It's The Season in Santa Fe -- it's The Season pretty much everywhere in New Mexico where tourists flock -- and we try to avoid the crowds as much as possible. Well, it's nice that folks want to come to this rugged corner of the country to see and do rugged or fancy tourist things and all, but the transition from relatively calm and tranquil to super-charged hyper-tourism is sudden -- happening within moments over Memorial Day weekend -- and it is guaranteed to discombobulate.
Ms. Ché and I have been up in Santa Fe and Taos repeatedly this Season, though, and we'll be going several more times before The Season ends, crowds or no crowds. I'm grateful in some ways that I can do it, since I'd been too ill to even think of it within the last few months. Now my various conditions seem to be controlled with medications, and I can get around well enough and for long enough to actually enjoy being out and about.
This weekend we took a group of Cherokee from Albuquerque to the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts in Santa Fe to tour the exhibit on Lloyd Kiva New, the co-founder of the Institute of American Indian Arts -- where Ms Ché has been a student for a year now. The tour was led by Aysen New, Lloyd New's widow, a remarkable woman and presence in her own right, who has maintained her late husband's legacy with wit and wisdom and whose tenacity has ensured he will not be forgotten.
There are three museum exhibits currently on view in Santa Fe which detail the life and legacy of Lloyd Kiva New. The Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, and the New Mexico Museum of Art are all simultaneously hosting Lloyd Kiva New exhibits through the summer and into the fall. In addition, there is an exhibit at the Institute of American Indian Arts -- the institution he co-founded -- and one of the galleries on the Santa Fe Plaza is offering a number of items created in Lloyd Kiva New's studio in Scottsdale, or created from materials and fabrics he made, for sale to collectors.
There is also a book, "The Sound of Drums," widely available at these exhibits. The book is an edited version of Lloyd New's memoirs which he composed and wrote late in his life. It's beautifully written in an almost magical realist style, by a man who clearly loved his work and lived his life to the full.
Another book, "Celebrating Difference" is also available, though not quite as widely, which uses an interview and essay technique to document the history and legacy of the Institute of American Indian Arts through 2012, the year of this volume's publication.
Next weekend, we'll provide another perspective on Lloyd Kiva New from one of his associates who knew and worked with him in Scottsdale and later came to Santa Fe as an educational consultant and worked with him throughout his tenure at IAIA and afterwards.
I'll report on that in another post later on.
It's been a long time since I've done anything like this. There was a time when we would routinely host receptions, seminars, workshops and what have you as part of our work in theater and the arts in California, but we pretty much gave that up when our theater company closed in 1996. We went off and did other things -- to make money in a word. Theater and the arts are not really money making propositions -- except for the very few at the top, and for them, prominence is precarious. We were able to make enough doing other things to retire in relative comfort, and now that we've settled in to retirement, Ms. Ché and I are both becoming more and more involved as donors, collectors, scholars and participants, in the local/regional arts communities. It's the way these things were no doubt meant to be.
Because of Ms Ché's Native American heritage -- specifically Cherokee -- we've focused most of our attention on Native American creative arts since we moved to New Mexico, but it's not our only interest and focus. Indeed, later this month and then again in October, we intend to focus on one of the major motors for New Mexico's early prominence in the arts, Mabel Dodge Luhan.
Ms. Ché attended a writer's workshop conducted by Jimmy Santiago Baca at her house, Los Gallos, in Taos two years ago. Ever since, she's been taken with Mabel and the stories of her life and work in New Mexico. Her house in Taos has also become a warm and welcoming destination for us. We took Ms Ché's cousin and her husband there on our brief day-trip to Taos when they came to visit just before the Memorial Day tourist inundations. Because it is an important site to us, we felt it was a worthwhile site for them to see and experience as well.
In May an exhibit on Mabel's life, work and cultural influence opened at the Harwood Museum in Taos. The exhibit was co-curated by Ma-Lin Wilson-Powell and Dr. Lois Rudnik, Mabel's chief biographer for many years. We haven't had the opportunity and time to see it yet, but plan to participate in some of the activities surrounding it later this month -- may even get up to D. H. Lawrence's ranch.
