Aug 28 - Nov 13
School of Filmmaking Symposium
School of Filmmaking: Symposium

The School of Filmmaking's "Symposium" series opens a door into the world behind the screen, offering audiences a chance to engage with filmmakers, artists and creative thinkers from myriad disciplines who are shaping contemporary storytelling. Through screenings, conversations and engaging dialogue, each event becomes a unique space to come together and explore how art is made, why it matters and what it reveals about the world we live in.

Sep 29 - Oct 3
Fall Dance
Fall Dance

The past and present collide as the School of Dance opens its performance season with a dynamic exploration of movement across generations. Contemporary dancers take center stage to perform works shaped by shared training, mentorship and creative exchange.

29
Sep
Joshua Rupley
Pianist Joshua Rupley in Recital

Hear the piano in conversation across time as Joshua Rupley returns to UNCSA for a residency and solo recital, tracing an arc through the piano's evolution. The program envelops the lyrical depth and clarity of Franz Schubert, the sweeping emotional intensity and structural weight of Johannes Brahms and the contemporary voice of Andrew Hirschfeld. Together, these composers guide audiences from romantic depth to modern exploration, revealing how the piano transforms through eras. Rupley is an award-winning performer and educator. A prizewinner of the Jackie McGehee Young Artists Competition and the Olga Kern International Piano Competition, he appears regularly in recital and is a dedicated advocate for contemporary music and new works. He currently teaches at the Leopold Mozart College of Music at the University of Augsburg.

Oct 1-8
Runied
"Ruined" by Lynn Nottage

Amid the upheaval of civil war in Congo, Pulitzer Prize-winning "Ruined" follows the formidable Mama Nadi, whose bar becomes a haven for women marked by violence, loss and survival. She must skillfully navigate violent power struggles while protecting those who rely on her courage and cunning.

3
Oct
Ksenija Komljenović
Percussionist Ksenija Komljenović in Recital

Engage your imagination and enjoy a bold exploration of sound and identity as faculty artist Ksenija Komljenović presents a solo recital of newly created works. New works by European composers Bartek Miler, Ana Krstajić and Miloš Branisavljević highlight rhythmic precision, tonal color and expressive range. Rooted in Komljenović's heritage, the music draws on a wide spectrum of influences -- folk traditions, blues, jazz, film scoring, and video games -- blending them into a contemporary musical language shaped by agility and invention.

4
Oct
UNCSA Improvised Music and Jazz Studio Fall Showcase
UNCSA Improvised Music and Jazz Studio Fall Showcase

A night of spontaneity, groove and creative risk unfolds as the UNCSA Improvised Music and Jazz Studio presents a smooth showcase of sound. Student performers explore a wide range of jazz and improvised traditions, from structured charts to fully open-ended creation - highlighting individual voice, ensemble listening and real-time musical decision-making.

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Turning point: Community Innovation Lab primed for action

Members of Winston-Salem’s Community Innovation Lab have reached a turning point in their journey, deciding at a recent workshop to focus on specific interventions they believe could help transform the city into a more equitable and abundant place for all its residents.

“This is the pivot moment,” said Richard Evans, President of EmcArts, a nationally known service organization based in New York City that is designing and facilitating the Lab with primary funding from the Kresge Foundation. 

“We really are moving from understanding the dynamics of the system, and what needs to change, toward developing some significant interventions that will be tested,” Evans said during a Lab workshop Feb. 26-27. “So for those who have been waiting for the action to begin, this is the time.” 

The Winston-Salem Lab has brought together a diverse group of stakeholders, including city agencies, community organizers, business leaders, artists, cultural organizations, faith-based organizations, nonprofit service providers as well as those affected by poverty, to address inequities in employment, income and wealth in the city. The Lab was convened last fall by the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, The Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County, and The Winston-Salem Foundation.

After a break of several months, during which teams of Lab members worked on “small experiments with radical intent,” the full group gathered recently at El Buen Pastor Latino Community Services. 

