Tag Archives: ACANSA Arts Festival

Tonight at 7, ACANSA presents EINSTEIN!

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ACANSA does more than just present the annual festival in September. They are kicking off their 2019 programming with the one man play Einstein! ~ Celebrating 100 Years of General Relativity

This award-winning one-man show has it all: as dramatic as it is funny, as uplifting as it is contemplative, Albert Einstein comes to life before your very eyes.  This solo play is written and performed by Jack Fry and directed by Tom Blomquist.

This is the multi-award winning and critically acclaimed show that has over 150 performances under its belt.  This 80-minute show is designed for a general audience and has played in many venues around the country.   Einstein comes back from the beyond.

Frustrated that no one has heard the real science history behind General Relativity, Albert takes us back to Berlin in 1914 where he is sent sideways in a world crumbling around him due to The Great War, colleagues trying to steal his theories, being isolated for his pacifist views, a wife who won’t give him a divorce, his failing health, a huge scientific backlash, anti-Semitism, his own self destructive genius, and his 10-year old son fighting for his father’s affections.  Told with humor, 3D graphics that help give us an insight to his brilliant mind,  Albert Einstein comes to life as Jack Fry revitalizes one of the most intriguing icons of all time.

The program will be at the Argenta Community Theatre. Doors open at 6pm, the performance starts at 7pm. Tickets are $30.

LR Culture Vulture turns 7

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The Little Rock Culture Vulture debuted on Saturday, October 1, 2011, to kick off Arts & Humanities Month.

The first feature was on the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, which was kicking off its 2011-2012 season that evening.  The program consisted of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 4 in A, Op. 90, Rossini’s, Overture to The Italian Girl in Algiers, Puccini’s Chrysanthemums and Respighi’s Pines of Rome.  In addition to the orchestra musicians, there was an organ on stage for this concert.

Since then, there have been 10,107 persons/places/things “tagged” in the blog.  This is the 3,773rd entry. (The symmetry to the number is purely coincidental–or is it?)  It has been viewed over 288,600 times, and over 400 readers have made comments.  It is apparently also a reference on Wikipedia.

The most popular pieces have been about Little Rock history and about people in Little Rock.

Spend Midsummer evenings at A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM this weekend

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ACANSA Arts Festival presents Free Shakespeare this weekend!
Spend a mid-summer evening enjoying A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM July 20-22.  All performances take place at the Clinton Center Ampitheater, 6:30 pm.
The event is totally free- no tickets are required, audience members can just come as they are to any and every show.
“ACANSA is so pleased to be working with the Clinton Center to bring this wonderful show to the community,” noted ACANSA executive director Dillon Hupp.  “Shakespeare is timeless, and we are thrilled to offer three entirely free performances of a Midsummer Night’s Dream next weekend. We hope you will make your plans to join us and support some wonderful local artists!”
Image may contain: sky, grass, tree, outdoor and nature A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM is a romantic comedy that follows young lovers on the run and a group of amateur actors on their journey deep into the forest of Athens where they unknowingly stumble into the fairy kingdom. When the worlds collide, chaos ensues and the fairies realize they’ve made a mistake that has to be corrected before sunrise.

What to Bring:
Picnic, bug spray & sunblock
Concessions will be available.

Seating:
The natural amphitheater overlooking the Arkansas River and Rock Island Bridge. Bring a blanket and pillows for the best seating locations.

Limited locations:
Camping chairs
Wheelchair accessible

Donate:
Donations will be accepted at the event to benefit Arkansas Repertory Theatre.

LR Women Making History – Charlotte Gadberry

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Charlotte Gadberry has long been a supporter of Little Rock’s various cultural institutions. She has both served on boards and consulted with boards in strategic planning.  Her major focus these past few years has been the founding of the ACANSA Arts Festival.

A trip to Charleston, South Carolina, amid it’s Spoleto USA arts festival inspired her to dream that Little Rock could play host to a similar endeavor.  Using her fundraising prowess and connections, she started to raise funds, friends and awareness for this idea.

In September 2013, the inaugural ACANSA Arts Festival was announced for September 2014.  Under her leadership, ACANSA (a name derived from an early Native American variation of what is now called Arkansas) incorporated both local cultural institutions as well as performers brought in for the event.

In the first four years ACANSA has featured theatre, dance, mime, puppetry, instrumental music, choral music, opera, jazz, painting, photography, history, lectures, and gallery tours.  It has worked with the Arkansas Arts Center, Arkansas Repertory Theatre, Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, Ballet Arkansas, Central Arkansas Library System, Mosaic Templars Cultural Center, and Wildwood Park for the Arts as well as numerous galleries and performance venues.

Because of her efforts to found ACANSA and lead it, Charlotte is being honored with an Arkansas Arts Council 2018 Governor’s Arts Award on March 29, 2018.

