Announcement from Black Mountain College:
Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center is partnering with UNC Asheville for a multi-day Faith in Arts Instagram takeover, presented in the spirit of the forthcoming Faith in Arts Institute. This takeover will feature emerging and established scholars, theologians, and artists exploring the themes of faith and arts within the history of Black Mountain College, as well as their own work and evolving spiritual and creative processes.
Hosted on the Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center Instagram
Tuesday, May 12th – Molly Silverstein
Wednesday, May 13th – Morning: Richard Chess / 7PM: Spiritual Cooking in the Time of the Plague with Danny Maseng (Virtual Discussion over Zoom, hosted by UNC Asheville)
Thursday, May 14th – Alicia Jo Rabins
Friday, May 15th – Kimberly Bartosik
The Faith in Arts Institute is presented by UNC Asheville and Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center with support from the Center for Jewish Studies at UNC Asheville, the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at UNC Asheville, a grant for the humanities from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Henry Luce Foundation as part of their Theology Responsive Grant program, the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, Bob and Carol Deutsch, and the Asheville Jewish Community Center.Image credit: John Cage at Ryōan-ji (“Temple of the Peaceful Dragon”), a Zen Buddhist temple (Kyoto, Japan), 1962.
Molly Silverstein is a graduate student at Harvard Divinity School, poet, and former staff member of the Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center.
Richard Chess is the author of four books of poetry, Love Nailed to the Doorpost (University of Tampa Press 2017) , Third Temple (University of Tampa Press 2007), Chair in the Desert (University of Tampa Press 2000), and Tekiah (University of Georgia Press 1994; reissued by University of Tampa Press 2002). His essays have appeared in Stars Shall Bend Their Voices: Poets’ Favorite Hymns & Spiritual Songs, The Carolina Table: North Carolina Writers on Food, 27 Views of Asheville, a nd elsewhere. He has been a regular contributor of IMAGE’s blog “Good Letters” for many years.
He has served as writer-in-residence at the Brandeis Bardin Institute and as a member of the faculty of the Jewish Arts Program at Isabella Freedman Jewish Retreat Center. He has directed UNC Asheville’s Center for Jewish Studies since 1992. At UNC Asheville, he is the Roy Carroll Professor of Distinguished Arts & Sciences. He was one of the founders of UNC Asheville’s contemplative inquiry initiative.
Born in Israel to American parents, Danny Maseng first came to the United States to star on Broadway in Only Fools Are Sad. A playwright, actor, singer, and composer, Danny has served as Evaluator of New American Plays/Opera-Musical Theater for the National Endowment For The Arts, as the Director of the Spielberg Fellowships for the FJC, as Spiritual Leader of URJ congregation Agudas Achim in NY, and as Cantor of Temple Israel of Hollywood in California. Danny is the founder of Makom LA , a new, dynamic, post-denominational Jewish Community, in Los Angeles, where for the past three years he has been the Chazzan and Spiritual Leader. A much sought after Scholar/Artist-in-Residence, Danny travels the world, inspiring, teaching and rekindling the love of Judaism through Torah, Hasidut, Jewish Culture, and the Arts.
Alicia Jo Rabins – A writer, musician, composer, performer and Torah teacher, Rabins creates multi-genre works. Her first collection of poetry, Divinity School, won the 2015 APR/Honickman First Book Prize and was a finalist for the Oregon Book Award. She also is the creator and performer of Girls in Trouble, an indie-folk song cycle about the complicated lives of Biblical women with accompanying curriculum, and A Kaddish for Bernie Madoff, a chamber-rock opera about the intersection of finance and spirituality which is currently being made into an independent feature film.
Kimberly Bartosik is a 2019 Guggenheim Fellow in Choreography. Her recent project, I hunger for you, was commissioned and presented by BAM Next Wave Festival 2018 and LUMBERYARD Center for Film & Performing Arts. She is a 2017-20 New York Live Arts Live Feed Residency Artist where her new work will premiere in March 2020. In NYC her work has also been presented by American Realness, FIAF’s
Crossing the Line Festival, Abrons Art Center, Gibney, Danspace, The Kitchen, and La Mama. Kimberly has toured to Supersense: Festival of the Ecstatic (Melbourne, Australia), Dance Place, Wexner Arts Center, American Dance Festival, The Yard, MASS MoCA/Jacob’s Pillow, Flynnspace, Bates Dance Festival, Church, Columbia College (2020), Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center (2020), Mount Tremper Arts, Festival Rencontres Chorégraphique Internationales de Seine-Saint Denis, and others. Kimberly is a 2019-20 Center for Ballet and the Arts at NYU Virginia B. Toulmin Women Leaders in Dance Fellow; a 2019-20 Harkness Dance Center Artist-in-Residence @ the 92nd St Y; and a 2019 Exploring the Metropolis (EtM) recipient with Composer Sivan Jacobovitz. In 2017 she received a National Dance Project Production & Touring Grant and Community Engagement Fund awards along with a MAP Fund award. She has also received support from the Jerome Foundation; FUSED (French-US Exchange in Dance); Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation, USArtists International ; American Dance Abroad; New Music USA; and Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Grants to Artists and Emergency Grants . Kimberly was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance company for 9 years and received a Bessie Award for Exceptional Artistry in his work.
Before you comment
The comments section is here to provide a platform for civil dialogue on the issues we face together as a local community. Xpress is committed to offering this platform for all voices, but when the tone of the discussion gets nasty or strays off topic, we believe many people choose not to participate. Xpress editors are determined to moderate comments to ensure a constructive interchange is maintained. All comments judged not to be in keeping with the spirit of civil discourse will be removed and repeat violators will be banned. See here for our terms of service. Thank you for being part of this effort to promote respectful discussion.