paintings while still in college at The Cooper Union in New York City. Through college and graduate school at Cornell University, Alan won scholarships, and created work of distinction in programs held at Yale University, Norfolk, CT, at Boston University, Tanglewood, MA, and at The Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Skowhegan, ME. Subsequently Alan has illustrated and published books and has worked as a graphic designer. He is also a published writer on the visual arts. Currently he is a professor of art in the School of Art, College of Imaging Arts & Sciences at the Rochester Institute of Technology, in Rochester, NY. Alan's artwork has been featured in museums such as the Everson in Syracuse, and the Smithsonian in Washington, DC. His work has also been featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions, primarily in the New York area.

For further information, phone the Department of Art at 315-443-2186.

William Schulz
University Lectures

Price: Free
Hendricks Chapel
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Dr. William F. Schulz was appointed Executive Director of Amnesty International (USA) in March 1994. An ordained Unitarian Universalist minister, he came to Amnesty after serving for 15 years with the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations (UUA), the last eight (1985-93) as President of the Association.

As President of the UUA, Dr. Schulz was involved in a wide variety of international and social justice causes. He led the first visit by a U.S. Member of Congress to post-revolutionary Romania in January 1991, two weeks after the fall of Nicolae Ceausescu. That delegation was instrumental in the subsequent improvement in the rights of religious and ethnic minorities in Romania.

Dr. Schulz has served on the boards of People for the American Way, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, the Communitarian Network and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, among others. He is currently a member of the International Advisory Committee for the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award.

He has appeared frequently on radio and television, including 60 Minutes, 20/20, The Today Show, Good Morning, America, All Things Considered, Talk of the Nation, ABC World News, Larry King Live, Nightline, Politically Incorrect, and on the BBC, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, FOX News and Bloomberg News. He has published and is quoted widely in newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Christian Science Monitor, the New York Review of Books, The Nation, The National Interest and Parade and is the author of several books, including Finding Time and Other Delicacies, Transforming Words: Six Essays on Preaching, Making the Manifesto: The Birth of Religious Humanism, and In Our Own Best Interests: How Defending Human Rights Benefits Us All. His latest book Tainted Legacy: 9-11 and the Ruin of Human Rights was published by Nation Books in September, 2003.

Syracuse University Setnor School of Music
SU Jazz Ensemble

Price: Free
Setnor Auditorium, Crouse College
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Under the direction of Joseph Riposo, the ensemble will perform works by Don Menza, Thelonious Monk, Neil Slater, Jerry Coker and Sonny Rollins. The concert will feature many of the ensemble's jazz soloists. For more information, phone 315-443-2191 or 315-652-8567.

Parking is available in Irving Garage.

From the Back of the Bus
The Media Unit

Price: Free
Southwest Community Center
401 South Ave., Syracuse

The 10th anniversary performance of the award-winning original production about teens and racism.

Wednesday, March 1, 2006

Scholastic Art Awards Exhibit
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Whitney Applied Technology Center
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

A vast exhibit of regional high school Scholastic Art Awards competition entries featuring multimedia, painting, photography and ceramics.

Visual Arts Showcase #55: Artists Create Artists
CNY Arts

Price: Free
WCNY
415 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

The exhibit highlights the work of Central New York's art teachers and their students.

Women Artists Invitational Art Show
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

[Fake] Fake Estates: Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates
Syracuse University School of Architecture

Price: Free
The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

An exhibition of recent work by Martin Hogue, assistant professor of architecture at SU. Hogue spent several months systematically canvassing Queens, NY for residual properties similar to the 14 parcels purchased there and documented by Matta-Clark in 1975. Best known for his spatially dynamic extractions of large sections of walls and floors from abandoned buildings, Matta-Clark, one of the most important American conceptual artists of the 1970s, purchased the Queens properties with the goal of highlighting neglected architectural environments that make up the urban and suburban fabric.

Hogue's exhibition includes drawings, collages and photographs that articulate moments when conventions for establishing the location and precise boundaries of a site produce a conceptual "excess of surveying," inviting speculation as to the value and purpose of land and revealing the conceptual potential of "real" sites, even small and unusable ones -- a 1/8-inch x 110-foot property, among others -- thought to lack architectural potential.

For more information, phone 315-443-2388 or email mcobrien@syr.edu.

Paid public parking is available on West Fayette Street, one block from the building.

I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective" will feature photographs taken by Wilkins through the years. Wilkins began taking photographs at age 10 and acquired her first camera at age 12 Since that time, she has documented several decades of local history and culture, focusing in particular on Syracuse's African American community. She says, "I feel that you view the world a little differently through a camera. It just makes life more interesting." Her lifelong passion for photography has been an inspiration to many, including her family members. "All my children are very aware of their surroundings because of the camera. They all take pictures," she says. Her son is a professional photographer with the Chicago Tribune. Wilkins adds, "I wish all children could have access to a camera of some sort, just to view the world a little differently." The exhibition will feature the people, places and events that have helped shape the local community through the years, as seen through the lens of one of Syracuse's most prolific photographers.

Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson" will feature recent works in a variety of media. Jones-Henderson has exhibited extensively both in the United States and internationally. He is one of the founding members of the AfriCOBRA collective. AfriCOBRA ("African Commune of Bad Relevant Artists") began in Chicago in the late 1960's as a group of visual, performing, and literary artists who sought to capture the vibrancy and spirit of African American urban life through elements found in traditional African art. Henderson is also a noted teacher, consultant and lecturer. He is currently the Executive Director of the Research Institute of African and African Diaspora Arts, Inc. in Roxbury, MA. He has studied at The Sorbonne in Paris, the Art Institute of Chicago, Northern Illinois University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

East of Eden: Works of Pipo Nguyen-Duy
Light Work Gallery

Price: Free
Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The images in the exhibition illustrate Nguyen-duy's ability to capture the interaction between nature and humanity in stunning large-format color photographs. Nguyen-duy's photography stems from the traditional style of landscape painting. According to Jennie Hirsch, Hannah Seeger Davis Post-doctoral Fellow at Princeton University, his "reliance on the natural world as a theatrical apparatus uncovers collisions between nature and culture, past and present, in carefully crystallized visions that inscribe themselves onto classical Western visions of the (un)natural world." Nguyen-duy's photographs hold references to mythology and history, and capture a thought-provoking vision of the American landscape and people.

Nguyen-duy's photographic style has been greatly influenced by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Before the attacks, his work was more focused on the "back-story" of the landscapes he photographed, while his work now is focused more on reality and what is happening in the present. According to Stephen Borys, curator of Western art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, this work "shows us a landscape developing, changing, retreating and advancing -- a land of multiple hues and conditions."

Nguyen-duy is a photography professor at Oberlin College whose work has been exhibited nationwide. He has lectured at universities and museums throughout the United States, and he participated in Light Work's Artist-in-Residence Program in 2004. He has completed residencies in Vermont and France.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring work by transmedia students at Syracuse University.

Digital Transitions: Selections from the Light Work Collection
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Photography Gallery
Schine Student Center, 306 University Ave., Syracuse

This diverse selection of work from the Light Work collection reflects important and dramatic changes in photography. It explores the new directions artists have taken in the brief period between 1990 and 2005. Many of these artists have experimented with digital techniques for the first time while working at Light Work. These images are hybrids of traditional and digital processes. Some artists go from analog to digital processes and even back to analog. Lines between the categories of analog or digital have been blurred and will continue to be. The boundaries will continue to dissolve and have less meaning.The classification of photograph, digital image, and new media will evolve and their definitions will change. This exhibition is a significant milestone at Light Work, as the first retrospective look at work by artists using various digital tools creatively. It is an enticing glimpse at digital photography's young history as we consider how new digital technologies redefine what photography can and will become.

Spare Time Not Wasted
Associated Artists

Price: Free
Manlius Village Library
Manlius Village Center, 1 Arkie Albanese Dr., Manlius

Works by Barbara Emmons and Judith Snedeker Jaquith.

