The woman in the painting is indeed her, Sophy Min ’12 says, “but it should be open to interpretation.”

During a junior semester in Florence on a Syracuse University program, Min, an economics and studio art double major, won best in show for this oil painting, The Lady and the Ladder.

During a junior semester in Florence on a Syracuse University program, Sophy Min ’12 won best in show for this oil painting, The Lady and the Ladder.

As a Myanmar citizen moving through Italy and Europe, Min had to travel carefully, and was subject to racial profiling by border authorities, sometimes mistaken for a Chinese citizen traveling illegally.

In the painting, the Lady’s face is hidden — “as an artist I do not want to tell viewers who this is” — as she seems to advance slowly, rung by rung. She has to hike her native skirt, called a longyi, which is unsuited for climbing because it’s worn snugly by pulling the fabric to one side, then folding and tucking into the opposite side.

“I want her to be jubilant.”

As the Lady pulls up the skirt, she shows some of her leg. That’s still unusual in a country emerging from a 48-year military dictatorship. The Lady’s hair is a bit out of place. And she’s not wearing shoes. “But if she had been,” Min says, “I would’ve made her lose one shoe by the top, to show a struggle.”

At the top, the Lady jumps for joy. “It was a question for me,” Min admits. “How do I celebrate? I want her to be jubilant.”

A friend served as the jump model, leaping happily over and over with Min taking pictures of each leap. “I knew what I wanted but it was hard getting it just right.” — HJB

Arts & Culture Facts

A cool exhibition on astrophotography is at the Museum of Art through Dec. 15, 2012.

Current student bands include Almost Awkward and AndroSkaggin.

Lecturer Robert Feintuch showed his paintings at the Akira Ikeda Gallery, Berlin.

The dance program “went major” in 20II, and the first Bates dance majors just graduated.

Giving Voice

The specialty of teaching voice and speech requires a nuanced understanding of both the anatomy of the voice and the art of using it to establish character.

Katalin Vecsey, senior lecturer in theater, photographed by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

For instance, “an Irishman who has lived in the U.S. for many years and was educated at Harvard will speak differently from an Irishman who has never left Ireland,” says Katalin Vecsey, senior lecturer in theater who has taught at Bates since 1996.

This year’s winner of the Kroepsch teaching award, Vecsey moved to the U.S. from her native Hungary in 1995, but remains close to that nation professionally and otherwise. She maintains a residence in Budapest and stays close to the Hungarian theater community.

Bates students profit from that proximity. Seven times since 1999, during Short Term, Vecsey and Dana Professor Theater Martin Andrucki have brought students to Hungary and the Czech Republic to study theater and film.

The worth of the experience derives in part from the fact that repertory theater is much more common in Hungary than in the U.S. Many companies “have eight, 10, 15 plays in repertoire, and run those shows as long as there is audience interest,” Vecsey says.

“One night they might play Hamlet, and the next a Beckett show, and then a Pinter play,” Vecsey says. “The actors have to know the texts and the blocking for each production.”

For the Bates students, “the most valuable experience is that they can go on different nights to the same theater and see the same actor in several roles. And see how adaptable actors are.”

“One night they might play Hamlet, and the next a Beckett show, and then a Pinter play.” — DLH

Easing Up on the Easel

One thing Caroline Sheridan ’12 learned about her art in 2011–12 is that less is sometimes more. Having seen Sheridan crowd her canvases with pigment, Robert Feintuch, the senior lecturer who works with studio art majors leading up to the Senior Exhibition, at one point jokingly accused her of artistic “horror vacui” — fear of empty space.

One thing Caroline Sheridan ’12 learned about her art in 2011–12 is that less is sometimes more. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

So she eased up and left more white space. “That was one of the best things I got from him,” says Sheridan, shown above holding a self-portrait.

World Facts

The first Bates student to pursue abroad study headed to Tokyo in 1956–57.

An alumni career tip for success in the work world: “Have a bias towards saying yes.”

Sixty percent of Bates students will study abroad during their college time.

