catapult magazine

Theatre & Art 2004

by The *cino Community

What was the best and/or worst theatre experience you had in 2004?

D.A.: Best theatre in 2004: Narrow Journey’s off-Broadway production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

. Worst theater in 2004: That goofy guy from Spin City’s Broadway performance in Sly Fox.

W.B.: Lifeline Theater’s production of Killer Angels was amazing. In a tiny theater, with a cast of five, they managed to convincingly evoke one of the bloodiest battles of the civil war. It was outstanding. Steppenwolf Theater did some honking amazing stuff, too. We also saw a
really good children’s show at DePaul. I honestly don’t think we had any bad theater experiences in 2004.

Did you attend an arts exhibition or event last year that stood out to you? If so, describe it.

C.N.: I walked through a friend?s house who happens to be a private collector. I still get goose bumps thinking about the Scourging of Christ engraving by Albrecht D?rer that he had hanging in his living room. Oops, there they go again.

D.A.: ?Everything Gaudi? in Barcelona.

A.S.: A friend and I were in San Francisco on Fisherman’s Wharf with some time to kill, and we walked into a gallery showing works by Dali. It was a revelation. Salvador was much more than hanging clocks, I assure you. Some of his paintings carried a startling mix of beauty and ugliness in the same frame.

W.B.: There was an exhibition in the Chicago Cultural Center last spring by an artist who did amazing portraits of handicapped people. Don’t remember the artist though.

K.M.V.: We have a really fantastic gallery in our church and I?m blessed to experience so much great artwork through that effort. Exhibits that stand out for me were John L. Wood?s intricate and meaningful pewter sculptures; Laura Gentry?s ?Seen But Rarely Heard: Voices of Adolescent Girls? exhibit with the words of teen-aged girls painted on the back of life-size cut our portraits; and Tim P?w??s wood sculpture, especially the small but functional prayer temple that modeled the biblical notion of prayer, with its unadorned plywood outside, but beautifully elaborate inside with expensive and painstaking stone inlay work. Another fantastic exhibit I encountered was at a local retreat community and consisted of driftwood sculpture formed into amazingly emotional and painful human figures. That may have been the most powerful art exhibit I?ve ever experienced. The sculptures of a refugee family and of the slaughter of the innocents gave me the physical impulse to weep under the weight of all humanity?s sorrow.

Discussion: Theatre & Art 2004

What would you add to the members? responses? What performances or art displays stood out for you in 2004? What accounts for the lack of these experiences in our day-to-day lives when compared to music, literature and film?