Indianapolis Museum of Art Blog

Chef and Food Educator Alice Waters will be giving a talk at the IMA’s Tobias Theater next Tuesday. However, tickets sold out within weeks of posting the event online. For those unable to attend her talk, this post is for you. It will give you a glimpse into Waters’ work and how she seeks to inspire. I had the delight of speaking with her about her passion earlier this year:

Interview with Alice Waters
As published in the winter issue of the IMA’s Previews membership magazine

Q. What culture do you think has the most interesting relationship with food?
While I can only speak to the cultures I’ve visited, I find the Mediterranean culture of Southern Italy has a unique balance in their relationship with food. Food is part of the fabric of life there. It’s not on the side in the form of health or fueling up. It’s connected to meaningful everyday experiences. Sitting down at the table with family and friends is precious and important.

Q. What did you learn from your grandparents about food?
Not much. My grandparents were Irish English and it seemed to me that they liked to eat quite a lot, but that’s it. They had a narrow, limited diet. My parents were concerned about diet but didn’t know how to cook. My interest in food came from working in my parents’ Victory garden, and my passion came from traveling to France at the age of 19. The experience opened up a world to me. Read the rest of this entry »

From mad reality comes the sanity of art.  “My whole village was crazy,” writes composer Tan Dun.  “We had a professional crying team available for hire at funerals and deaths…a shamanistic choir to set the mournful tone.”  In Chinese folk culture, “ghosting” is a verb: an active conversation with the spirits of the past and the hereafter.

In Tan’s composition “Ghost Opera”, part of the first concert presented in the IMA’s newly renovated Tobias Theater this Friday, gongs talk to splashing water (yes, water); stones talk to cymbals, and the breath of a monk talks to a Chinese lute (a pipa).  It’s going to be a visually stunning, dramatically lit piece in which the musicians won’t be sitting still.

Photo courtesy of Nana Watanabe

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Do you love the Summer Nights film series, but just can’t stand the heat? Enjoy classic movies, but hate to watch them at home? Are you a movie lover or a casual film fan? Well, we’ve got something just for you.

This winter, the IMA will debut Winter Nights, a counterpart to the IMA’s popular Summer Nights film series. Winter Nights will feature classic films with familiar names. All films will be screened in the IMA’s Tobias Theater (aka The Toby) which will open this fall. (Which means…unlike Summer Nights, the IMA will provide the seats AND climate control.)

Below are some of the films that you will get to see this winter on The Toby’s big screen: Read the rest of this entry »