Barbara Emmons works in acrylic, pen and ink, and watercolor. Judith Jaquith works mainly in watercolor, also oil pastel, pencil, and photography.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Dave Barry
Friends of the Central Library Author Series

Price: $25
Crouse Hinds Concert Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Author of more than 20 books and syndicated humor columnist for the Miami Herald. Late in 2004, Barry surprised readers when he announced he was taking an indefinite leave of absence from the column. In 1988, he won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary.

From New York to Paris in 35 Minutes
Civic Morning Musicals
Bruce Keplinger, clarinet; Susan Crocker, piano

Price: Free
Hosmer Auditorium, Everson Museum
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

French and American music for clarinet and piano:

Francis Poulenc Sonata for Clarinet and Piano
Vincent Persichetti Parable XIII for Solo Clarinet
Alec Wilder Sonata for Clarinet and Piano

Baruch Meir, piano
Syracuse University Setnor School of Music

Price: Free
Setnor Auditorium, Crouse College
Syracuse University, Syracuse

This solo piano recital will include works of Galuppi, Mozart, Chopin and Ravel. A native of Israel, Meir has performed extensively in Austria, England, France, Israel, Portugal and throughout the U.S. He is currently professor of piano at Arizona State University and founder, president and artistic director of Bösendorfer & Schimmel USASU International Piano Competitions. For more information, contact the Setnor School of Music at 315-443-5892.

Parking is available in Irving Garage.

Raymond Carver Reading Series
Featuring Sharon Olds, poetry

Price: Free
Gifford Auditorium, Huntington Beard Crouse Hall
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Molly Sweeney
Redhouse

Price: $33 regular; $26 senior (65 or older); $22 student
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

This breathtakingly beautiful drama explores the story of one woman's journey from blindness to the seeing world. As the play unfolds from three strikingly different points of view, Brian Friel proves once again why he is considered Ireland's greatest living playwright.

Read a review!

Guys and Dolls Jr.
Pine Grove Middle School

Price: $4 at door, $3 in advance
Pine Grove Junior High School
6318 Fremont Rd., East Syracuse

For more information, phone 315-656-7265.

Intimate Apparel
Syracuse Stage
Timothy Douglas, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A century ago, playwright Lynn Nottage's grandmother made her way in New York by sewing intimate undergarments for wealthy white socialites and women whose socializing tended more to the mercenary. From this thread of family history, Nottage weaves the appealing and touching drama of Esther Mills, a 35-year-old African-American seamstress and spinster whose search for love leads her to chance romance with George, a young Barbadian working on the Panama Canal. This play is a lovely slice of a New York gone by peopled with rich characters, endearing friendships, and true to life relationships.

Read a Review!

Untitled, the Musical
Rarely Done Productions

Price: $6 adult; $3 student
Jazz Central
441 E. Washington St., Syracuse

"Because some stories are better left unspoken"

An original two-act musical containing mature themes by Jon Balcourt and Jen Namoff. For more information, phone 315-546-3224.

Read a review!

A Midsummer Night's Dream
Syracuse University Drama Department
Lisa Anne Porter, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"The course of true love never did run smooth," but who knew it could be quite so chaotic? Certainly not the straight-laced, would-be lovers who flee to the woods where fairies (mis)rule, rude mechanicals play and order is certainly not the order of the day or night. One of the Bard's most beloved comedies, A Midsummer Night's Dream is Shakespeare's most delirious and comic look at love. Set in Athens, the main plot revolves around two sets of couples, Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius. Their entrance into the play's enchanted woods complicates the couples' romantic entanglements when they meet a band of fairies, including impish Puck, not to mention Bottom the weaver and his "rude mechanicals," who stumble into the action when they go into the same magical woods to rehearse a play that is very loosely (and comically) based on the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe. A Midsummer Night's Dream is an exploration of themes of love, dreams, and the creative imagination.

Read a review!

Thursday, March 2, 2006

Scholastic Art Awards Exhibit
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Whitney Applied Technology Center
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

A vast exhibit of regional high school Scholastic Art Awards competition entries featuring multimedia, painting, photography and ceramics.

Visual Arts Showcase #55: Artists Create Artists
CNY Arts

Price: Free
WCNY
415 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

The exhibit highlights the work of Central New York's art teachers and their students.

Women Artists Invitational Art Show
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

[Fake] Fake Estates: Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates
Syracuse University School of Architecture

Price: Free
The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

An exhibition of recent work by Martin Hogue, assistant professor of architecture at SU. Hogue spent several months systematically canvassing Queens, NY for residual properties similar to the 14 parcels purchased there and documented by Matta-Clark in 1975. Best known for his spatially dynamic extractions of large sections of walls and floors from abandoned buildings, Matta-Clark, one of the most important American conceptual artists of the 1970s, purchased the Queens properties with the goal of highlighting neglected architectural environments that make up the urban and suburban fabric.

Hogue's exhibition includes drawings, collages and photographs that articulate moments when conventions for establishing the location and precise boundaries of a site produce a conceptual "excess of surveying," inviting speculation as to the value and purpose of land and revealing the conceptual potential of "real" sites, even small and unusable ones -- a 1/8-inch x 110-foot property, among others -- thought to lack architectural potential.

For more information, phone 315-443-2388 or email mcobrien@syr.edu.

Paid public parking is available on West Fayette Street, one block from the building.

I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective" will feature photographs taken by Wilkins through the years. Wilkins began taking photographs at age 10 and acquired her first camera at age 12 Since that time, she has documented several decades of local history and culture, focusing in particular on Syracuse's African American community. She says, "I feel that you view the world a little differently through a camera. It just makes life more interesting." Her lifelong passion for photography has been an inspiration to many, including her family members. "All my children are very aware of their surroundings because of the camera. They all take pictures," she says. Her son is a professional photographer with the Chicago Tribune. Wilkins adds, "I wish all children could have access to a camera of some sort, just to view the world a little differently." The exhibition will feature the people, places and events that have helped shape the local community through the years, as seen through the lens of one of Syracuse's most prolific photographers.

Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson" will feature recent works in a variety of media. Jones-Henderson has exhibited extensively both in the United States and internationally. He is one of the founding members of the AfriCOBRA collective. AfriCOBRA ("African Commune of Bad Relevant Artists") began in Chicago in the late 1960's as a group of visual, performing, and literary artists who sought to capture the vibrancy and spirit of African American urban life through elements found in traditional African art. Henderson is also a noted teacher, consultant and lecturer. He is currently the Executive Director of the Research Institute of African and African Diaspora Arts, Inc. in Roxbury, MA. He has studied at The Sorbonne in Paris, the Art Institute of Chicago, Northern Illinois University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring work by transmedia students at Syracuse University.

East of Eden: Works of Pipo Nguyen-Duy
Light Work Gallery

Price: Free
Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The images in the exhibition illustrate Nguyen-duy's ability to capture the interaction between nature and humanity in stunning large-format color photographs. Nguyen-duy's photography stems from the traditional style of landscape painting. According to Jennie Hirsch, Hannah Seeger Davis Post-doctoral Fellow at Princeton University, his "reliance on the natural world as a theatrical apparatus uncovers collisions between nature and culture, past and present, in carefully crystallized visions that inscribe themselves onto classical Western visions of the (un)natural world." Nguyen-duy's photographs hold references to mythology and history, and capture a thought-provoking vision of the American landscape and people.

Nguyen-duy's photographic style has been greatly influenced by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Before the attacks, his work was more focused on the "back-story" of the landscapes he photographed, while his work now is focused more on reality and what is happening in the present. According to Stephen Borys, curator of Western art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, this work "shows us a landscape developing, changing, retreating and advancing -- a land of multiple hues and conditions."

Nguyen-duy is a photography professor at Oberlin College whose work has been exhibited nationwide. He has lectured at universities and museums throughout the United States, and he participated in Light Work's Artist-in-Residence Program in 2004. He has completed residencies in Vermont and France.

