ReInvention Stories

Kettering Cultural Arts Manager Picks Her Top Moments in Dayton Visual Arts 2013

January 6, 2014 By Shayna McConville 1 Comment

Dayton was home to numerous amazing art exhibitions, collaborations and projects in 2013. Although there were many, many more superb events that are not on this list, the arts listed below serves as a glimpse into the vitality of the Dayton region’s creative folks and spaces! Enjoy!

CIRCUS!
Dayton Visual Arts Centre

January 2 – 11
A collaborative project between artist Leesa Haapapuro and the Young People’s Homeschoolers program at K12 Gallery culminated into a short show at the Dayton Visual Arts Center. The young circus performers next to their murals, sculptures and paintings, created an incredible new world of possibility and magic for youth and adults.

Jud Yalkut: Visions and Sur-Realities
University of Dayton
Jan. 31 through March 7

Nam June Paik and Jud Yalkut, Beatles Electroniques, 1969

One of Dayton’s most treasured artists, Jud Yalkut was revered for his advocacy of the arts, his pioneer video works, his collages and his writing. The exhibition captured many of his artworks, including special screenings of his film and video works, many of which hadn’t been seen by the public in decades. Jud passed away in July 2013, marking an end of an era and a huge loss to the Dayton arts community. Learn more about the his timely retrospective and career here.

The week of May 4 – 12
Urban Nights, Sideshow 8, Art on the Playground and AIA Architecture Week
Throughout Dayton and Kettering

The high quality and numerous events that took place over the first and second weekends of May was inspiring; Dayton’s Urban Nights, The Circus Creative Collective’s Side Show 8, Kettering’s inauguralArt on the Playground and AIA’s Architecture Week brought thousands of people out to participate in Dayton arts and culture.

Reinvention Stories
Dayton Art Institute
June 30 – September 29

Emily Evans, Untitled (Twin Towers), 2012

As evidence of Dayton’s vitality, a special project launched in January captures the city’s pulse. Local radio station WYSO 91.3 and filmmakers Julia Reichert and Steve Bognar teamed-up to create the multi-platform media project Reinvention Stories, a series of audio stories and short films of Dayton and its residents. The project, instigated by WYSO’s general manager Neenah Ellis, is based on a series of questions: how does a city of inventors reinvent itself? How are individuals reinventing themselves? How are people dealing with the economic turmoil of recent years? How is Dayton doing? Through this documentation, a collection of videos and photographs were selected by Eva Buttacavoli, Executive Director of the Dayton Visual Arts Centre, and partnership with the Dayton Visual Arts Center and WYSO 91.3. Learn more bout the project at http://www.reinventionstories.org.

Inside Out 11M
August 4
Missing Peace Art Space and Synergy Incubator

Inside Out 11M at Missing Peace Art Space

Inside Out 11M is a project based on Jr’s Inside Out with a focus on the question of immigration. Focusing on the residents of Dayton, the project captured portraits of hundreds of kids, adults and seniors. From the website: “A nationwide participatory art initiative aimed at creating a portrait of America that includes immigrants and the descendants of immigrants alike.” Learn more about the project here.

HWD: Regional Sculpture Exhibition
August 26 – September 27
Rosewood Gallery

Roscoe Wilson, Austere Consumption

HWD, or Height x Width x Depth, featured dozens of artists working in three-dimensional form. Participating artists were featured from Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virgina, Kentucky, Michigan and Indiana. Highlights included the work of Don Williams, Terry Welker, Rebecca Emrick, Courtney Kessel, Carrie Longley, David Kenworthy, Erica Wine, and so many more. Learn more about the exhibition here and photos are here.

Soo Sunny Park
Unwoven Light
Wright State’s Robert and Elaine Stein Galleries
September 15 – October 13

Image courtesy of Wright State University

Exploring the boundaries between drawing and sculpture, Park’s chainlink fence and plexiglass transformed the Stein galleries into a moving experience. Originally commissioned by Rice University, Park’s beautiful installation has been traveling to galleries around the country.

