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The Houston Ballet performs at Northrop October 20.

Liquid movement. Abstract experimental ballet. An explosive amalgam of jazz, modern, and ballet styles. The 2007–08 Northrop Dance Season opens in October with three notable dance companies vastly different in approach, content, and execution, providing audiences with a rich excursion in contemporary dance.

Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan first visited the Northrop stage in 2003 with “Cursive,” a work in which choreographer Lin Hwai-Min quietly spelled out the similarities between choreographed bodies moving through space and the dancing brushwork of Chinese calligraphy. Through Hwai-Min’s movement vocabulary—a mix of martial arts, modern dance, and ballet—the dancers’ bodies become the animated signatures of the calligraphy project on stage, while the actual calligraphy resembled dancing bodies captured mid-move.

This year, Cloud Gate returns with “Wild Cursive” (October 13), a work reportedly far more fierce than the earlier one. The reason? Hwai-Min was inspired by the ancient Chinese art of “wild calligraphy,” in which written characters are set free from their normal forms, allowing those who write them to express their inner state. While the 19 black-clad dancers embody a turbulent representation of this style, an element of calm is created as banners of white rice paper fall to the stage marked by trails of black ink that drip, seep, and feather into free-form patterns.

The following weekend, the high-powered Houston Ballet brings three contemporary works to Northrop (October 20). Artistic director Stanton Welch’s quicksilver “Velocity,” set to angular music by composer Michael Torke, puts the female dancers in paper-thin tutus and on point to expose their classical technique. In contrast, Welch’s “Clear,” an artistic response to 9/11 set to music by Bach, showcases the male dancers’ aggressive exuberance, while keeping a solitary woman at the work’s core.

Associate choreographer Christopher Bruce also contributes “Hush” to this concert, set to tracks from the Hush album by Bobby McFerrin and Yo-Yo Ma. According to Bruce, the work was inspired by one of Ma’s liner notes: “Hush is a musical celebration of life—from youth to old age.” As such, the cast includes a family—mother, father, and four children—who dance through a lighthearted series of situations.

Philadelphia’s Koresh Dance Company debuts at Northrop with “Looking Back: the Music of the ’40s and ’50s” (November 13). Founded in 1991 by Israeli-born choreographer and artistic director Ronen Koresh, the company is renowned for both its eloquence and explosive energy. Pairing iconic songs with imaginative dance, “Looking Back” features a jazz-tango set to Louis Armstrong’s “Kiss of Fire,” men dancing with invisible partners during Dean Martin’s “Sway,” and a delightful Lindy Hop to Benny Goodman’s “Sing, Sing, Sing.” Songs by the likes of Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Elvis Presley, and Frank Sinatra also get the royal treatment in this choreographic salute.

All performances take place at Northrop Auditorium, 84 Church St. SE, on the East Bank of the Minneapolis campus. For information on the entire Northrop Dance Season or for tickets, go to www.northrop.umn.edu or call 612-624-2345.

Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan comes to Northrop October 13.

Music

German composer Kurt Weill’s ballet chanté (“sung ballet”) The Seven Deadly Sins, with German libretto by Bertolt Brecht, has long attracted adventurous artists. In November, the Opera Theatre at the University of Minnesota’s School of Music tackles the “story of a woman used and abused by the world,” says David Walsh, associate professor and director of University Opera Theatre. “The basic idea of the piece is that this girl from a small town in Louisiana rises through the ‘ranks’—from stripper/cabaret dancer to showgirl to model/actress,” he explains. “In the process, her natural charm and beauty are replaced with a kind of cold, hard, and artificial glamour. It’s the kind of journey that Hollywood makes famous, or notorious, depending on your point of view.”

The central character, Anna, is actually portrayed by two performers—a singer and a dancer. Anna 1, the singer, is the practical one who feels she must control the creative, impulsive, exuberant Anna 2, the dancer. Theoretically the two are identical twin sisters. But soon into the production they’re revealed as different sides of the same personality.

