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She’s
Got a Ticket to Ride, or: The Stock Car Ballet &
Other Virginia Art
Art and popular culture are no strangers
to each other. Think Marilyn Monroe, Campbell’s Soup and Andy
Warhol in the 1960s. Here in the Commonwealth,
though, the marriage has taken on a style unique to
our home-grown culture.
For example, this April, Roanoke
audiences experienced the “NASCAR Ballet,” performed by the
dancers-cum-stock cars of the Roanoke Ballet
Theatre. The company scheduled the ballet just days
before the actual Nextel Cup race on the NASCAR
circuit in nearby Martinsville.
The brainchild of choreographer Jenny
Mansfield, the NASCAR-inspired modern dance featured
30 dancers circling an oval track in bright jump
suits decorated with “sponsor logos.” The New
Age score featured the sounds of engines revving,
and a local sports anchor provided play-by-play
color. Three television screens broadcast the action
from various angles.
To prepare, dancers perused NASCAR
for Dummies. They also watched videos of past
Nextel Cup races, and even picked up the sports
page, reported Chris Kahn of the Associated Press in
an article picked up by newspapers nationwide.
NASCAR is just the most recent of
Mansfield’s dance endeavors. In 2001, she melded genres with her “Bluegrass
Ballet,” in which bluegrass celebrity Del McCoury
and his band appeared on stage with the ballet
dancers. Next, Mansfield
paid homage to
Roanoke’s proximity to the Blue Ridge mountains
with “Aerial Ballet.” Her performers
studied for six months with a mountain climbing
expert, and then danced 70 feet up, suspended by
ropes, off the roof of the building where the
company is housed.
Ballet isn’t the only art form that’s
enjoyed an Old Dominion interpretation. Virginia’s
car culture is the subject of a traveling display
created by the Blue Ridge Institute & Museum in
Ferrum. The exhibit, which made an appearance at the
Museum’s Blue Ridge Folklife Festival in October
2003, celebrates the “souped-up, chopped-down and
tricked-out automobile.” It features automobile
artists known for pinstripping – the freehand
painting of designs on hoods, trunks and dashboards
– plus artisans who sculpt interior upholstery
panels; and street rod, drag race and oval track
race car designs.
While cars have inspired Virginia ballet
and art, one particular Virginian inspired an opera.
Last October the Opera Theatre of Northern Virginia
premiered Nancy,
which was based on the true story of Nancy Randolph,
who was banished from colonial Virginia’s most
prominent family after a jury acquitted her of
murdering her illegitimate child. The opera tells
the tale of her exile to Connecticut, where the
gossip followed her, and then to New York, where she
married Gouverneur Morris, one of the architects of
the U.S. Constitution. When Morris’ nephew fears
the loss of an inheritance, he shares the gossip
with his uncle, who refuses to believe the
accusations. His nephew then threatens Morris with a
pistol and Nancy runs him off by brandishing a
saber. Nancy’s life was a libretto waiting to
happen!
Side note: opera aficionados may be
thrilled to note that Puccini’s last work, the
world-renowned Turandot,
begins its run at the Virginia Opera in Richmond on
October 1.
Besides being home to the Virginia Opera,
Richmond is also home to Virginia Commonwealth
University’s annual public art project. Since
1999, Linda Voreland of VCU’s art department has
lead an effort to use urban spaces to create
unconventional art that involves audiences as well
as performers.
At last year’s event, hair was the
medium and the message. The Urban Light Works
International Project featured five hair stylists
from a local salon creating illuminated hairdos as
8mm and 16mm home movies were projected onto the
walls of buildings.
Previously the group staged a two-day
kinetic show featuring a Norwegian ceramic artist
creating his work in a giant wood firing kiln. The
oven had been covered with a translucent fiber
blanket for better viewing. Past works have included
strolling artists in illuminated clothes.
Also in Richmond, Gov. Mark R. Warner
recently recognized Virginia’s artistic
contribution to the music industry when he signed
legislation in May designating 224 miles of mountain
roads as “Virginia’s Heritage Music Trail: The
Crooked Road.” Attractions along the trail include
the Old Fiddler’s Convention in Galax, and
Hiltons, the hometown of country music’s Carter
family, as well as a museum dedicated to the work of
bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley.
Gov. Warner wasn’t the only
legislator recognizing the value of Virginia-bred
art and artists. In the midst of the budget crisis
this spring, the Virginia General Assembly restored
$640 million in funds for the Virginia Commission
for the Arts.
By the way, the Commission will award
Artist Fellowships of $5,000 each to Virginia-based
poets and painters this fall. Now’s the time for
all you Bacon’s Rebels to dig out your pens and
paintbrushes and get some recognition for your
“creative excellence”! Deadline for receipt of
application is August 2.
NEXT UP: The Fat of the Land or: How Many
Carbs in a Country Ham?
--
July 26, 2004
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