c/o Wesleyan CFA

On Tuesday we brought you an incredible list of the upcoming theater productions on campus, and today we’re going to introduce you to the world of dance and visual arts! 

Dance

Dance kicks off with a workshop led by Urban Bush Women on Friday, Feb. 9, at 4:30 p.m. in the Bessie Schönberg Dance Studio. This workshop will allow participants to engage with dance in a variety of ways, regardless of their level of experience. All are welcome to take part in this free workshop, learning the techniques used by the Urban Bush Women, who taught this year’s first-year students dance moves during the Common Moment last August.

In the spirit of springtime, seniors will be showcasing their new dance works during the Spring Senior Thesis Dance Concert on Friday, March 29, at 7:00 p.m. and Saturday, March 30, at 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. The following weekend will allow faculty to put on their dancing shoes and show the University community their moves in the Spring Faculty Dance Concert on Friday, April 5, and Saturday, April 6, at 7:00 p.m. Visiting Assistant Professor of Dance Eury German ’16, Visiting Assistant Professor of Dance Five Ihza Marchiano, and Visiting Instructor of Dance Shirley Sullivan ’21 will be showcasing their new works during this performance. Both events will be held in the Patricelli ’92 Theater. Tickets to the senior thesis performances are $6 for all, while tickets for the faculty dance performances are $6 for members of the University community and $8 for the general public. 

April continues to be full of dance shows with the Spring Dance Concert featuring choreography from students in the course “Dance Composition: Choreography Workshop” (DANC250) taking place in the Patricelli ’92 Theater on Friday, April 19, at 7:00 p.m. and Saturday, April 20, at 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. The Worlds of Dance Showcase will end off a packed semester of dance events on Sunday, May 5, at 2:00 p.m. in the Crowell Concert Hall, spotlighting Javanese, Afro-Brazilian, and hip hop dance styles, among others. Tickets for the Spring Dance Concert are $4 for all members of the University community and $5 for the general public, while the Worlds of Dance Showcase is free to attend. 

Visual Arts 

Spring 2024 brings exciting news for the visual arts scene on campus as the Davison Art Center (DAC)—which ran its last exhibition in Fall 2019—is reopening in February 2024. The DAC houses over 25,000 works of art on paper, some of which will be used in a yet unknown exhibition that will be on display soon.

In addition to the DAC reopening, many other spaces on campus will be hosting a variety of student- and staff-curated exhibitions. Until Sunday, May 26, Olin Library is hosting “Sum of Its Parts,” a display divided into four parts and curated by four students. Graduate student Marina Díaz Cañedo-Argüelles explores the idea of dreams in theater, Nallely Salinas ’24 creates awareness of the various dance shows that have existed and continue to be performed on campus, Emerson Jenisch ’25 investigates the relationship between music creation and the spaces set aside for music at the University, and Loren Wang ’25 illuminates the tunnels beneath Wesleyan. The exhibit can be seen for free on the first floor of Olin.

Continuing the 50th birthday celebration for the Center for the Arts (CFA) last semester, the gallery “Always Being Relation: 50 Years of the Gallery at the CFA” is on display in the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery until Sunday, March 3, and is open Tuesday through Sunday from 12:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. This gallery is a review of many works of art that have been on display in the CFA over the past 50 years, with specific focus on the legacies built by University alumni artists and their interactions with visiting artists. The gallery is free to view. 

Last semester, the Center for East Asian Studies (CEAS) Gallery at the Mansfield Freeman Center featured a student-curated gallery, which inspired an academic tutorial where students can curate their own galleries. This semester, students from that course will have their gallery—“Exploding and Netting: A Somatic Archive of Transpacific Movement”—featured in the CEAS Gallery from Thursday, Feb. 29, to Sunday, May 26. The gallery is curated by Yijing Lai ’24 and Xiran Tan ’24 and features work by Wang exploring the question of identity for Chinese international students at the University and their interactions with both American and Chinese culture. The gallery will be free to attend, and there will be an opening party on Thursday, Feb. 29, from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m. to celebrate it. 

After “Always Being Relation” closes in March, senior thesis work by students in the art studio major will take over the displays in the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery starting on Wednesday, March 27, at 4:00 p.m. A group of six students will have their work on display from Wednesday, March 27, to Wednesday, April 3, when six new students will rotate into the space to showcase their work. This will continue every week until Wednesday, April 24. Make sure to check out the space every week to see all of the amazing student work that will be on display! Admission to the gallery is free. 

Caleb Henning can be reached at chenning@wesleyan.edu.