Ripe For Change

The IP Stanback Museum and Planetarium was host to the first film in the Southern Circuit Film series Ripe For Change, by filmmaker and producer Jed Riffe. About 60 students, faculty and community members attended and participated in a lively Q&A session afterwards. Ripe For Change illustrates the power pesticide companies have, and how they use that power to influence small farmers and ultimately determine what foods we eat, and what pesticides and herbicides are used in the production of that food.

Filmmaker Jed Riffe wanted to make this film due to a family history of agriculture. Originally from Dallas, TX where his grandfather owned and operated a farmer's market, he learned early on the value of organically grown food as he helped his grandfather operate the market. Formally trained as a journalist, he has been a magazine owner, businessman, and an activist, formerly against the Vietnam War, and lately against the use of pesticides. Later, Riffe became interested in film, and saw the power of film to organize and educate people.

(Pictured above left is IP Stanback Collections Manager Darryl Murphy, Filmmaker Jed Riffe and Museum Director Ellen Zisholtz; above right is Filmmaker Riffe with student Brittany Williams)

For more information, you can visit Riffe's Southern Circuit Film blog here.

SoHo on Sixth Review

The recent art exhibition in SoHo, New York with IP Stanback Museum and Planetarium Director Ellen Zisholtz generated some very positive responses. The following is by New York reviewer Richard Grimm, July 26, 2008:

Ellen Zisholtz and Pat Kaufman at SoHo on Sixth

One of the liveliest spots in the July becalmed Big Apple Saturday, July 19 was the reception
for the interesting joint show of artists Ellen Zisholtz and Pat Kaufman at SoHo on Sixth Gallery. While not quite household names, both are serious players on the arts scene, with Ms. Kaufman's work lately selling to collectors at excellent prices and Ms. Zisholtz certainly demonstrating the quality that could go similar places.

The eclectic attendees - I counted well over a hundred - represented a rainbow array of all ages of New York, South Carolina and Florida visual and performance artists, collectors, gallery denizens, students, teachers, musicians and designers.

Both artists have Southern bases, in addition to strong New York ties, with Ms. Zisholtz being the very active assistant professor in the Visual and Performing Arts Department at South Carolina State University, where she also directs the IP Stanback Museum and Planetarium. Ms. Kaufman spends a good part of the year in Sarasota, Florida, where she is a part of a compact, flourishing arts scene, much of it among part-time or ex-pat New Yorkers. Joining the artists for musical interludes in the art viewing and lively schmoozing were percussionist/composer James Orlick, who teaches music at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, who with fellow doctoral candidate Laura Jordan, put on a terrific marimba and drums-centered concert (marimba toted from Orangeburg)- with a pleasing mix from Philip Glass to Bob Marley. The good sized crowd responded enthusiastically. Paul Zisholtz, also known as BB Sweetwood, played his original musical compositions on guitar and sang.

Ms. Zisholtz's paintings are a thoughtful balance of representational and abstract themes. In colors and feeling, some, such as Still Life 1 and the landscapes Paisaje and El Zacatillo, have a Cezanne-like quality of bold colors and semi-abstracted picturesqueness. Abstract qualities predominate in the appealing, reduced-to-elemental-shapes Edisto River and Inspiration. Those paintings, like Diversity, Nahuatl Spirits and Reflections additionally have second look themes and progressions within them that connote psychological themes and puzzles. Nahuatl Spirits, uniquely for this show, is a semi-sculptural grey brooding reflection on long-gone Native American civilizations. Several of the other paintings also present a nice multicultural sensibility, partly reflecting her travels in Latin America.

Ms. Kaufman's paintings, almost all representational semi-cartoon-like of people, are whimsical, highly colorful and sexy. Most are portraits of herself or depictions of other women in exuberant poses and activities, often semi-nude and reflecting a feminist take on summer fun in the sun and intelligent self assertion. I liked them very much, especially the big Freedom Woman with explosive red hair and the affirmative self-portrait Putting Self Together Again.

I was happy to have received an invitation to this event as chair of the Annabella Gonzalez Dance Theater, which has had the pleasure of performing, teaching workshops and collaborating with the Arts and Language faculty at South Carolina State University.

(Pictured above right is Nahuatl Spirits by Ellen Zisholtz, and bottom left is Freedom Woman by Pat Kaufman)

African American Museums Annual Conference

The Stanback Museum & Planetarium Director Ellen Zisholtz attended the 30th Anniversary of the Association of African American Museums' annual conference in Chicago, IL, August 27 - 30. Four SCSU students enrolled in advanced museum courses also attended, Robyn Hemby, Andrea Pugh and Johnathan Smith, all Independent Studies students, and John Johnson, a Professional Internship student. The students attended seminars and workshops, and received a scholarship for tuition in return for volunteering at the conference. Two of the workshops they attended were "Conservation For The Budget Challenged Institution" and "Museum Collections 101". They also networked with museum professionals from IMLS, (Institute for Museum and Library Services) the National African American Museum of History and Culture, which is being built at the Smithsonian, Tavis Smiley's national touring exhibition "America I Am", as well as African American museums from all over the country. The students were witnesses to history when they, along with about 200 others, saw Barack Obama's acceptance speech in Chicago at the DuSable Museum of African American History.They also visited the McCormick Freedom Museum, The National Museum of Mexican Art and the Columbia College of Art and Media. The Stanback Director Ellen Zisholtz was re-elected Chair of the Director's Roundtable, which represents the directors of all the African American Museums in the country. She was a presentor in the workshop titled "The Gullah-Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor". Awards were given to two friends of The Stanback, Emory Campbell, former Director of the Penn Center, who received the Lifetime Achievement Award, and Carl Westmoreland, of the National Underground Railroad Museum in Cincinnatti, who received a "Service to Museums" award. All photos courtesy of Robyn Hemby.