Audiences who attend an ArtPower! event don’t just watch a performance—they engage with the artists and get a taste of the creative process. On Sunday, April 26, philanthropists will enjoy a sampling of the organization’s unique approach at the University of California, San Diego’s annual Big Bang at ArtPower! fundraiser. Co-chaired by Joan Jordan Bernstein and Martha Dennis, the celebration includes a festive lunch, a live master class with a UC San Diego student string quartet and a special performance by members of the acclaimed Amphion String Quartet. The event is open to the public and all proceeds will benefit the organization’s student engagement programs, with the goal of creating the ArtPower! Student Engagement Endowment Fund.
Held last May, the interactive event was part of a new partnership between San Diego’s public radio and TV station and UC San Diego’s Division of Arts and Humanities, designed to bring KPBS members to campus for a first-hand experience of the arts here.
Hats Off to Dr. Seuss!, an exhibit of original hats from Theodor Seuss Geisel’s personal collection, will be on display in Geisel Library on the UC San Diego campus from Feb. 24 through March 22, just in time for the University’s annual Dr. Seuss Birthday Party on March 2.
Nearly 200 UC San Diego volunteers gathered at Howard Pence Elementary School on Sunday to revitalize the school’s garden, paint murals on the playground and much more. The service project, held as part of the campus’s annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service, was organized by Volunteer50 and the Center for Student Involvement to educate students about the impact they can make in the local community. Following the Day of Service, about 500 campus members represented UC San Diego in the annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Parade, celebrating “Freedom Through Education.”
If you’ve ever wondered about the old television sets scattered around the lawn in front of the Media Center/Communication Building, wonder no more. The TV graveyard – along with a reproduction of Rodin’s famous “Thinker” and several small statues of Buddha gazing into the empty monitors – is the exterior portion of “Something Pacific” by Nam June Paik (1932-2006). Commissioned as part of the university’s renowned Stuart Collection of public art, “Something Pacific” was in 1986 Paik’s first permanent outdoor installation. The indoor portion is in the building lobby: a bank of 24 cutting edge and interactive TVs – except that they are no longer interactive or cutting-edge. A recent grant from the National Endowment of the Arts will change that.
As a young boy growing up in Hong Kong, Tsz Fung Kwan looked forward to reading the famous Jim Davis comic strip Garfield in the Sunday paper. Something about the iconic orange, lasagna-loving cat struck a chord with Kwan, and, at the age of 7, when his family immigrated to the United states in search of a better life, he paid homage to his comic hero by choosing “Garfield” as his new American name.