When the exhibit moves to the Albuquerque Museum in October, we will no doubt be involved in some of its activities as well. There are plays and even an opera connected with the exhibit, so we have an interest (!).
So our summer and fall schedules are filling up. Ms Ché is returning to IAIA as a student in August. She received the Fall 2016 Truman Capote Literary Scholarship, so it's likely she'll be... busy (in a good way) with her literary work and will likely be promoting the creative writing program at IAIA as well.
She and I are also involved in the development of a new performing arts facility on the IAIA campus. But that's a whole other story for another time.
Meanwhile, the increasingly dreary business of the American Political Classes struggles on. What a deplorable mess -- also another story for another time.
NOTE: Will add links as time allows. UPDATE: Links have been added!
Showing posts with label out and about. Show all posts
Showing posts with label out and about. Show all posts
Sunday, June 5, 2016
Sunday, April 6, 2014
Out and About -- Again
 |
| Microseconds of the Trinity Test |
Went out to Trinity Site yesterday. Because it was the only time the site would be open this year, there were larger than usual crowds, and it took close to an hour (maybe longer, come to think of it) to get cleared at the Stallion Gate.
Trinity Site, as I've written before, is a secular pilgrimage site in New Mexico, the site of the world's first atomic bomb explosion. One goes there to pay respects, not just to the hundreds of thousands of Japanese who were incinerated at the end of World War II by the two atomic bombs dropped on their country, but to the malevolent powers that were unleashed and which still haunt the world -- and haunt New Mexico in particular. I've said there is no place on earth outside Japan where the nuclear issue is so profound and profoundly moving as in New Mexico, as current and contemporary today as it ever was.
After arriving at the parking lot, I had to strategize actually getting to the site more than a quarter mile away and then getting back, as I am still lame from an episode of sciatica in January. So I got a seat-cane for the expedition, with the thought that if I were able to sit down during the trek, I'd probably be able to make it without too much trouble. (There is a transport for the old and lame from the parking lot to the site gate, but I decided to forgo it in order to test whether I could make it on my own.) Sure enough, the cane itself was sufficient to keep me appropriately propped up and walking, and I didn't have to sit on the way to or from the monument. Yay! Simple victories.
The April weather was a challenge, though. We'd been warned there might be rain, but instead, there was virga and many downdrafts which raised whirlwinds and clouds of dust and sand that got into everything. I found my wallet was full of sand and dust when we stopped for a late lunch after leaving the site. One man fell face first into the dirt in front of the monument when a gust caught him by surprise, and others were dumbfounded by the whipping whirlwinds and clouds of sand and dust pummeling them in the face. Nevertheless, the site is spectacular, and the winds and clouds added to the spectacle.
The site was essentially identical to what it had been in 2010 when I was there on my own. But this was the first time for Ms Ché, and she was quite taken with it. She and I grew up in a world in which nuclear power was seen as a panacea for practically everything that ailed mankind -- while the specter of nuclear annihilation loomed over us every single day.
Trinity Site is where that specter originated.
Yesterday's adventure there was made all the more dramatic by the dramatic weather knocking us and everyone else around so much.
After a brief return home to clean up, we headed back to Albuquerque to attend a fundraiser for the National Institute of Flamenco whose home base burned last
There were many highlights, but one that will stay with us for a good long time was the performance of Sonia Olla and Ismael Fernandez who demonstrated -- as if there were any doubts -- what this "flamenco" thing is all about. It was brilliant. But then, so was practically everything at the event.
It was yet another day and night to remember, and yet another "Only in New Mexico" experience.
Friday, April 5, 2013
Ay ¡Flamenco!
Flamenco! Flamenco! Flamenco! : Sevillanas from Christopher Michael Roybal on Vimeo.
