Category: Arts & Humanities

None of this might have happened if a Madison woman named Jane Pawasarat hadnâ??t had an extra ticket to a documentary at the Wisconsin Film Festival seven years ago. The film was “Spellbound,” which followed eight young spellers as they prepared for and competed in the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C.

Pawasarat called a friend – Jeff Kirsch, who directs the independent learning program in Spanish and Portuguese at the UW-Madison Division of Continuing Studies – and asked if he wanted to go.

When artist Beth Cavener Stichter visited the Chazen Museum of Art this month to introduce her sculpture, installed on the fourth floor of the museum, the crowd was tiny. But museum officials anticipate the installation â?? a provocative rendering of two aroused male goats in an intimate embrace â?? may start to attract more attention.

Museum director Russell Panczenko has agreed to conceal the bottom half of the sculpture when student groups visit.

MADISON, Wis. — A new piece of artwork on display at a museum in Madison is raising some eyebrows. Some say the piece has crossed a fine line between artistic expression and being offensive, but officials at the University of Wisconsin-Madisonâ??s Chazen Museum of Art said it is a beautiful work expressing human emotion.

This year Jacqueline Houtman turned 50, published her first novel and embraced her inner geek. â??The Reinvention of Edison Thomas,” targeted at readers age 8 and older, was written by Houtman, a professional science writer who earned her doctorate in medical microbiology and immunology in 1996.

French spies. A magic sword. Yodeling lesbian twins from New Zealand. A giant monster terrorizing South Korea. And, perhaps most bizarrely of all, Tom Cruise. Theyâ??re all part of the schedule for the 11th annual Wisconsin Film Festival, which is posted online Thursday at wifilmfest.org.

The schedule features 139 ticketed events, including narrative films, short films, documentaries, foreign films, and restored prints of classic films. This yearâ??s festival runs five days instead of the traditional four, April 14 to 18.

For film junkies, today is like Dec. 23, two days before Christmas. On Thursday, the full schedule for the 11th Annual Wisconsin Film Festival, which runs April 14-18, will be released at wifilmfest.org and in this weekâ??s Isthmus. Itâ??s a cinematic feeding frenzy, because tickets go on sale this Saturday, leaving moviegoers just 48 hours or so to pore over the list of titles and plan out which movies they want to get tickets for.

Madison audiences have been able to keep tabs on the growing Romanian New Wave through the free Romanian Film Festival. This springâ??s festival, which takes place Thursday through Saturday at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, is no exception, showing that Romanian film is here to stay.

The series is funded by the Romanian Cultural Institute and facilitated by UW-Madisonâ??s Center for Russia, East Europe and Central Asia.

Danielle Trussoni, a Wisconsin-born author and 1996 graduate of UW-Madison, has crafted an engrossing fiction debut in “Angelology,” a novel where the battle between good and evil has been waged for millennia.

Sitting in his hostâ??s living room under a colorful piece of artwork depicting a man and a woman comfortably sharing space, Jordan Rosenblum explained to interviewer Nancy Brown and an audience of 35 how Judaism was like tofu.

Rosenblum was speaking Sunday morning in Brownâ??s Palm Beach home ahead of the upcoming Passover holiday.His talk was an opportunity to introduce Palm Beach residents to the Mosse/Weinstein Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Rosenblum is the Belzer Assistant Professor of Classical Studies at the university.

Memoirist Danielle Trussoniâ??s gorgeous writing, fantastical imagination and familiarity with biblical and mythological texts are on splendid display in “Angelology,” her first novel – an ambitious adventure story complete with epic battles between good and evil, a decades-long search for a life-extending treasure, and social commentary about class conflicts. Trussoni majoed in English and history at UW-Madison.

Rebecca Skloot, author of “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” will be part of a talk and panel discussion at the Health Sciences Learning Center, near UW Hospital.

UW-Madison students Quincy Harrison and Cliff Grefe were profiled in USA Today last December for a song they wrote in the basement of their Langdon Street fraternity house.

Midway through Februaryâ??s Black History Month, the UW-Madison Health Sciences Learning Center opened “Passed but still Present: Icons of Black History,” a show presenting artist Stanley Sallayâ??s images of Frederick Douglass, Toni Morrison and Bob Marley.

…in 2006, an experience in the UW-Madison Odyssey Project, a free humanities course for adults facing economic barriers to higher education, led him to take up drawing again.

How do I poison thee? Let me count the ways: arsenic, mercury, strychnine, chloroform, wood alcohol and carbon monoxide. These were just a few of the options available to would-be murderers whose crimes were likely to go unpunished less than a century ago because of bumbling coroners and shoddy methods of chemical detection.

As a professor of science journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Deborah Blum has not lost the skills of good storytelling she honed as a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. She put them to excellent use a couple of years back in “Ghost Hunters,” a wonderful account of 19th-century investigations into supernatural and extrasensory manifestations, and they show no diminishment in her new book.

In a small, fluorescent-lit classroom filled with gleaming iMacs, UW-Madison journalism professor Deborah Blum is teaching students to craft prose with style. Dressed in a soft gray cardigan accented by a colorful scarf, and with her low, slightly breathy voice, Blum is a reassuring, encouraging presence.

