As the semester draws to a close, the Drama Department prepares to present its annual Fall Dance Concert, running from Nov. 20-22 in the Culbreth Theatre. This semester’s production boasts the largest cast in the past decade, promising an eclectic performance shaped by the innovative artistic aims of each dancer and choreographer.
The doors of downtown’s McGuffey Art Center opened to a sea of color this November, with paper flag garlands strung from the ceiling, painted skeletal masks adorning the walls and marigolds galore decorating surfaces. Walking through the first floor halls, a web of displays interspersed with saved messages of memory from past years transformed the gallery with the festive spirit of the 13-day Día de los Muertos exhibition, carefully crafted in remembrance of loved ones now passed on.
For most University students, the end of the semester looks like a wind-down for Thanksgiving followed by an immediate gear-up for finals, perhaps intermingled with reminiscing on another semester gone by too fast. However, for some, the end of the semester signals something a little different — a cappella concert season.
Chloe Clayborne, Class of 2025 alumna, is an interdisciplinary artist who focuses on the transcendent, using her art to question what a human soul is and how it relates to the world. Her current exhibit “Decadent Dissolution” at New City Arts in the Downtown Mall explores these themes through sculpture, as well as oil and watercolor paintings.
Life as a University student can mean dressing for many occasions, from football tailgates to sorority formals and from thirty degree mornings to sixty degree afternoons. This fall, many students have increasingly found that subscriptions to Nuuly — an online fashion rental company — are a sustainable way to both expand their closets and find fun pieces for special events and everyday wear.
It was early October 2020, amid her first season as a University of Virginia soccer player, when Lia Godfrey received a FaceTime call from her coach. Steve Swanson, though, wasn’t seeking any soccer-related thoughts from his freshman midfielder. No, Eddie Van Halen had just died, and all Swanson wanted was for Godfrey, an accomplished pianist, to play a song by one of his favorite bands.
To movie lovers around the world, David Lynch was an auteur with a singular vision and talent, the man behind films like “Mulholland Drive” and “Eraserhead.” To Kate Deming, he was just “Uncle David.” “For me, it was like, ‘Oh, that’s just Uncle David,’” Deming, a second-year student at the University of Virginia, said. “But I knew he was so special, not only for my dad, but for everyone in the creative industry.”
From side to side, they moved with rhythm in a nonstop swaying motion that set up kicks, blocks and dodges in the martial art dance known as capoeira. Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian martial art that combines dance, acrobatic moves, music and spirituality. Practitioners use kicks, handstands, cartwheels and complex maneuvers in a series of flowing movements that are equal parts expressive dance and self-defense.
When it comes to setting records, Omonye Isi prefers classic vinyl. Isi first joined the University of Virginia’s staff as a clinical research coordinator in the Emily Couric Clinical Cancer Center in 2023. A year later, when she was admitted to a master’s degree program in public health, she stopped commuting from Richmond and moved to Charlottesville.
You’re listening to WTJU Charlottesville. For Arts This Week, we chatted with actor and writer, Kate Bennis, about her involvement with the play Queen Lear. Tell us a little bit about your involvement with Queen Lear.
2025 is the year of the zine at the University of Virginia, according to Erin Dickey, Librarian for the Arts at UVA Library. From the Library’s Makerspace to classrooms across Grounds, Dickey has observed an uptick in students and faculty experimenting with creating the self-published, do-it-yourself magazines thanks in part to a new Library initiative, Zines Now!
Jacquelyn Kim first joined the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library in 2022 as a student worker, where she helped build an exhibition that examined the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville. The exhibition was curated by UVA alumni and community members and gave Kim a crash course in what she calls “the importance of co-creation.”