It’s a device Brecht used to demonstrate the schizophrenic nature of modern human existence, of someone “caught between the desire to be true to oneself and one’s innermost feelings, and the cravings and temptations generated by our materialistic, consumer society—a society driven by the notion that even art is a product,” Walsh explains. “There are clearly two different Annas and the result is the destruction of a person. It’s not a laugh-a-minute piece, that’s for sure.”

Walsh says he sharpened Brecht’s societal criticism further by translating the libretto himself, “to make it less poetic and more to do with the character of Anna and what is meant when she’s paid for her services. So it’s a bit hard-hitting in that respect.” Walsh also wanted to sharpen the work’s primary theme: the destruction of innocence and idealism. “The moral of the story is this: If you want to ‘make it,’ you have to learn to ‘play the game,’ often through blatant hypocrisy and exploitation of others.”

The story of The Seven Deadly Sins hasn’t changed since the 1930s, Walsh insists, “because unfortunately people haven’t changed.” The staging of the production, however, will bring the opera into the 21st century. “Our contemporary statement will be apparent in the clothes and in certain props that wouldn’t have existed back in the 1930s, like a cell phone.”

Vocalist Julie Brousseau sings the part of Anna 1, and Anna 2 will be danced by Chelsey Korus. Both appeared in Walsh’s production of Weill’s Street Scene last year.

The Seven Deadly Sins runs November 8 through 11 at the Ted Mann Concert Hall, 2128 Fourth St. S., on the West Bank of the Minneapolis campus. For information and tickets, go to www.music.umn.edu or call 612-624-2345.

Northrop Jazz Season

The 2007–08 Northrop Jazz Season opens its 14th year of concert-hall performances with the eminently enjoyable Pat Metheny Trio (October 14). Moody and atmospheric, Metheny’s stylistically innovative music has a signature looseness that belies its complex rhythms and clear articulation.

The Koresh Dance Company appears at Northrop November 13.

For this engagement, Metheny is joined by bassist Christian McBride and jazz drummer Antonio Sanchez. The jazz series continues with Bill Frisell’s compositions based on photographer Mike Disfarmer’s portraits of people living in Heber Springs, Arkansas, in the 1940s (October 27). “Musical Portraits from Heber Springs: Bill Frisell’s Disfarmer Project” features Greg Leisz on lap steel guitar and Jenny Scheinman on violin, as Frisell explores postwar rural life through his unique musical vocabulary. The fall season concludes with Steven Bernstein’s Millennial Territory Orchestra (December 1) reintroducing audiences to obscure jazz treasures from the 1920s and ’30s with a nine-piece, free-jazz band.

For more information, go to www.northrop.umn.edu or call 612-624-2345.

Theater

While Arthur Miller’s The Crucible takes place in 1692 during the witch hunts of Salem, Massachusetts, the Pulitzer Prize–winning American playwright wrote the story in 1953 during the McCarthy “witch hunts,” when—under U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy’s instigation—Americans were accusing each other of pro-Communist beliefs. Miller himself faced the House of Un-American Activities Committee, was found guilty of beliefs in communism, then found the verdict reversed in a 1957 appeals court.

The story of rising over adversity and standing for the truth even to death, however, is a timeless one, argues Kenneth Mitchell, acting instructor in the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater BFA Actor Training Program. “There’s always a witch hunt going on in our culture, whether on a political or social level,” Mitchell says. “Especially now, since 9/11, when anyone from the Middle East is looked on with suspicion and doubt.”

This fall, the senior class of the BFA program tackles The Crucible in a staging that “will be kept in New England’s Puritan times,” Mitchell explains, “yet have a modern sensibility. So the feel will be classical and contemporary.” Miller’s singular writing style will also be retained, as it simply and dramatically brings out the evil quality of Abigail and the other girls who wrongly accuse townspeople; the gullibility of the judges; and the absurdity and tragedy of the story’s events.