Brighten your mood at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Dance Programâ??s â??Almost Spring,â? a showcase of colorful improvisational and contemporary works this weekend at Lathrop Hall.

As the mother of two boys, Micaela Preston decided she wanted to start living more mindfully to help promote a healthier planet for her family. When she realized how overwhelming the concept of “going green” can be, she started a blog, Mindful Momma, to make eco-conscious living inspiring rather than intimidating.

How do I poison thee? Let me count the ways: arsenic, mercury, strychnine, chloroform, wood alcohol and carbon monoxide. These were just a few of the options available to would-be murderers whose crimes less than a century ago were likely to go unpunished because of bumbling coroners and shoddy methods of chemical detection.

The owner of a popular college bar says theyâ??ve put a large banner on the building to draw attention, not for business, but he says to raise awareness of the barâ??s expected move.

Tim Tysonâ??s home phone number in North Carolina isnâ??t listed, so when the stranger called and introduced himself, the first thing Tyson wondered was how he got the number.

“I didnâ??t even catch his name,” Tyson was recalling this week.

That was three years ago, and the man – whose name was Bob Steel – sure knew Tyson. He especially knew Tysonâ??s 2004 book, “Blood Done Sign My Name,” which was written and published during the 13 years Tyson spent at UW-Madison as a professor of Afro-American Studies.

ANTIGO – The snowy weather didnâ??t stop people from going to Antigo on Valentineâ??s Day, to express their love for the Badger State while listening to the University of Wisconsin-Madison Varsity Band.

Michelle Reif is President of the Antigo Band Boosters, an organization that brought the UW-Madison Varsity Band to Antigo for a concert in order to help the High Schoolâ??s band. “We thought this would be a good way to add some funds so that we can improve our band also.”

The concrete and steel rising next to the Chazen Museum of Art soon will be home to paintings, films and sculpture, but itâ??s also a big piece of something more: a vision for a revitalized UW-Madison arts district.

The $43 million expansion, funded entirely by private donations, will more than double the amount of art the Chazen can display, with new galleries dedicated to African, Asian and Upper Midwestern art, as well as classrooms, a film theater and an outdoor sculpture garden. The new building is set to be completed in May 2011 with a grand opening that October.

Jim Leach, chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities, will come to UW-Madison Wednesday on a 50-state civility tour. His goal is to call attention to the need for civility in public discourse.

It may be cold outside, but itâ??s a hot time for dance in Madison. With four shows in the next three weeks featuring a half-dozen dance companies, both local and national, itâ??s the perfect time to watch bodies in motion.

UW-Madison dance program chair Jin-Wen Yu celebrates his 50th birthday with his companyâ??s Meta-50, an evening of works presented in Lathrop Hallâ??s Margaret Hâ??Doubler Performance Space. Thursday nightâ??s opening performance, which included four premieres from Yu, was crowded.

In â??Meta-50,â? Jin-Wen Yu Danceâ??s celebration of its namesakeâ??s 50th birthday, just one work is a solo danced and choreographed by Yu, who is also chair of the UW Dance Program

An assistant acting professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison plans to portray lynching survivor James Cameron in 18 characters. Patrick Sims is putting on a one-man play called “10 Perfect: A Lynching Survivor Story” Feb. 5 and Feb. 6 in Lathrop Hall on campus.

An assistant acting professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison plans to portray lynching survivor James Cameron in 18 characters.

Patrick Sims is putting on a one-man play called “10 Perfect: A Lynching Survivor Story” Feb. 5 and Feb. 6 in Lathrop Hall on campus. The play imagines Cameronâ??s life until his 1930 lynching in Marion, Ind., when he was 16.

Iâ??ll admit it. Iâ??m not beyond being sucked in by a memorable movie title. And “Douchebag” is certainly memorable.

….The movie opens with a couple lying in bed — they seem madly in love, and we learn that theyâ??re getting married in a few days. The guy, Sam, has a gigantic bushy beard. And right away, I thought “I think I know that guy.”

As it turns out, I did. Andrew Dickler, a graduate of the UW-Madison, plays Sam.

Smart Studios, the Near East Side studio that recorded part of a Nirvana album, launched the band Garbage and gave Madison some of its coast-like coolness, is closing March 1. The studio, started in a basement in 1983 by UW-Madison students Butch Vig and Steve Marker, has been located since the late 1980s in a two-story, red-brick building at 1254 E. Washington Ave.

Noted: A step in this process will be the recently-announced foundation of the Mayrent Institute for Yiddish Culture to be permanently located on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Sapoznik will head the new institute which will be dedicated to helping understand the world of Yiddish through its arts.

You have to be willing to have only a few friends, Lorrie Moore said. Writers, if they are honest with themselves, cannot worry about offending or how many allies they have acquired in this world. Itâ??s an obnoxious position, hard to defend. But they do not work for the Chamber of Commerce; they are not examples to the community. They are there for their story, and if it sounds harsh…

Jerry Frautschi says the Overture Center has helped UW-Madison’s School of Music because the center helps recruit top faculty or top graduate students that have an opportunity to play in our Madison Symphony or Chamber Orchestra.