National Bronze Sculpture Symposium
October 13 – 26
Yellow Springs Arts Council

Image courtesy of Bernie Carreno

The Yellow Springs Arts Council launched its first symposium in October, focusing on the process of lost-wax bronze casting. Commissioning four sculptors, including D’jean Jawrunner (New Mexico), Susan Byrnes (Cincinnati), Brian Maughan (Yellow Springs), and John Weidman (New Hampshire), the artists created works on site for two-weeks, culminating in a live pour of their molds. Exhibitions, lectures and artist talks complemented the artmaking daily. More info is here.

Object of Devotion:
Medieval English Alabaster Sculpture from the Victoria and Albert Museum
Dayton Art Institute
October 26 – January 5, 2014

Anonymous, English, The Fifth Sign of the Last Judgment, c. 1440-1470. Courtesy of the Victoria and Albert Museum.

A stunning collection of medieval alabaster sculptures, on loan from the Victoria and Albert Museum, demonstrate the dramatic, narrative and intricate scenes interpreted from biblical texts. An art form popular in the 15th and 16th centuries, alabasters were considered a low-end of medieval craft for centuries. Over 40 examples at the Dayton Art Institute show the merit of this art form, which finally gained recognition by scholars and collectors in the twentieth century.

Bullet: Who Pulls the Trigger?
Art Street, University of Dayton
September 24 – November 3

James Pate and DECA students collaborative drawing

Art Street presented a complicated, difficult and important question within the multi-faceted collaborative art installation with artist James Pate, Dayton Early College Academy, South Chicago Art Center and Newtown, CT artists. Focused on creating a dialogue on issues of gun violence with a focus on South Chicago, Newtown and Dayton, panel discussions were a major component to the gallery exhibition. Artworks included New York artist S.B. Woods’ Meditation on Mourning, paintings made by Sandy Hook shooting survivors, Dayton-based artist James Pate and a group of DECA high school students. From the website: “This piece was conceived in part by James Pate, and in part by the students. After a conversation about gun violence, the students came to the consensus that ‘we as a society pull the trigger.’” Chicago artist Sarah Ward and students from the South Chicago Art Center created etchings of bullets to symbolize one for every person affected by gun violence on a daily basis. Read more about the exhibition here.

Dia de los Muertos
November 1

Dayton’s Day of the Dead parade and celebration took place on Friday, November 1, from the Oregon District to the historic St. Anne’s Hill neighborhood. Hundreds of folks participated, many donning costumes and painted faces as music, art and food commemorated our loved ones. Stivers School for the Arts students, professional and emerging musicians and artists contributed to the celebration. Spearheaded by volunteers, including Jean Howat Berry, MB Hopkins, Tonia Fish, Lisa Grigsby, and several others, the event found support from the community in its crowdsourcing fundraiser, as well as Welcome Dayton’s sponsoring of the parade, and Missing Peace Art Space and the Unitarian Fellowship for World Peace hosting.

WYSO ReInvention Stories: Shane Anderson

May 15, 2013 By Juliet Fromholt Leave a Comment

This week on ReInvention Stories we meet Shane Anderson, owner of Ghostlight Coffee on Wayne Avenue in South Park.

Growing up, Anderson was a band kid. In high school, he dreamed of becoming a band director, which, he did. Anderson was a band director and music teacher for fourteen years. Most of that time was spent at Miami East High School and Vandalia-Butler High School. But he had another dream, of one day running a coffee shop. And he wanted to quit teaching before getting too burnt out.

Listen

Ghostlight Coffee celebrated its one-year anniversary in November of 2012.

This ReInvention Story was produced by Juliet Fromholt, Julia Reichert, Niki Dakota, and Sarah Buckingham.

