Culturally Speaking

By Cornelia Seckel
ART TIMES online October 2011

These are just a few of the places and events I visited this past month. More, including details of the Catharine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club's 115th Annual Exhibit, The Audubon Artists 69th Annual Exhibition, The Pastel Society of America's 39th Annual Exhibit, Merce Cunningham's Legacy Tour and the Chagall exhibition in High Falls, NY (thru Oct 30) will be in the upcoming November/ December Culturally Speaking column.

A performance at the Passage to India fundraiser at Opus 40, Saugerties, NY. Primilla Dixit Nag, Director of Big Medicine Charitable Trust(R) spoke about the Trust and why the Vanaver Caravan has been invited to perform at the Shilpgram Festival in Udaipur India on December 30th (attended by over 200,000 people).
Ten members of the Vanaver Caravan will be staying on in India for 3 weeks visiting schools and performing locally and beginning the preliminary planning stages for an ongoing relationship with the newly formed Shakti Academy for Dance and Healing Arts. This will involve a mentoring and teacher training project in establishing their dance program. For further information and to make a donation to the Caravan to support their contact artistic director Livia Vanaver at livdance@aol.com •or• www.vanavercaravan.org

The opening reception at Upstream Gallery, Dobbs Ferry, NY of "Reunion". This exhibit honors the work of over 40 artists who have been or are members of this cooperative gallery, the oldest in Westchester. For more about this gallery and their members see www.upstreamgallery.com

Eve Waltermaurer (l), president of the Rosendale Theatre Collective board, accepting the award on behalf of the theatre from Barbara Cohen (r), Chairperson of Fall for Art— an annual fundraising event in Kingston, NY that supports the work of the Ulster County Jewish Federation and presents a check to an outstanding arts organization in the Hudson Valley.
For more about Fall for Art and the Federation www.ucjf.org

See video

Garllic Festival cocktail party (L to R) Gail Abate, Mery Rosado, Fran Garofalo, Faye Wood, Angela Gaffney-Smith, Carol Zaloom, Andrea Cunliffe (Gail and Mery) staff at the Cafe and artists who have designed the Garlic Festival Posters at an exhibit of these posters at Cafe Mezzaluna in Saugerties, NY

The Garlic Festival is an annual event sponsored by the Kiwanis Club of Saugerties, NY. Each year over 50,000 people attend this 2-day celebration of "the stinking rose".
The money received from the festival goes back to the Saugerties community as Scholarships for students, Donations to non-profit organizations within the Hudson Valley, including programs such as the Boys and Girls Club, Boy Scouts of America, Coats for Kids, Girl Scouts of America, Historical Society, Seamon’s Park, Saugerties High School Key Club, Saugerties High School Scholarships, Special Olympics, Kamp Kiwanis, Karing for Kids, Saugerties Library, School Supplies for Kids, Ulster Literacy, Toddler Town, Ulster Crime Victims, Seamon’s Park Holiday Celebration and various sports teams. They also give assistance with the purchase of community quality-of-life-enhancing facilities such as an ice skating rink, purchased in February of 1998, to better serve the communities’ diverse sports and other life interests. For more about the festival www.hudsonvalleygarlic.com

The National Academy Museum and School, NYC, celebrated the reopening of the Museum with newly renovated galleries and entranceway. “Will Barnet at 100” was the featured exhibition and a group exhibition of former and current members including Samuel Morse, Thomas Cole, Asher B. Durand, Jasper Francis Cropsey, Frederic Edwin Church, Albert Bierstadt, and William Merritt Chase.