Note: This weekend and beyond, there are livestreams for listening, ongoing exhibitions in Davis and Sacramento to view in person, and don’t forget the Manetti Shrem Museum ongoing winter exhibition, which opened last week. (Go to manettishrem.org or read the full exhibition story here.)
UC Davis Music Department has livestream concerts
Note: These concerts will be available via livestream only and will not be available for in-person attendance. See links for the livestream.
Eclipse Quartet
Eclipse Quartet is dedicated to the music of twentieth-century and present-day composers, with a special appreciation of women composers. The scope of their repertoire spans works by John Cage, Morton Subotnick, and Roscoe Mitchell, to Ruth Crawford, Kajia Saariajo, and Meredith Monk. Eclipse’s residence at UC Davis may include performances, workshops, lecture demonstrations, student composition readings, masterclasses, and private lessons.
The Eclipse Quartet is composed of Sarah Thornblade and Sara Parkins, violins; Alma Lisa Fernandez, viola; and Maggie Parkins, cello.
Thornblade is the associate principal second violin of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. She is an avid chamber musician and a member of both the Eclipse quartet (a new music string quartet) and X-tet. Currently, she is on faculty at Pomona College.
Violinist Sara Parkins is a Grammy-award winner for the Best Chamber Music Performance of the complete recordings of the Haydn String Quartets, with the Angeles Quartet. Sara is also a member of the acclaimed Eroica Trio. She is currently principal second violinist with the Pasadena Symphony, is an active studio musician, and was a member of the Rosetti String Quartet in Los Angeles.
Alma Lisa Fernandez, violist, attended the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and UCLA, where she received a master’s degree in viola performance. She performs regularly with such ensembles as the LA Opera Orchestra, LA Master Chorale, Long Beach Symphony, and Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra. She is currently professor of viola at Pepperdine University in Malibu.
An uncommonly versatile musician, cellist Maggie Parkins is equally at home performing chamber music, orchestral music, and the avant-garde, and has concertized throughout the Americas and Europe. In addition to being a member of the Eclipse Quartet Maggie is also the cellist of the Los Angeles-based Mojave Piano Trio and Brightwork newmusic. She taught cello and chamber music at the University of California, Irvine for nineteen years and currently teaches cello at Pomona College.
Eclipse Quartet: Works by Graduate Students
Thursday, Feb. 3, 12:05-1 p.m., Free, a Shinkoskey Noon Concert
Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center
[All are world premieres by UC Davis graduate students in composition]
This program features Emily Joy Sullivan: OK to Go, Joseph Donald Peterson: String Quartet No. 1 (“Becoming Material”), Jacob Lane: Gapa, Dean Kervin Boursiquot: Altered States, and Adam Strawbridge: super loops
Livestream to noon concert here.
Eclipse Quartet: Source Code
Feb. 4, 7-8:30 p.m., Free
Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center
The program features Sarah Gibson: all ashore WORLD PREMIERE, Gabriela Lena Frank: Kanto Kechua No. 2, Zenobia Powell Perry: Adagio from Three Designs for Four Instruments, Chen Yi: Burning and Global Outreach, denouncing terrorist acts on 9/11/2001 (2003), Vivian, Fung: Pizzicato from String Quartet No. 1, Jessie Montgomery: Source Code, Alisson Kruusmaa: three miniatures WORLD PREMIERE, and Julia Wolfe: Blue Dress for string quartet
Find a direct link to the livestream here.
Tribute exhibition at E Street Gallery, Sacramento
The E Street Gallery in Sacramento is presenting a tribute exhibition to artist Linda Katzdorn Austin who died last year. With remarkable efficiency, humor, and care for our students, Linda managed the art studio’s printmaking lab for nearly twenty years.
Celebrating the Life and Art of Linda Katzdorn Austin, 1947-2021 will be on view Feb. 5-26 with an opening reception on Feb. 5, 12-5 p.m.
E Street Gallery is located at 1115 E St., Sacramento
New exhibition at Gallery 625 starts Friday
Gallery 625 has a new show opening on Feb. 4 that is inspired by the pandemic lockdown.
Stuck Together and Torn Apart: Process and Printmaking in the Pandemic showcases 14 artists as they explore these opposing themes, inspired by the COVID-19 pandemic’s lockdown that both compressed people together and tore them apart due to social distancing, through printmaking.
The exhibit includes prints, three-dimensional handmade artist books working in etching, screenprint, lithography, monotype, woodcut, collagraph, risograph, collage and chine-collé.
Artists featured in the show include Shunsuke Ando, Sandra Beard, Zach Clark, Zen Du, Chris Kidd, Joanna Kidd, Dixie Laws, Sara Post, Susan Silvester, Nikki Thompson, Summer Ventis, Katherine Venturelli, Rebecca Wallace, and Emily Wilson.