Digital Transitions: Selections from the Light Work Collection
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Photography Gallery
Schine Student Center, 306 University Ave., Syracuse

This diverse selection of work from the Light Work collection reflects important and dramatic changes in photography. It explores the new directions artists have taken in the brief period between 1990 and 2005. Many of these artists have experimented with digital techniques for the first time while working at Light Work. These images are hybrids of traditional and digital processes. Some artists go from analog to digital processes and even back to analog. Lines between the categories of analog or digital have been blurred and will continue to be. The boundaries will continue to dissolve and have less meaning.The classification of photograph, digital image, and new media will evolve and their definitions will change. This exhibition is a significant milestone at Light Work, as the first retrospective look at work by artists using various digital tools creatively. It is an enticing glimpse at digital photography's young history as we consider how new digital technologies redefine what photography can and will become.

Spare Time Not Wasted
Associated Artists

Price: Free
Manlius Village Library
Manlius Village Center, 1 Arkie Albanese Dr., Manlius

Works by Barbara Emmons and Judith Snedeker Jaquith.

Barbara Emmons works in acrylic, pen and ink, and watercolor. Judith Jaquith works mainly in watercolor, also oil pastel, pencil, and photography.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Different Strokes
Delavan Art Gallery

Price: Free
Delavan Art Gallery
501 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Jane Crow: acrylics
Vincent Fitches: mixed media paintings
Cheyne Rood: pen and inks
Members of the Central New York Art Guild: varied works

Opening reception 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

DanceWorks Annual Performance

Price: $7 regular, $4 with SU ID
Goldstein Auditorium, Schine Student Center
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring various styles of dance, including hip-hop, jazz, modern, tap, ballet, lyrical and funk!

For more information, phone 215-264-5778.

Contemporary Film Series: Womanhouse and Guerrillas in Our Midst
Everson Museum of Art

Price: $3 members and students, $4 non-members
Everson Museum of Art
401 Harrison St., Syracuse

A historic documentary, Womanhouse offers a fascinating look at feminism and the ever-important relationship between art and social change. Director Johanna Demetrakas charts one of the most important feminist cultural events of the 1970s and follows Judy Chicago, best-known as the creator of "The Dinner Party", and Shapiro as they rent an old Hollywood mansion and alter its interior through decor and set-pieces to "search out and reveal the female experience...the dreams and fantasies of women as they sewed, cooked, washed and ironed away their lives." (USA, 47 minutes, 1974)

Guerrillas in Our Midst presents a savvy exploration of the maneuverings of the commercial art world during its boom in the 1980s, and brings the Guerrilla Girls to the big screen. An anonymous group of art terrorists, the Guerrilla Girls have succeeded in putting realism and sexism on the agenda in the art world since 1985, while their witty and creative tactics changed the face of political and cultural activism. Interviews with key figures in the Manhattan art scene, and with the Guerrilla Girls themselves, combine to highlight how the myth of the heroic male painter is perpetuated. Directed by Amy Harrison. (USA, 35 minutes, 1992)

B-Movie Fest Preview
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $6
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

She's Got an Atomic Bomb (2005, 18 mins)
A punk rock femme fatale infamous among members of the city for ruining their sewer system attempts to build an A-Bomb. Can she avoid the hijinx of two marauding punks intent on stealing her secret? And even if they do, will she inflict her personal justice upon the neighborhood? Stars CNY resident Peter DaMica.

The Kill People (2006, 14 mins)
A money-humping, narcoleptic detective is hired to find a large corporation's missing hired killer. Violence and swearing ensue. Co-written by Syracuse native Tim Ferlito. Co-written and directed by Syracuse native, Jon Case.

Borrowing Time (2005, 82 mins)
Borrowing Time is a sci-fi epic dangling on tiny wires - Part Harryhousen effects film, part science lecture the film is an homage to outdated effects and style. The story revolves around a pair of Victorian aliens touring a ravaged earth. Along the way they encounter a handful of unlikely characters -- aliens, earthlings, and an army of ravenous atomic ants.

Brunch of the Living Dead (2005, 28 mins)
Think your days in college were tough? Try making up with your girlfriend, finding food for your best buddy, running into a psycho RA and putting up with her whiny boyfriend on the same day! Oh, and did we mention that everyone else is a zombie? Shot on Syracuse University Campus.

Syracuse University Setnor School of Music
Syracuse University Wind Symphony

Price: Free
Setnor Auditorium, Crouse College
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Syracuse University Wind Ensemble and Symphony Band will combine to perform as the Wind Symphony under the direction of Bradley Ethington, associate professor and director of the Setnor School of Music in SU's College of Visual and Performing Arts, and Justin Mertz, director of the SU Marching Band.

Parking is available in Irving Garage.

Preview of H.M.S. Pinafore
Syracuse Opera

Price: Free
Setnor Auditorium, Crouse College
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Preview of H.M.S. Pinafore
Syracuse Opera

Price: Free
Barnes & Noble
3454 Erie Blvd. E., Dewitt

The Strange Case of Sheik Yerbuti
Acme Mystery Company

Price: $25.95 plus tax and gratuities (includes meal and show)
Spaghetti Warehouse
689 N. Clinton St., Syracuse

Interactive comedy/thriller.

Guys and Dolls Jr.
Pine Grove Middle School

Price: $4 at door, $3 in advance
Pine Grove Junior High School
6318 Fremont Rd., East Syracuse

For more information, phone 315-656-7265.

West Side Story
Skaneateles High School Drama Program

Price: $9 regular, $7 students/seniors
Skaneateles High School
49 E. Elizabeth St., Skaneateles

For more information, phone 315-291-2296.

Intimate Apparel
Syracuse Stage
Timothy Douglas, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A century ago, playwright Lynn Nottage's grandmother made her way in New York by sewing intimate undergarments for wealthy white socialites and women whose socializing tended more to the mercenary. From this thread of family history, Nottage weaves the appealing and touching drama of Esther Mills, a 35-year-old African-American seamstress and spinster whose search for love leads her to chance romance with George, a young Barbadian working on the Panama Canal. This play is a lovely slice of a New York gone by peopled with rich characters, endearing friendships, and true to life relationships.

Read a Review!

Shakespeare's R&J
Black Box Players
Rodney Hudson, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

The Syracuse University Drama Department will present Shakespeare's R&J, Joe Calarco's all-male adaptation of Shakespeare's most famous love story.

Unlike the traditional Renaissance setting of the tale, Shakespeare's R&J moves the action to modern day, when four students at an all-boys parochial school discover a forbidden copy of Romeo and Juliet. Eager for distraction from reciting their Latin verb conjugations, the boys soon begin performing the play. At first timid in exploring the passionate tale among their teenaged peers, the boys eventually lose their inhibitions and embody the story's characters with a palpable understanding of adolescent love - and lust.

Assistant Director Leslie Noble points out that the all-male cast of R&J relates directly to Romeo and Juliet's beginnings on the stage. "The Elizabethan idea of men playing all the roles coupled with the prep school setting was very compelling and set forth a series of meaty questions," Noble said. "How would the circumstances of their youth and upbringing - the military strictness, the rigid gender roles, the sexual repression, the adolescent innocence - affect the performance of Romeo and Juliet? And how would the act of performing this classic love story affect the boys? What a compelling staging challenge to tell both stories at once!"

To reserve tickets, phone 315-443-2102. The Black Box Theatre has a policy of open seating on a first come, first served basis.

Read a Review!

Untitled, the Musical
Rarely Done Productions

Price: $6 adult; $3 student
Jazz Central
441 E. Washington St., Syracuse

"Because some stories are better left unspoken"

An original two-act musical containing mature themes by Jon Balcourt and Jen Namoff. For more information, phone 315-546-3224.

Read a review!

Molly Sweeney
Redhouse

Price: $33 regular; $26 senior (65 or older); $22 student
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

This breathtakingly beautiful drama explores the story of one woman's journey from blindness to the seeing world. As the play unfolds from three strikingly different points of view, Brian Friel proves once again why he is considered Ireland's greatest living playwright.

Read a review!

A Midsummer Night's Dream
Syracuse University Drama Department
Lisa Anne Porter, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"The course of true love never did run smooth," but who knew it could be quite so chaotic? Certainly not the straight-laced, would-be lovers who flee to the woods where fairies (mis)rule, rude mechanicals play and order is certainly not the order of the day or night. One of the Bard's most beloved comedies, A Midsummer Night's Dream is Shakespeare's most delirious and comic look at love. Set in Athens, the main plot revolves around two sets of couples, Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius. Their entrance into the play's enchanted woods complicates the couples' romantic entanglements when they meet a band of fairies, including impish Puck, not to mention Bottom the weaver and his "rude mechanicals," who stumble into the action when they go into the same magical woods to rehearse a play that is very loosely (and comically) based on the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe. A Midsummer Night's Dream is an exploration of themes of love, dreams, and the creative imagination.

