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I Wish That I Had Spoken Only of It All: 20 Years of Sheryl Oring’s I Wish to Say

DiMattio Gallery at Rechnitz Hall

With backgrounds in journalism and fine art, Sheryl Oring began her ongoing project I Wish to Say in 2004 from a concern that many people’s voices were not being heard. She started to take dictation from the public about what they wanted to say to the (next) President. Dressed as a 1960s secretary with a typewriter, she records whatever participants say onto a postcard, making copies with carbon paper. During larger events, a secretarial bank takes dictation. Oring mails the postcards to the White House and exhibits copies. To date she has mailed over 4100 postcards.

Free and open to the public

Michael Anthony Donato: Angels & Devils

Pollak Gallery

Michael Anthony Donato, a School of Visual Arts graduate, is an award-winning children’s book illustrator. His work on Squanto and the First Thanksgiving aired on Showtime and earned honors from the American Library Association. His illustrations for Tales Alive, a collection of global folktales, received a Parents’ Choice Award. Donato also collaborated with Simon & Schuster and the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Voyage Up the Nile. He currently teaches drawing and advanced painting at Monmouth University.

Free and Open to the Public

Mike Richison’s Election Collection: 2004-2024

Rotary Ice House Gallery

Mike Richison’s Election Collection: 2004-2020 showcases 20 years of design and video art inspired by the presidential election cycle. Richison began working with this topic in 2004 when he created a short video loop of George W. Bush drinking water during the debates. This evolved into performances and interactive video projects that break down language into musical and abstract elements.

Free and open to the public

An Evening with Rickie Lee Jones

Pollak Theatre

Rickie Lee Jones is an American musician, storyteller and two-time Grammy winner who has been inspiring pop culture for decades, beginning with her star-making self-titled debut, followed by the seminal Pirates.  Named the “premiere song-stylist and songwriter of her generation” by The New Yorker, and “The Duchess of Coolsville” by Time magazine, Jones released her Grammy-nominated album Pieces of Treasure in 2023, a reunion with Russ Titelman, who produced her first two records.  Jones’ celebrated memoir Last Chance Texaco was named Book of the Year by MOJO and a Best Book of the Year at Pitchfork and NPR.  The Independent writes, “There has always been something defiant about Rickie Lee Jones . . . a voice from a dream, elusive yet familiar, transcendent, a messenger from another place.” 

Tickets starting at $40
Event Series I Wish to Say Teach-In Series

I Wish to Say Teach-In Series

DiMattio Gallery at Rechnitz Hall

This fall the DiMattio Gallery is hosting I Wish That I Had Spoken Only of It All, an exhibition of Sheryl Oring’s social practice project I Wish to Say and related works (https://www.monmouth.edu/mca/event/i-wish-that-i-had-spoken-only-of-it-all/). Part of our programming will be a teach-in series from MU faculty about topics related to themes that intersect with Oring’s project as art reaches across disciplinary bounds. These teach-ins will be free and open to the public.

Free and Open to the Public
Event Series Producing the Beatles

Producing the Beatles

Virtual

Based on his acclaimed podcast, Producing the Beatles, Jason Kruppa explores the music of the Fab Four from the perspective of the one person whose point of view has never been properly and thoroughly examined: their producer, George Martin. Using innovative techniques to break down their recordings, we’ll discover how the Beatles went from learning their way around the studio to becoming masters of the art of recording, with their producer working side by side with them each step of the way. And finally, with re-recordings and detailed recreations of Martin’s orchestral scores that allow us to hear individual instrument parts,, we’ll learn how his arrangements enhanced and shaped the Beatles’ music.

$50 (for two sessions)

Grounded

Pollak Theatre

Two-time Tony Award–winning composer Jeanine Tesori’s powerful new opera Grounded, commissioned by the Met and based on librettist George Brant’s acclaimed play, wrestles with the ethical quandaries and psychological toll of 21st-century warfare. Mezzo-soprano Emily D’Angelo, one of opera’s most compelling young stars, portrays Jess, a hot-shot fighter pilot whose unplanned pregnancy takes her out of the cockpit and lands her in Las Vegas, operating a Reaper drone halfway around the world. As she struggles to adjust to this new way of doing battle, she fights to maintain her sanity, and her soul, as she is called to rain down death by remote control. Met Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin oversees the Met premiere of Tesori’s kaleidoscopic score and a cast that also features tenor Ben Bliss as the Wyoming rancher who becomes Jess’s husband. Michael Mayer’s high-tech staging, using a vast array of LED screens, presents a variety of perspectives on the action, including the drone’s predatory view from high above. This live cinema transmission is part of the Met’s award-winning Live in HD series, bringing opera to movie theaters across the globe.

$23 (general public); $21 (seniors), $10 (child) and $5 (Monmouth U. Students)

A Separation

Pollak Theatre

Nader (Payman Maadi) and Simin (Leila Hatami) argue about living abroad. Simin prefers to live abroad to provide better opportunities for their only daughter, Termeh. However, Nader refuses to go because he thinks he must stay in Iran and take care of his father (Ali-Asghar Shahbazi), who suffers from Alzheimers. However, Simin is determined to get a divorce and leave the country with her daughter.

Free and open to the public

Munch: Love, Ghosts and Lady Vampires

Pollak Theatre

Munch: Love, Ghosts and Lady Vampires strives to shed new light on Edvard Munch, a profoundly mysterious, fascinating man, a trailblazer and a master for everyone who came after him. Now marks a turning point in our knowledge of the artist: the new MUNCH museum which opened in October 2021 in Oslo houses the immense legacy the artist left to his city: 28,000 works of art including paintings, prints, drawings, notebooks, sketches, photographs and his experiments with film. This extraordinary legacy gives us an exceptional insight into the mind, the passions and the art of this genius.

$23 (adult); $21 (senior); $10 (child); $5 (MU student)

A Tribute to Jean Valentine – Panel Discussion featuring Alice Ostriker, Joan Larkin, Carey Salerno, and Anne Marie Macari

Julian Abele Room (The Great Hall Room 104)

Jean Valentine was born in Chicago, earned her B.A. from Radcliffe College, and lived most of her life in New York City. She won the Yale Younger Poets Award for her first book, Dream Barker and Other Poems, in 1965. Valentine authored over a dozen collections of poetry including, The River at Wolf (1992); Door in the Mountain: New and Collected Poems, 1965-2003 (2007); Break the Glass (2010); and Shirt in Heaven (2015). All of her full-length works, including an unpublished manuscript, have been compiled in the posthumous collection, Light Me Down: The New & Collected Poems of Jean Valentine (2024).

Free and open to the public