IN THIS ISSUE: JACK Quartet performance, Martirano award concert planned | UI dinner to celebrate French Wine | I space exhibit explores 'Made in China' | Japan House hosts swordsmen demo | 'An Open Northwest Passage' explored | Program seeks faculty, staff advisers | Events remember Germany, then and now | Plan now for the holidays | Annual campus security report available online | Ed Kieser hosts tornado show
Concerts scheduled Nov. 17 and 19
The JACK Quartet will perform at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 17 and Nov. 19 in the Foellinger Great Hall of the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts. | Photo by Justin Bernhardt
JACK Quartet performance, Martirano award concert planned
The Martirano Award will celebrate its 13th year with two concerts that feature the JACK Quartet at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 17 and Nov. 19 in the Foellinger Great Hall of the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts.
Praised for its “powerhouse playing” by the Chicago Sun-Times and its “extraordinary precision” by The Boston Globe, the JACK Quartet has quickly established a reputation for its high-energy performances. Members of the quartet are Urbana native Christopher Otto and Ari Streisfeld on violins, violist John Pickford Richards and cellist Kevin McFarland. The Nov. 17 performance will feature the premiere of a new work by UI composer and music professor Zack Browning plus works by Xenakis, Sharp and an arrangement of music by Guillaume de Machaut.
The Nov. 19 concert is the 13th Annual Martirano Award Concert that will feature four award-winning works performed by the UI New Music Ensemble under the direction of Erik Lund. Among the works is “Tear of the Clouds” for chamber ensemble and electronics by Yale faculty member Michael Klingbeil.
The JACK Quartet will perform Martirano’s “String Quartet” and “Tetras,” by Iannis Xenakis.
After the concert, there will be a reception in the lobby of Krannert Center featuring music by the Boneyard Jazz Quintet.
Klingbeil, a UI alumnus, will receive the $1,000 award and attend the concert and present his music at a Composer’s Forum at 3 p.m. Nov. 17 in Room 1201 of the Music Building. The forum is free and open to the public.
The UI School of Music sponsors the Martirano Composition Award competition and concert each year in memory of Salvatore Martirano, a UI professor of composition from 1963 to 1995.
Spice Box at Bevier Hall
UI Dinner to celebrate French wine
The fifth annual Beaujolais Nouveau Celebration will be held in the Spice Box in Bevier Hall at 7 p.m. Nov. 23. The event will feature a wide variety of food as it celebrates the release of the 2009 Beaujolais Nouveau wine.
“This year’s celebration will be an evening full of gourmet food and French wine that people won’t want to miss,” said Chef Jean-Louis Ledent, the executive chef for the UI’s hospitality management and dietetics programs in the department of food science and human nutrition. “It’s very exciting to have hosted this special celebration for the community for five years,” he said.
The annual celebration of the Beaujolais Nouveau release has become one of the most exciting and lively wine events in the world. According to French law, the Beaujolais Nouveau cannot be sold until the third Thursday of November, creating a great deal of fanfare when it is released.
The cost to attend is $75 per person, and reservations and advance payment are required by Nov. 17. Call 333-6520 or contact Jill North Craft at jnorth@illinois.edu for more information or to make a reservation. Funds will support the quantity foods facilities.
I space
Exhibit explores ‘Made in China’
A nearly ubiquitous country-of-origin label seen on countless U.S. consumer goods is the subject of a new exhibition on view through Nov. 14 at I space, the Chicago gallery of the UI.
The exhibition, “made in china: Erik Hemingway and Allison Warren,” explores the meaning of the phrase that appears on a practically endless stream of consumer goods marketed worldwide.
Hemingway, a UI professor of architecture, and Warren, an instructor in the UI School of Architecture, have organized the exhibition as part of an ongoing research project initiated during a residency in China during the summer of 2008.
Hemingway said the exhibition includes interactive components that will be used to inform the continuing data-collection and research process. The scholars plan to compile the results and publish them in book form.
The exhibition features a variety of installations, one of which is a series of video projections of urban Chinese street views – presented from three perspectives: vehicular, bicycle and pedestrian traffic. The video images will be projected on a screen fabricated from common white-rice bags, stretched and sewn together.
I space gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m Tuesday through Saturday.
Open house
Japan House hosts swordsmen demo
Japan House, an educational and cultural center at the UI, will host its annual fall open house from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Nov. 7.
The featured presentation at this year’s open house will be a demonstration by Hajime Sugawara and Masahiro Imafuji titled “Kendo: The Way of the Sword,” at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. Practitioners of Kendo, a highly stylized, traditional Japanese martial art, typically use bamboo swords.
Sugawara is sixth Dan (sixth-degree black belt) and Imafuji, fifth Dan, in the Central Indiana Kendo Club.
From 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., tea ceremony demonstrations will be conducted by members of the Urbana-Champaign Association of Chado Urasenke Tankokai.
Visitors also may tour the Japan House gardens at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. The tours will be led by James Bier, who designed the gardens.
For those who would like an even more authentic experience, Bier and Japan House director Kimiko Gunji will host a tour to Japan April 5-16 that will include visits to several notable gardens in Kyoto, Okayama and Tokyo. The deadline for signing up for the tour is Dec. 1. For more information about the tour, contact Japan House at 244-9934 or japanhouse@illinois.edu.
Nov. 5 symposium
‘An Open Northwest Passage’ explored
Scholars from around the world will meet at the UI for a symposium about global security, climate change and the Arctic.
With rapidly melting ice in the Arctic Ocean, there may soon be opportunities for enhanced international marine shipping though the Northwest Passage. The symposium will explore the issues surrounding this prospect, which has raised a specter of tensions among various countries for access to corresponding transit routes and natural resources. The symposium will take place from 3-5 p.m. Nov. 5 in Room 314A of the Illini Union. A reception will follow.
