Semester 1

Arts TRYathlon #1: NextNOW

September 6th, 2024, The Clarice Performing Arts Center, NextDance

#music, #theater, #dance.

I attended six events at the 2024 NextNow Fest at University of Maryland’s Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. On September 5th, the costume sale where craftsmanship paired with affordability, Maryland Night Live which had me laughing at unexpected skits, Submergence which made my inner child smile, Silent Disc-Glo that united a whole crowd and gave us a night to never forget, and on September 6th, a Swing Dancing Class I wanted to take for years! However, the NextDance is the event I want to focus on. This art was special because despite not didn’t knowing what was going on, every act pulled on my emotions making me feel remorse, disgust, peace, despair, and more. In one act involving a horror theme, a performer pretended to throw up and contort their body. While watching I felt very nauseous and had shivers run down my spine the first time the lights went out and eerie phone calls started playing out across the stage. Although I couldn’t figure out a plot, I felt unnerved, from the harsh red lighting of the room playing on our associations with danger, pain, and fear, to the performers' perfectly timed reactions on stage. My favorite performance of the night was the finale, which (in my interpretation) depicted two girl’s changing relationships throughout their lives. The dance jumped around and was brimming with energy, whimsy, and conflict, leaving me feeling hopeful and energized by the end. The performance enlightened me to the complexity of the human mind and how we are able to pick up on and feel these emotions almost as our own, even without our mind to guide us to a reason. I left NextNow inspired to create something, possibly a painting, that could invoke emotions without logical reasoning like the NextDance did for me.

Arts TRYathlon #2: Choose Your Own Adventure

October 5th, 2024, The Clarice Performing Arts Center, Kay Theatre, Emma

#theater, #dance

For my second Art TRYathlon I attended the theatrical performance Emma. This performance was breathtaking from the detailed props, lighting, and stage effects, to the craftsmanship of the costumes and passionate acting. I felt the play connected to what we learned in Art Scholars’ Art in Social Context through the crowd’s reactions to the play, as well as The Art of Improv, as the performers reacted to the crowd. I noticed the crowd seemed to find great humor in everything during this performance, so much so that there were some moments in which I was caught off guard from the entire crowd cackling so loudly and enthusiastically over a joke or mistake so small, if one was even present at all. I feel like this says a lot about the audience and their expectations and experience. I imagine many spectators came wanting or expecting a fun night out rather than an insightful one, and had reacted more strongly during the play to compensate for that. More interesting however was the actors' reactions to the humor. They seemed to take things less seriously, they themselves would smile at the bouts of laughter and the play took on a lighter feeling because of it. There were some moments I doubted if a scene was initially meant to feel a certain way or if it had been adapted by the actors to suit the audience of the night, akin to the “yes and” improv practice. I feel that this event was significant in being able to inspire the audience through its tales of romance, as well as adapt to the crowd’s desires to treat them to a joyous, laughter filled night.

Arts TRYathlon #3: Arts Scholars Event

October 23rd, 2024, Bel Air Hall Lounge, Pumpkin Painting

#movie, #painting

For my third Arts TRYathlon I attended the Pumpkin Painting Craft and Chat hosted by the Arts Advisory Board. For this event, my friends and I painted miniature pumpkins while watching the movie Coraline. This event was significant to me because it provided an opportunity for me to bond with and understand my peers in art scholars further and contemplate the function of art in a technical movie setting. It connected specifically to my major of Mechanical Engineering because of the technologies that go into stop motion animation to make the different parts function properly. The movie inspired me to do more in depth research into stop motion animation as it sounds like an interesting and passionate job to apply skills in mechanical engineering to. Ways you could do this I found through my research is through designing the gears and mechanisms that cause shifting environments, camera working and being part of the film team, Cad design, and construction of the Coraline character models and settings for functioning in different environments. For example, in the film there were 28 different puppets of varying sizes designed for the character Coraline alone. The event itself related to the lessons in Art Scholars through our discussions focused on if art belongs in STE(A)M, of which it was of mine and several of my peers opinion that art and STE(A)M integration is important for human centered design functionality and is an essential part of the design process in all forms of technology. Overall, the Pumpkin Painting event was valuable because of the thought provoking questions and ideas it sparked in relation to my chosen major as well as from our discussions related to art and stem in colloquium.

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