Arts & Culture

Washington University’s Department of Music in Arts & Sciences will present its annual sing-along of George Frideric Handel’s oratorio Messiah at 3 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 10, in Graham Chapel. John Stewart, director of vocal activities, directs the program.

The Washington University Opera will present a program titled “In Women’s Chambers” at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Dec. 8 and 9, in Karl Umrath Lounge. The program will include portions of three 20th-century operas: Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia (1946), Conrad Susa’s Black River (1975) and Little Women (1998) by Mark Adamo.

Poet Carl Phillips, professor of English and of African & African American studies, both in Arts & Sciences, has won the 2006 Academy of American Poets Fellowship, given in memory of James Ingram Merrill. The fellowship is awarded annually to a poet for distinguished poetic achievement at mid-career and provides a stipend of $25,000. The academy’s board of chancellors, a body of 15 eminent poets, elected Phillips.

David Kilper/WUSTL Photo Services*Bit.Fall* by Julius PoppChristiane Paul, adjunct curator of new media arts at the Whitney Museum of American Art, will speak on Grid vs. Network: Aesthetics of New Media Spaces at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 30. The talk is sponsored by the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum in conjunction with the exhibition [Grid Matrix], on view through Dec. 31.

Poet Susan Wheeler will read from her work at 8 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 30, for The Writing Program Reading Series. Wheeler is the author of four acclaimed collections: Bag ‘o’ Diamonds (1993), Smokes (1998), Source Codes (2001) and Ledger (2005). Her work has appeared in appeared in eight editions of Best American Poetry.

David Kilper/WUSTL Photo Services*Women’s Voices* by Christine Knoblauch-O’NealWashington University Dance Theatre, the annual showcase of professionally choreographed works performed by student dancers, will present BODYMIND/Art of Movement, its 2006 concert, Dec. 1-3 in Edison Theatre. Performances will feature close to 50 dancers, selected by audition, performing seven works by faculty and guest choreographers.

Jerry BauerOrhan PamukTurkish writer Orhan Pamuk, winner of the 2006 Nobel Prize in Literature, will receive Washington University’s inaugural Distinguished Humanist Medal as part of “Celebrating Our Books, Recognizing Our Authors,” the university’s fifth annual faculty book colloquium. The award — which includes a cash prize of $15,000 — is supported by the Center for the Humanities and the Office of International and Area Studies, both in Arts & Sciences. It will be given biannually to a distinguished scholar, writer or artist whose career merits special recognition for excellence and courage.

The Washington University Symphony Orchestra will present “OrganFest,” a concert showcasing the university’s recently refurbished Graham Chapel organ, at 3 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 19. Dan Presgrave, instrumental music coordinator in the Department of Music in Arts & Sciences, conducts the 70-plus-member orchestra. Featured soloist are William Partridge, Jr., university organist; and Barbara Raedeke, instructor in organ.

Robert Criss, Ph.D., professor of earth and planetary sciences in Arts & Sciences, has analyzed data from the Lewis and Clark expedition and says it shows that the Missouri River today is but a shadow of what it was two hundred years ago, narrower and more prone to serious flooding.A geologist at Washington University in St. Louis and his collaborator at Oxford University have interpreted data that Lewis and Clark collected during their famous expedition and found that the Missouri River has markedly narrowed and its water levels have become more variable over the past two hundred years. This narrowing, or channeling, created by wing dikes and levees constructed mainly in the 20th century, has put the Missouri River at an increased risk of more damaging floods, the authors say. They blame the fact that the river cannot spread out as it did naturally at the turn of the 19th century, thus forcing water levels higher. More…

Four aspiring playwrights will present staged readings of their work Nov. 16 and 17 as part of Washington University’s 2006 A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Festival. Sponsored by the Performing Arts Department in Arts & Sciences, the festival’s selection process actually began in January, when students from across the university submitted original plays to an adjudication committee made up of faculty and theater professionals. The committee then selected four plays — two full-length works and two shorts — to undergo an intense two-week workshop this fall, culminating in the staged readings.