A campaign to stop violence against women

Eve Enseler's The Vagina Monologues will be read at the Moose Exchange at 8 pm on Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday, Feb. 13, 14, and 16 as part of the Bloomsburg University College Campaign V-Day.

On Thursday, Feb. 14, the Moose will also host One Billion Rising at 9:30 pm. On Friday, Feb 15, at 8 pm there will be a reading of A Memory, A Monologue, A Rant And A Prayer: Writings To Stop Violence Against Women and Girls.

Tickets available at the door: $7 students with BU ID  and $10 general public. Proceeds benefit: Women’s Center Inc., Columbia Montour Family Health, and Beyond Violence. The events are sponsored by Bloomsburg Players and The Center for The Visual and Performing Arts.

Miscellanea: Beginnings, closings, readings and taxes

Bloomsburg University’s annual Chinese New Year Party, sponsored by the BU Chinese Student Association and Chinese Faculty, will begin at noon Saturday, Feb. 9, in Kehr Union Ballroom. The potluck dinner will be served at 1 p.m., followed by music and dance programs. For information, contact Ju Xin, associate professor of physics and adviser of the Chinese Student Association, (570) 389-5309.

***

A reception to close an exhibit of photography by Tomiko Jones will be held from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday, Feb. 11, in Bloomsburg University’s Haas Gallery of Art. For information, contact Rebecca Morgan, art gallery associate, (570) 389-4708 or rmorgan@bloomu.edu.

***

Bloomsburg University English faculty members Anne Dyer Stuart and Jerry Wemple will read from their personal works at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 12, in BU’s Monty’s Assembly Room, Upper Campus. Each will present their manuscripts-in-progress: Stuart from How to Behave after Murder and Wemple from The Artemas Poems. For information, contact the BU English Department, (570) 389-4427. The reading is part of the Big Dog Reading Series.

***

Discussions on faith 

Dr. Ian Wendt, history department, Bloomsburg University, will give a talk “One God, Many Gods: Diverse Hindu Paths” on Thursday, Feb. 21, at 7 pm in McCormick Center, room 1303.

Dr. Jeffrey Long, Professor of Religious Studies and Department Chair, Elizabethtown College, will give a talk “Buddhism: Origins, Philosophy, and Practice” on Tuesday, March 12, at 7 pm in Hartline Science Center, Kuster Auditorium, Hartline.

***

Free tax help for qualified residents of Columbia and Montour counties is available from the Student Accounting Association at Bloomsburg University. Help will be available from 4 to 8 p.m. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday from Monday, Feb. 11, to Wednesday, April 10, at Wesley United Methodist Church, 130 W. Third St., Bloomsburg. The site will be closed March 18, 19 and 20. No appointments are needed. To learn more about the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program, visit the IRS website or contact Gabriel Genovese, accounting instructor, (570) 389-5234 or ggenoves@bloomu.edu.

Chops: Guitar and Compositional

Matthew Slotkin, Bloomsburg University's guitar professor, will give a solo recital Wednesday, Feb. 6, at 7:30 pm in Carver Hall, Gross Auditorium.

* * * 

Linda Buckley, a composer based in Dublin, will give a lecture Thursday, Feb. 7, at 5 pm in Haas Center for the Arts, room 166. Buckley is a member of the Spatial Music Collective, dedicated to the creation and presentation of spatial acoustic and electroacoustic music. She studied Music at University College Cork, and Music and Media Technologies at Trinity College Dublin. She holds a Ph.D in Composition from Trinity College, where she also lectures.

And now for something completely silly ...

The National Broadway Tour of Monty Python’s “Spamalot” will appear Friday, Feb. 8 at 8 p.m. at Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania’s Haas Center for the Arts, Mitrani Hall.

Tickets for the Celebrity Artist Series presentation cost $34.50 for adults, $19.50 for children and $17 for BU students. Based on the work of Eric Idle, Mike Nichols and John Du Prez, the theater production won a Tony Award for Best Musical in 2005. With a plot ripped from the film “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table encounter dozens of bizarre obstacles, including the taunting Frenchmen and an over-zealous dead body removal service.

