The Mormon Arts Center Festival was this weekend, and it was absolutely incredible. Riverside Church was replete with gorgeous architecture and stained glass windows, the speakers were riveting (with many people considering the talk about Francisco Estevez the best of them all), the art exhibit was astounding, and the sing-in led by Craig Jessop was an unforgettable experience.
Unfortunately, I didn't end up making it. As I mentioned, I had pretty horrendous back pain this weekend and I could barely move even after (or even thanks to) my ER visit. The train would have been awful, the subway would have been rough, and I wouldn't have even been able to sing at the sing-in if it required more than a little breathing.
So I stayed home and imagined what it would have been like seeing the art and singing with everyone. Although I knew this probably wouldn't have happened had I gone, I imagined scenarios where some accomplished composer pulled me aside, found a piano, and helped me with a few measures here and there on some arrangements I've been working on. And then President Uchtdorf shook my hand and told me to name my baby Dieter.
In good news, all the talks will be available online over the next few days, so I will gradually be able to catch up on what I missed. I'm still disappointed that I didn't get to interact with people, but my kids provided a pretty good consolation prize for me . . .
They made their own arts festival! There were costumes, there were original compositions (well, based on the Batman theme song but they made new words), and there were plenty of art exhibits!
Allow me to take you through this highly erudite, avant-garde festival.
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| "Bat-Tigger," designed by J -- this costume explores the wide ranges of emotions in a child. The slinky sticking out of his shorts represents the playfulness embodied by Tigger, while the Batman T-shirt and "Bat-sword" sheathed in his self-constructed utility belt represent the brooding introspection that even children can't entirely escape. |
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| "The Tree of Life," built by J -- because what Mormon art exhibit is complete without a representation of Lehi's vision? |
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| "The Great and Spacious Building," built and photographed by Joseph -- this Lego sculpture depicts a building founded on crony capitalism, untamed opulence, and an overconfidence in science and secularism as represented by all the dinosaur references. This picture is intentionally blurry to represent how the philosophies of men obscure true vision. |
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| "The Inferno," crafted by J -- this top-down look at Dante's Inferno reminds us that the center of hell is ice cold, as are yellow, red, and green popsicles symbolized by these foam quarter circles. |
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| "Farmer Trance" (titled by M) -- this plastic sculpture embodies the daydreams of a farmer who wants to reject an agrarian, Wendell Berry-esque existence and see a world run by robots. Either that or Matthew's just saying Transformer wrong. |
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| "Moroni 8" -- this photograph depicts the fears of little children being sprinkled with cold water. |
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| "The Of Book Of Mormon" (black construction paper, white crayon) -- this first piece in J's triptych does a slight play on words of "The Book of Mormon," reminding us of the ownership we can feel of The Book of Mormon, as well as other gospel topics in the triptych. |
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| "Hartford Temple at Night" (black construction paper, white crayon, yellow crayon) -- this neo-cubist look at the Hartford Temple continues the theme of ownership. A series of lines, rectangles, and triangles work together to create a representation of the temple, just as we can all work together to build a Zion community. |
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| "Man in House at Nighttime" (black construction paper, white crayon) -- this sketch represents Mormon pioneers looking out the windows of their homes in various locations across the American Midwest. Although they were not able to achieve long term ownership of those dwellings, they had ownership in the Zion community that led them west. |
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| "After the Language of my Fathers" (black construction paper, crayon) -- this standalone piece by Matthew tells the dramatic story of Lehi's family crossing the ocean. I think. |
And finally, there was a performance of an original composition by J and M, entitled "Poulets."
This piece also proves that modern music doesn't just sound like toddlers pecking at the piano any more than Jackson Pollock paintings just look like toddler scribbles.
Although there were also a series of lectures given over the course of several days (the most memorable being "The color of my spoon needs to match the color of my shirt," "Hi fingers, how are you?" and "Na na na na na na na na na CHANGE DIAPER"), these will not be available on YouTube because they stop doing whatever they were doing when I pull out the camera.
We hope to attend future Mormon Arts Center events in New York City. In the meantime, at least we've got budding artists in New Haven.
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