Joining an honored tradition, Sen. Ed Muskie ’36 once read George Washington’s inaugural speech on the Senate floor.

Art of the Sale

Sophy Min ’12 teams with Erica Long ’12 for an impromptu art sale in Commons. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen.

Marketa Ort '13 of New York City in the Bates College production of Alan Ball's play "Five Women Wearing the Same Dress." Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

Performed at Bates College as part of an independent study in bringing characters to life on stage, Alan Ball’s Five Women Wearing the Same Dress will be performed at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 16 and 17, and 2 p.m. Sunday, March 18, in Gannett Theater, 305 College St.

Admission is open to the public at no cost. The script contains conversations about sex and drug use that may be inappropriate for children. For more information, please call 207-786-8294.

Five Women reveals the conversations, confessions and laughs that ensue when five reluctant bridesmaids hide from a wedding reception in an upstairs bedroom. As the night progresses, the women learn that despite their many differences, they share a bond that runs much deeper than their identical dresses.

The six actors in this production are performing the piece as part of an independent study in theatrical characterization. Their instructor is Senior Lecturer in Theater Katalin Vecsey, who is also directing the play.

Ball, creator of the TV series True Blood and Six Feet Under and the Academy Award-winning film American Beauty, wrote Five Women in 1993.

Audiences who don’t know his work but enjoyed the 2011 film Bridesmaids will appreciate his humorous depiction of women’s relationships and the stress of a wedding. Both last year’s film, written by Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo, and Ball’s play “are very funny, include great female characters and show the vital importance of female friendships in the context of a wedding,” says Vecsey.

“Each character gets her moment to break out and break down in Five Women. As they get drunker, they fall into raw confessions about abortion, drug use, loveless marriages, illicit sexual encounters and one sad story about child abuse.

“But there’s more comedy than drama in this play, with lots of laughs.”

The edgy and complex characters in Ball’s bridal party include:

• the bride’s sarcastic sister Meredith, played by senior Caitlyn DeFiore of Westborough, Mass.
• the bride’s “ugly sidekick” Georgeanne, played by senior Nora Brouder of Winchester, Mass.
• the promiscuous friend Trisha, played by senior Jen Flanagan, of Sherborn, Mass.
• the naïve cousin Frances, played by junior Marketa Ort of New York City
• and the groom’s lesbian sister Mindy, played by sophomore Singha Hon, also of New York City.
• The only male character on the stage, Tripp Davenport, is an usher who falls for Trisha. Davenport is played by sophomore Danny Birkhead of Tyngsboro, Mass.

The actors have spent the semester working to create three-dimensional characters from Ball’s text. After a thorough investigation of how each character is represented in the play, Vecsey asks each actor to put imagination to work in writing an essay that rounds out the character’s life and personality. The goal is to create recognizable and believable characters and avoid archetypes and caricatures that are limiting and clichéd.

Vecsey, an expert on the use of the voice and speech in public presentations, emphasizes the importance of voice and movement in conveying the character. “The main focus is developing the physicality and the voices for each character without turning them into caricatures,” she says.

“The students are not allowed to use their own voices at all.”

Two students are involved in the play to fulfill independent studies in other theatrical disciplines: stage manager Liza Danello, a sophomore from Washington, D.C., and set designer Travis Jones of Ithaca, N.Y. They are working under the supervision of Bates lecturer and managing director Michael Reidy.

Promoted to senior lecturer in theater in May 2011, Katalin Vecsey teaches courses in voice and speech, and voice and gender. With Dana Professor of Theater Martin Andrucki, Vecsey co-leads the Short Term course “Central European Theater and Film,” which brings Bates students to Budapest and Prague.

Now in her 16th year at Bates, Vecsey has adapted numerous plays, poems, short stories and other texts for stage performance by her voice and speech students. She serves as vocal director for mainstage and student-directed theater productions, has directed 10 other productions, and advises student performance groups. She is also an independent voice consultant with a specialty in working with male-to-female transsexuals.

