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Page 6 University Daily Kansan, April 2, 1982
Dancer's dream comes true; Kaw Valley group performs
By LISA GUTIERREZ
Staff Reporter
When Theresa Mertes, Prairie Village sophomore, was younger, she wanted to dance. Her parents thought she was going through a stage.
But when her in ninth birthday rolled around, she pressed the choice of playing in the school band or on a choir.
Theresa chose the dance lessons and this weekend, she will once again prove to her parents that it wasn't merely a stage she was going through—because she'll be dancing on one.
Mertes will be performing with the Kaw Valley Dance Theater when it presents its spring performance Friday, April 2 and 3 at West Juniper High auditorium, Harvard and Crestline.
"When you start in the 6th grade, you're kind of a late bloomer," Mertes said recently. "Dancers usually get started when they're three years old."
LAST BLOOMER OR NOT. Mertes has been dancing with the ballet and modern dance troupes throughout the city.
"I wanted more ballet than KU had to offer."
she said, "KU wants me more elegant and modern."
Mertes said she wasn't really nervous when she tried out for the dance troupe.
They were held just like regular ballet class. "she said
"Except we had numbers pinned to our chests." she added
One of the three newest members of the dance theater, Mertes said the first, uncomfortable feelings of being the new kid on stage have disappeared.
"It takes a little bit of biting used to, but I feel much more comfortable now," she said.
DURING THIS WEEKEND's performance, Mertes will dance in three of the theatre's six presentations: "Lebleseller ballet," a ballet by the choreographer Tina Broussard; "Juliana," a comic ballet set to rattle piano.
The other three presentations include "In-Tu",
a modern dance with a synthesizer; "Blurgess
Suite", a modern dance; and "Deflections", a
modern dance with jazz music.
The program features the works of Lawrence comosser Rarr Kurt, Kurt Sigmon and Dave
Hosek. Choreography is by Kristin Benjamin,
Elizabeth Sharon and Willie Lenoir.
Mertes said the troop began practice for the soring program right after Christmas break.
"We been practicing or twice a week," Mrs. said. "But this week it's once or two times."
ALTHOUGH THIS would not be Mertes' first performance with the Kaw Valley Dance Theatre, performing with them in their fall presentation and recent production of the show, she said she still experiences a small amount of anxiety when she performs in public.
"It's scary. With acting, you're afraid you'll forget the lines," she said.
"But in ballet, you can, number one, just as easily forget the steps or, number two, you can
“It’s fun once you get up there, though,” she said.
The Kaw Valley Theater's performances will be Friday at 8 p.m. and Saturday at 3 p.m. for senior citizens, for senior citizen students, $2.50 and for children. $1 tickets will be available at the door.
Elderly enjoy center's varied classes
By CATHERINE BEHAN
Staff Writer
The students painstakingly pushed their pants to form the intricate shapes of the pahana.
the instructor, Wayne DeQuain, was not teaching his students the rudiments of curving, but rather the serifs and parallel lines of the ancient form of printing: calligraphy. And his students were not first graders, but 16 area residents who were at least 60 years old.
The calligraphy class is just one of 12 craft classes and services offered to older residents by the Douglas County Council on Aging, 745 Vermont. The services and craft classes are available free of charge to anyone over the age of 60 and their spouses.
"I's great." Catherine Ward, Route 1, said.
"It really gets you out and out mixing with people your own age. It gives you companionship and especially when they all are grown.
"I don't know what I'd do without it."
Companionship is just one of the goals of the services the center provides. Grady Tardbutton, information and referral coordinator, said other members of the community dependence, health and mobility of county residents.
The majority of the senior citizens who frequent the center are not in nursing homes, Tarbutton said, but those who do live in a nursing home provide information on problems they might be having.
"We do casework for people who have lots of
problem," Tarbuton said. "We can help people with questions about Medicare or Medicaid or other health care options."
"They can't sue somebody for free, for instance," he said.