Yjastros at the KiMo Theatre in Albuquerque October 30, 2009, with Alma Flamenca and Niños Flamencos.
A couple of weeks ago, after we saw "West Side Story" at Popejoy Hall in Albuquerque (located on the campus of UNM), we walked to a friend's house a few blocks away to visit for a bit. We passed by a number of posters promoting something called 'Encuentros' with a dance company called 'Yjastros.' ¡Flamenco!
Indeed.
The performance was coming up in a few weeks at the National Hispanic Cultural Center, part of the festivities leading up to the celebration of Cesar Chavez Day (which is tomorrow at the NHCC, featuring Dolores Huerta as honored guest -- and we might have to go. There's another long story involved... )
At any rate.
Flamenco is easily my favorite dance form. My introduction to it dates back some decades to St. Louis, specifically the Opera Theatre of St. Louis on the campus of Webster University. Maria Benitez and her company had been invited out from Santa Fe by Richard Gaddes, then artistic director of the Santa Fe Opera and the founder of Opera Theatre of St. Louis, to choreograph and perform in the dance segments of that summer's zarzuela, "La Verbena de la Paloma."
This was not my first encounter with opera by any means, in fact, I'd worked with a number of opera companies on the West Coast prior to heading out to St. Louis by car. It would mean my first -- and second -- encounter with New Mexico, however, since the Interstate passes right through both going and coming (who'dathunk!).
Sometimes when driving through Albuquerque, I pass by the motel where I spent the night back in 1982, (well, it wasn't actually the "night" as my arrival was at dawn, and don't think I got more than two hours' sleep before the cleaners began banging around, but that's another story, too.) That motel, the Crossroads, is apparently something of a landmark these days due to a television series I've never seen; it's something out of the 1950's, looking very much now as it did then, perched there on Central hard against I-25. You can't miss it.
But that aside...
The zarzuela was the highlight of the Opera Theatre of St. Louis season. Everyone, including me, said so. Gaddes, for his part, was gushing about it constantly, deservedly, too. He'd never tried anything like it in St. Louis, and he was very uncertain how it would go over with a hard Missouri "Show Me" crowd. But they loved it.
Maria and company also did a special flamenco performance on their own during the run of "La Verbena," and that's where I saw flamenco for the first time in its purest, live form. It was -- for me at least -- thrilling.
I've been a fan and an admirer of Maria Benitez ever since. There's a extended story that goes along with that, but I'll skip it for now to get to Yjastros and 'Encuentros' last night.
Between the time of my first encounter with Maria Benitez and flamenco in St. Louis, a number of flamenco movies were made in Spain, featuring Antonio Gades and Cristina Hoyos. Eee! The first one I saw was "Carmen" -- a flamenco Carmen, imagine -- and it was stunning. I still have visions of some of the scenes in my head. It was amazing. I'd never seen, or even thought of, anything like it. Strangely enough, or perhaps not so, the spareness of the production, the idea that it's a rehearsal for an upcoming production, the incredible discipline and skill of the performers, and the simplicity of the whole thing -- compared to Grand Opera, for heaven's sake -- was in line with my percolating notions of "poor theater" as delineated by the Becks and Grotowski and many others.
"El Amor Brujo" and "Bodas de Sangre" were not quite as spare and relevatory, at least to my reckoning, but they were in their own way just as astonishing. They can still take my breath away.
And so to Yjastros, the local-national-international flamenco company, that I'd barely been aware of prior to last night. Well, yes, I'd heard of them and knew of Joaquin and Marisol Encinias. But I'd never seen them, never thought I would until I noticed the poster after the performance of national tour of "West Side Story," and thought, "Why not?"
Yes, well.
Why not, indeed.
The show was... brilliant.
There's no other word for it. I'm sure a flamenco purist would criticize this or that dancer, dance, or the whole concept as being "not quite" something or other, and I would be the first to admit there were flaws here and there -- both technical and artistic -- but I don't care. It doesn't matter.
