Everything Nac

The 2016 SummerStage Festival at Stephen F. Austin State University will entertain audiences of all ages with a pair of lighthearted productions.

This year’s SummerStage Festival is slated for June 24 through July 16 in W.M. Turner Auditorium on the SFA campus and features the School of Theatre’s presentations of the children’s musical “A Year With Frog and Toad” by Robert and Willie Reale and “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” a witty comedy by actor, screenwriter and stand-up comic Steve Martin.

The SummerStage Festival was launched in 2014 as the School of Theatre sought to reach out to new audiences looking for a fun and easy-going way of spending warm-weather time with family and friends, according to Scott Shattuck, the school’s director.

“The festival brings people together by bringing engaging stories to life,” Shattuck said. “Half the fun is the audience. It’s full of neighbors laughing together and greeting each other before and after the show and at intermission, families making memories, and friends chatting about the amusing experience they’ve shared.”

Angela Bacarisse, the director of the smash hit “Spamalot” and the summer kids’ favorites “The Emperor’s New Clothes: The Musical” and “How I Became a Pirate,” now brings to SummerStage the only children’s show ever nominated for the coveted Tony Award for Broadway’s Best Musical. In “A Year With Frog and Toad,” based on the books by Arnold Lobel, the beloved suburban amphibians leap to tuneful life with irresistibly upbeat Frog lifting the spirits of his worrywart neighbor Toad.

“I remember reading these books to my son when he was younger,” Bacarisse said. “We still have them on our bookshelf. I’m sure many parents and children will love seeing these characters brought to life.”

Inga Meier will make her directorial debut on the Turner stage with “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” a hilarious play about an imagined meeting in 1904 between a would-be scientist called “Einstein” and an irresistible-but-unknown painter named “Picasso” in a Paris café called the Lapin Agile. Wit and whimsy fuels their talk of creativity and inspiration with the bistro’s unforgettable cast of regulars until a very different kind of genius mysteriously arrives from the future. This play is recommended for mature audiences, who are invited to call it “Picasso,” leaving out the unpronounceable locale in the title.

“One of the compelling things to me about Steve Martin, whether as a playwright, novelist, actor or stand-up comedian playing a banjo with an arrow through his head, is his incredibly unique style of humor,” Meier said. “All bets are off. The rules of time and space and story don’t apply at all, and yet everything ties together in a delightfully magical way. He crafts worlds that are just so much fun to explore.”

Performances of “A Year With Frog and Toad” are at 10 a.m. June 28 and July 13 and 15; at 2 p.m. June 24 and 27 and July 14 and 16; and at 6:30 p.m. June 25 and July 9 and 13. General admission tickets are $7.50.

Performances of “Picasso at the Lapin Agile” are at 7:30 nightly July 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 14, 15 and 16. General admission tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for seniors and $7.50 for students/youth.

For tickets or more information, visit www.finearts.sfasu.edu or call (936) 468-6407 or (888) 240-ARTS. All performances are in W.M. Turner Auditorium in the Griffith Fine Arts Building on the SFA campus.

Education students at Stephen F. Austin State University gained a better understanding of Japanese culture while participating in an art class project now displayed in the Janice Pattillo Early Childhood Research Center.

Students in School of Art Assistant Professor Bill Nieberding’s art education courses for pre-service elementary teachers recently completed a project based on a multicultural curriculum developed at Princeton University. It began by inquiring about the background behind a paper crane donated to the World Trade Center Memorial Museum in New York City in 2009.

Using their smartphones in class, the students learned that the crane was donated by Masahiro Sasaki, whose sister, Sadako Sasaki, died of leukemia after exposure to radiation in the bombing of Nagasaki during World War II. Upon reading the book “Sadako” in class, students learned that she folded 1,000 paper cranes with the hopes that her wish to be healed would come true, an example of an old Japanese legend that if someone folds 1,000 cranes, their wish will be granted.

“As part of our process of coming to understand the meaning of the cranes, we started folding cranes with the intention of learning the process, each student folding a few,” Nieberding explained. “However, when two of the students suggested that it would be good to exhibit the cranes on campus, it became apparent that we should complete what is called a Senbazuru, or a group of 1,000 origami cranes.”