Read a review!

Friday, March 3, 2006

Scholastic Art Awards Exhibit
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Whitney Applied Technology Center
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

A vast exhibit of regional high school Scholastic Art Awards competition entries featuring multimedia, painting, photography and ceramics.

Visual Arts Showcase #55: Artists Create Artists
CNY Arts

Price: Free
WCNY
415 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

The exhibit highlights the work of Central New York's art teachers and their students.

Winter's End: Works of Donal and Shel Little

Hazard Branch Library
1620 W. Genesee St., Syracuse

New art work by popular Syracuse artists Donal and Shel Little of LittlePath Studio. The exhibit will include a piece created especially in honor of St Patrick's Day.

Women Artists Invitational Art Show
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Ann Felton Multicultural Center and Gallery
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

[Fake] Fake Estates: Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark's Fake Estates
Syracuse University School of Architecture

Price: Free
The Warehouse Gallery
350 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

An exhibition of recent work by Martin Hogue, assistant professor of architecture at SU. Hogue spent several months systematically canvassing Queens, NY for residual properties similar to the 14 parcels purchased there and documented by Matta-Clark in 1975. Best known for his spatially dynamic extractions of large sections of walls and floors from abandoned buildings, Matta-Clark, one of the most important American conceptual artists of the 1970s, purchased the Queens properties with the goal of highlighting neglected architectural environments that make up the urban and suburban fabric.

Hogue's exhibition includes drawings, collages and photographs that articulate moments when conventions for establishing the location and precise boundaries of a site produce a conceptual "excess of surveying," inviting speculation as to the value and purpose of land and revealing the conceptual potential of "real" sites, even small and unusable ones -- a 1/8-inch x 110-foot property, among others -- thought to lack architectural potential.

For more information, phone 315-443-2388 or email mcobrien@syr.edu.

Paid public parking is available on West Fayette Street, one block from the building.

I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective" will feature photographs taken by Wilkins through the years. Wilkins began taking photographs at age 10 and acquired her first camera at age 12 Since that time, she has documented several decades of local history and culture, focusing in particular on Syracuse's African American community. She says, "I feel that you view the world a little differently through a camera. It just makes life more interesting." Her lifelong passion for photography has been an inspiration to many, including her family members. "All my children are very aware of their surroundings because of the camera. They all take pictures," she says. Her son is a professional photographer with the Chicago Tribune. Wilkins adds, "I wish all children could have access to a camera of some sort, just to view the world a little differently." The exhibition will feature the people, places and events that have helped shape the local community through the years, as seen through the lens of one of Syracuse's most prolific photographers.

Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson" will feature recent works in a variety of media. Jones-Henderson has exhibited extensively both in the United States and internationally. He is one of the founding members of the AfriCOBRA collective. AfriCOBRA ("African Commune of Bad Relevant Artists") began in Chicago in the late 1960's as a group of visual, performing, and literary artists who sought to capture the vibrancy and spirit of African American urban life through elements found in traditional African art. Henderson is also a noted teacher, consultant and lecturer. He is currently the Executive Director of the Research Institute of African and African Diaspora Arts, Inc. in Roxbury, MA. He has studied at The Sorbonne in Paris, the Art Institute of Chicago, Northern Illinois University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

East of Eden: Works of Pipo Nguyen-Duy
Light Work Gallery

Price: Free
Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

The images in the exhibition illustrate Nguyen-duy's ability to capture the interaction between nature and humanity in stunning large-format color photographs. Nguyen-duy's photography stems from the traditional style of landscape painting. According to Jennie Hirsch, Hannah Seeger Davis Post-doctoral Fellow at Princeton University, his "reliance on the natural world as a theatrical apparatus uncovers collisions between nature and culture, past and present, in carefully crystallized visions that inscribe themselves onto classical Western visions of the (un)natural world." Nguyen-duy's photographs hold references to mythology and history, and capture a thought-provoking vision of the American landscape and people.

Nguyen-duy's photographic style has been greatly influenced by the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Before the attacks, his work was more focused on the "back-story" of the landscapes he photographed, while his work now is focused more on reality and what is happening in the present. According to Stephen Borys, curator of Western art at the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College, this work "shows us a landscape developing, changing, retreating and advancing -- a land of multiple hues and conditions."

Nguyen-duy is a photography professor at Oberlin College whose work has been exhibited nationwide. He has lectured at universities and museums throughout the United States, and he participated in Light Work's Artist-in-Residence Program in 2004. He has completed residencies in Vermont and France.

Transmedia Photography Annual
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Media Center
316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring work by transmedia students at Syracuse University.

Digital Transitions: Selections from the Light Work Collection
Light Work Gallery

Robert B. Menschel Photography Gallery
Schine Student Center, 306 University Ave., Syracuse

This diverse selection of work from the Light Work collection reflects important and dramatic changes in photography. It explores the new directions artists have taken in the brief period between 1990 and 2005. Many of these artists have experimented with digital techniques for the first time while working at Light Work. These images are hybrids of traditional and digital processes. Some artists go from analog to digital processes and even back to analog. Lines between the categories of analog or digital have been blurred and will continue to be. The boundaries will continue to dissolve and have less meaning.The classification of photograph, digital image, and new media will evolve and their definitions will change. This exhibition is a significant milestone at Light Work, as the first retrospective look at work by artists using various digital tools creatively. It is an enticing glimpse at digital photography's young history as we consider how new digital technologies redefine what photography can and will become.

Skin, Eyes, and a Lost Mnemon
Spark Contemporary Art Space

Price: Free
Spark Contemporary Art Space
1005 E. Fayette St., Syracuse

Photo exhibit by Xie Jiankun. Opening reception at 7:00 pm.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Different Strokes
Delavan Art Gallery

Price: Free
Delavan Art Gallery
501 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Jane Crow: acrylics
Vincent Fitches: mixed media paintings
Cheyne Rood: pen and inks
Members of the Central New York Art Guild: varied works

DanceWorks Annual Performance

Price: $7 regular, $4 with SU ID
Goldstein Auditorium, Schine Student Center
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring various styles of dance, including hip-hop, jazz, modern, tap, ballet, lyrical and funk!

For more information, phone 215-264-5778.

Rainbow's End and Samson vs. The Vampire Women
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Rainbow's End
Three small time crooks capture a Leprechaun and try to shake him down for his pot of gold. Stars Dean Cameron ("Summer School", "Bad Dreams") (2005, 15 min)

Samson vs. The Vampire Women
Currently unavailable on DVD. A professor recruits a professional wrestler to protect his daughter from vampires intent on kidnaping her and marrying her to the devil. (1962 Mexico, 86 min, English subtitles)

Recommended ages 13 and above.