I couldn't get the silly grin off my face the whole time, nor could I keep myself from shouting a not infrequent ¡Olé! at a particularly intricate paso. These people were on. This was flamenco duro.
We don't see that very often, not even in New Mexico, where flamenco is one of the many cultural art forms that suffuse the place. I adore Maria and her company, and her artistry is unmatched as far as I'm concerned, but this, this Yjastros, was something else again.
It was hard, gorgeous, enthralling.
Oh, and there were standout performers. Oh my, yes. Particularly, in my view, Elena Osuna, whose every fiber of being, whose tension and passion, drew you in to a mysterious and compelling world as expressed with her feet and hands and arms and body. Even when she danced with a corps, you knew she was exceptional and she kept your attention no matter who else was onstage or what else was going on.
Carlos Menchaca was nearly -- not quite -- her match. There were only two men (besides the artistic director, Joaquin Encinias) in the dance company. Male dancers seem to be as scarce as the proverbial hen's teeth in New Mexico, so it's fairly easy for a man with reasonable talent to be a standout in dance productions, but Carlos was exceptional.
He danced "Jaleo" with Marisol Encinias, a co-director of the company (Joaquin is her brother), in a passionate duo that had the audience shouting and clapping at the audacity and spirit of the whole thing.
Marisol herself had a solo that brought the house down. It was long, intricate, emotional, and exuberant. Her stamina must be incredible. To say the least.
Joaquin performed with great vigor, not a lot of style, at the end of the show. He's got some weight on him, but that's never stopped a flamenco performer in my recollection, and he did his turn well. The crowd loved it, thought I heard one wag in the restroom afterwards saying he thought "that big dude was gonna get his heart attack right there on the stage."
Perhaps the most alluring performance was that of cantante Kina Mendez who sang through most of the show and sang and danced (in stiletto heels!) in her own solo segment.
The guitarists were nothing short of brilliant themselves.
All in all, it was a memorable evening, one of so many we've had since settling in New Mexico.
Yjastros at the KiMo Theatre in Albuquerque October 30, 2009, with Alma Flamenca and Niños Flamencos.
A couple of weeks ago, after we saw "West Side Story" at Popejoy Hall in Albuquerque (located on the campus of UNM), we walked to a friend's house a few blocks away to visit for a bit. We passed by a number of posters promoting something called 'Encuentros' with a dance company called 'Yjastros.' ¡Flamenco!
Indeed.
The performance was coming up in a few weeks at the National Hispanic Cultural Center, part of the festivities leading up to the celebration of Cesar Chavez Day (which is tomorrow at the NHCC, featuring Dolores Huerta as honored guest -- and we might have to go. There's another long story involved... )
At any rate.
Flamenco is easily my favorite dance form. My introduction to it dates back some decades to St. Louis, specifically the Opera Theatre of St. Louis on the campus of Webster University. Maria Benitez and her company had been invited out from Santa Fe by Richard Gaddes, then artistic director of the Santa Fe Opera and the founder of Opera Theatre of St. Louis, to choreograph and perform in the dance segments of that summer's zarzuela, "La Verbena de la Paloma."
This was not my first encounter with opera by any means, in fact, I'd worked with a number of opera companies on the West Coast prior to heading out to St. Louis by car. It would mean my first -- and second -- encounter with New Mexico, however, since the Interstate passes right through both going and coming (who'dathunk!).
Sometimes when driving through Albuquerque, I pass by the motel where I spent the night back in 1982, (well, it wasn't actually the "night" as my arrival was at dawn, and don't think I got more than two hours' sleep before the cleaners began banging around, but that's another story, too.) That motel, the Crossroads, is apparently something of a landmark these days due to a television series I've never seen; it's something out of the 1950's, looking very much now as it did then, perched there on Central hard against I-25. You can't miss it.
But that aside...