Vecsey is a native of Hungary. In addition to writing many conference papers and journal articles, she wrote, directed and presented the instructional piece Voice Workout Video for Professional Voice Users (In Hungarian) in 2000. She received her doctorate in developmental and educational psychology at Eötvös Lóránd University, Budapest, and the equivalent of master’s and bachelor’s degrees in speech and language pathology and special education at Bárczi Gusztáv College, also in Budapest. She is frequently invited back to Bárczi Gusztáv College to teach master classes.

Written in 1997, Closer was made into a 2004 film starring Natalie Portman, Julia Roberts, Jude Law and Clive Owen, and directed by Mike Nichols. The film, like the play on which it is based, has been viewed as a modern tragic version of Mozart’s opera Così fan tutte.

• Saturday, Wednesday and Thursday, April 4, 8 and 9 at 7:30 p.m.
• Pettigrew Hall, Gannett Theater, 305 College St.

A $2 donation is suggested. Tickets are available at the arts center starting at 4 p.m. on the day of the performance; no reservations are accepted, but overflow seating will be available. The production is sponsored by the Robinson Players, a student theater organization. For more information, call 207-786-6135.

Eve Ensler is an award-winning playwright, poet, activist and screenwriter. For The Vagina Monologues, she asked a diverse group of women about their thoughts and feelings regarding this part of their bodies. The play Ensler created from these interviews relates women’s stories in terms that are personal yet universal, comic and poignant, brazen and mysterious.

“The play was brought to Bates in 2001 by a friend of mine” — Ariana Margolis, of the class of 2003 — “as part of a campaign on college campuses nationwide to raise awareness of violence against women,” says Myles, of St. Louis, Mo. “Some of the monologues are more political, others are humorous and still others are quite moving.”

“It’s becoming a wonderful tradition at Bates — one that I hope continues well into the future,” she says. “I have some big shoes to fill. The previous shows have been so successful, and I want this year’s to exceed everyone’s expectations.”

Since its Obie-winning premiere, in 1996, the play has been performed to broad acclaim worldwide. Productions have featured such top actors as Glenn Close, Cate Blanchett, Winona Ryder, Susan Sarandon, Marisa Tomei, Rosie Perez, Lily Tomlin, Kate Winslett, Melanie Griffith and Calista Flockhart.

At Bates, students (including Myles herself) will perform all the monologues. Katalin Vecsey, a lecturer in the Bates theater department and the vocal coach for theater productions, has been adviser to the project since its inception.

“It’s an empowering play for everyone involved — especially the audiences!” says Myles, an American cultural studies major with a secondary concentration in theater.

The Red Faust, by Zsolt Pozsgai, a two-time award winner of the annual Erno Szap Prize for best new Hungarian play, will be directed by Martin Andrucki, professor of theater at Bates. The production stars Australian actor and Budapest resident Peter Linka, who translated the production into English and who serves on the staff of the Hungarian National Academy of Drama and Film. All other actors are Bates students.

The play is a fictionalized version of the life of Mindszenty. Jailed by the fascists during World War II and sentenced to life imprisonment by the communists during 1949, the Hungarian dissident was briefly freed during the 1956 revolution. With the arrival of Soviet troops in Budapest, he sought refuge in the American embassy, where he spent the next 15 years of his life.

In this drama, the playwright imagines Mindszenty as a kind of Faust, constantly tempted by a diabolical fellow inmate to abandon his principles in exchange for freedom.

In May, as part of a Short Term unit in which students at Bates study one subject in great detail for five weeks, the Bates cast and crew will head to Hungary where they will present their English-language production at the International Buda Stage. The U.S. Embassy, where Mindszenty sought refuge, will host a reception for the Bates students during their stay.

Katalin Vecsey, a lecturer in theater at Bates with extensive Budapest connections, will accompany the group, which will study historical and political backgrounds of the play, meet with leading figures in contemporary Hungarian culture and visit relevant historical sites.

Vecsey and Andrucki originally received a special faculty development grant from Bates College to study and translate contemporary Hungarian drama and establish ongoing relationships between the college and the Budapest theater community.