Everything Nac

Stephen F. Austin State University will hold seven commencement ceremonies for May 2021 to accommodate measures aimed at ensuring attendee safety.

May and August 2020 graduates are invited to participate in the May ceremony, and seating in the Johnson Coliseum will be adjusted to help ensure physical distancing. All attendees will be required to wear face masks.

Graduates and their guests must present tickets to enter Johnson Coliseum. Tickets are free but will help university officials ensure the venue is not overcrowded and that adequate spacing can be maintained during the event. Each graduate will be allotted one ticket for themselves and a maximum of six guest tickets for their respective ceremony.

Candidates from the following schools and departments will participate in a ceremony on Friday, May 7:

1 p.m., the Department of Human Services and Educational Leadership and the 2020 May and August graduates, with Dr. Nina Ellis-Hervey as speaker
4 p.m., the Department of Education Studies and the College of Forestry and Agriculture, with Dr. Steve Bullard as speaker
7 p.m., the School of Human Sciences and the Department of Kinesiology and Health Science, with Dr. Rachel Jumper as speaker

Candidates from the following schools and departments will participate in a ceremony on Saturday, May 8:

9 a.m., the College of Business, with Mike Parham as speaker
noon, the College of Fine Arts and the School of Social Work, with Dr. Sam Copeland as speaker
3 p.m., the College of Liberal and Applied Arts, with Dr. Troy Davis as speaker
6 p.m., the College of Sciences and Mathematics, with Dr. Roy Joe Harris as speaker

Degrees to be awarded include 1,286 bachelor’s, 295 master’s and four doctoral degrees. Approximately 500 students will graduate with honors, including 168 cum laude, 140 magna cum laude and 187 summa cum laude. Sixty-five will graduate with the university scholar designation.

All ceremonies will be livestreamed on the SFA Facebook page, facebook.com/sfasu. For more information, visit sfasu.edu/commencement.

By Joanna Armstrong, marketing communications specialist at Stephen F. Austin State University.

Plans are being finalized for the May 1 outdoor music festival hosted by the Music Preparatory Division of the Stephen F. Austin State University School of Music in celebration of Music Prep’s 40th anniversary.

The all-day event will take place at the Music Prep House, located at 3028 Raguet St., and will feature the talents of Music Prep’s outstanding student musicians and give local merchants the opportunity to showcase their businesses while showing support for the School of Music’s outreach program, according to Alba Madrid, Music Prep director and program instructor.

“This family-friendly outdoor music festival is the perfect way to end our school year, and it is a fitting tribute to 40 years of making music,” Madrid said. “This music festival will be a socially distanced event allowing music lovers to enjoy exceptional music, exhibition booths, food vendors and the great outdoors.”

The festival is designed to celebrate the accomplishments of current Music Prep students by sharing their performances with the community. The program will begin with the youngest artists in Kindermusik and Suzuki programs. Students taking private lessons will be featured in solo performances in various instruments. The festival will include a compelling performance by the Piney Woods Youth Symphony Orchestra.

A number of local merchants have signed on as sponsors for the event, including Lisle Violin Shop and Regents Academy, allegro sponsors; Rex Perry Autoplex, Etech, University Rental, Elliott Electric, New Camerata Opera, Nacogdoches Pediatric Dentistry and Gobel School of Dance, moderato sponsors; and Morning Glory Yoga, Commercial Bank of Texas, McWilliams & Son, Rodan + Fields and Nest Spa, adagio sponsors. Additionally, several merchants will have booth spaces to showcase their businesses. Local food trucks will be on site.

A new project also being celebrated is the creation of the Shirley Watterston Piano Lab at the Prep House. With the lab, named in honor of the Music Prep co-founder, the Preparatory Division will be able to deliver affordable group piano instruction to members of the Nacogdoches and East Texas community. Classes will be offered for students of all ages (retirees, adults, teenagers, elementary) and skill levels. In addition to outreach potential, the piano lab program will also provide music majors internship opportunities to gain valuable teaching experiences in conjunction with their piano pedagogy classes.

The festival is from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, May 1. For more information about the festival or the programs offered by Music Prep, contact Madrid at (936) 468-1291 or musicprep@sfasu.edu, or visit sfamusicprep.com.

In recent years, people have become familiar with “pop up” events, including spontaneous shopping fairs, street dances, festivals and art exhibitions. Sometimes opportunities arise when least expected, and graduate art students at Stephen F. Austin State University embraced the opportunity to show their work after an unexpected cancellation at the Ed and Gwen Cole Art Center @The Old Opera House.

Their “pop up” show, which features work from a graduate seminar, takes up the ground floor Ledbetter Gallery and the Hallway gallery space on the second floor, and selected works by SFA filmmaking students can be viewed in the upstairs Reavley Gallery. The SFA art students have called their exhibition “Collected” to reflect its character as a group effort.

“The word ‘collected’ here takes on both the basic dictionary meaning ‘gathered together’ and the implied meaning of being emotionally collected, that is, ‘to be calm and composed through concentrated effort,'” said Dr. David Lewis, professor of art history at SFA.

“The title well reflects the cooperative nature of their joint activities in putting the show together within an unusually short time frame,” Lewis added. “The exhibition did come together quickly: it had to, and these emerging artists were up to the challenge.”

The show represents a broad range of styles and media, including painting, sculpture, printmaking, digital media and film, and it offers an introduction to some of the larger ideas, issues and media that represent current trends in the visual arts.

Among the works are digital prints by Kendra Brown, including “Fan Favorite,” which playfully uses quilt patterns; large, imposing sculptures in mixed media by Kailan Counahan, such as “The Lines we Walked …,” composed of nylon, wood, nails and thread; and charcoal drawings by Lindsey Creel portraying forms suggesting crumpled paper or cloth, including “Hivemind.” Elizabeth P. Fontenot contributes oil painting, watercolor and prints in various media, with titles such as “Shelter in Place,” reflecting the events of recent times. Work in ceramics is represented by Homero Gutierrez with the whimsically titled “Hare Season.” Jessica Gryder contributes photography and digital media works like “Exaggerated Spin.” Working in a graffiti art style reminiscent of Basquiat, Weelynd McMullan shows mixed media paintings and drawings. “Always Watching” and other digital works by Charles G. Oliveri create dynamic optical effects; and the oil paintings of Travis Walthall portray eerily surreal images of mysterious workers in Hazmat suits cleaning up disaster areas. The film selection includes shorts ranging from 45 seconds to five minutes: “A Siren’s Lullaby” and “Fragmented” by Calvin Henson Jr. and “The Calm Interrupted V3” by Oliveri.

The exhibition continues through June 12.

The Cole Art Center is SFA’s historic downtown art gallery, located at 329 E. Main St. For more information, contact the School of Art at (936) 468-4804.