05/02/22
UB Arts Collaboratory Invites students to apply for new interdisciplinary experiential class-Fall 2022
Posted by Tim on May 2, 2022 in Academics, Honors Experiences, Workshops
UB Arts Collaboratory invites all students to apply for a
Fall 2022 new interdisciplinary experiential class
400 level, 3 credits, no pre-reqs. for undergraduates
500 level for graduate students
Working Artists Lab with Dara Friedman
Fridays 2:30-4:50pm, and select Saturdays during September and October 3 credits. No prerequisites.
Directed by Prof. Maria S. Horne and Arts Collaboratory Director Bronwyn Keenan, this course presents students with the opportunity to witness and participate in the production process of live art and to collaborate across disciplines with international guest artists, UB faculty, students and community partners. Our Fall ‘22 UB Arts Collaboratory Working Artists Lab will host international guest artist Dara Friedman, in residency, as Dara leads us through the creation process of a labyrinth, River Hill, at Silo City under the care and guidance of ecologist Josh Smith. Additionally, the Lab has invited professional artists and researchers from multiple disciplines to join us in this inspiring project. To quote Robin Wall Kimmerer, “Perhaps that is what we need. Artists as foresters…poets as ecologists.”
Specifically, this course aims to bring together a “company” of students. Company here is understood as a group of students who come together, united with a shared purpose to work, learn, provide friendship and enjoyment in sight of fulfilling a shared purpose. The shared purpose of this course is to deepen our understanding and commitment to conflict resolution. We will be using the below noted modalities to collectively learn how to navigate blockages, perceived or otherwise, in order to heal and gain wisdom in our relationships: personal, interpersonal, and with the world at large. At the same time, the course itself is an artwork, a Gesamtkustwerk, created from our collective parts.
TH 411 Theatre Workshop/ TH 513 Special Topics*
Rolling admissions with early decision for applications received by May 1.
To apply, fill out the application form included below. Seats are limited.
Application will remain open until all seats are filled.
Collaborate on the creative process and construction of a labyrinth, River Hill, at Silo City
- There is the possibility of scholarships for graduate students.
(Please make a note if you would like to be considered for such a scholarship.)
Course Descirption
For more information about the Arts Collaboratory’s Working Artists Labs, please visit: buffalo.edu/arts-collaboratory/working-artists-labs
The focus and second classroom of this course will be centered around the creation of a labyrinth, River Hill, at Silo City under the care and guidance of ecologist Josh Smith. The hill will become a highly attractive, hardy and fine smelling pollinator garden transforming the current brownfield at Silo City and consisting of a 1,450 ft long path mowed through introduced yarrow. The intention of River Hill is to be an active monument used for positive transformation and growth. The design of this labyrinth is a confluence of the striking meander of the Buffalo River, Silo City’s location, and ancient, sacred Ariadne style labyrinth design. As a filmmaker Dara understands the physical movement through the labyrinth as a movie of sorts with the potential for an emotional development or shift. The saying goes, “It’s a movie. Make it move.”
What the labyrinth does as a walking meditation is physically pivot the body to see the world (inner and outer) from opposite perspectives. This winding and unwinding physically changes the walker’s point of view along the path. While designing and building the labyrinth we will also be learning conflict resolution through the physical practice of Aikido led by artist Spencer Sweeney. Aikido uses spiraling movements to shift the direction a challenger’s, or our own nose is facing. This spiraling circular motion is called aiki and is born from a commitment to peaceful resolution when antagonized by refusing to play a zero-sum game of winners and losers. We will work on creating a muscle memory of the spiraling and pivoting motion with the understanding that a change of perspective can happen in the blink of an eye.
Additional modalities addressed in the class will be Game Theory, Breathwork, Contact Improvisation, Land Art, Chladni patterns to chart physical vibration, Filmmaking and screenings, and the concept of Reciprocal Giving, among others. Texts covered in the class will be Mystic Spiral: Journey of the Soul by Jill Purce; Giving in to Get Your Way by Terry Dobson; Molecules of Emotion by Candace Pert, and Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer among others.
About the UB Arts Collaboratory Working Artists Lab
The UB Arts Collaboratory Working Artists Labs are designed to allow Buffalo artists, UB students, faculty, and visiting artists to develop new work and collaborate across disciplines. Leading figures in the arts are invited by the Arts Collaboratory to engage with the UB and Buffalo arts communities, and over the course of a semester, UB students learn what it’s like to be out in the world as a working artist. Previous Labs have been led by Grandmaster Flash (Fall 2021), Cecily Brown (Spring 2021), Michael Mwenso (Fall 2020), and Alan Zweibel (Spring 2020). To realize many of these Labs, the Arts Collaboratory forged an essential partnership with Maria S. Horne, Director of the IACE Program and associate professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance.
About Dara Friedman
Dara Friedman is a German born artist and filmmaker working in Miami. She uses everyday sights and sounds as the raw material for film and video artworks that reverberate with emotional energy. With a background in structural film and dance, Friedman’s cinema calls for a radical reduction of the medium to its most essential material properties. In place of linear storylines, her films typically portray straightforward actions and situations that unfold according to predetermined rules and guidelines. Yet for all of Friedman’s strenuous logic and discipline, her approach remains unabashedly sensual and emotive. Bearing rich imagery and a strong emphasis on bodily experience, her films generate moments of high-pitched, cathartic intensity as well as serene, even euphoric interludes.
Dara Friedman, River Hill labyrinth plan, Silo City, Buffalo
Working Artists Lab with
Dara Friedman
We invite you to complete the Working Artists Lab with Dara Friedman student application for Fall 2022. Please address ALL the questions within each section. If you would like more information about the Lab, please contact Bronwyn Keenan, Director for the Arts Collaboratory, by email at artscollaboratory@buffalo.edu.
PLEASE SEND COMPLETED APPLICATION TO: artscollaboratory@buffalo.edu
Name:
UB Email Address:
Phone Number:
Instagram Handle:
Academic Department:
Major/Minor:
Academic Level and Anticipated Graduation Date:
Personal Statement:
Please write a brief statement indicating why you are interested in participating.
*Graduate students ONLY: if you would like to be considered for a scholarship, please address it here.
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