Arts & Culture

Cellist Anne Fagerburg, violist Morris Jacob and violinist Erin Schreiber — all members of the St. Louis Symphony — will join pianist Martin Kennedy, assistant professor of music, and mezzo-soprano Nöel Prince, instructor in voice, for a free performance at 7:30 p.m. Monday, March 28. Sponsored by the Department of Music and the St. Louis Symphony Community Partnership program, the concert will feature music of Franz Liszt, Edward MacDowell, Franz Schubert and Gustav Mahler.

The SGC International is the largest printmaking organization in North America, with thousands of members in all 50 states, Canada, South America and Europe. Next week, the SGCI will bring more than 1,200 printmakers from around the world to the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis, which is hosting Equilibrium, the organization’s 2011 conference. 

In 1997, at the distinguished Siddons School on Manhattans Upper East Side, the school year opens with distressing news: Astra Dell, “that pale girl,” “the dancer with all the hair,” is suffering from a rare disease. And so begins All Souls, the funny, poignant and wickedly original tale of innocence, daring and illness by Christine Schutt, the Visiting Fannie Hurst Professor of Creative Literature in Washington University’s Department of English in Arts & Sciences, who will present two events as part of the Writing Program Reading Series. 

The Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum will launch its annual Kemper Presents Concert Series with a performance by the Pernikoff Brothers March 4. The series, designed to showcase the talents and diversity of contemporary St. Louis musicians, will feature seven local acts working in a variety of styles and genres, from indie-folk and a cappella to American roots music and lush, melancholic jangle-pop. 

One of the most acclaimed poets of her generation, Louise Glück has, over the last four decades, received virtually every major honor available to a U.S. poet, including the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award and a Wallace Stevens Award for “outstanding and proven mastery in the art of poetry.” At 8 p.m. Thursday, March 10, Glück, the Visiting Fannie Hurst Professor of Creative Literature in Washington University, will read from her work as part of The Writing Program’s spring Reading Series. 

In an age of computer graphics and 3-D rendering, South African artist William Kentridge employs the simplest materials imaginable — paper, charcoal and pastel — to create animated films that explore apartheid, colonialism, human rights abuses and other sobering topics with breathtaking insight and poignancy. At 6 p.m. Wednesday, March 2, Kentridge — whose work also includes prints, books, sculpture, collage, etching and performing arts — will receive the Dean’s Medal from the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis. 

Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin is among the most celebrated Irish poets of her generation and arguably the foremost female poet today writing in Ireland and Great Britain. Next week, Ní Chuilleanáin, the Visiting Fannie Hurst Professor of Creative Literature in Washington University’s Department of English in Arts & Sciences, will present two events as part of The Writing Program’s spring Reading Series 

Rafael Moneo is arguably the most celebrated Spanish architect working today, known for innovative modern buildings that deftly navigate even the most challenging urban sites while preserving and respecting the existing environments. At 6:30 p.m. Monday, Feb. 28, Moneo will discuss his work for the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts’ spring Public Lecture Series. 

Praised as “one of the finest players of his generation” by the Moscow’s Kommersant Daily, Scottish pianist Kenneth Hamilton is renowned for his spectacular performances of Romantic music, particularly the work of Franz Liszt (1811-86). On Feb. 26, Hamilton will mark the 200th anniversary of Liszt’s birth with a solo piano recital titled “Liszt and His Contemporaries: A Pianistic Panorama” and take part in a free symposium organized by the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences. 

City versus forest. Apollonian rationality versus Dionysian subconscious. Wayward lovers and working-class thespians versus the regal, glittering world of the fairies. William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a study in contrasts, joining elegant verse and bawdy humor with cruel punishments and magical enchantments “past the wit of man.” This month, the Performing Arts Department will present the Bard’s most popular comedy — arguably the most popular ever written — as its spring Mainstage production.