Representatives from each team described the experiments, which ranged from simply reading books about poverty to better understand the issue to conducting “listening conversations” with residents of a low-income apartment complex to find out what barriers they face to living healthier and fuller lives.

One such experiment, a mentoring group for female entrepreneurs, really took off, said Mary Haglund, a chef and owner of Mary’s Gourmet Diner.

“I have a burden for women in my community that also want to be entrepreneurs,” she said. “There are systems that I feel like need to be interrupted. We are treated like a minority when we are a majority.” 

Haglund was moved to tears when she talked about creating the group “Mary’s Mavens” on Facebook and quickly attracting nearly 300 members. Sixty women came to the first meeting.

“I knew there was a need,” she told fellow Lab members. “The energy was palpable. These women were like sponges — everybody started feeding each other. It was an amazing experience. We are now doing workshops on life coaching, finance, startup businesses. 

“I am not a joiner by nature. I’ve never been a part of anything remotely like this. Then you gave me something to do. And it has been astounding.”

After discussing their experiments, Lab members spent the rest of their time together examining a dozen proposed strategies for systemic change that grew out of their work last fall and deciding which of the interventions they wanted to pursue further. They considered whether the interventions could play out over time on a broad scale; could clearly disrupt ingrained mindsets and structures that drive the way things now work in Winston-Salem; and could incorporate opportunities for artists and cultural organizations to play central roles moving forward.

The group voted to focus on four system interventions, or “clusters,” in the coming months: 

  • The Art of Dialogue: Create arts-based forums for the community to share ideas, information, experiences and assumptions about race, class and power for the purpose of personal and collective learning.
  • An Inclusive Economy: Build radical new structures of mutual support for entrepreneurs and small business owners who traditionally have been excluded from access to capital, such as people of color, women, artists and low-income residents.
  • One-Stop Shops for Social Services/Wraparound Justice: Find inventive new ways to integrate and simplify the experience of accessing social services, focusing on a personal and holistic approach, such as community centers or mobile delivery. Lab members also expressed interest in developing peer-to-peer support networks and wrap-around services for people currently in the justice system and those re-entering the community.
  • Equitable Schools/21st Century Skills: Activate a network of unusual community partners to accelerate work toward equity in public education, advancing issues of school segregation, funding disparity, biased discipline, culturally relevant curriculum and staff diversity. Create new pathways for young people to develop the 21st century skills they’ll need to adapt to a changing economic landscape in Winston-Salem by curating robust new partnerships between students, parents, educators, businesses, creative industries, training institutions and workforce development.

Evans asked Lab members to brainstorm the names of others in the community they need to invite to further explore these system interventions at the group’s next workshop, planned for April 22-23. 

“If these clusters are to be successful, to be leveraged so that you get a big bang for your buck, which agencies, organizations and individuals really need to be involved?” he asked.

The core questions driving the Lab’s work include: How can we create a more equitable and abundant Winston-Salem? How can we move systems of race, class and power to do so? How can we, as a community, build enough trust to enable transformative change to happen?

EmcArts recently received a grant of $1.5 million from the Kresge Foundation to support completion of its two pilot Community Innovation Labs, launched in 2015 in Winston-Salem and in Providence, Rhode Island, and the launch of two additional Labs in communities across the United States. With the grant from Kresge, along with local funders and conveners, EmcArts has committed to a two-year investment in the Winston-Salem community totaling $1 million.

Karina Mangu-Ward, a lead facilitator for EmcArts, said the Kresge funding can support the work of up to three clusters through April of 2017 with a grant of up to $60,000 for each. 

Lab members collectively expressed a desire to move forward.

“The fact is, the federal government and state government don’t care about us,” said Ralph Womble, Vice Chairman of the Downtown Winston-Salem Partnership. “If we don’t fix it, nobody will.” 

Rebeccah Byer, an artist entrepreneur who owns The Olio glass-blowing studio, said the issues the Lab is grappling with are the kind that keep her up at night.

“And this is the work that wakes me up in the morning,” Byer said. “Knowing that there is a room full of people who are all committed to doing the hard work and asking the difficult questions is really important to me.” 

More Information:

March 23, 2016