The zarzuela was the highlight of the Opera Theatre of St. Louis season. Everyone, including me, said so. Gaddes, for his part, was gushing about it constantly, deservedly, too. He'd never tried anything like it in St. Louis, and he was very uncertain how it would go over with a hard Missouri "Show Me" crowd. But they loved it.
Maria and company also did a special flamenco performance on their own during the run of "La Verbena," and that's where I saw flamenco for the first time in its purest, live form. It was -- for me at least -- thrilling.
I've been a fan and an admirer of Maria Benitez ever since. There's a extended story that goes along with that, but I'll skip it for now to get to Yjastros and 'Encuentros' last night.
Between the time of my first encounter with Maria Benitez and flamenco in St. Louis, a number of flamenco movies were made in Spain, featuring Antonio Gades and Cristina Hoyos. Eee! The first one I saw was "Carmen" -- a flamenco Carmen, imagine -- and it was stunning. I still have visions of some of the scenes in my head. It was amazing. I'd never seen, or even thought of, anything like it. Strangely enough, or perhaps not so, the spareness of the production, the idea that it's a rehearsal for an upcoming production, the incredible discipline and skill of the performers, and the simplicity of the whole thing -- compared to Grand Opera, for heaven's sake -- was in line with my percolating notions of "poor theater" as delineated by the Becks and Grotowski and many others.
"El Amor Brujo" and "Bodas de Sangre" were not quite as spare and relevatory, at least to my reckoning, but they were in their own way just as astonishing. They can still take my breath away.
And so to Yjastros, the local-national-international flamenco company, that I'd barely been aware of prior to last night. Well, yes, I'd heard of them and knew of Joaquin and Marisol Encinias. But I'd never seen them, never thought I would until I noticed the poster after the performance of national tour of "West Side Story," and thought, "Why not?"
Yes, well.
Why not, indeed.
The show was... brilliant.
There's no other word for it. I'm sure a flamenco purist would criticize this or that dancer, dance, or the whole concept as being "not quite" something or other, and I would be the first to admit there were flaws here and there -- both technical and artistic -- but I don't care. It doesn't matter.
I couldn't get the silly grin off my face the whole time, nor could I keep myself from shouting a not infrequent ¡Olé! at a particularly intricate paso. These people were on. This was flamenco duro.
We don't see that very often, not even in New Mexico, where flamenco is one of the many cultural art forms that suffuse the place. I adore Maria and her company, and her artistry is unmatched as far as I'm concerned, but this, this Yjastros, was something else again.
It was hard, gorgeous, enthralling.
Oh, and there were standout performers. Oh my, yes. Particularly, in my view, Elena Osuna, whose every fiber of being, whose tension and passion, drew you in to a mysterious and compelling world as expressed with her feet and hands and arms and body. Even when she danced with a corps, you knew she was exceptional and she kept your attention no matter who else was onstage or what else was going on.
Carlos Menchaca was nearly -- not quite -- her match. There were only two men (besides the artistic director, Joaquin Encinias) in the dance company. Male dancers seem to be as scarce as the proverbial hen's teeth in New Mexico, so it's fairly easy for a man with reasonable talent to be a standout in dance productions, but Carlos was exceptional.
He danced "Jaleo" with Marisol Encinias, a co-director of the company (Joaquin is her brother), in a passionate duo that had the audience shouting and clapping at the audacity and spirit of the whole thing.
Marisol herself had a solo that brought the house down. It was long, intricate, emotional, and exuberant. Her stamina must be incredible. To say the least.
Joaquin performed with great vigor, not a lot of style, at the end of the show. He's got some weight on him, but that's never stopped a flamenco performer in my recollection, and he did his turn well. The crowd loved it, thought I heard one wag in the restroom afterwards saying he thought "that big dude was gonna get his heart attack right there on the stage."
Perhaps the most alluring performance was that of cantante Kina Mendez who sang through most of the show and sang and danced (in stiletto heels!) in her own solo segment.
The guitarists were nothing short of brilliant themselves.
All in all, it was a memorable evening, one of so many we've had since settling in New Mexico.
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