Latchis Arts' monthly Spotlight Series puts a focus in July on rising stars in filmmaking with a theme of Young Voices.
Spotlight is a curated series, featuring films on a different theme each month which illuminate different voices in filmmaking.
Films are shown on Thursdays at 7 p.m., at the Latchis Theatre, with no admission fee other than a suggested donation of $10.
This month features four “original and engaging films that spotlight bold and brave directors at the beginning of their careers,” organizers write.
Canal Street Art Gallery (CSAG) presents the Canal Street Art Gallery Represented Artist Show at Main Street Arts (MSA), on view to the public through Monday, Aug. 9. This group show is a collaborative exhibition featuring artwork from the Canal Street Art Gallery's roster of represented artists and curated...
The Nature Museum has been running full programs, both virtually and in person, since closing its doors in 2020. During this time, its staff has been hard at work building a new element for museum visitors: the Magic Forest Playscape. On Saturday, July 17, from noon to 4 p.m.,
Putney's Brighter Summer - a project of the town of Putney, Putney Public Library, Putney Pool, Putney Community Cares, and Food4Kids (Putney Foodshelf) - was recently selected to receive $29,488 in funding from the Summer Matters for All grant program. According to Gov. Phil Scott, programs in 13 counties will collectively receive up to $3.85 million with the goal of expanding access to summer enrichment opportunities for youth of all ages this summer. Scott has put an emphasis on helping...
Brattleboro-West Arts presents a group show of members' work through July at the Crowell Gallery at the Moore Free Library, 23 West St. An artist reception will be held at the gallery on Saturday, July 10, from 2 to 4 p.m. Brattleboro-West Arts represents a diverse range of artists who live and create in the watershed of the Whetstone Brook. The exhibit will feature a selection of two- and three-dimensional works by painter Greg Moschetti, textile artist Kris McDermet, encaustic...
A chance encounter during the summer of 2019 between New York–based painter John Newsom and Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (BMAC) Director Danny Lichtenfeld gave rise to the 17-artist exhibit currently on view in the museum's capacious Wolf Kahn & Emily Mason Gallery. “Expedition” opened on June 19 and remains on view through Oct. 11. It marks the first time that artwork by actor and filmmaker Matt Dillon, who is also a practicing visual artist, has appeared in a museum.
Independent features writer and journalist for cinema and performing arts Vidhi Salla is hosting the town's first Bollywood Movie Night, part of the Stone Church's Socially Curious Summer Series. The movie - Queen (2014) - is “one of the rare feminist Bollywood films that are so few that are made in India, and this one was highly regarded, it was hugely successful,” said Salla, who co-organized the show with Robin Johnson, the venue's owner. She wanted to show an Indian...
The Windham Southeast Supervisory Union begins its new fiscal year with a new leader: Green Street School Principal Mark Speno, who will serve as the WSESU's interim superintendent. “I'm embracing the challenge,” Speno said on July 2 from his office at Green Street School, where he has served for seven years and where he is preparing to lead schools serving Brattleboro, Dummerston, Guilford, Putney, through June 30, 2022. While the role of superintendent is new for him, finding ways to...
Wildlife advocates recently presented four petitions at the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Board meeting, including a petition to restrict recreational trapping. Despite the fact that the petitions were submitted to Fish & Wildlife in February, we petitioners were contacted only one week prior to the June board meeting and were told that we had to attend in person if we wanted to participate. Fish & Wildlife staff responded to the petitions with presentations that were not so much responses as...
The Connecticut River Conservancy (CRC), Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC), American Whitewater, and other recreation partners say they will hold two public events “to tell hydropower companies you want better access to the Connecticut River.” According to a news release, a pair of “portage parades” will focus on upgrades to portage routes for paddlers around the Bellows Falls and Turners Falls, Mass., dams as examples of recreation investments that would benefit local communities. The events will start with a brief gathering...
Marlboro Music began its 70th summer season last month, as 75 musicians journeyed to Potash Hill to study, practice, and perform together. The musician residency and summer performance series has drawn musicians and music lovers to the area for decades, leaving a hole in many local music lovers' sense of normalcy last year when the school cancelled its program in response to the global pandemic. It is also why the school's return this summer can be seen as a celebration...
