The Bowdoin Orient

For the past fifty years, Bowdoin students doing summer research have had the opportunity to attend performances by world-renowned musicians at the annual Bowdoin International Music Festival. Next summer, Lewis Kaplan, the man who made it all possible, will retire from his directorial post. Since its founding in 1964, the festival has evolved from a local, small summer concert series to an international training program for accomplished young musicians.

After a run as one of the Bowdoin College Museum of Art’s most well-attended exhibitions, “William Wegman’s Hello Nature” came down on Sunday, October 21, concluding three months of critical acclaim. The main floor galleries, where the Wegman show was on display, are currently in a transitory state. Boxes, tools and carts litter the space while José Ribas ’76, the museum’s technician and preparator, busily works to ready the space for upcoming exhibitions.

Bowdoin’s Dining Service is consistently ranked as one of the top dining services in the country—there’s no denying that it definitely helps to be well-fed when you’re working as tirelessly as the typical Bowdoin student. Five things to know as you begin your journey with Bowdoin Dining:

1) The timeless question: Moulton or Thorne?
2) Brunch is a thing here.
3) The food isn’t going anywhere.
4) Regarding Special Events and the Bowdoin log.
5) Other Dining terminology.

New York-based art critic Donald Kuspit will speak on Monday, May 7 about persisting distinctions in art criticism through the 19th and 20th centuries. His lecture, "Critical Consciousness of the Arts," will explore the divisions between realism and abstraction that have evolved throughout the last two centuries of art criticism.

A unique fusion of theater and dance, "Lullaby," will premiere next week in the culmination of a year-long exploration of far-ranging emotions, personal narratives and collaborative creation.

In the first installment of a two-part lecture series celebrating 200 years of art collecting at Bowdoin, Andrew McClellan, professor of art history at Tufts University, will deliver a lecture titled "Private Collecting in the Age of Museums" next Thursday.

Featuring interweaving secret police investigations and puppetry sequences, senior Zach Perez's production of Martin McDonagh's "The Pillowman" will run Wednesday and Thursday.

A group of unruly and existentialist British schoolboys take the Pickard stage this weekend in Masque and Gown's production of "History Boys."

George Lopez, an accomplished pianist and musician, is wrapping up the first year of his two-year tenure as an artist-in-residency with a concert featuring the acclaimed Esterhazy string quartet.

In conjunction with the current exhibit at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, "Object of Devotion," the music department will sponsor "Requiem," a concert in Early Renaissance music by St. Mary Schola.

Paddling its way around the country, the Reel Paddling Film Festival will make a stop at Bowdoin tonight. Self-described as showing "The Best Paddling Films of the year," the film festival lends out its films to outing clubs, stores and theaters nationwide.

From curating student exhibits to Maine Arts Commission public artwork, Visual Arts Technician Kyle Downs has devoted his life to his craft. In addition to his post at Bowdoin, Downs is an active artist in his own right. His most recent project, “Beyond The Forest,” opened last Friday at the Coleman Burke Gallery at Port City Music Hall in Portland.

Miscellania hits high note on tour over break

While it may be less conspicuous than the expansive chair exhibition, "Something Completely Different: Raymond Pettibon's Repeater Pencil" packs a punch. The 14-minute video installation is composed of Pettibon's drawings and watercolors—animated and set to audio narration.

Lectures and dance performances are typical fare for Kresge auditorium, but the Women in Action (WIA) brought a unique combination of both art forms to the stage last night. The six female Nicaraguan dancers of WIA performed traditional Nicaraguan folk dance pieces while incorporating informative lectures about WIA's humanitarian initiatives to combat poverty in Nicaragua.

Though Eleven doesn't quite add up to 11, the band's now eight-person lineup has grown (significantly) since the band was formed in the fall of 2006. Then-first-years Alexi Thomakos '10 and Nick Lechich '10 began playing music together in the common room of their first-year dorm. Soon thereafter, they met bassist Max Taylor '10 and keyboard player, guitarist, and vocalist Sammie Francis '09, who pushed for the formation of a band.

Singing their way up and down the Northeast coast, Bowdoin's oldest female a capella group, Miscellania, rang in the New Year with its first musical tour since 2007.

Tonight, Fanny Pak will be performing on Bowdoin's own Pickard Theater stage, flaunting their eccentric style and the fanny packs made famous on MTV's second season of "America's Best Dance Crew."

Some holiday celebrations transcend religion and culture.

Although clowning around is not usually encouraged in an academic atmosphere, Bowdoin's student theater group, Masque and Gown, is giving students an opportunity to goof off.

At Bowdoin the name Ahmad Hassan Muhammad '10 is synonymous with piano prodigy, and tonight, students will have the chance to see Muhammad perform original compositions.

Jamaican choreographer Garth Fagan, best known for his Tony Award-winning work in the Broadway stage production of Disney's "The Lion King," will conduct a lecture demonstration tonight as a part of the celebration of 40 years of Africana studies at Bowdoin.

What happens when you take one-part Barry Mills's nephew, one-part former Miscellania member, and a crowd of aurally curious Bowdoin students? With this evening's "Shameless Plugs" concert featuring Dan Mills and Samantha Farrell '05, the Entertainment Board (E-board), is hoping for a hit. Co-President of the E-Board Chris Omachi said the "Shameless Plugs" project aims to showcase Bowdoin-related talent. The brainchild of Megan Brunmier '08, student activities advisor to the E-board. Tonight's show will be the first in what the E-board intends to make into an annual showcase.