Art is a powerful tool for community awareness and social change, which is why Redefine, a student organization that connects social justice and the arts, has coordinated Shift, an event intended to highlight the immigrant experiences of students on campus, as well as to champion diversity within the Michigan community.
Shift will feature artists from the Middle East, India, Bahamas, Puerto Rico, Brazil, as well as from many more areas. There will be narratives that center around the experiences of immigrants, refugees, and international students. The event will feature multicultural performances, a two-hour art exhibition, and FREE FOOD.
I am a member of Redefine, and I know that the e-board has been working tirelessly for the past few weeks in preparation for this upcoming event, partnered with the student organizations Zeta Omega Eta, Refugees to College, Iraqi Student Association, Students Organize for Syria, and The Call for Humanity. Please check it out! This event promises to be a spectacular night.
Event details:
When: Thursday November 16, 7-9PM
Where: The Pendleton Room at the Michigan Union
Cost: FREE!!!
With the University of Michigan’s Bicentennial Year coming to a close, our beloved Central Student Government will be hosting its very own Illuminations World Showcase (not to be confused with the spectacular IllumiNations performance at the World’s Happiest Place on Earth!). However, with a similar approach to that of Disney’s Epcot World Showcase, CSG’s intent is on celebrating the diversity of its student communities here at the University. Although the Bicentennial Year comes with celebrating the University’s history and milestones achieved, the Illuminations Showcase is intended to foster a vision of the legacy we strive to see the University uphold for its many years to come.
This event is comprised of two parts: a food fair of numerous authentic, international cuisines followed by a performance exemplifying our students’ talents from across the globe. Some of the groups you can expect to see are the African Students Association and Arab Students Association along with many others.
The food fair will be held at Ingalls Mall at 5 PM and the culture show at the Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre in the Michigan League at 7 PM. Both events are entirely free with no tickets necessary.
While EnspiRED is a fashion organization, they described the showcase last night as their annual multimedia event. The purpose was to highlight the work of all artists around campus, making last night “more than just fashion.”
There were two paintings and a photo print making up the display part of the event, while the majority of the night consisted of live performances. There were no labels on the visual art but I got a photo of the canvases near the door.
Chase Garrett, a poet, was the first live performer. It was a political narrative preaching optimism even though the state of America is less than favorable at the moment. It seemed to resonate with the audience, who was very responsive throughout the evening.
Next was a singer/guitarist, Jake Lemond. While he reminded me a little of The Lumineers’ main singer, he was unique with his stage presence and skill with the guitar. He played three songs, most of them alternating between a Travis pick-style verse and a strummed chorus. There was a lot of strum pattern and vocal variation which made each song different. He even used harmonics at the end of his last song!
Dennis London, another poet, came next. His first piece was a rap in the middle of a song played over the speakers. His second was, in my opinion, a love poem. He called himself a “photographer by day” and talked about his newly-published book. The book is about how happiness is earned. The motivational speech he gave at the end of his performance seemed to be a snippet of that message.
After that, the dance group Ambiance performed. They were an all-female group. Their performance was an interesting mix of modern dance, showcasing fluidity of movement and form. They also incorporated some ballet movements into the piece (which I only recognized because of a history of dance class I’m taking this semester) as interludes between dance exchanges. I was sitting near the back, however, so it was difficult to see what they were doing sometimes as there was a lot of groundwork.
Unfortunately, my phone died during intermission and I was unable to take notes for the second part of the night. It was, overall, a very cool experience.
Looking for something to do tomorrow night? Interested in fashion, the arts, campus culture, and free food? Stop by North Quad space 2435 for all of these things and more! ENSPIRED presents The Art Experience, featuring dance performances, art, fashion, photography, poetry, and more!
When my friends and I grabbed seats near the front of the Lydia Mendhelson theater we had arrived over 40 minutes early to ensure prime seats, and yet the first several rows were already packed with people. Despite being held in a bigger venue than the past several shows I had been to, the seats started filling up quickly, and even with ten minutes left before the start of the show all I could hear was a dull roar as both the main floor and balcony were filled with noisy students excited for their pre-finals fix of improv comedy.
