End of Year Projects
learning through making
In Fall of 2019 the students in American Studies 1220: Boatbuilding: Design Making and Culture spent the semester learning about and constructing a 14-foot long Peapod boat, a wooden rowboat traditionally used by lobstermen in Maine in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Working in the Brown Design Workshop, the students built the boat themselves from the ground up, learning about engineering, design, and the history and culture of boatbuilding. The class culminated with the launch of their boat, nicknamed “S.S.N.C.” (an homage to Brown’s S/NC grading system), on a cold December morning on the Seekonk River.
Making the 21st Century Musical
Netspace by the Anti-Fascist Drum Machine Ensemble
Netspace is the web component of the MUSC 0221 (Meme Ensemble: Anti-Fascist Drum Machines) final projects. It is home to an asynchronous audio piece and an archive of curated pieces and performances from the semester. The ensemble members have created the Netspace as a permanent website to be explored. The “Anti-Fascist Drum Machines Ensemble” was a group improvisation course this spring that evolved around the idea of the “drum machine:” machines that make beats and which exist in complex relationships with their human users, even if no real machines are involved at all. We used political metaphors, such as conforming to versus resisting a dominant force, in order to critically develop schemes for musical improvisation with rhythm. Ensemble Members: Cameron Chaleff, Will Evans, Ray Fishman, Asha Franchi, Leni Kreienberg, Miranda Luiz, Pedro Polanco, Amick Sollenberger, and Cody West. Instructor: Marcel Sagesser. Click here to visit the Netspace.
The Viral Monologues
The Viral Monologues concluded the final performances for the Spring TAPS 23 Acting class taught by Professor Sarah dAngelo. The original performance project created space for students to respond to COVID-19 pandemic impact in an artful manner. The premise of the Viral Monologue centers on a character sheltering in place, isolated and alone dealing (or not) with their life upended by “these unprecedented and uncertain times” of COVID-19. The restrictions of social distancing amplifies their circumstance. Their only safe contact with others occurs through the screen of their smartphone or laptop.
Mellon Foundation Fellow and Safe Harbors Indigenous Theatre Collective Artistic Director Murielle Borst Tarrant (Kuna/ Rappahannock) led students in a week-long residency using embodied practices and traditional storytelling methods. Students wrote their own monologues and filmed their performances which were later viewed by the class. Here is a sampling of the student’s who wanted to share their Viral Monologues with a wider audience.
Acting and directing classes
New Stars, New Constellations
by Nat Sorscher
Bubbleyum Princess Preview
by Jenna Benzinger
Little Women: The Tragedy
by Jenny Greener, Benjamin Morris, and Katia Rozenberg
BRown/Trinity Rep MFA Recitals
May 20 and 21, 3:00pm EDT
Join the culminating performance event for Brown/Trinity Rep’s MFA third-year actors. Seven artists engage with public storytelling for the Rhode Island community in short self-authored, self-produced and self-recorded solo performances across two days, May 20 and 21. Performances will be presented on YouTube with support from Brown Arts Initiative.
Wednesday, May 20: Kalyne Coleman, Jack Dryden, Haley Schwartz, Lindsey Steinert
Thursday, May 21: Caitlin Duffy, Ian Kramer, Michael Rosas
Actors as Makers
Thursday, May 28th from 6:00 to 7:30 EDT
The Brown/Trinity Rep MFA Program second year acting company invites friends, family, colleagues, and members of the greater Brown University community to attend for a viewing of new work. The company of ten actors will share seven short works in video format created through collaborative devising and solo composition processes.
Click here to join the zoom webinar on May 28 at 6:00pm.
Student Grants
The Brown Arts Initiative Student Grants Program provides funding to Brown students in support of projects that involve the production, study and/or critique of the creative arts. The following projects were completed with support from BAI.
Dumping Ground by Pia Mileaf-Patel ’20 is a web series that straddles narrative and experimental film in a comedic and heartfelt web series about heartbreak, irony, coming-of-age, and location nostalgia. Based on real life stories of break-ups, Dumping Ground highlights the idiosyncrasies in the ways people decide to break up with someone, putting the viewer in the almost alien position of someone being dumped, while also serving as inspiration for a good laugh.
Click here to watch the series on Vimeo.