Filed under: Outside Project | Tags: Music, Outside Project, study abroad, writing
Singer/Songwriter spending final COA year abroad
Singer/Songwriter Cora Rose Lewicki
Cora Rose Lewicki, known to music lovers around Mount Desert Island as Cora Rose, will be performing a farewell concert at the college’s Gates Community Center on Saturday, May 30 at 8 p.m. Lewicki is known for her singing and song writing, and for her MDI performances during her time as a student at COA. While she is not actually graduating this year, Lewicki will be spending her senior year studying international trade in Ghana and Mexico. As in previous concerts, Lewicki will be performing her own songs, with possibly a few covers. She’s been playing piano since kindergarten, writing songs since 3rd grade, and started performing her own work in 8th grade.
Filed under: Senior Project | Tags: marine, photography, Senior Project, watercolor
Christiaan van Heerden and Adam Kumm exhibit work
Underwater photography by Adam Kumm
Local artist and owner of the former Moss Gallery, Christiaan van Heerden will be showing watercolors at College of the Atlantic’s Blum Gallery along with underwater photographer Adam Kumm.
The two are exhibiting their work as part of their final projects as graduating COA seniors.
The show features 14 images taken of fish swimming through deep coral reefs in the Caribbean by Kumm and six large watercolors by van Heerden. (more…)
Filed under: Senior Project | Tags: Blum Gallery, fiber arts, photography, Senior Project
Exhibit features weavings of seven fibers, photos of the hands of ten artisans
"Working Hands" by Hannah Stevens
College of the Atlantic’s spring series of senior work continues with “Working Hands,” a show focusing on the artistry of the hand. The exhibit combines the efforts of Becky Wartell of Portland, ME and Hannah Stevens of Canton, NY. Wartell is a weaver and all-around craftsperson. Stevens is a photographer who has spent the term photographing craftspeople in the highly artistic region in upstate New York where she was raised, known as The North Country.
Wartell’s project involves seven different items each woven with one of seven different fibers: animal fibers of wool and silk; plant fibers of cotton, linen and hemp; and two cellulose fibers (plant fibers that require heavy processing): bamboo and tencel. Her exhibit includes the graduation dress she made from silk she wove, a bamboo skirt, a woolen blanket and some cotton plaid fabric. At the reception, the runner on the food table will be made of linen woven by Wartell. Also part of the exhibit will be a loom on which gallery visitors can experience weaving. The resulting communal piece of fabric will be turned into a purse that will be sold to raise money for a weaving-related cause. (more…)
Filed under: Senior Project | Tags: anthropology, photography, Senior Project, writing
Michael Keller, Watson Fellow, presents images and a book of refugee experience in the US
A Chinese man and his Bosnian wife were resettled by the International Rescue Committee. They opened a noodle and dumpling shop out of a small window. They were very successful and now operate a much bigger restaurant in Charlottesville, VA. Photo by Michael Keller.
To celebrate the publication of his book, “Streets, Boundaries, and Other Places: Stories of Asylum,” College of the Atlantic senior Michael Keller is presenting an exhibit of photographs and narratives of refugees resettled by the International Rescue Committee in Charlottesville, VA.
“Too dangerous to go back” was the phrase many used to describe the nations that these people left, says Keller of his encounters with refugees in Virginia. His photographs and stories, he says, “show the resilience of refugees in starting over, in starting new lives.” The photographs depict resettled individuals from Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, Myanmar, China, Afghanistan, Togo, Democratic Republic of Congo, and Somalia. (more…)
Filed under: Outside Project | Tags: bollywood, interdisciplinary, Shakespeare, theatre
Production brings dance, music and new flair to Shakespeare
The Bollywood Tempest at COA
College of the Atlantic’s production of “The Tempest” is unlike any you have ever seen. Co-directors Dan Mahler and Alicia Hynes have set William Shakespeare’s island fantasy as a Bollywood production, adding the music and dance style of contemporary Indian movies. Says Mahler, who last year created a masterful blending of music and dance in his direction of the Greek tragedy “The Bacchae,” “We can do this with Shakespeare because it’s so open-ended. The text transcends its time period. Choreographers are Tanvi Nair of India and Aishath Loofa Mohamed of the Maldives. Both are familiar with Bollywood style and the traditional dance upon which many of the numbers are based. (more…)
Filed under: Senior Project | Tags: ethnography, Law, photography, poland, policy, Senior Project, study abroad, sustainability
Mike Kersula, Matt McInnis reflect on connections
Self-proclaimed radical environmentalist Janusz Korbel has fought for years to expand the Bialowieza National Park. Photo by Matt McInnis.
Nature of Poland, featuring photos by Matt McInnis and ethnography by Mike Kersula. The exhibit explores Poland as a country of contrasting environments, from moss-covered old growth forests to smoggy industrial wastelands.
The exhibit came about following the annual United Nations conference on climate change hosted by Poland last December. Kersula and McInnis attended the meetings-but with more than the treaty process on their minds. They wanted to understand how people of a post-socialist society connect to nature. (more…)
Filed under: Outside Project | Tags: interdisciplinary, Outside Project, senior, Socially Responsible Business, sustainability, travel, water, Watson
Brett Ciccotelli, Nick Jenei, and Michael Keller receive Watson Fellowships
Brett Ciccotelli
All three of College of the Atlantic’s Watson nominees have been awarded Watson Fellowships this year – despite the Watson Foundation’s reduction of the awards by 20 percent due to the economy. This prestigious fellowship funds a year of international travel to graduating seniors. In past years, fifty fellowships were awarded; this year, there were only forty, chosen from 177nominees from forty-seven of some of the best colleges in the United States.
In his letter congratulating COA and the recipients, Watson Foundation Director Cleveland Johnson noted that, “the elimination of ten fellowship slots has made this year’s competition especially fierce.” The awards to all three COA nominees, he added, “is a high honor given the extraordinary strength of the national pool of nominees this year and the reduced number of available fellowships.”
The students are Brett Ciccotelli, Nick Jenei, and Michael Keller.