Ultraman: The Next
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $8
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

Jet Pilot Maki miraculously survives a mid-air crash with a UFO. He learns that a week earlier, another pilot who had had a similar experience with a UFO, and has now mutated into a huge monster that is now on the loose. Once the two finally meet, Maki, also, is transformed into a bizarre creature, "Ultraman". Can he stop this strange creature from destroying the Earth?" (2004 Japan, 97 min, 35mm, English subtitles, all ages)

Lady Vengeance
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $8
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

Lee Geum-Ja, at the age of 19, goes to prison for the murder and abduction of a child on behalf of her accomplice Mr. Baek, only to find out that she is betrayed. While in prison, she carefully prepares for her revenge by winning the hearts of her fellow inmates with her kindness, thus earning herself the nickname 'kind Ms. Geum-Ja'. Upon her release from prison after 13 years, Lee Geum-Ja sets out to seek revenge on the man who framed her with the help of her former prison mates. From the director of "Old Boy". (2005 Japan, 112 min, 35mm, English subtitles, ages 17 and above)

Blackout and Massacre Time
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Blackout
A young man chases a mysterious woman, finding pieces of memory between the two. (2006, 13 min)

Lucio Fulci's Massacre Time
Currently unavailable in the USA. A prospector must fight a sadistic man and his son who have taken over his ranch. (1966 Italy, 85 min, in English)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

Donut Run and Mondo Trasho
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Donut Run
This dark comedy puts a John Waters spin on a modern working girl tale, only this time there's blood, sex and sweet revenge. In order for Bella to find peace, she must give new meaning to the term 'Dead End Job'. Stars Dian Bachar (Orgazmo, BASEketball, South Park). (2005, 22 min)

John Water's Mondo Trasho
Never released on DVD. A day in the lives of a hit-and-run driver and her victim, and the bizarre things that happen to them before and after they collide. (1969, 95 min)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

Battle Roy,ale
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $8
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

Ninth grade students are taken to a small isolated island with a map, food and various arms. They have to fight each other three days long until the last one remains and are forced to wear a special collar which will explode when they break a rule. (2000 Japan, 122 min, English subtitles, ages 17 and above)

Why the Fifties Wanted the Thirties to be More Like the Twenties: Poetry, Anticommunism, and the Archive
Featuring Alan Filreis

Price: Free
Bird Library, 6th Floor
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Alan Filreis, Kelly Professor of English and faculty director of the Kelly Writer's House at the University of Pennsylvania, is a specialist in modern and contemporary American poetry and the literary politics of the American 1930s and 1950s. He has published an edition of Wallace Stevens's correspondence with Jose Rodriguez Feo, Secretaries of the Moon (1986), as well as Stevens and the Actual World (Princeton, 1991) and Modernism from Right to Left (Cambridge, 1994). He is currently writing a literary history of the idea of modernism in the American 1950s called The Fifties Thirties. Filreis is a winner of the Lindback Award and the Ira Abrams Award, and was chosen as the 1999 Pennsylvania Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation.

Paid parking is available in the University and Marion visitor lots.

Onondaga Community College
The Mandarins

Price: Free
Storer Auditorium
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

The Arts Across Campus debut by the award-winning women's a capella group.

The Boy With No Name
Encore Presentations
Tony Brown, conductor

Price: $12 regular, $10 students/seniors, $8 LeMoyne students and faculty
St. Clare Auditorium
Lodi and Isabella Streets, Syracuse

The story of a mentally challenged boy and his family. Mature themes. For more information, phone 315-952-4228.

Read a review!

Folkus Project
Shrinking Violets

Price: $10
May Memorial Unitarian Society
3800 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

Playing together as Shrinking Violets since 1993, Darryl and Julia Murdock completed their partnership by marrying in 1997. They have wandered throughout the Northeast, gracing such stages as Night Eagle Cafe and Coffeehouse in Oxford, NY and Caffe Lena in Saratoga Springs. They have an instantly recognizable, yet indefinable singer/songwriter style that can best be described as "jazzy folk pop." Both Darryl and Julia are classically trained and experienced in performing for many types of audiences.

Since their humble beginning in a small graduate student club in Syracuse, the Violets have built a solid following for themselves in Upstate and Central New York and in Vermont. With their tight vocal harmonies, the driving sound of acoustic guitar, and the uniqueness of sweet-sounding viola, they have successfully sold their audiences on their songwriting efforts. Their on-stage storytelling and light, good-natured banter engages the audience. Their songs are unpretentious, very listenable, and have been called "as comfortable as a soft flannel shirt."

They have made live radio appearances on several Central New York shows including Dave Frisina's Soundcheck on 95X, TK99's Homegrown radio network, the State Theatre Radio Hour hosted by Gene Ira Katz on I-100, and Common Threads on 88.3 WAER. Their song "Not Ready to Let You Go" was included on the State Theatre Radio Show Compilation CD, released in June of 1996, where it keeps company with songs from such artists as Karen Savoca and Donna the Buffalo.

In 1997 Shrinking Violets were nominated as Best Acoustic Act of 1997 by the Syracuse Area Music Awards (SAMMYs). They have expanded their range to include shows in Massachusetts, Ohio, Maine, and Canada. Invited to perform at the North by Northeast Conference and Festival, they played to a packed house at the Free Times Cafe in Toronto. Headlining at Caffe Lena's, the oldest running coffeehouse in America, was a dream realized for the Violets as they played on a stage where artists such as Bob Dylan and Tom Chapin have performed. They have opened for the legendary Tom Rush as well as new folk luminaries Vance Gilbert and Ellis Paul.

For reservations, email tickets@folkus.org or call 315-440-7444.

Ancient Voices
LeMoyne College
Music Journeys
Featuring Joanna Manring, soprano

Price: $12 regular, $7 seniors, free for students with ID
Coyne Center for the Performing Arts
LeMoyne College, Syracuse

An all-American program featuring songs of little-known American songstress Mary Howe, along with George Crumb's monumental song cycle, Ancient Voices of Children. Joining Manring in her performance will be a cast of distinguished Central New York artists, including oboist Amy Mendillo, percussionists Jennifer Vacanti and Rob Bridge, mandolin master Ric Chrislip, and boy soprano Austin Roney.

Joanna Manring is currently a doctoral student at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore. Originally from Central New York, she graduated from Syracuse University where she was a recipient of the Marion Armstrong and Dennis Gilbert Awards in performance. Manring has performed as a soloist with Syracuse Opera, Oswego Opera, the Skaneateles Festival, the Lake Placid Institute, and with the New York Chorale at Weill Recital Hall. She was the winner of the Central New York NATS Competition in Ithaca in 2003.

Classics Series: Chang Plays Brahms
Syracuse Symphony Orchestra
Daniel Hege, conductor
Featuring Sarah Chang, violin

Price: $16-$50
Crouse Hinds Concert Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Higdon Machine
Brahms Violin Concerto
Bartok Concerto for Orchestra

Read a review!

Odd Couple: The Female Version
Onondaga Hillplayers
Marna Connelly, director

Price: $36 includes dinner, theater, tax and gratuity
Inn of the Seasons
4311 W. Seneca Tpke., Syracuse

For reservations, phone 315-492-1221 or 315-492-4001. Credit cards not accepted.

Read a review!

God's Trombones
Paul Robeson Performing Arts Company

Price: $15 advance, $18 at door, $12 seniors with ID and groups of 20 or more, $5 for college students with ID and children 12 and under
South Presbyterian Church
Corner of W. Colvin and S. Salina Streets, Syracuse

God's Trombones, by James Weldon Johnson, is a spectacular compilation of seven Negro sermons in verse. Under the creative direction of William H. Rowland, Jackie Warren Moore, and Annette Adams-Brown this production will be a magnificent mixture of oration, song, dance and music. Local ministers from around the community will recite the opening prayer called Listen, Lord - A Prayer. Choral Director Lagreer Cummings will lead a mass Choir, made up of church choral members from across the Syracuse community, that will fill the sanctuary with joyous gospel songs, while prominent actors from the SU campus and Syracuse community engage and delight your senses with the remaining sermons; The Creation, The Prodigal Son, Go Down Death - A Funeral Sermon, Noah Built the Ark, The Crucifixion, Let my People Go, and Judgment Day through recitation, dramatization, narration and storytelling. The play will run approximately 1-1/2 hours.

Moon Over Buffalo
Baldwinsville Theatre Guild

Price: $15 adults, $12 students
First Presbyterian Church of Baldwinsville
64 Oswego St., Baldwinsville

West Side Story
Skaneateles High School Drama Program

Price: $9 regular, $7 students/seniors
Skaneateles High School
49 E. Elizabeth St., Skaneateles

For more information, phone 315-291-2296.

Moon Over Buffalo
Theatre '90

Price: $19 regular, $16 students/seniors, $12 children under 12
Empire Theater
New York State Fairgrounds, Geddes

Read a Review!

Shakespeare's R&J
Black Box Players
Rodney Hudson, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

The Syracuse University Drama Department will present Shakespeare's R&J, Joe Calarco's all-male adaptation of Shakespeare's most famous love story.