The students folded cranes and strung them into the traditional form of 25 strands of 40 cranes. While doing this, the students debated appropriate places to display the work, Nieberding said.

Several students suggested the ECRC, and when Nieberding reached out to Lysa Hagan, principal of the SFA Charter School, and Elizabeth Vaughan, professor of elementary education and chairman of the Department of Elementary Education, they were “extremely enthusiastic about the project,” he said. “The students all agreed that it was a good idea to donate the artwork to the ECRC.”

The process affected each student in a different way, Nieberding said.

“Making 1,000 paper cranes as a class was a really unique experience,” said Sheridan Sharp, Lumberton sophomore. ” It provided a way for all of the students from different walks of life to create a simple piece of art that would be united all together in a mass display as a symbol of unity and love.”

“To me, the cranes symbolize peace and tranquility, aspects that we, as college students, are missing in our daily lives much of the time,” Longview junior Erin Whittenberg said.

Ali Piran, Stephen F. Austin State University lecturer of physics and astronomy, was recently awarded the inaugural Mary Beth Monroe Award for Distinguished Service to the Texas Section of the American Association of Physics Teachers.

“I am honored to be a recipient of this prestigious award,” Piran said. “This award is very important to me because Mary Beth Monroe was a true mentor to many students and colleagues and an educator who had a passion for teaching physics. She always reminded us of the importance of physics education in our society, had a great attitude and always looked at the glass as half-full. I hope that one day I achieve a small portion of what she has accomplished.”

Piran has been the Society of Physics Students adviser at SFA for more than 20 years. SFA SPS has won 16 national Outstanding Chapter Awards under his guidance. His primary teaching assignments at SFA have been teaching introductory physics.

Phoenix, Arizona, artist David Shannon-Lier won first place in the 2016 Texas National Competition and Exhibition at Stephen F. Austin State University.

Commenting on the high quality of work entered in the 22nd Texas National event, Juror Abelardo Morell selected Lier’s piece titled “Grassland Moonset, Gla National Forest, New Mexico” the top honor.

Second place went to Albuquerque, New Mexico, artist Serena Stevens for “Just Keep Swimming,” and third place went to Portland, Maine, artist Betsy Lewis for “Finale (3).”

Honorable mention entries were by Houston artist Kathy Drago for “Pre-Contact,” Hattiesburg, Mississippi, artist John Lawler for “Innocence and Violence,” and Gainesville, Virginia, artist Raphael Warshaw for “Rio Douro 18.”

The SFA School of Art’s annual juried competition and exhibition attracts entrants from across the United States, providing artists an opportunity to have their work juried by highly acclaimed artists and critics, such as Morell. The exhibition includes photography, painting, sculpture and mixed media pieces.

Texas National 2016 and an exhibition of Morell’s photographic work will show through June 11 at The Cole Art Center @ The Old Opera House, located at 329 E. Main St. in downtown Nacogdoches.

For more information, call (936) 468-1131.

Stephen F. Austin State University’s James I. Perkins College of Education recently hosted its end-of-the-semester celebration to honor teacher candidates as they reach the culmination of student teaching and their educator preparation, according to Dr. Jannah Nerren, associate dean of assessment and accountability.

During the event, representatives from the college of education’s educator preparation program presented several SFA seniors with awards for their work during the semester.

Dr. Deborah Buswell, associate professor of kinesiology at SFA, presented Yaneli Cortez with the Dr. June Irwin Outstanding Women’s Kinesiology Graduate Award.

Dr. Elizabeth Vaughan, chair of the Department of Elementary Education, presented Caryn Berkowitz with the Hilda M. Barfield Outstanding Interdisciplinary Studies Graduate Award.

Dr. Neill Armstrong, associate professor of secondary education and educational leadership, recognized Hillel Davis, who was named the Exemplary Secondary Student Teacher.

Also, Dr. Paula Griffin, assistant professor of elementary education, presented Deanna Anders with the Janice A. Pattillo Outstanding Early Education Graduate (early childhood through sixth grade completer) Award.

Dr. Michelle Williams, associate professor of elementary education, and Dr. Jannah Nerren, associate dean of assessment and accountability, presented Brooke Taylor-Johnson with the Olds Family Outstanding Elementary Student Teacher Award.