Art Factory

I just wanted to do a quick post and shout out to a place of healing and art.
…. and has a cool Belhaven connection as some of the founders of this place are the parents one of our theatre students here at Belhaven…. 🙂

The Art Factory Revealed from Rick & Mary Beth Holladay on Vimeo.

Opportunities for visual artists and those supporting the visual arts in Europe. The Art Factory is a faith-based initiative to rediscover the possibility of a creative and restorative relationship with God and encourage and enjoy the making of art.

“I like it here.”

We have now finished and struck our production of  “Murder in the Cathedral”. I consider myself extremely privileged in this whole process. I have had the opportunity to watch the audition process and the casting process, warm up the actors vocally and physically during rehearsals, paint drops, sew costumes, and (my personal favorite!) “walk” the knights backstage.
I suppose there are places out there SOMEWHERE that may have similar opportunities to be so widely involved in a production. But you know what? The people here are just plain cooler. Why would you want to paint a drop for hours on end, unless you could join the painters around you in singing at the top of your lungs to rock n’ roll, and occasionally listen to a bit of Dane Cook? What would be the use of staying up until 3:45 in the morning stitching hoods and capes and jackets and tutu’s, unless you could be surrounded by people who appreciate the finer points of the movie “Clue”, and then join in a late-night-run to Whataburger for food? One of the loveliest moments yet has been applying a stage-tatoo to the back of a “priest” while she read aloud to me the play “Art”.
It’s moments like these that make me walk up to the Chair of this dept., (Joe Frost) and just say
“I like it here.”
A simple statement; but you should know… I mean it with all my heart.

NY Times article on being a parent and in the theatre

ARTICLE

An article in the New York Times about the experience of Maddie Corman, a 40 year old mother of 3 who is now appearing in the new show on Broadway, Geoffrey Naufft’s “Next Fall”.

Regular topics of conversation in our department include how to maintain a healthy lifestyle and potentially raise a family while pursuing a life in the theatre, and how just gaining life experience can and will influence an actor’s abilities on stage.  This article touches both of those topics.