Unlike the traditional Renaissance setting of the tale, Shakespeare's R&J moves the action to modern day, when four students at an all-boys parochial school discover a forbidden copy of Romeo and Juliet. Eager for distraction from reciting their Latin verb conjugations, the boys soon begin performing the play. At first timid in exploring the passionate tale among their teenaged peers, the boys eventually lose their inhibitions and embody the story's characters with a palpable understanding of adolescent love - and lust.

Assistant Director Leslie Noble points out that the all-male cast of R&J relates directly to Romeo and Juliet's beginnings on the stage. "The Elizabethan idea of men playing all the roles coupled with the prep school setting was very compelling and set forth a series of meaty questions," Noble said. "How would the circumstances of their youth and upbringing - the military strictness, the rigid gender roles, the sexual repression, the adolescent innocence - affect the performance of Romeo and Juliet? And how would the act of performing this classic love story affect the boys? What a compelling staging challenge to tell both stories at once!"

To reserve tickets, phone 315-443-2102. The Black Box Theatre has a policy of open seating on a first come, first served basis.

Read a Review!

Untitled, the Musical
Rarely Done Productions

Price: $6 adult; $3 student
Jazz Central
441 E. Washington St., Syracuse

"Because some stories are better left unspoken"

An original two-act musical containing mature themes by Jon Balcourt and Jen Namoff. For more information, phone 315-546-3224.

Read a review!

Molly Sweeney
Redhouse

Price: $33 regular; $26 senior (65 or older); $22 student
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

This breathtakingly beautiful drama explores the story of one woman's journey from blindness to the seeing world. As the play unfolds from three strikingly different points of view, Brian Friel proves once again why he is considered Ireland's greatest living playwright.

Read a review!

Intimate Apparel
Syracuse Stage
Timothy Douglas, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A century ago, playwright Lynn Nottage's grandmother made her way in New York by sewing intimate undergarments for wealthy white socialites and women whose socializing tended more to the mercenary. From this thread of family history, Nottage weaves the appealing and touching drama of Esther Mills, a 35-year-old African-American seamstress and spinster whose search for love leads her to chance romance with George, a young Barbadian working on the Panama Canal. This play is a lovely slice of a New York gone by peopled with rich characters, endearing friendships, and true to life relationships.

Read a Review!

A Midsummer Night's Dream
Syracuse University Drama Department
Lisa Anne Porter, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"The course of true love never did run smooth," but who knew it could be quite so chaotic? Certainly not the straight-laced, would-be lovers who flee to the woods where fairies (mis)rule, rude mechanicals play and order is certainly not the order of the day or night. One of the Bard's most beloved comedies, A Midsummer Night's Dream is Shakespeare's most delirious and comic look at love. Set in Athens, the main plot revolves around two sets of couples, Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius. Their entrance into the play's enchanted woods complicates the couples' romantic entanglements when they meet a band of fairies, including impish Puck, not to mention Bottom the weaver and his "rude mechanicals," who stumble into the action when they go into the same magical woods to rehearse a play that is very loosely (and comically) based on the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe. A Midsummer Night's Dream is an exploration of themes of love, dreams, and the creative imagination.

Read a review!

Saturday, March 4, 2006

Scholastic Art Awards Exhibit
Onondaga Community College

Price: Free
Whitney Applied Technology Center
Onondaga Community College, Syracuse

A vast exhibit of regional high school Scholastic Art Awards competition entries featuring multimedia, painting, photography and ceramics.

Winter's End: Works of Donal and Shel Little

Hazard Branch Library
1620 W. Genesee St., Syracuse

New art work by popular Syracuse artists Donal and Shel Little of LittlePath Studio. The exhibit will include a piece created especially in honor of St Patrick's Day.

Different Strokes
Delavan Art Gallery

Price: Free
Delavan Art Gallery
501 W. Fayette St., Syracuse

Jane Crow: acrylics
Vincent Fitches: mixed media paintings
Cheyne Rood: pen and inks
Members of the Central New York Art Guild: varied works

Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"Requiem for Our Ancestors and Other Warriors: Works by Napoleon Jones-Henderson" will feature recent works in a variety of media. Jones-Henderson has exhibited extensively both in the United States and internationally. He is one of the founding members of the AfriCOBRA collective. AfriCOBRA ("African Commune of Bad Relevant Artists") began in Chicago in the late 1960's as a group of visual, performing, and literary artists who sought to capture the vibrancy and spirit of African American urban life through elements found in traditional African art. Henderson is also a noted teacher, consultant and lecturer. He is currently the Executive Director of the Research Institute of African and African Diaspora Arts, Inc. in Roxbury, MA. He has studied at The Sorbonne in Paris, the Art Institute of Chicago, Northern Illinois University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective
Community Folk Art Center

Community Folk Art Center
805 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"I, Witness: A Marjory Wilkins Retrospective" will feature photographs taken by Wilkins through the years. Wilkins began taking photographs at age 10 and acquired her first camera at age 12 Since that time, she has documented several decades of local history and culture, focusing in particular on Syracuse's African American community. She says, "I feel that you view the world a little differently through a camera. It just makes life more interesting." Her lifelong passion for photography has been an inspiration to many, including her family members. "All my children are very aware of their surroundings because of the camera. They all take pictures," she says. Her son is a professional photographer with the Chicago Tribune. Wilkins adds, "I wish all children could have access to a camera of some sort, just to view the world a little differently." The exhibition will feature the people, places and events that have helped shape the local community through the years, as seen through the lens of one of Syracuse's most prolific photographers.

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Claire Harootunian Retrospective: Sculpture and Collage Art
Redhouse

Price: Free
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

Come join in the magic of the art works of Claire Harootunian, alumnus and former Syracuse University adjunct professor A consummate hunter, gatherer and collector, Ms. Harootunian is constantly reinventing and reinvigorating new life into "found" objects and materials. Claire Harootunian begins with the possibilities of the material, whether she is layering fine, delicate papers and fabrics or welding heavy steel and bronze she delights in the creative process. Her joy in creating, no matter the medium, is apparent in all she touches.

DanceWorks Annual Performance

Price: $7 regular, $4 with SU ID
Goldstein Auditorium, Schine Student Center
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Featuring various styles of dance, including hip-hop, jazz, modern, tap, ballet, lyrical and funk!

For more information, phone 215-264-5778.

Day of the Cabbage, Flyaway and Pulgasari
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Day of the Cabbage
A mysterious cabbage-meteor crash-lands and wreaks havoc on Matzoville in this Vegetronics giant-monster mini-epic. (2006, 10 min)

Flyaway
A little wooden plane, despite the price it must pay, does the impossible and joins a world it could only dream of. (2004, 12 min)

Pulgasari
In feudal Korea, an old blacksmith is imprisoned and starved to death by an oppressive King. His last creation is a tiny figurine of a monster- Pulgasari, a Godzilla-like creature that eats iron. The blood of his daughter brings the creature to life, and fights with the poor, starving peasants to overthrow the corrupt monarchy. (1985 North Korea, 95 min, English subtitles)

Recommended for all ages.