ReInvention Stories is brought to you by WYSO and Localore, a national initiative produced by AIR, the Association of Independents in Radio, Incorporated – in collaboration with Zeega- with financial support from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
Shane Anderson from Reinvention on Vimeo.

Reinventing The Telling of Stories – A New Interactive Website About Dayton Wants Your Input

March 11, 2013 By Jonathan McNeal Leave a Comment

In the Spring of 2012, Emmy-winning, Oscar nominated filmmakers Julia Reichert and Steve Bognar, along with about 15 other media artists, hit the streets of Dayton asking the question, “How is Dayton doing?” Engaging subjects in thoughtful interviews and creating compelling, non-fiction stories is nothing new for Reichert and Bognar – but it turns out that this project was much more difficult than anticipated.

“This was a really ambitious project,” said Bognar. “We were attempting to take the pulse of the whole city. And we did not know what the answers would be.”

After identifying a handful of focus neighborhoods, the group—which was a collaboration with WYSO 91.3 FM— split into teams. They began to find and interview people who were in the process of reinventing themselves. In addition, the group documented over 35 events throughout the city. After weeks and months of sifting through hundreds of hours of material (not to mention a whole different language of web design), the resulting efforts can now be seen on an interactive website – ReinventionStories.Org.

Upon logging on the site, the first thing you’ll see is a beautifully animated introduction featuring a vintage postcard of the city and various soundbytes from numerous interviews. This introduction leads into an 18-minute documentary featuring 7 individuals from various neighborhoods. Using a combination of still photography, audio interviews and video footage, users get a sense for who these people are and how they are in the process of reinventing themselves. Each piece ends with a sort of cliffhanger. This 18-minute piece is merely Act One of three. In the coming weeks, each of the seven characters’ stories will continue in Act Two and Three. Reichert says that as the stories unfold, more dramatic material will reveal itself. She said, “These stories fit together to tell a bigger story about the city. We wanted to capture our City’s life and diversity and to show that we’re not all that far from each other. We’re all in this together.”

The 7 subjects of the documentary on ReinventionStories.org.

Those ideas are conveyed even more as we “Drive the Road.” This section of the website takes the viewer down East 3rd Street. The voice of Carol Coffey, teller of one of the stories, asks: “ What signs of life do you see in Dayton?” While passing storefronts and houses, a series of bubbles appear that allow the user to watch short stories about events from over the summer, prompting the viewer to think about that question. One story is about the Dayton Gay Men’s Chorus, another is about the Blessing of the Bikes, another, the World Soccer Tournament, sponsored by Welcome Dayton.

The storytellers want us to think about the fabric of the city…that all these very different events are happening in the same town.

In a third section of the site, the user is asked questions like “Where do you see signs of life in Dayton?” or “What city event do you most look forward to each year?” Once answered, the responses are broadcast via twitter. @ReinventDayton

In addition to new sections of the documentary, the coming months will see more coverage of events while “Driving Down the Road” and additional questions posed to users. The team also noted that “treasures have yet to be unveiled.”

The website went live in late February, but the idea is to let the website become a living, breathing site that will reveal more elements in time. The interactive part will rely on users to keep it fresh and alive. By April, Daytonians can upload their own stories of reinvention.

Neenah Ellis of WYSO and filmmakers Steve Bognar & Julia Reichert.

This project came about when WYSO director Neenah Ellis approached Reichert and Bognar regarding a national competition called LOCALORE – a new initiative of the Association of Independents in Radio (AIR), in collaboration with Zeega (a group of people who want to push non-fiction storytelling into unchartered territory*). Hundreds of organizations applied for the competition – only 10 were selected.

Bognar said he had so much fun running around the city over the summer. He noted that there was so much to do and that events were all always well attended. “When we started, we weren’t really sure how the city was doing. But luckily for the project and for the community, a corner was turning as we hit the streets. People were taking risks, opening new businesses, forming groups,and we caught the wave.” Reichert added, “A year later, we can answer with certainty. Yes. The city is very much alive and growing.