Between the outrageous antics and absurd-yet-catchy songs, the Sunday Times says the show “[raised] silliness to an art form.”

Upcoming productions for BU’s Celebrity Artist Series’ 2012-13 season include:

• Luciana Souza – Sunday, Feb. 17, 2013, at 7:30 p.m. in Carver Hall, Kenneth S. Gross Auditorium. Tickets: $29.50 
• DALA – Friday, April 5, 2013, at 7:30 p.m. in Carver Hall, Kenneth S. Gross Auditorium. Tickets: $29.50
• Kathy Mattea – Friday, April 26, 2013, at 8 p.m. in the Haas Center for the Arts, Mitrani Hall. Tickets: $34.50 
• Nai-Ni Chen with the Ahn Trio – Saturday, May 11, 2013, at 8 p.m. in the Haas Center for the Arts, Mitrani Hall. Tickets: $34.50 

 For tickets or more information, visit www.bloomu.edu/cas or call the box office at (570) 389-4409.

What I want to know is how they'll handle the "Black Knight" scene on a stage. — EGF

Reflections on Shakespeare ...

Some thoughts on Shakespeare after seeing BTE's As You Like It with my wife and eight-year-old daughter on Friday.

Walking to the show, Sofie (the eight-year-old) announced that she knows all about Shakespeare ...

A girl dresses up as a boy and proves that girls can do everything boys can do.

(Sofie has seen She's the Man, an absolutely fabulous tween film adaption of Twelfth Night that manages to be simultaneously fresh and fairly faithful.)

That's the thing about Shakespeare. You can adapt it, streamline it, or go huge and it remains essentially awesome.

But whether live or even on film, there is nothing like seeing Shakespeare performed. The words are so stuffed with meanings ... it's almost too much to absorb comfortably by reading. A handful of lines can almost stand as plays in themselves.

An interesting (and unusual) metaphor for the density of information is pure perfume oil described by Luca Turin in his (unexpectedly interesting) book Perfume ...

Pure oils tend to have very dense smells in which the components are hard to discern, which can make you miss most of the point of a well-crafted perfume. It's as if the story of the fragrance were written in very small print. The appropriate dilution opens up the fragrance and makes it legible to your nose. 

And so it is with Shakespeare for me. Somehow a performance gives the words space and room so the mind can unravel and contemplate them.

A few more random thoughts about the BTE production.

• The rock band on stage had a cool Brian Eno/Robert Fripp vibe going. 
• For me, Daniel Roth in particular brought a memorable dignity to the melancholic Jacques (of the "All the world's a stage" speech.) 

— EFG.

PS: FWIW. Here's a vote for Twelfth Night.

Photo realism ...?

Tomiko Jones is exhibiting at Haas Gallery of Art through Feb. 11. The exhibit is open to the public free of charge Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Saturday from noon to 2 p.m. A reception will be Monday, Feb. 11, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the gallery.

 Jones’ work consists of sculptural video installations and “questionably fictional photographs.” Her videos are essentially moving photographs, showing an authentic scene with innovative angles and perpetual movement.

Jones received a Master of Fine Arts in photography with a certificate in museum studies from the University of Arizona in Tucson in 2008. She has received various awards, including the national Society for Photographic Education Freestyle Crystal Apple Award for Outstanding Achievement. She teaches 3D Concepts at Drury University in Springfield, Mo., as part of a summer intensive Master of Arts Program

Miscellanea: Dine for kidsburg

Dine for Kidsburg 2.0: Dine a Balzano's in Wednesdays in January and 10 percent of food sales will benefit Kidsburg 2.0.

***

Looking ahead to ArtWalk-In: The 2013 ArtWalk-In will be Thursday, Feb. 21, from 4 to 8 pm at the Moose Exchange.  To have your work exhibited during this unparalleled annual event, contact the Bloomsburg ArtWalk committee at bloomartwalk@hotmail.com. Space limited, applications due February 1, with $25 fee.