The Crimson Ghost
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

In this classic serial, a criminal mastermind known as The Crimson Ghost is out to steal a device called the Cyclotrode, which can short-circuit all electrical current on the planet. (1946, 75 min, all ages)

Gamera: Guardian of the Universe
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $6
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

Gamera returns to save Earth from Gyaos, a giant prehistoric bird who has nested atop Tokyo Tower. (1995 Japan, 96 min, 35mm, all ages)

Pretty Kitty and Big Fish in Middlesex
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Pretty Kitty
After several unsuccessful attempts to get his cat to listen to him, a man snaps and decides to show him who's the boss. (2005, 4 min)

Big Fish in Middlesex
Young adults struggle with violence, discrimination, exploitation, tyranny and death. When the going gets tough, they get tougher and meaner. Fate throws unexpected curves as some struggle with the trappings of small town life while others dream of flight and escape but each will reach a turning point at the crossroads of life. (2005, 112 min)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

Rusty Forkblade and Blue Plate
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Rusty Forkblade
After a freak boating/drinking/grilling accident, a Texas redneck is mistakenly transported to Valhalla, the legendary afterlife meant for slain Viking heroes. (2005, 25 min)

Blue Plate
A white trash melodramedy wherein Charlene finds out just how southern-fried a lover's triangle can be. (2005, 77 min)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

Gamera: Attack of Legion
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $6
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

A strange meteor lands in Japan unleashing hundreds of insect-like "legion" creatures which find their way into Tokyo, and only Gamera can stop them. (1996 Japan, 99 min, 35mm, all ages)

Gamera: Revenge of Iris
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $6
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

An egg hatches into a small monster, which a young girl, Ayana, decides to raise and quickly develops as psychic bond with. As Ayana's monster, named Iris, grows to adulthood, the flying turtle Gamera begins to take an interest in this new potential threat. (1999 Japan, 108 min, 35mm, all ages)

Bubbles & Pick and Both
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Bubbles & Pick
When Martin Farwell is pushed to the limit by his obnoxious and abusive boss, he hires two mysterious assassins to even the score. But Bubbles and Pick deliver results that Martin never expected, as a straightforward murder-for-hire turns into a hilariously revealing look at the true nature of revenge. (2005, 11 min)

Both
Haunted by memories of her long-lost hermaphrodite brother, a stunt double discovers that her sexual identity is a tissue of lies created by her parents and doctors. (2005, 86 min)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

The Absolute Truth About Pro Wrestling
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

For six years, Mark Ezovski followed three individuals to explore the strange, fascinating and secretive world of professional wrestling. "Luscious" Johnny Valiant, a WWE hall of famer, and 30 year veteran of the mat wars misses life as a wrestler. "Empress Asia" Sky Hosoya is a former professional body builder, a Golden Gloves boxing Champion, a world renowned dominatrix and of course a professional wrestler. "Professor" Larry Brisco, wrestling villain by night, Larry was trained in an "old school" style with a respect for the craft of the sport. A funny, sad and ultimately uplifting portrait of life outside of the squared circle. (2005 documentary, 120 min, ages 17 and above) Johnny Valiant will be in attendance.

Dead Man Shoes
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $6
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

A disaffected soldier (Considine) returns to his hometown to get even with the thugs who brutalized his mentally-challenged brother (Kebbell) years ago. (2004 UK, 90 min, ages 17 and above)

Marebito
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $6
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

A fear-obsessed freelance cameraman (Shinya Tsukamoto) investigates an urban legend involving mysterious spirits that haunt the subways of Tokyo. (2004 Japan, 92 min, ages 17 and above)

Legion: The Word Made Flesh and Ellektra
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Legion: The Word Made Flesh
A fallen Priest tries to help a Mother free her child from a demonic curse. They are lost in an occult underground where nothing is as it seems and no one can be trusted. 'Exorcist' meets 'Sixth Sense'. (2005, 20 min)

Ellektra
Ellektra is a story about comfort. The main character Sam finds real comfort and is released from her virtual comfort, drugs. Her true comfort is the 16 year old girl Ellen, who puts people suffering from severe misfortune into contact with each other through SMS, and gives new meaning to their lives. (2004 Belgium, 103 mins, English subtitles)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

Frog-g-g
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

Chemical waste seeps into a small town's water supply, causing the birth of a mutant FROGGG which is instinctively driven to mate with its genetic match - human women. Sexy EPA super-agent Dr Barbara Michaels tracks the Froggg's every move, fighting off corrupt good-ol'-boy politicians and drunken rednecks at every turn. (2004, 106 min, ages 17 and above)

Netherworld and Special Dead
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Netherworld
God bets the fifth millennium on the archangel Gabriel losing an underworld boxing match. But Gabriel doesn't throw a fight for anyone... It'll be one hell of a bout. (2005, 16 min)

Special Dead
When a zombie plague infects Camp Special Dude, a dude ranch for the mentally handicapped, a ragtag band of campers and counselors struggles to survive the night. Led by the indifferent, nunchuck-wielding head counselor, Mac, and his wheelchair-bound sister Dale, the unlikely heroes fight their way off the mountain as, one by one, they're picked off and join the ranks of the walking dead. Written by Syracuse native Jared Tweedie. (2006, 90 min)

Recommended ages 17 and above.

Lecture and Gallery Tour
Redhouse
Featuring Claire Harootunian

Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

Lecture and gallery tour with the artist in conjunction with the opening of the Claire Harootunian Retrospective.

The Boy With No Name
Encore Presentations
Tony Brown, conductor

Price: $12 regular, $10 students/seniors, $8 LeMoyne students and faculty
St. Clare Auditorium
Lodi and Isabella Streets, Syracuse

The story of a mentally challenged boy and his family. Mature themes. For more information, phone 315-952-4228.

Read a review!

Mountain Women Can Be Heroes
Featuring Balladeer Peggy Lynn, with Sandra Weber

Price: $10 suggested donation. Children under 18 free.
First Unitarian Universalist Society of Syracuse
109 Waring Rd. (at the corner of Nottingham Rd.), Dewitt

In ballads and stories, Peggy Lynn and Sandra Weber present their Mountain Women Can be Heroes concert. Their book of stories, Breaking Trail: Remarkable Women of the Adirondacks, provides a historical record of Adirondack women. Ms. Lynn has captured in ballads the comic, amazing, and poignant experiences of these mountain women.

Peggy Lynn, called "The Voice of the Mountains" by poet Maurice Kenny, is a sultry alto whose music ranges from folksy to blues. She has recorded four solo CDs, and another four albums that include Dan Duggan and/or Dan Berggren. Her most recent CD is "Stand a Chance", ballads of Adirondack women. In 1996, Peggy was selected as the Adirondack Woman of the Year by the Adirondack Business & Professional Women's Association. The Adirondack Girl Scout Council recognized Peggy in 1998 as an Adirondack Woman of Distinction. Both are peer-recognized honors. In 2005, the Adirondack Mountain Club awarded Peggy the Arthur E. Newkirk Education award. As arts educators, both Lynn and Weber are continuing their work of recording and teaching the history of Adirondack women.

This concert is being held to benefit Vera House. For more information, phone 315-446-5940.

Syracuse Friends of Chamber Music
Amernet Quartet

Price: $20 regular, $15 senior, $10 student, children under 13 free
H. W. Smith School Auditorium
1130 Salt Springs Rd., Syracuse

Mozart Quartet No. 15 in D minor, K. 421
Bartok Quartet No. 1
Brahms Quartet No. 3 in Bb minor, op. 67

Classics Series: Chang Plays Brahms
Syracuse Symphony Orchestra
Daniel Hege, conductor
Featuring Sarah Chang, violin

Price: $16-$50
Crouse Hinds Concert Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Higdon Machine
Brahms Violin Concerto
Bartok Concerto for Orchestra

Read a review!

The Elephant Child
Open Hand Theater
The Puppet People

Price: $9 adults; $6 children (members get $1 off)
International Mask and Puppet Museum
518 Prospect Ave., Syracuse

A hilarious, contemporary adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's classic tale about the elephant child's insatiable curiosity.

Hercules, the Maiden and the Lion
Magic Circle Children's Theatre

Price: $5
Spaghetti Warehouse
689 N. Clinton St., Syracuse

Interactive family show.

Intimate Apparel
Syracuse Stage
Timothy Douglas, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A century ago, playwright Lynn Nottage's grandmother made her way in New York by sewing intimate undergarments for wealthy white socialites and women whose socializing tended more to the mercenary. From this thread of family history, Nottage weaves the appealing and touching drama of Esther Mills, a 35-year-old African-American seamstress and spinster whose search for love leads her to chance romance with George, a young Barbadian working on the Panama Canal. This play is a lovely slice of a New York gone by peopled with rich characters, endearing friendships, and true to life relationships.

Read a Review!

Odd Couple: The Female Version
Onondaga Hillplayers
Marna Connelly, director

Price: $36 includes dinner, theater, tax and gratuity
Inn of the Seasons
4311 W. Seneca Tpke., Syracuse

For reservations, phone 315-492-1221 or 315-492-4001. Credit cards not accepted.

Read a review!

