Thu, Feb 19, 2009
February 19, 2009
Wisconsin Legal Scholar to Speak During Black History Month
Thomas W. Mitchell will present the Winthrop and Frances Lane Lecture at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Law at noon Feb. 19 in the courtroom of McCollum Hall, East Campus Loop and Fair Street. An associate professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School, Mitchell will speak on "Transactional Law and Economic Justice: Addressing Some of the Civil Rights Movement's Unfinished Business."
Mitchell has done extensive research and outreach work on property issues within minority communities, both domestically and internationally. He is a national expert on the issue of black landownership in the United States and is working on a Ford Foundation-funded research project that will culminate in a book tentatively titled "Land Reform in the New Deal: Separate and Unequal Projects and Their Racial Legacy." more...
Theatrix Hosts New Artists Festival
Theatrix, the student producing theatre organization is excited to bring back the New Artists Festival, a showcase of some of Lincoln's most exciting young playwrights, directors, and actors. A fully produced celebration of seven 10-Minute plays, the festival combines drama, comedy, absurdist, and physical presentations and includes over thirty student actors and both undergraduate and graduate student designers.
The New Artists Festival will run through February 21 in the Lab Theatre on the 3rd floor of the Temple Building. All performances begin at 7:30 p.m., with an additional performance at 10:30 p.m. on Friday, February 20. Individual show tickets are available for $6 via credit card (some user fees may be applied) at the UNL Tickets website or at the theatre the evening of the performance (subject to availability).
Alexander Calder Sculptures on View at Sheldon Museum of Art
This winter Sheldon Museum of Art at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln presents six sculptures by Alexander Calder (1898-1976) in the Great Hall. Three pieces are from Sheldon's permanent collection: "Snake on Arch," "Sumac II" and "Red Disk, Black Lace." Three small sculptures, "Canine," "Cello Player" and "Slender Ribs" are on loan from a private collection. Five Calder posters are also on view in the Sheldon board room.
Calder is one of the 20th century's most acclaimed and innovative sculptors. Calder helped to redefine sculpture by adding the element of play. more...
SHELDON MUSEUM OF ART
BAILEY LIBRARY, 228 ANDREWS HALL, 4PM
Classics and Religious Studies Lecture - "Is Evolution Compatible with Monotheism?"
Dan D. Crawford, senior lecturer in classics and religious studies
NEBRASKA UNION, 7PM
Honors Forum - a Nebraska Colloquium event - "The Challenge of U.S./Mexico Transnationalism to the Linkage Between Schooling and Democracy"
Professor Ted Hamann
MARY RIEPMA ROSS MEDIA ARTS CENTER
Three Films Play at the Ross
UNL's Mary Riepma Ross Media Arts Center presents Slumdog Millionaire, Dear Zachary: A Letter To a Son About His Father, and Ballast. All three films will screen through February 19.
Slumdog Millionaire is the story of Jamal Malik, an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India's "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika, the girl he loved and lost. Each chapter of his story reveals the key to the answer to one of the game show's questions. Intrigued by Jamal's story, the jaded Police Inspector begins to wonder what a young man with no apparent desire for riches is really doing on this game show? When the new day dawns and Jamal returns to answer the final question, the Inspector and sixty million viewers are about to find out...
Filmmaker Kurt Kuenne's excruciatingly powerful documentary Dear Zachary: A Letter To a Son About His Father, begins as a memorial to a lost friend, Andrew Bagby, who was brutally murdered in 2001 by a crazed ex-girlfriend. Yet as Kuenne traveled the globe to interview friends and family of the beloved young doctor, Bagby's killer, Shirley Turner, fled to Newfoundland to escape arrest. Under the backwards protection of the Canadian law, she was allowed to remain free; during that time, she revealed that she was pregnant with Andrew's child. A deeply personal home video memoir, a true crime thriller, an impassioned plea for judicial reform, and an ode to two of the most heroic, loving parents the screen has ever seen, Dear Zachary is painful viewing, but it is also nonfiction filmmaking at its most vital and important.
Winner of numerous prizes at prestigious film festivals all around the world, including Sundance, San Francisco, and Buenos Aires, Ballast is a stunning, emotionally powerful feature-film debut from Lance Hammer, who wrote, directed, and edited the film and served as one of the producers. Although there was a script, the dialogue was mostly improvised, and Hammer uses only natural sound and light, heightening the reality of the hard lives these people lead. Ballast is a bold, brutal work, filled with pain and honesty, violence and warmth, offering no easy answers.
More information is available at the Ross website.
