Cowboy Artist Borein Is Featured at Great Plains Gallery

The special exhibition, Edward Borein: The Artist's Life and Work, runs to Feb. 18 at the Great Plains Art Collection, 215 Love Library.

The exhibit features works on paper by an artist and cowboy whose high rank among artists of the American West is undisputed. The 54 watercolors, etchings, and nine pen-and-ink sketches, all from the Rockwell Museum's collection in Corning, N.Y., include examples of his well-known Stampede rodeo posters, depictions of Western wildlife and Hispanic missions, and his highly regarded imagery of longhorn cattle and cowboy life on the open range.

Edward Borein (1872-1945) was born and reared in California. His inclination to draw what he experienced without pretension or sentimentality came naturally and without formal art training.

He chose the lifestyle of a professional cowboy and became proficient at roping, riding and saddle-making. These themes along with ranching and Hispanic subject matter were depicted in his imagery throughout his career.

In 1900, due to the changes in ranching life of coastal California, Borein quit ranching, established a studio and began illustrating for local magazines and newspapers. Seven years later, he moved to New York where he diligently observed and taught himself illustrative techniques. While there he had a brief training at the Art Students' League and exhibited some of his work. His 42nd Street studio that he shared with James Swinnerton became a meeting place for fellow artists and friends. It was here where he cemented his friendship with Charles Russell. The two re-established contact in California where Borein relocated in 1921. The younger artist introduced Russell to other artists in the area and both mingled with Western celebrities such as Will Rogers, Annie Oakley and "Buffalo Bill" Cody. The richness of Borein's life as expressed through his art will fascinate viewers.

Edward Borein: The Artist's Life and Work draws from the extensive collection of the artist's works on paper assembled by Robert F. Rockwell Jr., whose private collections were incorporated into the Rockwell Museum in 1976, establishing the largest comprehensive collection of American Western art on view in the eastern United States.

ORFÉO Created by Michel Lemieux & Victor Pilon

Mythical Story Recreated in New Multimedia Theater Piece

Ancient Greek mythology and modern technology meet in the haunting new multimedia work, Orféo, by Michel Lemieux Victor Pilon Création. Orféo will be presented at the Lied Center for Performing Arts, at 8 p.m. Jan. 28 and 29.

In Greek mythology Orpheus is the inventor of music and poetry. When his wife Eurydice dies, Orpheus refuses to accept her death. He travels to Hades and sings so movingly about his loss that the powers of the underworld let Eurydice return to the world of the living.

The traditional ending is that Eurydice is lost to Orpheus forever when he breaks the conditions set by the lords of Hades. However, in more modern interpretations, Orpheus loses Eurydice, but wins her again with his powerful singing. The Lemieux-Pilon production of Orféo falls between these two extremes.

In Orféo, the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice is modernized and the story is presented via ultramodern methods as well. Making Orféo stunningly unique is the use of three-dimensional holographic images that interact with the live actors on stage. For example, when Eurydice dies, she is transformed into a moving opaque "ghost" - seemingly real, but without solid form.

Words are used sparingly in Orféo, with mesmerizing music and electronic sounds providing the appropriate haunting atmosphere for the story. Despite being intensely musical, Orféo is not an opera, but with its intricate mime-like movements and expressive choreography is more like a ballet. The end result is a stunning "virtual theater" piece - which many feel will be the future of modern theater.

Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon are among a new generation of "multidisciplinary artists" who use photography, scripting, set design, electronic media, etc., to create virtual performances and exhibits. Initially following separate but similar artistic careers, Lemieux and Pilon have been collaborating on multimedia theater since 1990. Orféo is the latest multidisciplinary theater piece created by the team, who have become widely respected in their native Canada.

Tickets for the performance are $34 and $30; half-price for students.

Call the Lied box office at 472-4747 or 800-432-3231 for ticket availability.

All About My Mother features Penélope Cruz as Sister Rosa (left) and Cecilia Roth as Manuela (right).

Ross Presents Cannes Fave All About My Mother

Certainly the hands-down favorite of the 1999 Cannes Film Festival and the winner of the Best Director prize, this screwball valentine to all women - All About My Mother - is lovingly fashioned by Pedro Almodóvar.

Madrid and Barcelona provide the lurid urban landscapes that harbor Almodóvar's beautifully portrayed characters who brim with compassion and an unstoppable life force. The film shows at Mary Riepma Ross Film Theater Jan. 27 through 29.

