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Stories
Recap Video
While the festival was coming to a close, our videographer was just getting started. In the weeks after we wrapped up in July, he and his crew were editing every presentation, concert, and discussion in order to put it all on YouTube. That way, anybody can experience the entire festival wherever they live. We asked him to create a short recap video, and we sent it out to all of our subscribers yesterday. Here's a link to the video on YouTube.
More Great Press
In a Church News article over the weekend that highlighted events of the Mormon Arts Center Festival, staff writer Morgan Jones described some exciting elements of our June event. Although it happened far away from Salt Lake City, the Center has been very fortunate to attract the attention of media outlets in Utah, including the Salt Lake Tribune, the Deseret News, Church News, and KSL-TV.
The Kindness of Strangers
In addition to the crew of committee members and supportive friends, the Center has been the recipient of some anonymous kindness in preparation for the festival. One of the last checklist items before the festival opens on Thursday was a series of posters and banners to decorate the Italian Academy itself. Printing oversize posters can be expensive. A large poster can be about $200. So I was pretty nervous when I went to my local shop and gave them a flash drive with about 15 posters--some of them to be mounted to foam core.
Sing With Us
Mormons a generation or two ago knew the music of Evan Stephens like the back of their hand. It was everywhere. Nearly two-thirds of the hymns in the early 20th century hymnal were composed by him. Conductor of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, prolific composer of hymns, anthems, oratorios, and operettas, and a master choral teacher: Stephens was easily one of the most influential men of his era in the Church. How did this son of a Welsh coal miner, with almost no musical training become such a force?
One Great Whole
We were at an Advisory Board meeting for the Center in January, and J. Kirk Richards had an idea: what if we did something at the Festival that allowed multiple artists to make something together? At the 2017 Festival, we exhibited Kirk's multi-panel work, Cristo (2014), that brought together 161 paintings of different sizes together. These had been created by Kirk working with people in his community who were invited to show how they imagined Jesus Christ to appear; then Kirk reworked the images to unite them stylistically.
Saturday Morning Cartoons
In June at the Festival, one of the sessions will feature three prominent animators who will show and talk about their work. All are connected--as faculty or alumni--to the BYU Center for Animation, which has become a successful developer of student talent and a pipeline to important studios. Many of their graduates have gone to major studios including Disney, Pixar, DreamWorks, Blizzard, etc.