Please note: this Salon was rescheduled from October 14.
This unique program, created for The Rhode Island Council for the Humanities Series, Celebrating the Centennial of the Pulitzer Prize, will be a multi-disciplinary performance at the intersection of the arts, nature, science and the humanities to form a complex essay about the environment. The Aurea Ensemble combines music with the spoken word, bringing together both contemporary and classic compositions and texts to explore significant themes and inspire audiences. This Salon will concentrate on the process involved bringing together all the layers of the program, after the usual intense research and incubation period, with specific reference to the Athenæum’s Special Collections.
For the “Of Nature Composed” campfire, the ensemble, including actor, Nigel Gore, actor/musician Chris Turner, and musicians, Katherine Winterstein, Megumi Stohs, Consuelo Sherba and Emmanuel Feldman, will feature music and writings of 2014 Pulitzer Prize winner John Luther Adams, John Cage and Charles Ives, music of ground-breaking Renaissance composer Johannes Ockeghem, words of contemporary Pulitzer Prize winning nature poets Galway Kinnell and Mary Oliver, as well as the naturalists, Henry David Thoreau and John Muir. Multi-media imagery will also will be integrated into the performance. Join us as Sherba discusses the process involved bringing together all the layers of this program.
Funded by the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities, the Open Sesame Project brings together six artists/scholars working in different genres to research into the Athenæum’s extensive collections.
Of Nature Composed is part of a collaborative series of programs facilitated by the 100th anniversary of the Pulitzer Prizes in 2016. An exploration of the changing nature of journalism and the humanities in the digital age, What is the 21st Century Essay? programming thematically focuses on environmental issues because of their urgency and relevance to our health, communities, and economy. To learn more, click here.
