It was a Sunday afternoon in the home of a long-time IMA patron on one of winter’s bleakest, iciest days that we heard a wonderful performance of Franz Schubert’s great 1827 song cycle Die Winterreise, or A Winter Journey. The cycle comprises 24 songs about the painful feelings of a lover’s rejection, personal loss, loneliness and confronting mortality.

Now that it’s spring, we’re days away from a concert of another sort: Grammy-award winning contemporary music ensemble eighth blackbird will perform at The Toby Saturday, March 26 in a concert co-sponsored by Ensemble Music Society and the IMA. So what’s the connection besides the truism that spring always follows winter?

One striking aspect of that wintry afternoon was the spectacular contemporary art everywhere in the home.  Wherever we glanced were paintings and sculptures by well-known artists. The collection was fabulous. So the guests were listening to a great collection of early 19^th century music while enjoying paintings and sculpture from 150-175 years later.

What would you think if the contrasting periods were switched?  Does the art you enjoy at the IMA or have on your walls at home match your “art for ears?”  Are you willing to go to a concert and be as surprised and challenged as you are when you enter the fourth floor galleries at the IMA?

I remember thinking once I was quite sophisticated and knowledgeable about modern music, so I expounded to a friend, “John Adams and Philip Glass—how pointlessly simpleminded.”  Then I went to a conference in LA where we heard excerpts from Adams’ then somewhat new opera Nixon in China. That evening changed my perspective on an entire group of modern composers and deepened my belief that music loses so much when it’s recorded.

When eighth blackbird first came to Indianapolis almost three years ago, I experienced a tinge of anxiety before the concert because this group included extensive percussion and used video projectors with amplification in the program, again extending my personal boundaries of “classical” music, and as well as for many in the audience.  The audience reaction by people of all ages was enthusiastic.  You have to be willing to jump in and try it out.

So look beyond the dozens of recordings of Vivaldi or Pachelbel on iTunes and come to The Toby on March 26.  Be open to change and discover exciting music by Philip Glass, Steve Reich, Missy Mazzoli and others.

Filed under: Public Programs, The Toby

Detour (1945), tonight’s Winter Nights film, comes from a little independent studio despised for its cheap pictures.  The studio, PRC, was said to be an acronym for “Putrid, Rotten Crud.”  (Well, it wasn’t actually “crud,” but you get the idea!) This moniker was so pervasive that today, when a PRC movie is recovered, we often find that this phrase has been marked on the film can by an unhappy projectionist.  Why then would the IMA choose to show a film from such a studio?

The answer is simple. Detour (1945) is an exception to the rule.  Director Edgar G. Ulmer never let a tiny budget hamper him.  Like many film noir directors, Ulmer had a background that stretched back into the German Expressionist era in the 1920s.  The Black Cat (1934) was his first major American film as director, and it was made at a time when Universal was strapped for cash.  Rather than shoot it as a traditional horror film in a drippy castle, with expensive sets, Ulmer rewrote the movie to take place in an ultra-modern fortress, with spartan interiors that cost little to make.  The film was a hit, and Ulmer seemed on his way as a top director.

Shortly afterward, Ulmer met his future wife Shirley, who was married to producer Max Alexander, nephew of studio boss Carl Laemmle.  Shirley and Max divorced, she married Ulmer, and the new couple were banned from the Universal lot.  Ulmer’s career was over before it had really begun.  He was banished to small studios for many years, where his talent for stretching a dollar was tested every day, especially at bottom-of-the-barrel PRC.

PRC specialized in westerns and cheap horror films.  At the time, theaters would pay a flat fee for a movie that could play in the bottom half of a double feature.  If PRC could make a movie for less than that fee, then it was profitable before it ever played in theaters.  Their profits went up as the film budgets went down.  Who cared if it was any good?

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Filed under: Film, Public Programs, The Toby

Nothing like an ice storm to make you dream green.  It’s hard to fathom the audacity of this amaryllis on our kitchen counter right now:

Fathoming, though, is a big part of sustainability – that’s why we love it at the IMA.  Green thinking demands an experimental spirit, and usually reflects a nod to smart design.  The status quo (pollution, wastefulness, inefficiency) has got to go.

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Filed under: Design, Education, Public Programs

Sometimes manna drops from the sky.  As when I get an e-mail from an agent in Chicago seeking concert venues for 23-year-old Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds.  This fair fellow composes delicate pieces for chamber ensembles, tinted with a hint of electronica.  I tell the agent: you had me at Iceland.

Angelic sounds from the mystical country that produced Bjork, in the month of January, in The Toby, made by a musician headed for Istanbul and London once his US tour is done?  A poetic no-brainer.  So it stands to reason: you must join us at the IMA for Ólafur Arnalds this Saturday evening.

Here’s a sample from Arnalds’ new record, …And They Have Escaped The Weight Of Darkness:

I find these sounds delicate as a paper-thin sheet of ice on a lake.  Resplendent as white fondant on a winter wedding cake.  Patterned like lace, or bird tracks in the snow.  At the concert, there will be long-haired ladies playing cellos.  And moody sweetness with the lights low.  A little peace; a fairy-tale feel.

Read what one concert-goer had to say about the show in Detroit on Wednesday night.

Oh, I’m supposed to also tell you that you can enter a sweepstakes to win a trip to Iceland, courtesy of Iceland Naturally.

So, tomorrow, our crack IMA public programs team will fire up the lights and sound in The Toby, tune up the Bösendorfer, provide plenty of smoothies and beer (as requested in the rider), tear the tickets, and then let Arnalds’ sonic sheen wash over us all.

Filed under: Public Programs

The IMA always has many interesting events on the calendar. From films to performances, there is always something (or several things) coming up which I personally want to make time to see. Throughout the year, our Public Programs department is busy lining up events to help Indianapolis be culturally adventurous (the Toby’s tag line), and New Media is often ready to capture an event so more people can experience it later on our Website and on ArtBabble.

Here are three IMA events we have recently posted video of, all of which I saw in person. The funny thing is, in each case I noticed or appreciated something new while watching the video that I had missed during the event.

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Filed under: Art and Nature Park, Local, Public Programs, The Toby