The center provides free legal advice about questions such as last will and testaments, Tarbutton said. The center will provide free long as the service is not fee-generating.
The center also has referral service that can send an elderly person to the right agency if he has a particular problem. Trained Internal Revenue Service volunteers answer questions about income.
If an elderly person has problems getting to the center, to a doctor or to a grocery store, the center provides a bus called "Bus 62" that runs five days a week. One of the most important trips takes the residents to places where free meals are served in the congregate meal program.
This program provides for socializing, entertainment and nutritional meals at a noon in four locations, five days a week. The food is prepared by volunteers in Kansas Union and delivered to the meal sites.
"One hundred and sixty are served each day and 17 meals are home delivered." Tarbutton
Many people depend on these meals, he said, but budget cuts proposed by the Reagan administration could somewhat cut this and other services. The center is funded primarily through a Douglas County mill levy, and partially by the federal government, donations and grants.
Although agencies funded primarily through the federal government will suffer the most from the proposed cuts, Tarbutton said the proposed 24 percent cuts could make things difficult.
"We couldn't do half the things without the volunteers, he said.
Probably, though, people like Ward will be able to continue learning calligraphy, basket weaving, sewing and enameling, as well as help with the special problems of the aging.
The 16 students paid close attention to their teacher, and explained just how easy gallantry will be.
"It will eventually flow and come automatically," DeQuoin said. "It's just so
But right now, the students are just beginning to conquer old bad habits they learned long ago, and DeQuoin, a former KU graduate student and instructor, keeps helping them along the way.
"I can't even write the first letter of my own name," student Irene Moll said. Everyone laughed as they struggled with their own letters, each one picked up the slow careful strokes very easily.
"Some of these people are really talented, I call them," Ward said. "The pick up it realizes."
Many of the students were anxious to start working with the inkwells and nibs associated with the print style, so they could make things for their grandchildren.
Irene Sanford, Lecompton, a 72-year old great-grandmother said, "Kids are my passion."
Laciffic Harmon. Lawrence concentrates while working on a piece in enameling class yesterday afternoon at the Lawrence Counsellor Asisting
Weekend Arts
TODAY
THE CHAMBER OPERA "CABILDO," by
Maurice Bardot performs at 7 p.m.
in Swingtime Recital Hall.
BENJAMIN BRITTEN'S OPERA, "THE RAPE OF LUCRETA,"staged by the School of Fine Arts, will open at 8 p.m. in the University Library on Wednesday. For information call the Murphy Hall Box Office.
THE OZARK MOUNTAIN CARAVAN will perform "ECHOES OF THE OZARKS" at 8:30 p.m. in Swarthout Recital Hall. For ticket information call the Muphy Hall Box Office.
MICHAEL SEKELSKY will perform a MASTER'S RECIFAL on percussion at p.m. in
THE UNIVERSITY CONCERT SERIES will
close with a performance by THE ROMEROS, a classical guitar quartet from at, 3:30 p.m. in the University Theatre. For ticket information call the Murghv Hill Roy Office.
THE KU CONCERT BAND AND THE JAZZ ENSEMBLE I will perform their Spring Concert in the University Theatre. Allen Vizzuti will be the guest concert. The concert is free and open to the public.
Special to the Kansas
This calligraphic detail is from a poem of the Northern Sung period (1052-1107) in China. Mi Fu was the calligrapher.
Calligraphy; simplistic beauty
By DAVID HENRY
Either definition, however, only begins to describe "Masterpieces of Sung and Yuan Dynasty Calligraphy from the John M. Crawford Jr. Collection," currently on display at the Spencer Museum of Art. The small exhibit of 13 scrolls, fans and banners reveals how the art of century reveals the simple beauty of what can be done with only a brush, ink and paper.
The Greeks used the word "kalligraphia",
meaning "beautiful writing." The Chinese called it "shu fa," "a system or method of writing."
