Student Arts Grants: A Year in Photos 2015-16

From calypso to classical opera, from adaptations of classic texts to original, student-written theater, this year’s Student Arts Grants supported creative diversity across Stanford campus. This year’s grantees included the recipients of the inaugural Creative Spaces grants which provide support specifically for the costs associated with performing in some of Stanford’s most popular venues (such as the Bing Studio…

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New Stanford dance performances highlight different views toward ‘space’

Four Stanford dance faculty members created four new dance works, showing how dance interacts and engages with space in different ways. The performances took place in Memorial Auditorium.

With a nod toward the artistry of “space,” the dance performance Spatial Shift will take place May 26-27 in Memorial Auditorium on the Stanford campus. The final event in the Department of Theater & Performance Studies’ 2015-16 performance season, Spatial Shift is a series of new dance works by Stanford faculty members Diane Frank, Aleta Hayes,…

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The Live Context of War

Imagine a world in which the barriers between art and society, university and community, and mind and heart are erased, and creative synthesis becomes the norm. Such is the vision from which Stanford Live’s Live Context: Art + Ideas was born. This season’s two extraordinary Live Context: Art + Ideas series, War: Return & Recovery and Arts & Social Change,…

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Stanford’s historic Roble Gym to open in the fall after arts-oriented renovation

Harry Elam, vice provost for undergraduate education and a drama professor, will direct the first theater production in the newly renovated building.

Roble Gym is undergoing a $28 million renovation to provide new program spaces for theater and dance productions for theDepartment of Theater & Performance Studies. The Roble upgrade will be finished late spring or early summer, and then open to students when the fall term begins in September. One key goal is to create a…

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For Robert Moses, rehearsal is full of amazing, beautiful, wonderful things that nobody else will ever see.

When Robert Moses was a young member of Twyla Tharp Dance and ODC, he threw himself into performance with the spirit of an athlete. Today, his artistic life is less about performance, the “jumping over people’s heads,” and more about sharing – with himself, with students, with other dancers. In addition to teaching at Stanford, Moses…

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Happy 2016!

The arts had an amazing year at Stanford in 2015.

With the opening of the McMurtry Building, the new home for the Department of Art & Art History, we reached a milestone in the university’s ongoing commitment to building programs, curricula, and resources in the arts. The new building provides an architecturally exciting and inspiring home for the department, allowing it to expand its programmatic…

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Stanford performances and symposium highlight architecture

Stanford continues to be the "it" place for architecture with upcoming dance performances on Nov. 7-8 and a symposium on Nov. 13 with international experts.

It has been weeks since the last hard-hat spotting in the arts district, but buildings remain in the spotlight at the corner of Roth Way and Lomita Drive. This weekend, architecture will be considered and celebrated through the medium of performance. Building Scene: Space Launch, performed by the Chocolate Heads Movement Band, is a dance…

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Spark! Grants: A Year in Photos 2014-15

From a rock band record release to Steve Reich, from Much Ado About Nothing to original, student-written musical theater, this year’s Spark! grant supported creative diversity across Stanford campus. These student groups, individuals, undergraduates, and graduates enliven the campus with their artistic endeavors. 2014-2015 Projects: SImps Workshops The Long Way Around The Benevolent Institution Proof…

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Congratulations 2014-15 graduates!

Go forward and remember the words of your Baccalaureate speaker and civil rights leader Vernon E. Jordan, Jr. who said that the world was calling out for you to realize your talents – not just for your own gain – but also to lift up those in whose shoes, but for the grace of God,…

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Unexpected intersections

These collaborations blur traditional boundaries and open new avenues for discovery and expression.

Far-flung collaborations flourish at Stanford: Physicists create dance performances, biologists and musicians expand our understanding of epilepsy, and engineers speed environmental research. This interdisciplinary environment springs from having strong science and humanities departments adjacent to a thriving arts district and is aided by research institutes that cross school and department lines. These collaborations blur traditional…

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Stanford Live expands its mission with 2015-16 season

Next season will feature three events with Anna Deavere Smith and a new work by Stanford composer Jonathan Berger for the Kronos Quartet.

“The Arts and Social Change” and “War: Return and Recovery” are the two key themes at the core of Stanford Live’s 2015-16 season. The program will offer a full spectrum of classical, contemporary and multimedia performances, as well as talks, panels and seminars that build on the intellectual depth and breadth of this past season’s…

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Choices!

It’s May at Stanford and that of course means – an exciting smorgasbord of arts activities. Every weekend is packed with an abundance of arts options. Make some difficult choices – or attend them all! Here is just a sampling of what each weekend brings: May 1-3: Musical Happy Hour with Fleet Street and Chanticleer…

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Students draw parallels between civil rights movement in the 1960s and today in “Hairspray”

Ram's Head Theatrical Society explores racial integration against the backdrop of an inventive LED set.

Stanford’s oldest and largest theatrical organization, the Ram’s Head Theatrical Society, explores civil rights and today’s world in its upcoming Hairspray production. Hairspray will take the spotlight in Memorial Auditorium for five performances: April 10­–11 and 16­–18. The theatrical society sets the scene for the production: Tracy Turnblad is a high school student in 1962…

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Music scholarship and dance performance come together in Stanford scholar’s study of interwar music

Through a study of the relationship between music and dance in ballets produced between the two world wars, Stanford graduate student and conductor Anna Wittstruck illustrates how composers sought to bring audiences together.

Music graduate student Anna Wittstruck is a unique combination of performer and scholar. The orchestral cellist currently conducts the Stanford Wind Ensemble and has conducted the Summer Stanford Symphony Orchestra for the past five years. She has also conducted in the Orchestral Studies program at Stanford. In the midst of all this conducting and performing,…

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Art and Ideas at Stanford Live

An in-depth look at the composer Joseph Haydn and his era – coupled with performances of some of his most iconic works. An evening of music by 11 different cultures along the Nile River – combined with conversations about geography, cultural policy, and environmental sustainability. These were the first two programs in a new series…

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What would you ask Tony Award-winning choreographer Bill T. Jones? Stanford students get their chance, twice

Jones and his dance company perform on campus and the choreographer carves out time to engage with students in writing before his visit and in person once he arrives.

In a rare performance appearance, choreographer, dancer, director and writer Bill T. Jones will narrate 70 one-minute vignettes performed by his company dancers on Friday, Jan. 30, in Memorial Auditorium. Story/Time is a multidisciplinary work about family, lovers and others drawn from his life. “Bill T. Jones and his great company of dancers are one…

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