“Miller’s text is so strong and the language so beautiful in this play about integrity and redemption,” Mitchell says. “Everyone in the play goes through their own personal crucible, their own melting down to who they truly are. And that experience is timeless. It’s in the moments of extreme crisis that we find out who we really are.”

The Crucible will be performed October 26 through November 3 in the Whiting Proscenium Theatre at the Rarig Center, 330 21st Ave. S., on the West Bank of the Minneapolis campus. For more information or tickets, go to www.theatre.umn.edu or call 612-624-2345.

Diverse Voices

In March 1988, Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., created for education of the deaf and hard-of-hearing, experienced a watershed event. Outraged at the selection of another hearing president, students protested until she resigned and was replaced by I. King Jordan, Gallaudet’s first deaf president in its 124-year history. A movement was born, Deaf President Now (DPN), which has become synonymous with the self-determination and empowerment of deaf and hard-of-hearing people around the world.

In 2006, campus activists mobilized again when Gallaudet announced that provost Jane Fernandes would succeed Jordan. Fernandes was a deaf educator raised in an oral-education program that taught her to speak, rather than in a sign-language program. Even though Fernandes later learned American Sign Language (ASL), DPN protested her presidential appointment.

Evonne Bilotta-Burke, a sign-language interpreter at the University of Minnesota, explores these controversies in her original documentary script, Inside the Gate, which will be read by Diverse Voices (September 17). A collaborative, staged reading by students from the University Theatre, the Xperimental Theater, and local high schools, Diverse Voices was created to showcase themes and issues that address underrepresented communities. Inside the Gate will be read in English and in sign language simultaneously, putting hearing and hearing-challenged members of the audience on equal footing.

For more information, visit www. theatre.umn.edu.

Speakers

No science background is necessary to attend Café Scientifique; just bring your questions and a genuine interest in the pressing science issues of our time. The goal of Café Scientifique is to demystify science while helping the curious understand and engage in the scientific topics affecting our world.

The first Café Scientifique, created by Duncan Dallas, was held in Leeds, England, in 1998. Inspired by the Cafés Philosophiques in France, Dallas decided to create a similar forum for topical scientific ideas and set it in lively non-academic surroundings. The idea was to bring people together in a friendly pub after work to hear an informal introduction—by an expert—on a current scientific topic. Questions and answers and general discussion would follow.

That forum was so successful that, since then, such cafes have sprouted up around the world. The Minneapolis branch of Café Scientifique, which is run by the University’s Bell Museum of Natural History, began four years ago to help the museum fulfill its goals for public engagement, says Shanai Matteson (B.A. ’05), program coordinator and host. “The Bell was also interested in reaching a younger audience,” she adds, “people in their 20s and 30s who aren’t usually involved in the Bell’s programming.”

That’s why the Minneapolis installments of Café Scientifique take place at some of hippest spots in town. Plus, Café Scientifique audiences—regardless of age—largely consist of people who are interested in science but lack the opportunity to discuss their views with someone in the know. In other words, the speakers don’t require, or expect, scientific knowledge on the part of the audience. So anyone can participate and no question is “stupid.”

The theme of this year’s Minneapolis Café Scientifique is “Seeing Change” and focuses on “the intersections of people and environment,” Matteson says. The series kicks off on September 10 at 7 p.m. at the Loring Pasta Bar in Dinkytown, when a panel of University experts discusses the future of science, the questions and challenges

Zhang Qunzi and Her Two Daughters, Mengjin County, Henan, 1996, by Jiang Jian

facing researchers, and the role of culture and technology in the evolution of science education and policy.

