Carolina dreams even bigger on the second Arts Everywhere Day
The Arts Everywhere initiative has moved into south campus with a new art makerspace in Morrison Residence Hall. The renovated space will feature flexible work spaces for students to draw, paint, sketch, store and display all kinds of art.
On the second Arts Everywhere Day, Carolina once again moved arts from beyond the stage and into the quad, but this time the University stretched the arts even further — reaching where more students live on south campus.
The installations, live performances and other events spanning campus on Friday might have been temporary, but soon the arts will have a new, permanent footprint on south campus as the University announced plans to renovate the Morrison Residence Hall basement into an art makerspace.
“It brings the curriculum right into the dorms for the students,” Chancellor Carol L. Folt said on April 6 as she toured and participated in several Arts Everywhere activities near the Pit.
“It’s our dream to see the arts in every part of the campus and to see them enliven everyone’s lives in the way we know that they can,” she said.
Arts for everyone
The announcement was one part of Arts Everywhere Day, a daylong art celebration that featured installations and performances across campus and in the Chapel Hill community. The event is part of the greater Arts Everywhere initiative.
“Arts Everywhere is really about making sure that everyone knows that the arts are for everyone and the idea that everyone has within them that creative potential to be artistic,” said Emil Kang, special assistant to the chancellor for the arts.
Folt launched the Arts Everywhere initiative in 2016 with the belief that the arts are an essential tool for learning and engaging communities. The groundbreaking, campus-wide initiative is a strategic investment in sustained creative practice, live arts experiences and arts learning with the goal of making Carolina a leader in transforming the 21st century liberal arts education.
Senior biology major Rachel Purvis exemplified the idea that the arts are not just for art majors at the installation she led, which invited visitors to complete the statement, “Before I Die …”
“Art is going to have a positive impact no matter what your major is,” Purvis said. “It allows us to reflect and share our hopes and dreams with the Carolina community.”
After Folt completed the “Before I Die…” statement with an ongoing goal to take a selfie with all of her students, Purvis promptly posed for a signature photo with the Chancellor.
A makerspace for the arts
As part of the renovations in Morrison, some of the basement will be outfitted as the Arts Everywhere Painting Studio with flexible work spaces for students to draw, paint, sketch, store and display all kinds of art.
The space will also house an apartment and private studio space for an Arts Everywhere Fellow, a newly created fellowship for one MFA student. The graduate student will also host workshops and advise students.
On Friday, Carolina Performing Arts unveiled a mural on the basketball court near the residence hall. The mural was created by art students and world-renowned artist Nina Chanel Abney.
Other art pieces and performances included:
- Campus and Community Keys, 10 pianos painted by students and community members spread across outdoor locations.
- “Right Angles,” a colorful work made entirely of tape by Chapel Hill artist Mary Carter Taub to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the House Undergraduate Library.
- ArtsQuad, a site for hands-on artmaking activities, like an open studio led by the Undergraduate Art Association.
- “Opera and Live Painting,” a collaboration that merged opera and visual art as assistant professor of music Marc Callahan performed excerpts from Franz Schubert’s “Die Winterreise,” while visual artist Andrew Myers brought the work to life through live drawing.
- Performances in the Pit by PlayMakers Repertory Company and student groups.