Arkansas Gives today from 8am to 8pm

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If you are like me, you’ve been receiving notifications about Arkansas Gives Day for months.  Well, today is the day!  From 8am until 8pm, you can help grow the love for Arkansas’s nonprofit organizations by making a donation to the charity of your choice.  The event is sponsored by the Arkansas Community Foundation.

As a special incentive to give, each gift made through ArkansasGives on April 6, 2017, will be matched with additional bonus dollars; the more you give, the more bonus dollars your favorite charity will receive.

Nonprofit organizations and other tax-exempt charitable organizations may participate if they:

  • Are headquartered in Arkansas or have a base of operations in Arkansas.
  • Have 501(c)(3) tax exempt status under IRS code AND are qualified as a 509(a)(1), (a)(2) or (a)(3) organization or as a private operating foundation.

The minimum amount is $25; there is no maximum amount you may give. You may designate up to 10 charities per transaction.

Accepted Forms of Payment: Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express credit cards online.
You will receive an email receipt of your gift; please retain it for tax purposes. Unless you choose to remain anonymous, your donor information will be sent to the nonprofits to which you give.

Here is a list of cultural organizations which offer services within the boundaries of the City of Little Rock.

 

There are MANY MANY MANY other worthy nonprofits which are participating. But since this is a culture blog, only the cultural institutions are listed.  But please consider visiting the website and perusing the entire list.

Creative Class 2016: Werner Trieschmann

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cc16-treischmannWerner Trieschmann is a playwright-teacher-writer-you could keep adding hyphens and words.

His numerous plays — including Dog Star, Wrought Iron, and Killers — have been staged by Moving Arts in Los Angeles, Ensemble Studio Theatre in New York City, The New Theatre in Boston, Mobtown Players in Baltimore, and Red Octopus Productions in Little Rock. Werner was a resident at the Mount Sequoyah New Play Retreat in Fayetteville. His play Lawn Dart won first prize in the Contemporary Arts Center of New Orleans New Play Competition. He was the first playwright to receive the Porter Prize, an Arkansas literary award recognizing outstanding achievement by an Arkansas writer.

Werner’s play Disfarmer about Arkansas photographer Mike Disfarmer, was featured in Theatre Squared’s Arkansas New Play Festival. It was subsequently mounted at the first ACANSA Arts Festival.

His full-length comedy You Have to Serve Somebody is published by the Dramatic Publishing Company; several of his short plays are published by Playscripts, Inc.; his dark one-act comedy Killers is published through Original Works Publishing; and a monologue from Killers is included in the The Best Women’s Stage Monologues 1999, published by Smith & Kraus. Werner has an MFA in Playwriting from Boston University. He is a Theatre Arts professor at Pulaski Technical College and an adjunct faculty member at Hendrix College, his alma mater.  He has also served as a dramaturg at the Arkansas Repertory Theatre and was a writer for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.  

Creative Class 2016: Christen Burke Pitts

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cc16-pittsDancer and choreographer only defines two of Christen Burke Pitts‘s involvement with the arts.  She and her family are also active supporters of the Arkansas film industry and are patrons of all of the performing arts.  But it is in dance that Christen probably makes her largest impact.

Since 1996, she has been the founder and director of the NLRHS Dance Program.  In that capacity, she teaches scores of students each year as well as choreographs musicals, plans workshops, and produces dance performances.  She received the 2012 Governor’s Arts in Education Award from the Arkansas Arts Council and was also named the 2012 Arkansas Communication and Theatre Arts Association Teacher of the Year.

Christen holds her MEd from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and a BA in Drama/minor in Dance Performance from the University of Arkansas. She studied ballet, tap, jazz, modern, pointe, and musical theatre with various instructors across the country and trained at workshops/intensives with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, MOMIX, Pilobolus, Luigi, Frank Hatchett, Finis Jhung, Bill Hastings, and many others.

Christen has performed in over fifty shows throughout the South including Damn Yankees at the Arkansas Repertory Theatre, the Shoji Tabuchi Show and The Crystal Gayle Show in Branson, and numerous industrial shows. She has appeared in local and national commercials, “The Ernest Green Story” on The Disney Channel, and in television specials on The Family Channel. Christen was a company member of the Memphis Dance Ensemble and the University of Arkansas Dance Company.

She has taught dance workshops for the ARC National Performing Arts Camp, the Arkansas Repertory Theatre (Summer Theater Intensive-Camp Rep), Arkansas Communication and Theatre Arts Association, and Arkansas Dance Network. A co-founder of the Arkansas Dance Network, she has also served been affiliated with ACANSA Arts Festival, the THEA Foundation, Arkansas Festival Ballet, and Argenta Community Theatre, among others.