Manuela (Cecilia Roth) loses her loving son and begins a quest to find his wayward father. En route, she encounters and nurses back to sanity several varieties of wounded women. Almodóvar's affection for his subject has never been more fervent and is fully realized by the extraordinary performance of Roth, Marisa Paredes, Penélope Cruz and Antonia San Juan.

A Greek saying holds that only women who have washed their eyes with tears can see clearly. The saying does not hold true for Manuela. The night a car ran over her son Esteban, Manuela cried until she was completely dry. Far from seeing clearly, the present and the future become mixed in darkness.

That same night, while she waits in the hospital, she reads the last lines written by her son in a notebook that he always kept by his side. "This morning I looked through my mother's bedroom until I found a stack of photographs. All of them were cut in half. My father, I suppose. I have the impression that my life is missing that same half. I want to meet him, I don't care who he is, or how he behaved with my mother. No one can take that right away from me."

She never told him who he was; "your father died long before you were born" was all she ever told him.

In memory of her son, Manuela leaves Madrid and goes to Barcelona in search of the father. She wants to tell him that their son's last written words were directed to him, even though he never knew his father. But first she has to tell him that when she abandoned him 18 years ago, she was pregnant, they had a son, and he has just died.

She must also tell him that she named their son Esteban, like his biological father, before he changed his name to Lola; Lola the Pioneer.

Manuela goes to Barcelona in search of Lola, her son's father. The search for a man with that name cannot be simple. And, indeed, it isn't.

Also showing is a short feature, Life History of a Star by Jennifer Gentile, a glimpse into the warped realities of Angie and Dave, an enthusiastic couple traveling to Hollywood with dreams of success.

All About My Mother and Life History of a Star are showing Jan. 27 through 29. Screenings are on Thursday and Friday at 7 and 9:15 p.m.; on Saturday at 1, 3:15, 7 and 9:15 p.m.

More Than 50 Artworks From an Artist and Teacher

Exhibit Highlights Henri and the Ashcan School

The Sheldon Memorial Art Gallery and Sculpture Garden presents Robert Henri and the Ashcan School, an exhibition of more than 50 artworks featuring oil paintings and works on paper, drawn exclusively from the permanent collection.

This exhibition features Henri as both artist and teacher, along with several of his students included in the Ashcan School group, whose identity as a "school" or "movement" had more to do with Henri's influence than with stylistic or ideological affinities.

The Sheldon collection is the most comprehensive public assembly of Henri's painting and archival materials. It will be on display through Feb. 20.

As an artist, an art teacher, and an advocate for modern art, Henri influences generations of artists with his artworks, and also with his word. His book, The Art Spirit, published in 1923, is still used today. Henri's philosophy was based on the Humanist tradition, which regarded the fundamental dignity of the individual as the source of true knowledge. Henri expected every artist to consider the broad philosophical issues of art and life as intrinsic to the creative vision. Through introspection and intellectual honesty, each student was encouraged to discover his or her own personal style. Traditional art school teachings and juried exhibitions were at odds with the Henri message. He directed his students' interests to the world outside the classroom. Believing that painting should be a testament of the American artist's response to his immediate experience, and thus represent his nationality, he urged his pupils to become actively involved in the life of the city and country around them.

Henri's relationship to his students was unique in American art education. He was a catalyst, an encourager who discarded dry rules and useless laws of art.

Representing the full spectrum of artistic styles that make up the eclectic Ashcan School group, George Bellows, Arthur B. Carles, William Merritt Chase, Arthur B. Davies, William Glackens, Walt Kuhn, George Luks, Maurice Prendergast, Everett Shinn and John Sloan are associated with the first American modern movement in the 20th century. So called the Ashcan School because of some of the artists' interest in the banal and mundane, their tremendous aesthetic diversity characterizes the history of modern art in the United States throughout the 20th century,

Community Programs Coordinator Nancy Dawson will present a gallery talk on the work of Henri and the Ashcan School at 12:15 p.m. Feb. 16 in the Sheldon Gallery, as part of Sheldon's "Wednesday Walks" series.

David Ackroyd Presents Harris Lecture

David Ackroyd, professional actor, will deliver the Ron and Chris Harris Lecture Jan. 28 and be in residence that day for theatre students. He will be featured performer that evening for the Nebraska Repertory Theatre's Season Kick-off Party.

The Ron and Chris Harris Lecture Series is a program devoted to providing opportunities for students to interact with working professionals in film, television and theatre. During morning acting classes, Ackroyd will present a seminar for theatre students on "The Business of Acting" and will present a free public lecture at 2:30 p.m. in Sheldon Gallery auditorium.