The series continues on September 18 at 7 p.m. in the theater at the Bryant-Lake Bowl in the Lyn-Lake neighborhood of south Minneapolis. A panel of behavioral psychologists (Christie Manning, Elise Amel, and Brian Scott) tackles the question, “Is America Seeing Green?” As Minnesotans become increasingly aware of such green technologies as wind energy, energy-saving appliances, and fuel-efficient cars, green living has become de rigeur. But—as people strive to incorporate these technologies and other green strategies into their everyday lives—is the sustainable trend really sustainable? The panel will evaluate, with input from the audience, why people go green and whether the green life we’re pursuing today is valuable for the long-term health of the planet.

Other Café Scientifique topics this fall cover agriculture and landscape ecology; changes in urban landscapes through planning; and geology and fluid dynamics on the Mississippi River. “I try to pick out topics that are intriguing, cutting-edge, and culturally relevant, especially when they coincide with policy,” Matteson explains. “This year, the environment, and particularly climate change, are on everyone’s minds, just as we enter an election year.”

For more information, go to www.bellmuseum.org or call 612-624-9050.

Museums and Galleries

Documenting China: Contemporary Photography and Social Change

In the Western world, the transformation from an agrarian-based rural life to an urban-industrial way of life was a gradual process that, in some countries, occurred over more than a hundred years. In China, however, that change is progressing at a breakneck pace. 

Until the 1970s, three-quarters of China’s population lived in isolated rural areas where they maintained their traditional lifestyles. In the last 20 years, however, hundreds of workers from rural fields and factories have flooded the cities in search of a better life, their traditions clashing with mechanized, digitized, 21st-century culture and its pop icons.

The seven Chinese photographers featured in “Documenting China: Contemporary Photography and Social Change” at the Weisman Art Museum have recorded that change with vivid, candid images. Curated by Gu Zheng of Fudan University in Shanghai and organized by the Bates College Museum of Art in Maine in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, the show focuses on the impacts of urbanization and industrialization in China from insiders’ points of view.

“This exhibition isn’t through a news lens or through the financial or economic lens of a business journal, but through the artistic and visual point of view of Chinese documentary photographers,” explains Diane Mullin, the coordinator of the exhibition. “It’s a unique point of view for westerners from a country that’s front and center in global politics and culture.”

Only one photographer, Liu Xiaodi, presents images of rural peasants from the 1970s in iconic portraits of Maoist China. The rest provide contrasting documents from the 1990s, many of which depict the harsh

The swan diormama is based on a scene from in Bloomington in the 1940s.

realities of dehumanizing work and culture shock. Zhang Xinmin’s raw photographs show peasants who have migrated to the cities in search of work only to find themselves at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder. Zhou Hai captures industrial workers swathed in smoke, steam, or grime, staring defiantly at the camera.

Conversely, Jiang Jian’s color portraits tenderly depict peasant families in their homes, while Lu Yuanmin’s sepia-toned portraits document the middle-class apartments in which objects both past and present find unlikely juxtaposition. Luo Yongjin has photographed the cities’ new modern architecture. And a panoramic shot by Zhou Ming captures Shanghai’s Disneyesque skyline.

With China in the news on a weekly basis, Mullin hopes the exhibition will “contribute to our ongoing intellectual engagement with China. Here’s a way to think through China and its effects on the world at a deeper level, see China from an insider’s perspective, and contemplate photography’s role in our lives.”

Documenting China runs September 8 through November 25 at the Weisman, 333 E. River Road, on the East Bank of the Minneapolis campus. For information, go to www.weisman.umn.edu or call 612-625-9494.

Here by Design III: Process and Prototype

Since the exhibition “Here by Design” premiered in 2001, the world that Minnesota designers inhabit has changed radically. “There’s been a huge shift in design technology in terms of digital fabrication and rapid prototyping,” explains curator James Boyd-Brent, associate professor of graphic design in the University’s College of Design. “It really wasn’t on the radar six years ago and now it’s unavoidable.”

Digital fabrication refers to the creation of objects via computer. Rapid prototyping—developed to test equipment for large-scale manufacturing—encompasses such methods of digital fabrication as 3-D printing and stereo-lithography. The two come together when digital fabrication methods are used to manufacture objects in small numbers, resulting in a new rapid manufacturing capability.