Contributing Reviewer
Calligraphy, regarded by the Chinese as their highest artistic achievement, has only recently begun to be appreciated and collected by Westerners like Crawford. The acceptance of modern abstract art by many collectors undoubtedlybled the way for the West's "discovery" of 4,000 years of Chinese calligraphy.
Yet calligraphy is not entirely abstract art. Unlike the drip painting of the '50s American painter, Jackson Pollock, for example, each line in Chinese calligraphy has a meaning. The most striking effect is telling the reader a story or composing a poem or simply writing a note to himself.
Beautiful calligraphy is the result of complete control of both the brush and the calligrapher's hand. Thus mastery comes only after long practice, according to Stephen Addiss, associate professor of art history at KU. Additionally, Chinese calligraphy is
extremely difficult to master, Addiss says, because the artist must learn the thousands of tricks that go into making a performance.
English, by contrast, has only 26 different characters.
Despite these obstacles, calligraphy succeeds in conveying more than mere words or ideas. "The works of the Sung and Yuan periods provide an opportunity for communication with the spirit of outstanding artists, poets and statesmen of the past," writes Kwan S. Wong, in the exhibition "Song in the World." The organizer the show last year with Addis' assistance, describes these periods as an age of "new forms of personal expressiveness."
What is extraordinary about the calligraphy of these two dynasties is its amazing diversity. Some of the writing is done with sharp, angular strokes, the round fault lines of Lüssen, for example, while using Tung's script is filled with lived, almost wild lines.
Highly structured and difficult to master,
Moving along a long scroll from the Crawford Collection, while admiring the enormous variety of lines laid down with a palette of pastels and a glossy, the visual music that is Chinese calligraphy.
calligraphy, like music, has strong rhythm and movement.
Review
The enjoyment of this ancient art form is enhanced by a well-designed installation of these originals.
Authentic Ozark music performed
He was not the performer credited in 1938 with selling over a million harmonicas a year over the radio, but Bud Hunt of the "Brush Creek Follies" played his best on KC in M Kansas City, Mo.
This banjo player and singer will be one of the performers in "Echoes of the Ozarka," a program featuring banjo picking and fiddle playing, authentic cowboy and early country music. The banjo jig danced. The program will be Friday, April 2, at Sawtout Recital Hall at 8:30 p.m.
"The songs will be traditional music people have learned, not from music lessons, but from life."
"The show will have selected performers from the four Oar state, of which Kansas is one." Gloria Throne, Kansas Immigrants Program director at KANU Radio, said.
The object of the show, Throne said, was to take the surviving tradition and display it to the audience.
"Some of the performers were early-day radio
personalities," she said. "But the performances are not slick or commercialized.
"It's not like what you see when you go down to Arkansas and go to the Hill Billy Jamboree. The performers kind of make fun of or play around with the tradition.
The concert in Lawrence, the only appearance scheduled for Kansas, will end the program's tour of nine cities. The show's organizer is the National Council for the Traditional Arts with funding from the National Council for the Arts. It is being sponsored locally by the Sonneck Society, a music college organization, and financially by KANU Radio.
At each community where a performance is held, a special guest artist representing the folk traditions of that area is invited to play. For example, the Lyman Eleanor of Kansas City was selecte.
"They must characterize the music."
Tickets are available at the Murphy Hall ticket
center. The concert will be broadcast live on
KANU TV.
on campus
TODAY
THE UNDERGRADUATE BIOLOGY CLUB
will meet at 4 p.m. in the Sunflower Room of the
Biodiversity Center.
THE SIMULATIONS GAMING GROUP will meet at 10 a.m. in Cork for 10 of the Union.
SUNDAY
THE KU CIRCLE K CLUB will meet at 7 p.m. in 641 Mallt Hall.
THE ALL SCHOOLSHIP HALL CHRISTIAN
SCHOOL will meet at 3:08 p.m. in
Danforth Hall