Maine Arts Commission Grant Sends Paul Bunyan on Tour with Student Performers

Thanks to a $10,000 grant through the Maine Arts Commission’s SMART grant, adventurous audiences in Freeport, Portland, Westbrook, and Peaks Island will soon be treated to some wild and wooly chronicles of Maine's own Paul Bunyan, Mighty Woodsman, Inventor of Logging, and Hero-Leader of the best band of jim-crackin' rip-snortin' rogues that ever tramped the Maine woods.Figures of Speech Student Ensemble, has taken on the Maine-based tall tale of Paul Bunyan. Ian Bannon, Figures of Speech's director of education explains, “I've been fretting over the fact that we are, generationally, losing touch with America's rich history of storytelling. Characters like Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill and John Henry embody our collective spirit as Americans. With all of the talk about immigration policies and border safety, it's good to remember our commonalities through these legends of tenacity, ingenuity and bravery, as well as the immigrants and pioneers who generated them.”

The 12-member ensemble will use a variety of media including shadow puppets, projections and dozens of tiny lumberjack figurines, to play with human-to-superhuman scale and generally cram all the fun that can be had into a 45-minute-long performance for all ages.

The “Paul Bunyan” tour will open on Friday, January 28 at 7:30 PM at the Mast Landing School in Freeport. Admission is $7 students, $10 adults. The run continues on Sunday, January 30 at 7:30 PM at Lucid Stage in Portland; on Friday, February 4 at 7:30 PM at the Warren Library in Westbrook, and on Sunday, February 6 at 1:00 PM at the Peaks Island School. For more detailed information on locations, tickets, etc., go to www.figures.org or call Figures of Speech Theatre, 865-6355.

The next deadline for the Maine Arts Commission's SMART grant is April 22, 2011. Visit MaineArts.com for more details of this and all of the agency's grant programs.

Maine Arts Commission Approves $92,000 in Arts Education Funding

The Maine Arts Commission recently approved 11 SMART (Schools Make Art Relevant Today) grants for a total of $92, 550 in funding. The grant provides funding for arts education projects and has a maximum award of $10,000. There is one deadline each year.

SMART grants have been traditionally awarded to projects serving elementary school populations but this year a unique project was presented by the University of Maine at Augusta to provide funds to create a Youth Orientated program of the University of Maine, Augusta, or YoUMA for short.

YoUMA is a summer interdisciplinary arts immersion program with a focus on visual and performing arts for up to 100 rising sophomore, junior and senior high school students, and also recent graduates and GED recipients.
YoUMA will:
• raise awareness of the availability of local, high quality post secondary arts education,
• encourage prospective students to consider going to college majoring in visual/performing arts by exposing them to an innovative introduction to what college can be like, thereby encouraging participants to realize higher education is indeed within their capabilities and
• develop stronger partnerships and collaborations with arts programs in Maine high schools, communities, and educational programs to recruit participants.

Students will receive college credit for each week completed in the course and will have a glimpse into the life of a college art student, and the subsequent positive college experience. YoUMA will orient students to higher education and promote attendance using artistic modes of problem solving, which, in turn, bring an array of expressive, analytical, and development tools for each student.

The review committee applauded the University for recognizing that arts education is one way to keep students in school until they graduate and working to make connections between high school and college is a gap that needs to be bridged.

Other grants awarded under the SMART grant were:
• The Auburn School Department for an arts-based afterschool program, $9,915
• Biddeford School Department, for an in school dance residency, $2,635
• Figures of Speech Theatre, for Figures of Speech Student Ensemble, $10,000
• Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, or a community-based artist residency with and student mentor program, $5,000
• Maine Alliance for Arts Education, for the LINC program, $10,000
• John F. Murphy Homes, Inc., for a creative movement program, $10,000
• Portland Museum of Art, for a two-year art immersion program for high school students, $5,000
• Sanford School Department, for a project utilizing professional artists to instruct students and staff, $10,000
• The Telling Room, to allow students to work with writers and a comic book artist to tell their stories, $10,000
• Tides Institute and Museum of Art, for artist residencies, workshop and visiting artist program, $10,000

For more information on the Maine Arts Commission's SMART grant visit MaineArts.com.

An Educational Success at Colby College Museum of Art

Supported by a SMART grant from the Maine Arts Commission, Colby College Museum of Art is presenting Lively Spaces, a summer performance by children enrolled in the George J. Mitchell Elementary School’s Before and After School Program. The program engages its participants by fostering active learning through the arts and working directly with objects in the museum collection, as well as, dance/movement and theatre instruction.

This program, featured in the latest Maine Arts Magazine, contained an inspirational quote from Lauren Lessing, Colby Museum’s Mirken Curator of Education, “Students typically come in wide-eyed and interested, but they leave completely engaged and return to the museum with parents in tow.”

This free performance takes place between 1 and 2pm on Thursday, July 30 at the Colby College Museum of Art, and is open to the public.