“Today, rapid prototyping affects design thinking and digital fabrication plays a major part in design production,” Boyd-Brent says. “There’s a whole new world of possibilities for designers, in terms of speeding up production time and envisioning vast numbers of possible iterations for a project.”

The third installment of “Here by Design” at the Goldstein Museum of Design, “Here by Design III: Process and Prototype,” examines “the new possibilities these technologies open up for designers,” Boyd-Brent says. For instance, the Mount’n Mover, prototyped by BlueSky Designs, Inc., secures a variety of devices to wheelchairs, beds, and workstations and can be easily unlocked and repositioned.

Marc Swackhamer, an assistant professor of architecture who investigates how techniques of digital fabrication can address sustainability and speed of assembly, prefabrication, and affordability, has developed an acoustic wall of interlocking panels that also serves as a piece of furniture. “It’s a complex system that exemplifies how digital fabrication can, paradoxically, bolster the idea of craft in design,” says Boyd-Brent.

Using computer-aided design, the

Icarus Too, 2005, by Gary Hallman

architectural firm Vince James and Associates devised a folded-and-perforated stainless-steel skin that’s part of a prefabricated building kit ready to assemble into a dynamic structure on site. One of its first uses will be as a guard house at the base of a gate house at the University of Cincinnati. “Designed to be visually dynamic during the day, it will transform into a lantern-like colored veil at night,” explains Jennifer Yoos, a principal at the firm.

“Here by Design” runs October 20 through January 20 at the Goldstein, 240 McNeal Hall, 1985 Buford Ave., on the St. Paul campus. For information, go to www.goldstein.che.umn.edu or call 612-624-7434.

Behind the Diorama Glass

‘‘Dioramas are the hallmarks of traditional national history museums in North America,” says Don Luce, curator of exhibits at the Bell Museum of Natural History. During the first half of the 20th century, dioramas were a radically new interpretation—and presentation—of nature as a living system of interconnection. Featuring painted backgrounds executed in exquisite detail, they introduced viewers to the importance of habitat. Today, they’re “time capsules” of the natural world as it once existed. Says Luce: “Dioramas were the original virtual reality.”

Many natural-history museums around the country, however, are retiring their dioramas. Not the Bell Museum. “When you stack our dioramas up against others around the world, the Bell’s are considered one of the top three in terms of quality,” Luce says. “They’re a remarkable, unique resource in Minnesota.”

As the Bell gears up for its move to new digs next year, it’s mounting a new exhibition that provides a behind-the-scenes look at how its dioramas were constructed. The show, “Behind the Diorama Glass,” includes “cool stories about who made the dioramas and why,” Luce explains, along with photographs of the dioramas in process, molds and tools used, and models prepared beforehand. “This show will get at the heart of how dioramas combine art and science.”

“Behind the Diorama Glass” runs November 10 through February 10 at the Bell Museum, 10 Church St. SE, on the East Bank of the Minneapolis campus. For information, go to www.bellmuseum.org or call 612-624-7083.

Retrospectives

Gary Hallman pioneered the use of digital technology in creating his photography. His sometimes iconic, often quirky images are the hallmarks of major collections around the country. Guy Baldwin is a sculptor whose kinetic works might emit sounds or move along a gallery floor. Both are distinguished faculty members in the University of Minnesota’s Department of Art and receive a joint retrospective at the Katherine E. Nash Gallery this fall. In a prior faculty exhibition, Baldwin’s motorized sculpture featured a calligraphy brush that swept marks across paper, an image of artistic resonance that technologically predates Hallman’s synthetic and narrative imagery.

“Retrospectives” runs October 9 through November 8 at the Nash Gallery, 405 21st Ave. S., on the West Bank of the Minneapolis campus. For information, go to www.nash.umn.edu or call 612-624-6518.

Camille LeFevre (B.A. ’81) is a St. Paul–based freelance writer.