Tag Archive for: arts

A black, white, and teal logo for Art Slope

The Park Slope Civic Council and Art Slope present a free outdoor screening of films from their Shorts in the Slope short film festival.
Bring your lawn chairs and blankets to the field behind OSH to support talented Brooklyn filmmakers and enjoy movies under the stars!

Art Slope is the arts advocacy committee of the Park Slope Civic Council, whose mission is to enhance the lives of Park Slope residents and visitors.

as you like it written in black text on white background, with you scribbled over in red

Shakespeare’s iconic “Pastoral Comedy” comes to Old Stone House of Brooklyn with a Seven Stages Shakespeare Company twist.

At moments light and silly, by turns devastating and harrowing; hope triumphs in this classic tale.
In this three dimensional exploration of nature, family, power and destruction, and the battle between classes; AS YOU LIKE IT promises to get you thinking, and a song or two to leave whistling.

This is a site specific production, the play will be performed outdoors in Washington Park!
All performances are free or pay what you will.

No More Water brings together emerging artists Tahir Carl Karmali and Justin Sterling to respond to the Old Stone House’s unique space. Both artists use reclaimed and abstracted vernacular materials––including used cell phone batteries and broken windows––to symbolize local and global policies that contribute to inequality and displacement. The title No More Water also implies our current climate emergency (characterized by increased floods, wildfires, and water contamination) and an urgent call for action.

The artists chose No More Water to reference James Baldwin’s 1963 publication The Fire Next Time, which begins and ends with the line, “God gave Noah the rainbow sign, no more water, the fire next time!”, quoting the spiritual Mary Don’t you Weep and alluding to the Old Testament story of God flooding a corrupt earth. The Fire Next Time is considered a galvanizing text for the American Civil Rights movement in its examination of racial injustice and its call for all people of “consciousness” to “change the history of the world.” Situated at OSH in a reconstructed colonial farmhouse and Revolutionary War battleground, Karmali and Sterling’s work helps confront uncomfortable truths of the past and present while also suggesting possibilities for transformation.

Both artists explore the potential and limitations of art’s role in addressing injustice. Karmali describes his installations as “deceptively beautiful or attractive, as an art form, allowing the viewer to savor them as primary material before a layer of trauma (of migration, of displacement, of labor) slowly reveals itself.” He presents new and site-specific work from his ongoing STRATA series, which consists of layered raffia dyed with cobalt extracted from cell phone batteries, referencing traditional Congolese kuba cloth and the exploitation of cobalt miners in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Sterling’s sculptures made of broken windows and other urban detritus, by contrast, retain more of their original, sometimes jarring forms, alluding to the controversial policing policy of the same name as well as other forces that contribute to displacement, gentrification, and mass incarceration. Yet they offer myriad “attempts to fix, recycle, or archive” as an alternative to discarding. Both artists metaphorically push back against the destruction of both local communities and our larger environment, while simultaneously placing the viewer in close physical proximity with the impact of this destruction, challenging a “culture of indifference.”

At the August 15 opening at 7pm, Justin Sterling’s opening performance will combine trumpet and movement improvisation to respond to the work on view, also alluding to his roots in New Orleans, an area with a history of natural disasters and rebuilding.

Funding for No More Water is made possible, in part, by the Puffin Foundation and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

Musical Ecologies returns to OSH for a seventh season of music and conversation. The season begins with New York-based composer and audio technologist Anastasia Clarke performing her Crushed Matrices project.

Anastasia Clarke (she/they) works in live embodied electronic music performance. Anastasia’s solo and collaborative projects use custom musical instruments and performing systems, functioning as sites for research and meaning-making around the subjects of physical instrument interaction, improvisation, and the healing qualities of sound.

Founded in 2012, Musical Ecologies is a monthly symposium on music and sound. Curated and hosted by composer Dan Joseph, each event focuses on a single artist. Each presentation is preceded by an extended conversation between the artist and curator.

Admission is $10, advance tickets are available here.

a green apple on white background with text that reads "Grow!"

Follow the life cycle of an apple seed through four seasons in this lovely, interactive performance for very young children.

Young audiences and the storyteller plant a seed together and help it grow, while learning gentle and charming songs and ASL signs to help tell a story of seasonal growth.

Get your tickets here.

Jen Kutler operates one of her instruments

Musical Ecologies returns to OSH for a seventh season of music and conversation. The season continues with artist Jen Kutler, who will perform a work using one of her unique interactive electronic media systems.

Jen Kutler is a multidisciplinary artist and performer. She modifies found objects that are cultural signifiers of power, gender, queerness and intimacy to create atypical instruments and sculptures. Her performances feature many of her instruments incorporated with immersive field recordings to explore common and discrepant experiences of familiar social tones in immersive sound and media environments.

Founded in 2012, Musical Ecologies is a monthly symposium on music and sound. Curated and hosted by composer Dan Joseph, each event focuses on a single artist. Each presentation is preceded by an extended conversation between the artist and curator.

Admission is $10, advance tickets are available here.

Domino the penguin returns to OSH on November 9 at 10 am & 11:30 am

Domino the Penguin gets in trouble…a lot. Sometimes Domino chooses to be naughty, but sometimes it happens without her realizing. There are so many rules! This interactive performance for 2-5 year olds follows Domino as she navigates a tricky world filled with opportunities to be naughty…or not.

Reserve your spot at Brown Paper Tickets today!

Betsey Biggs hiking on glaciers in Greenland

Musical Ecologies season seven continues with composer Betsey Biggs, performing at OSH on November 14. Biggs is based in Boulder, CO where she is a Fellow and Assistant Professor of Critical Studies at the University of Colorado. She attended Colorado College and Mills College, and holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University in Music Composition.

The evening’s discussion will concentrate on Biggs’ career in music and her multimedia opera music-film titled MELT: The Memories of Ice. The piece blends field recordings from her exploration of Greenland’s glaciers including the sounds of bubbling streams, sled dogs, and whale song. Don’t miss the rare opportunity to hear this great work!

Founded in 2012, Musical Ecologies is a monthly symposium on music and sound. Curated and hosted by composer Dan Joseph, each event focuses on a single artist. Each presentation is preceded by an extended conversation between the artist and curator.

Admission is $10, advance tickets are available here.

Our friends from Spellbound are back with a larger than life book that leads children through familiar daily events using favorite nursery rhymes and songs to tell the story, as well as surprising treasures, puppets, and discoveries.

Book your tickets here!

Join us to experience the PIEDMONT BLUZ acoustic duo.

Valerie and Ben Turner are dedicated to the preservation of Country Blues and the Piedmont style, and their mission is to help keep this rural, east coast tradition alive by educating audiences about this unique aspect of African American culture through musical entertainment.

This husband and wife team are much loved wherever they go and feel that “there are stories to tell, people to remember, and things that must be said” so, in addition to tickling your ears with delightful music, they weave a bit of history into the presentation of each song.

Tickets are $10 at the door.