May-June Highlights

The annual Arts Fest carillon and gamelan concert, held at Rockefeller Chapel, will take place at 2 p.m. Sunday, June 6.

Third Annual Hyde Park Arts Fest
Saturday, June 5 through Sunday, June 6
Activities will take place around Hyde Park; headquarters will be at the Smart Museum, 5550 S. Greenwood Ave. 702-FEST. http://artsfest.uchicago.edu/. Free.
A collaboration by 30 area cultural institutions, the Hyde Park Arts Fest will offer a smorgasbord of arts activities—from live music, theater, ballet and modern dance to poetry readings, arts exhibitions and access to some of Chicago’s great museums. The fest includes the 57th Street Art Fair, the oldest juried art fair in the Midwest. A free trolley system will link the many participating arts institutions offering concerts, workshops and tours. Parking is free of charge in the University’s parking lots. Some participating institutions include the Frank Lloyd Wright Robie House, the Smart Museum, the Renaissance Society, the Chicago Storytellers Guild and the Oriental Institute Museum.

A portion of Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel, Maus: A Survivor’s Tale.

University Festival of the Arts
Through Saturday, May 29
Activities will take place around campus. http://fota.uchicago.edu/. Free.
At this student-run arts festival, a wide range of artistic events will be held throughout campus.One festival highlight is a lecture by Art Spiegelman, the Kestenbaum Family Writer-in-Residence and the Pulitzer Prize winning novelist. Spiegelman, known for his graphic novel Maus: A Survivor’s Tale, will deliver a lecture titled “Comix 101,” giving a chronological tour of the evolution of comics while explaining the power and influence of the medium. This lecture will take place at 4:30 p.m. Thursday, May 27, at the Court Theatre, 5535 S. Ellis Ave. Spiegelman will join graphic novelist Chris Ware, author of Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth, for a conversation on graphic novels and comics at 4:30 p.m. Friday, May 28, at the Court Theatre. Also under FOTA’s umbrella is a performance by the acclaimed “poetry band” Ten Tongues, which begins at 5 p.m. Saturday, May 29, in Classics 10, 1010 E. 59th St. The performance will be preceded by afternoon workshops in fiction, writing poetry and performance poetry.

The Motet Choir

The Department of Music
University Symphony Orchestra, University Chorus and Motet Choir
8 p.m. Friday, June 4
4 p.m. Saturday, June 5
Mandel Hall, 1131 E. 57th St. Call 702-8069 for information, 702-9075 for tickets. $8 general, $5 students and children.
In this annual end-of-season collaboration, the combined forces of the University Symphony Orchestra, the University Chorus and the Motet Choir will present a program titled “Russian Splendors.” The program centers on works by two prominent Russian composers: the Romantic composer Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, and Igor Stravinsky, an influential 20th-century composer. Randi Von Ellefson will conduct the ensembles’ performance of Stravinsky’s neoclassical Symphony of Psalms. Barbara Schubert will conduct the remainder of the program, including Stravinsky’s Fireworks, Op. 4; Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings; and the ballet suite based on the tale of The Firebird, also by Stravinsky.

Franke Institute for the Humanities
The Mellon Project: “Universities.com”
1:30 p.m. Friday, May 28
Franke Institute, room JRL-S118, Regenstein Library, 1100 E. 57th St. 702-8274.
http://humanities.uchicago.edu/orgs/institute/mellon/. Free.
This interdisciplinary project—which explores how different disciplines (especially in the humanities) are taught and researched in different countries and cultural traditions around the world—will feature a public lecture by Colin Bundy, director of the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London. The lecture will be held in Classics 10, 1010 E. 59th St., and a workshop and discussion will follow at the Franke Institute.