“When I was asked to enter my work in this exhibit, it fit the theme so perfectly,” Silvester said in a press release. “One of the processes I use is called chine-collé. This is done by gluing a thinner more translucent paper onto a thicker paper. I was able to express the isolation and separation from friends and family that I’ve been experiencing. Also, giving new meaning to older work that has been stored in my flat file is very satisfying.”
An opening reception with the artists is scheduled for Friday, Feb. 4 from 5:30-8 p.m. Light refreshments will be available and music will be performed by Julie Dachtler on the piano.
“This exhibit showcases an exciting range of artwork and themes by artists who are exploring new processes during the pandemic which, for many of them, has resulted in more time in their studios,” said Janice Purnell, YoloArts creative director.
The artwork can also be viewed and purchased here. The exhibit is set to run at Gallery 625 through March 29.
Gallery 625 is located at 625 Court St. in Woodland, in Yolo County’s Erwin Meier Administration building and is open Monday-Friday, 8 a.m.- 5 p.m. For more information, contact YoloArts at 530-309-6464.
UC Davis alum in Art History Lecture Series at the Pence
Feb. 5, 2-3 p.m., via Zoom
Free (suggested donation $10)
‘Til Death Do Us Part: How the Victorians Kept Love Alive from Beyond the Grave”
Join the Pence Gallery for the next talk in their free, virtual Art History Lecture Series. Caitlin Schwarz (MA' 19, UC Davis), Curatorial Assistant at the Crocker Art Museum, explores Victorian mourning culture with a focus on how the Victorians celebrated romantic and familial love through jewelry and other everyday objects.
Find more information and register for this event here.
Bling Bling at the Pence opens Friday
Who doesn’t love a shiny object? A little something to catch the eye, perhaps show off a wrist or a necklace? As a tribute to Valentine’s Day, the Pence invited a wide variety of artists to create a one-of-a-kind artistic piece of bling. For some, this invitation is a step into the unknown, and a welcome foray into something fun and different. As Carol Gravem writes of her piece in the exhibit, “My attempt is to elevate the primitive to the elegant, using semi-precious stones and sterling silver on an interesting, discarded piece of slip-cast ceramic. Something I normally would never do.”
Bead queen Trish Mayer also joins in the exhibition, along with Nancy Shapiro, Deborah Hill, John Marchello, Alison Spreadborough, Alison Morse, Sara D, Amina Harris and Marti Schoen.
Bling Bling runs Feb. 4-27, with an opening reception on Feb. 11, 6-9 p.m.
Art Social Media of the Week
Coming Up
TANA artist spotlight
Art and Activism: Graphics for Civic Engagement
Feb. 9, 4 p.m.
Local artist and educator Elyse Doyle-Martinez will present their work in relation to silk screen printing, as well as public works such as murals at UC Davis TANA. Working with local youth and organizations, Doyle-Martinez has used their artistic ability to combat disenfranchisement and oppression on multiple fronts. Working with and engaging youth that would otherwise be criminalized by the punitive justice system, Their students have pushed for proactive anti-gang efforts focused on healing and prevention. Through affiliation with Brown Issues, Doyle-Martinez has also been organizing and mentoring young people with leadership qualities to advocate for better educational and enrichment opportunities at the local and state level. Join them for a discussion on how the use of graphics can be used to empower, advocate, and encourage youth to be civically engaged.
The event takes place at TANA, 1224 Lemen Ave., Woodland.
Booster required at Mondavi later in month
Starting Feb. 24
Following CDC Guidance we are requiring all eligible audience members to show proof of a booster shot, as well as proof of vaccination, prior to entering the Mondavi Center.
If you are not up to date on your vaccines, you can provide proof of a negative COVID-19 test result (lab/PCR/TMA) from the last 48 hours. Point-of-Care antigen tests must be administered within 24 hours of the event time. Home antigen tests will not be accepted.
This change is in addition to all our other health and safety requirements.Thank you for helping us to keep our artists, audiences, campus and community safe.
Heartbeat Opera at Mondavi
Beethoven’s Fidelio, Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts, Feb. 19 (Mondavi Center Presenting Program). (Photo at top of blog.)
Opera is an artistic medium that articulates and confronts human passions with powerful immediacy. This conviction is what drives Heartbeat Opera’s desire to rejuvenate opera and to transform its recognized masterpieces from venerated relics into freshly challenging encounters.
In this stunning adaptation of Beethoven’s Fidelio, a black activist is wrongfully incarcerated. His wife, Leah, disguises herself to infiltrate the system and free him. But when injustice reigns, one woman’s grit may not be enough to save her love. Fidelio’s live cast of five singers and seven musicians are joined by a prerecorded virtual chorus of more than 100 incarcerated singers from six prison choirs in the United States. The result is “Imaginative, vital and heartbreaking” (The New Yorker). This daring work pits corruption against courage, hate against hope.
Buy tickets here.