Ackroyd is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama and was a charter member of the Yale Repertory Theatre where he played more than 25 roles in three seasons in plays ranging from those of William Shakespeare to Terence McNally. He made his Broadway debut in Phillip Roth's Unlikely Heroes, and followed with Full Circle directed by Otto Preminger, Hide and Seek opposite Elizabeth Ashley and the Tony-Award winning production of Children of a Lesser God.

Ackroyd has appeared in several films and numerous television roles.

In 1998, Ackroyd was awarded a William and Eva Fox Foundation Fellowship for Advanced Study, which enables selected established actors to further their craft and artistic potential. He can currently be heard as the narrator of The History Channel series History's Mysteries.

Recent Acquisitions Highlighted in Sheldon Exhibition

Recent Acquisitions, an exhibition of more than 40 works that have entered the Sheldon Art Gallery's permanent collection within the last two years, runs at the gallery through Feb. 20. The exhibition consists primarily of two print portfolios that feature important contemporary artists exploring a common set of themes.

Distributed by the Museum of Modern Art and published by Parasol Press, the Rubberstamp Portfolio consists of 13 works by Carl Andre, Sol LeWitt, Sylvia Mangold, Agnes Martin, and Myron Stout. Printed in 1976, the works of the Rubberstamp Portfolio are all of equal dimensions, except the slightly larger work of Martin, and are printed on a variety of different papers. Each work demonstrates an artist's unique perspective in utilizing the intimate space.

Another portfolio, called The Live Model Group, was published by Crown Point Press in 1997. That summer, Enrique Chagoya, Fred Dalkey, June Felter, and Nathan Oliveira, spent an afternoon at the Press drawing from a live model directly onto copper plates, enhancing the immediacy of the artists' individual responses to the human figure.

Other works included are by assemblage artist Kim Abeles, with an environmental piece; adjunct UNL faculty member Eddie Dominguez, with a brilliantly colored and glazed ceramic work; regional photographer Charles Guildner; abstract artist Leon Polk Smith, with a geometric two-color lithograph; and local painter Robert Weaver, with an intensely colored landscape.

Ballet Is Tribute to Diaghilev

Acclaimed ballet troupe Ballet de l'Opéra de Bordeaux will present "Tribute to Diaghilev" at the Lied Center at 8 p.m. Feb. 2. The program includes "Les Sylphides" (Chopiniana), "L'apres-midi d'un faune" (The Afternoon of a Faun), "Le Spectre de la Rose" and "Petrouchka."

Sergei Diaghilev, famous Russian impresario, commissioned many new dance works in Russia and Western Europe. He was associated with progressive artistic organizations in Russia and then established the Ballets Russes in Paris. The great importance of Diaghilev's choreographic contributions is his abandonment of classical tradition, earning him the distinction as the originator of modern dance.

The Ballet de l'Opéra de Bordeaux began as the ballet wing of the Royal Academy of Music of Bordeaux, France, in 1752. The company became the ballet of the Grand-Théåtre de Bordeaux with the opening of the Grand-Théåtre in 1780, and nine years later Jean Dauberval, the company's ballet master, created his masterwork La fille mal gardée. After Dauberval's departure, Sebastien Gallet became ballet master, and the company was soon praised by Napoleon Bonaparte as the gem of all French dance companies. In 1834 Jean-Antoine Petipa became ballet master. Petipa's son Marius, who became one of the greatest choreographers in the history of ballet, was principal dancer with the company. Succeeding his father as ballet master, Marius Petipa choreographed some of his earliest works in Bordeaux.

Throughout the following century the Ballet de l'Opéra de Bordeaux enjoyed further growth and renown throughout the world of dance. Outstanding choreographers of the time often created new works for the company. The Emperor Louis Napoleon (Napoleon III) restored the Opera house, and the company came under his personal support.

In the company's recent history, the great premier danseur of the Bolshoi Ballet, Vladimir Skouratoff, became ballet master in 1970, and brought to the company once again the great Franco-Russo heritage created in the last century by Marius Petipa.

Since the arrival of Charles Jude to the post of dance director in 1996, Ballet de l'Opéra de Bordeaux has achieved a vast repertoire which ranges from La Fille mal gardée to the most contemporary works.

A principal dancer of the Ballet de l'Opéra National de Paris, Jude studied at the Nice Conservatory. He joined the corps de ballet of the Paris Opera Ballet in 1972, where he quickly gained acclaim.

Pre-performance talks occur in the Lied's Steinhart Room 55 and 30 minutes prior to curtain.

Tickets for this performance are $36, $32 and $28; half-price for students.

Call 472-4747, for ticket availability.