God's Trombones
Paul Robeson Performing Arts Company

Price: $15 advance, $18 at door, $12 seniors with ID and groups of 20 or more, $5 for college students with ID and children 12 and under
South Presbyterian Church
Corner of W. Colvin and S. Salina Streets, Syracuse

God's Trombones, by James Weldon Johnson, is a spectacular compilation of seven Negro sermons in verse. Under the creative direction of William H. Rowland, Jackie Warren Moore, and Annette Adams-Brown this production will be a magnificent mixture of oration, song, dance and music. Local ministers from around the community will recite the opening prayer called Listen, Lord - A Prayer. Choral Director Lagreer Cummings will lead a mass Choir, made up of church choral members from across the Syracuse community, that will fill the sanctuary with joyous gospel songs, while prominent actors from the SU campus and Syracuse community engage and delight your senses with the remaining sermons; The Creation, The Prodigal Son, Go Down Death - A Funeral Sermon, Noah Built the Ark, The Crucifixion, Let my People Go, and Judgment Day through recitation, dramatization, narration and storytelling. The play will run approximately 1-1/2 hours.

Cats
Syracuse Civic Theatre

Price: $24 regular; $20 students/seniors; $16 children
Carrier Theater, Mulroy Civic Center
411 Montgomery St., Syracuse

Read a Review!

Moon Over Buffalo
Baldwinsville Theatre Guild

Price: $15 adults, $12 students
First Presbyterian Church of Baldwinsville
64 Oswego St., Baldwinsville

West Side Story
Skaneateles High School Drama Program

Price: $9 regular, $7 students/seniors
Skaneateles High School
49 E. Elizabeth St., Skaneateles

For more information, phone 315-291-2296.

Moon Over Buffalo
Theatre '90

Price: $19 regular, $16 students/seniors, $12 children under 12
Empire Theater
New York State Fairgrounds, Geddes

Read a Review!

Shakespeare's R&J
Black Box Players
Rodney Hudson, director

Price: Free
Loft Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

The Syracuse University Drama Department will present Shakespeare's R&J, Joe Calarco's all-male adaptation of Shakespeare's most famous love story.

Unlike the traditional Renaissance setting of the tale, Shakespeare's R&J moves the action to modern day, when four students at an all-boys parochial school discover a forbidden copy of Romeo and Juliet. Eager for distraction from reciting their Latin verb conjugations, the boys soon begin performing the play. At first timid in exploring the passionate tale among their teenaged peers, the boys eventually lose their inhibitions and embody the story's characters with a palpable understanding of adolescent love - and lust.

Assistant Director Leslie Noble points out that the all-male cast of R&J relates directly to Romeo and Juliet's beginnings on the stage. "The Elizabethan idea of men playing all the roles coupled with the prep school setting was very compelling and set forth a series of meaty questions," Noble said. "How would the circumstances of their youth and upbringing - the military strictness, the rigid gender roles, the sexual repression, the adolescent innocence - affect the performance of Romeo and Juliet? And how would the act of performing this classic love story affect the boys? What a compelling staging challenge to tell both stories at once!"

To reserve tickets, phone 315-443-2102. The Black Box Theatre has a policy of open seating on a first come, first served basis.

Read a Review!

Molly Sweeney
Redhouse

Price: $33 regular; $26 senior (65 or older); $22 student
Former Redhouse Theater
219 S. West St., Syracuse

This breathtakingly beautiful drama explores the story of one woman's journey from blindness to the seeing world. As the play unfolds from three strikingly different points of view, Brian Friel proves once again why he is considered Ireland's greatest living playwright.

Read a review!

Intimate Apparel
Syracuse Stage
Timothy Douglas, director

Archbold Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

A century ago, playwright Lynn Nottage's grandmother made her way in New York by sewing intimate undergarments for wealthy white socialites and women whose socializing tended more to the mercenary. From this thread of family history, Nottage weaves the appealing and touching drama of Esther Mills, a 35-year-old African-American seamstress and spinster whose search for love leads her to chance romance with George, a young Barbadian working on the Panama Canal. This play is a lovely slice of a New York gone by peopled with rich characters, endearing friendships, and true to life relationships.

Read a Review!

A Midsummer Night's Dream
Syracuse University Drama Department
Lisa Anne Porter, director

Storch Theater, Syracuse Stage
820 E. Genesee St., Syracuse

"The course of true love never did run smooth," but who knew it could be quite so chaotic? Certainly not the straight-laced, would-be lovers who flee to the woods where fairies (mis)rule, rude mechanicals play and order is certainly not the order of the day or night. One of the Bard's most beloved comedies, A Midsummer Night's Dream is Shakespeare's most delirious and comic look at love. Set in Athens, the main plot revolves around two sets of couples, Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius. Their entrance into the play's enchanted woods complicates the couples' romantic entanglements when they meet a band of fairies, including impish Puck, not to mention Bottom the weaver and his "rude mechanicals," who stumble into the action when they go into the same magical woods to rehearse a play that is very loosely (and comically) based on the myth of Pyramus and Thisbe. A Midsummer Night's Dream is an exploration of themes of love, dreams, and the creative imagination.

Read a review!

Sunday, March 5, 2006

Favorite Flix
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Favorite Flix is a traveling exhibition of works by artists from the Society of Illustrators, including many artists with ties to Syracuse University's College of Visual and Performing Arts. The artists all had the same, open-ended assignment -- to illustrate a scene from their favorite movie -- but tackled the project in a variety of ways using various media. From Shine to The Shining, Frankenstein to Frida, the 62 illustrations appeal to a diverse group of moviegoers and art lovers.

Maysles Films: Christo & Jeanne Claude
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

The Maysles began filming the environmental art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude in the early 1970s. The films concentrate on the preparation, installation and realization of each project. Domenico Iacono, associate director of the Syracuse University Art Collection, states that the films have become "lasting documents of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary artwork ...[and] effectively present the scale of these projects or the movement of the fabrics as they are impacted by wind, rain and other environmental factors." Featured works include Surrounded Islands, in which the artists covered 11 islands in Biscayne Bay with bright pink fabric, as well as the installation of an 18-foot high wall which stretched for over 24 miles of northern California countryside, entitled Running Fence. Valley Curtain, Umbrellas and The Pont Neuf Wrapped will also be included in the exhibition.

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956-1959
Lowe Art Gallery

Price: Free
Shaffer Art Building
Syracuse University, Syracuse

Albert Maysles Photographs: 1956 - 1959 presents 39 black-and-white photographs documenting contemporary life at the time of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. A graduate from Syracuse University with a degree in psychology, Maysles gained a tourist visa in 1955 to enter the Soviet Union. He began creating his photo-documentary with images from mental hospitals. His camera often focused on children throughout his travels, as well as travelers asleep in public places. Maysles thought of himself as an observer and believed a camera had the freedom to capture lives without the cultural and personal prejudices of the 1950s.

The Perils of Pauline
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

In this classic serial, Pauline (Pearl White) evades attempts on her life. She fights pirates, Indians, gypsies, rats, sharks, and her dastardly guardian. Her most familiar plight is being tied to railroad tracks with a rapidly approaching train. (1914, 75 min, all ages)

Manos: The Hands of Fate
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater
2384 James St., Syracuse

Classic low budget horror about a family getting lost and stumbling upon a hidden, underground, devil-worshiping cult led by the fearsome Master and his servant Torgo. (1966, 74 min, ages 13 and above)

Pawns of Paradise: Inside the Brutal Kashmir Conflict and Dying to Live: A Migrant's Journey
Alternative Movies and Events

Price: $5
Palace Theater Ballroom
2384 James St., Syracuse

Pawns of Paradise: Inside the Brutal Kashmir Conflict
Flashpoint Kashmir. Could the unthinkable happen tomorrow? India and Pakistan -- both nuke-ready heavyweights -- lay fierce claim to the territory. Journalist Zoltan Istvan is traveling alone in the region -- trying to capture the story of the 12 million Kashmiris who forge their lives in a land beset by 50 years of war and terrorism. (2006, 55 min)

Dying to Live: A Migrant's Journey
Immigration is a complex issue that is changing the face of cultures worldwide. In the United States it is often controversial with many social, economic, political and even religious implications. Dying to Live brings out the human face of the migrant and the face of Christ in the migrant. (2005, 33 min)

Recommended ages 13 and above.