Elizabeth Alexander News

Bill T. Jones, MacArthur Genius Award and National Medal of Arts awardee and Artistic Director of New York Live Arts, and Janet Wong, Associate Artistic Director, announced the New York Live Arts' fall 2019-2020 season today. 'Is there such a thing as 'we'? How and why do we come together?  What makes a community? These questions are on our minds as we enter our 9th season. How do artists embody and shed light on these questions?', said the team.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation announced the appointment of Emil Kang as Program Director for Arts and Cultural Heritage. In this role, Kang will lead the Foundation's grantmaking program that seeks to nurture exceptional creative accomplishment, scholarship, and art conservation practices while promoting a diverse and sustainable ecosystem for the arts.

Celebrated actress Ellen Burstyn,who won an Academy Award for Best Actress for Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, will share some of her favorite poems as part of Poetry & the Creative Mind, a performance in celebration of National Poetry Month to be held April 24, 2019, at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall. 

Kathryn Hall will succeed Danielle S. Allen as the Chair of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's Board of Trustees, the Foundation announced today. Allen announced her retirement after eleven years of service, the last four as Chair. The Foundation also announced the election of museum director Thelma Golden and investor Joshua S. Friedman to the Board of Trustees.

In what is believed to be one of the largest awards made to support poetry in the United States by a philanthropic institution, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has made two grants to the Academy of American Poets totaling $2.2 million. The funds will enable the work of several poets serving in civic Poets Laureate positions, and of more than 20 poetry organizations who comprise a national Poetry Coalition.

The Academy of American Poets is pleased to announce that Joy Harjo and Natasha Trethewey have been named its newest Chancellors, an honorary position that has been held by some of the most distinguished poets in the United States, including W. H. Auden, John Ashbery, Elizabeth Bishop, Lucille Clifton, Yusef Komunyakaa, Adrienne Rich, and Mark Strand. Poets elected to the Board of Chancellors become an important part of the history of Academy of American Poets and as of 2019, only 115 poets have been elected to this board since it was formed in 1946.

Minneapolis-based Bharatanatyam dancer/choreographer Ashwini Ramaswamy, celebrated for her ability to "[weave] together, both fearfully and joyfully, the human and the divine" (The New York Times) discusses her multidisciplinary original work Let the Crows Come featuring collaborator and "genre-busting" (The Guardian) composer/DJ/author Jace Clayton and Twin Cities dancer Alanna Morris-Van Tassel, who "embodies the power of dance to create deep and lasting connections where words cannot" (Dance Magazine, "25 to Watch"). Using the mythography of crows as a framework to explore memory as a source of guidance and dislocation, the work layers Ramaswamy's visceral interpretation of ancestry, ritual, and tradition with a genre-defying evolution of movement and music across cultural and corporeal boundaries. Presented at the newly-renovated Parkway Theater in South Minneapolis, the work-in-progress conversation is part of the SPCO's Tapestry19 Festival and will include video footage of Ramaswamy's Space Residency at The Baryshnikov Arts Center. 

Martin Farawell, Director of the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival, has announced highlights of the upcoming 17th biennial four-day event, October 18-21, featuring bestselling authors, literary legends, Pulitzer Prize winners, slam champions, and Academy of American Poets Chancellors. Former U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera, Pulitzer Prize-winners Sharon Olds and Gregory Pardlo, as well as much-published and award-winning poets Sandra Cisneros, Sapphire, Eileen Myles, Ntozake Shange, Kwame Dawes, Alberto Rios, David St. John, Henri Cole, Gregory Orr, Mary Ruefle and David Young will be giving Featured Readings during the Festival and are among the dozens of acclaimed poets who will participate in the four-day event, which takes place at the

Juilliard President Damian Woetzel announced several key initiatives and new projects aimed to advance Juilliard's excellence and impact in his first address to the Juilliard community, on September 4. During the convocation ceremony, which also featured performances by Juilliard students, faculty, alumni, and some of the newly announced Creative Associates, Woetzel outlined his plans to build on Juilliard's tradition of excellence while also focusing on creative enterprise and inclusivity in the arts.

New Jersey Performing Arts Center, the country's most diverse arts presenter, announced a sensational opening lineup for the 2018-2019 season, an adventurous range of more than 150 attractions - Bollywood to ballet, hip-hop to K-pop - for every kind of audience.

New episodes of Poetry in America will be on public television stations nationwide starting the first week of April and running throughout the Spring.(Check local listings as some stations will debut the series at other times during the spring.)

The cast has come up with a hashtag #DivasWhoBelieva, and the divine divas of SCERA's "Sister Act: The Musical" are prepared to dazzle. The premise: It's the 1970s and exuberant disco diva Deloris Van Cartier wants a recording contract. Little does she know that soon she will be singing praises to heaven instead as she hides in a convent while eluding a gangster boyfriend.

When the Academy of American Poets created and launched National Poetry Month in April 1996, it couldn't have predicted that its signature program would inspire events in all fifty states, becoming the nation's largest literary celebration. The annual initiative both introduces young readers to poetry and creates an opportunity for teachers, librarians, booksellers, poetry organizations, and poets themselves to showcase the importance of reading and supporting poetry year-round. Today, National Poetry Month remains the Academy of American Poets' special contribution to the art of poetry in the United States, and it is pleased to announce the following activities, initiatives, and resources for this year's celebration.

NBA Hall of Fame basketball star and platinum hip-hop artist Shaquille O'Neal reads the immersive Edward Hirsch poem “Fast Break” about the universal experience of playing basketball in a remarkable new 12-part television series Poetry in America that aims to bring poetry to millions of viewers. Watch the trailer here!

NEW YORK, Feb. 7, 2018 /PRNewswire/ The Trustees of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation have elected Elizabeth Alexander to be the Foundation's next President, effective March 2018. Alexander will succeed Earl Lewis, who has served as President since 2013.

The Halalisa Singers presents Draw the Circle Wide: Songs of Justice and Inclusion today, January 20, 8 pm at Follen Community Church, 755 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, and on Sunday, January 21, 3 pm, United Universalist Church of Reading, 239 Woburn Street, Reading.

The Halalisa Singers presents Draw the Circle Wide: Songs of Justice and Inclusion on Saturday, January 20, 8 pm at Follen Community Church, 755 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, and on Sunday, January 21, 3 pm, United Universalist Church of Reading, 239 Woburn Street, Reading. The world music choral ensemble is led by Artistic Director Mary Cunningham, accompanied by Trevor Berens, piano and Bertram Lehmann, percussion.

The Halalisa Singers presents Draw the Circle Wide: Songs of Justice and Inclusion on Saturday, January 20, 8 pm at Follen Community Church, 755 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, and on Sunday, January 21, 3 pm, United Universalist Church of Reading, 239 Woburn Street, Reading.

American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) and Harvard Art Museums have partnered in conjunction with the A.R.T.'s production of WARHOLCAPOTE to present a series of events highlighting the contemporary legacies of Andy Warhol and Truman Capote, including a unique encounter with Warhol screen-prints and a speaker series featuring journalists, multimedia artists, curators, and collectors.