*AUTHOR’S BONUS NOTE FOR CINEASTES – Bognar told me that Zeega is named after Dziga Vertov – director of the masterpiece MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA. This is a great treat for film lovers. Vertov’s films and theories influenced the cinema verite movement…which pushed “non-fiction storytelling into unchartered territory.”

Dayton ReInvention Stories – Using Radio, Film and Web to tell stories about starting over…

February 25, 2013 By Dayton Most Metro Leave a Comment

Dayton’s own Academy Award nominated, Emmy winning filmmakers Julia Reichert and Steven Bognar announce the launch of REINVENTION STORIES – a multiplatform documentary project which tells stories of Daytonians who have started over in their lives.

A groundbreaking interactive documentary, created solely for the internet, will launch on February 26, 2013, at www.reinventionstories.org. This immersive interactive experience, a collaboration with WYSO 91.3 FM, will introduce stories, photos, events, neighborhoods and people from throughout the Miami Valley, in an engaging form.

“Creating an interactive documentary has been a wild ride,” notes Julia Reichert. “We’re doing something brand new, by creating a nonfiction film experience specifically for the web. It’s been scary and fun and we’ve learned a ton. There are very few documentary projects in the world that have been created in this new form. There’s not even word for it – we’re calling it a “transmedia” documentary.”

The Sundance Institute recently awarded ReInvention Stories a production grant, to help with programming the complex web site. “We’re so honored that this local project is getting such national attention,” notes WYSO General Manager Neenah Ellis, who launched the project by urging Reichert and Bognar to apply for a national competition.

ReInvention Stories one of only ten projects to win a major grant from AIR, the Association of Independents in Radio, a national organization of radio producers based in Boston. Other cities to receive the grants include Los Angeles, Chicago, Austin and San Francisco. “Dayton is one of only two small cities to receive this big project funding . We’re proud to have been so competitive on a national scale,” adds Steven Bognar.

A series of radio stories based on the project interviews began airing weekly on WYSO on Wednesdays during Morning Edition. Each radio story is accompanied by a short film on the WYSO website, www.wyso.org. There have been film and radio stories of the Fifth Street Brewpub in St Anne’s Hill, Pat Reed of Angie’s Firehouse Tavern in Belmont, former GM worker Debbie Bradley of Fairborn who is now a Registered Nurse, Oronde Clarke of South Park, Kevin Rotramel of Truth and Triumph Tattoo in Belmont, among others (see all videos below). Upcoming is Kim Cottrell, creator of Olive and Brenda DeWinter of South Park, and many more.

A team of producers, including WYSO staff, alumni of Wright State University’s award winning film program, and WYSO’s Community Voices radio training program, hit the streets last summer, walking neighborhoods, collecting stories. “We wanted to get out of our comfort zones,” explains Julia Reichert. “We didn’t want to interview people who we already knew, or even use the usual journalistic sources. So we trusted to luck and fate, and we met amazing people from all over town.”

The team focused on four Dayton neighborhoods, Twin Towers, Residence Park, South Park and Belmont, but also covered dozens of events and reinvention stories from Fairborn, St. Anne’s Hill, Clayton, East Dayton and Kettering, among others.

The transmedia documentary will launch in three parts, following the structure of the interview questions the team posed: Who was I? What happened? Who am I trying to become?

Act 1 of the stories will launch on February 26, Act 2 on March 19 and Act 3 on April 9^th at www.reinventionstories.org and can also be found at the WYSO website: WYSO.org.

ReInvention Stories is part of a national initiative of AIR, the Association of Independents in Radio, Inc and with financial support from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting , The Wyncote Foundation, the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Regional funders include Chicken and Egg Pictures, The Ohio Arts Council, The Yellow Springs Community Foundation and Wright State University’s Center for Collaboration and Leadership in the Arts (CELIA).

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