Panelists include Michael Byers, a professor and Canada Research Chair in political science at the University of British Columbia; Klaus Dodds, a professor of geopolitics at the University of London; Ingrid Lundestad, a research fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Studies at the Norwegian Institute for Defense Studies; and William Chapman, a senior research programmer in the department of atmospheric sciences at the UI.
The discussion will explore the observed effects of global warming on climate conditions in the region and will cover positions and perspectives of key actors such as the European Union and its member states, including Canada, Nordic countries, Russia and the United States. Panelists will offer assessments of recent developments associated with this emerging issue as well as analysis of projected impacts on global security, foreign policy, economics, international maritime law and access to energy resources.
The symposium was organized by the European Union Center; the Program in Arms Control, Disarmament and International Security; and the Russian, East European and Eurasian Center.
‘Learning in Community’
Program seeks faculty, staff advisers
Faculty and staff members interested in helping students and nonprofit organizations may become project advisers to the Learning in Community program during the spring 2010 semester. The program is a service-learning course in which interdisciplinary teams of students work on real projects proposed by nonprofit community partners.
Those with expertise on the project topic are welcome, though previous experience is not required. Project advisers can contribute by listening, asking questions, reading weekly progress reports, helping students build their networks of contacts and providing timely feedback and advice.
The class meets Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12:30-1:50 p.m.; however, project advisers do not need to be available for every class session, nor do they need to attend entire sessions.
For more information and the volunteer form, see http://linc.illinois.edu.
Fall of the Berlin Wall
Remembering Germany, then and now
Personal accounts by people living in Germany before, during and after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 will be among the highlights of a symposium planned on the UI campus Nov. 11-13.
“Choosing Change: A Symposium on the 20th Anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall,” will be hosted by the department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, with support from other campus units including the School of Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics and the departments of comparative and world literature; Slavic languages and literatures; and Spanish, Italian and Portuguese.
“Twenty years after the division of Germany and Europe ended, this symposium aims to re-examine the causes, historical significance and aftermath of the collapse of socialism,” said organizer Anke Pinkert, a professor of Germanic languages and literatures.
“Rather than simply viewing the historical shift in 1989 as a victory of capitalism, the symposium will re-evaluate the historical lessons that can be learned from the failure of socialism, such as the need for social visions and civil rights.”
The symposium, which seeks to engage participation of UI faculty members and students, as well as community members, is free and open to the public and does not require advance registration. It opens on Nov. 11 with a screening of the 2006 film “Lives of Others,” directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. The screening will take place at 7 p.m. in 1080 Foreign Languages Building.
The symposium continues the following day, at 3 p.m. in 210 Illini Union, with a faculty panel, moderated by Germanic languages and literatures professor Anna Stenport. The panel will focus on the presentation of personal narratives.
A keynote address by Gabriele Gysi, delivered in German, will follow the panel discussion at 5:15 p.m. Her talk will derive from her experience growing up in the former East Germany and working in the performing arts and in the cultural institutions of East, West and unified Germany.
During her visit to the Illinois campus, Gysi also will present a two-day workshop for theater students Nov. 6-7.
The symposium will end Nov. 13 with a panel discussion, “Post-1989 Literature and Culture: New Approaches,” presented by UI graduate students at 9 a.m. in 2090B FLB. The panel’s moderator will be Germanic languages and literatures professor Stephanie Hilger.
For more information, contact Pinkert at pinkert@illinois.edu.
Three reduced-service days
Plan now for the holidays
Civil service and academic professional employees are reminded that there are three reduced-service days (Dec. 28-30) during this year’s holiday schedule.
It is expected that most units will be closed on reduced-service days and most employees will not be working on these days. Employees have two floating holidays that can be used any time from July 1, 2009, until June 30, 2010, which can be used to cover two of the three reduced-service days.
Departments are strongly encouraged to begin planning for this period and to discuss these plans with employees. Employees should review their leave balances available for usage during the reduced-service days. An exact list of the holidays and reduced-service days for December is online.
Questions regarding reduced-service days may be directed to Corbin Smith, manager of labor and employee relations, at 333-3105, or Sharon Reynolds, associate director of Academic Human Resources, at 333-6747.
Division of Public Safety
Annual security report available online
The UI Division of Public Safety employs a community-based policing approach as part of an effort to involve everyone in creating and maintaining a safe community.
As part of that effort, the division maintains and publishes campus crime statistics in accordance with federal regulations. The most recent campus report is online. (A paper copy may be obtained by calling 333-1216.)
This report includes three years of statistics on crimes that occurred on campus, in certain off-campus buildings or property owned or controlled by the university, and on public property that is within, or immediately adjacent to and accessible from the campus. This report also includes institutional policies concerning campus security and other crime-prevention information.
In a mass e-mail to campus, Barbara R. O’Connor, executive director of public safety and chief of police, urged members of the campus community to read the report and use the information in it to increase awareness and help make the campus community a safer place to live, work and study.
Illinois Public Media
Ed Kieser hosts tornado show
WILL chief meteorologist Ed Kieser will present a tornado safety seminar at 7 p.m. Nov. 6 at the William M. Staerkel Planetarium at Parkland College. The presentation is part of the planetarium’s World of Science Lecture Series. Admission is $1 at the door.
Now in his 19th year of presenting tornado safety shows, Kieser will talk about late season tornadoes such as the F-4 tornado that killed four people and injured 26 near Van Wert, Ohio, on Nov. 10, 2002; show video of tornadoes; and provide tips people can use to protect themselves when severe weather threatens.