The show opened with a short video clip that prepped the audience for the show they were about to be treated to. With a dramatic narration done ala morgan freeman, describing the club as if they were not merely a (very good) improv group, but instead a group of heroes destined for greatness, it sent ripples of chuckles through the audience.
Once the Comco members took to the stage the audience was cheering like mad, ready for the show to begin. They opened with a long-form game called “monologue.” Two cast members would come up and give short monologues based off of a prompt given by the audience, and then the rest of the cast members would riff off those stories for a god 10-15 minutes, jumping in and out as needed. Some of the situations and stories were so absurd I couldn’t help but laugh, but the cast members did a wonderful job keeping each scene flowing and relating them back to the previous scenes for added laughter.
One of my favorite games of the night was when two cast members had to act as the arms for another two, either working in unison or sabotaging them, and reacting to whatever scene was taking place. The scene was two passengers in a turbulent air plane ride, one freaking out while the other tried to calm them down, to no avail. Watching the cast members helplessly going along with whatever their “hands” decided to do was nothing short of hilarious.
I’d like to also emphasize how well the cast members bounced off each other as well as read the audience. If a joke was ever falling flat they did a good job of picking it right back up or cutting the joke short. Conversely, whenever a joke was doing particularly well they were able to really play it up, reacting in time to the audience and giving them whatever caused the largest cheers. That being said my friends and I were constantly cheering and laughing throughout the night, ensuring that my cheeks were red and sore by the time we were leaving the theater.
One of the most touching moments of the night was when the Comco players said their farewells to the graduating seniors, giving them large posters with every show they had done in Comco on the front, and touching personal notes on the back. Both the comco members on stage, and several audience members were holding back tears.
Finally, after that touching moment it was time to close the show just as they close every show, with the game “I like my men like I like my ______,” allowing audience members to fill in the blank to humorous responses. I especially like that they invite Comco alumni onto stage to complete that game with them. My friends and I couldn’t stop talking about our favorite moments from the show the entire walk back, and despite this being their very first Comco show, they are raring to go back next year. Check out Comco at their facebook page, here!
What a night. I started walking over to the Power Center with my friend five minutes before the concert started to find a building packed with students. Before the first group took the stage, the organizers announced that this was the second sold-out concert in a row.
Some sold-out concerts don’t feel sold out. You can spot empty seats and the audience is tame. Not so for this young, rambunctious crowd that hooted and hollered names of friends in the dance groups all throughout the event. Between the energy of the audience and the students moving around on stage, the 2.5 hour event felt like taking a shot of espresso.
When things get hot and heavy on stage
First off, I have to apologize at not being able to keep track of the names of the groups. Every group that took the stage was incredibly talented in their own unique way. Alas, I did not have a program with me during the concert so I could not tell exactly which group was on stage at a particular time.
I can’t imagine it’s easy to fit a wide variety of student acts into one concert, but Dance Mix 17 pulled it off through smooth transitions between more traditional ballet (top left picture) and decidedly modern hip-hop (top right picture), as well as dancers that both to the melodies of ballads and rock songs alike.
One of the highlights of the group was Revolution and their stringless yo-yo performance. Countless students walked across the stage slinging their plastic yo-yo’s like divine beings levitating rocks. Those plastic yo-yo’s flew across the stage and around the slingers and every trick drew fresh cheers from the crowd. Even the tricks that failed still felt like successes, and I was definitely not the only one entranced by the performance.
Later, Photonix performed in the dark with glow sticks, producing images like the one you see in the header photo of this blog. Towards the end of the performance, they unleashed hundreds of mini glow sticks into the audience.
The audience being composed almost entirely of students, everyone went wild.
Another highlight of the night was a Bollywood rendition of Top Gun (by Michigan Manzil I think). The story was a cliche telling of a young fighter pilot who loses his friend in a fight, but this isn’t a Hollywood film and the performance was one of the standouts of the second half of the night.
The Bollywood-esque peformance went through half a dozen wardrobe changes without a hitch, in addition to props and set pieces, and above all it was entertaining as heck.
Rounding out the rest of the night were performances by EnCore (picture below), Outrage, and FunKtion again.
I’m incredibly glad I was able to attend this event, and if you’re reading this blog and didn’t go this year, you NEED to attend next year.