The board and staff of the Winston Prouty Center for Child and Family Development offer our deepest thanks to our friends who participated in our Par for the Cause fundraiser on June 26 and 27. We are delighted that so many people took us up on the chance to play a family-friendly game of disc golf over a whimsical nine-hole course, and to join us for a picnic featuring great music and wonderful food. The event would not have been...
As the president of the Board of Trustees of the Moore Free Library in Newfane, I remind both your readers and your reporters that Erica Walch wrote her letter of opposition to the West River Valley Mutual Aid group's petition to the Newfane Selectboard as a private citizen and Newfane taxpayer, not as a representative of the Moore Free Library. The opinions that Ms. Walch expressed in her letter are hers alone and should not be construed by anyone to...
Sandy Golden takes me to task for not practicing what I preach. While appreciating Ms. Golden's reminder of the importance of walking the talk, a reminder I can always use, I would also argue that my essay is not a good example of my failure to do so. In contrast to my insistence that a “functioning democracy is all about valuing life, valuing each other,” Ms. Golden maintains that I contradict myself when I write that the Republican Party, and...
Critical race theory and critical social justice are the latest bandwagons for the “woke.” Critical theory, founded in Marxism, is designed to further divide our country. It is carefully packaged in a set of seemingly benign and appealing terms, ideas, and goals that, if one doesn't look too closely, appear hard to refute, so it has been a relatively easy sell to the public at large. After all, how many would disagree that diversity, equity, social and restorative justice, and...
SIT Graduate Institute announces three merit-based scholarships, including one for Vermonters. School for International Training (SIT) is the accredited higher institution within the World Learning Inc. family, which also includes World Learning and The Experiment in International Living. SIT is composed of SIT Graduate Institute, SIT Study Abroad, and the International Honors Program. Fields of study include climate change and global sustainability, conflict transformation and peace and justice leadership, international and global education, sustainable development, and teaching English as a...
Thanks to community support and a successful inter-agency collaboration to preserve Windham County's biodiversity, the nonprofit Green Mountain Conservancy (GMC) has added 627 acres to the Deer Run Nature Preserve, augmenting the 297 acres bought 18 months ago. “It feels great, absolutely wonderful; we are absolutely delighted,” said Green Mountain Conservancy President Mary Ellen Copeland, calling the buy “a huge success.” “It's a beautiful, beautiful place,” she said. “There are some openings for power lines we have to put up...
The American Legion Baseball schedule in Vermont is short, with a lot of games to be crammed into a six-week window in June and July. But with the variable nature of Vermont weather in summer, getting all the games played can be a challenge. That explains why Bellows Falls Post 37 and Bennington Post 13 were playing in a downpour on July 1 at Hadley Field. The first game of the season between the two teams got postponed due to...
On Friday, July 9, at 5 p.m., the Brattleboro Literary Fest continues its 20th anniversary year with a home-on-the-range trip to Elko, Nevada via KT Sparks' new book, Four Dead Horses. Sparks will participate in a free online conversation with local writer Stephanie Greene. On May 1, 1982, 18-year-old Martin Oliphant watches a horse drown off the shore of Lake Michigan - the first of (almost) four equine corpses marking the trail that will lead Martin out of the small-minded...
In-person dining returns at Brattleboro Senior Meals BRATTLEBORO - On Thursday and Friday, July 8 and 9, after more than a year and a half providing and delivering up to 200 Meals on Wheels home deliveries daily and weekends, Brattleboro Senior Meals will be reopening for congregate lunches at the Senior Center in the Gibson-Aiken Center on Main Street. Lunches will be served from noon to 12:30 p.m. To reserve a place, call 802-451-8296 or email director@brattleboroseniormeals.org. After July 9,
The Backlot Cinema Series continues on Friday, July 9, when Epsilon Spires will screen the 2020 feature-length documentary Epicentro and the 1977 animated short Powers of Ten in the parking lot of the historic First Baptist Church, 190 Main St. Epicentro is a vivid journey through modern-day Cuba, where, event organizers write, the legacy of Spanish and American imperialism - including its current incarnation in the form of the tourist economy - have scarred a nation still grappling with its...
College news • The following local students graduated in May from Ithaca (N.Y.) College: Freesia Capy-Goldfarb of Guilford, B.F.A. in film, photo, and visual arts; Ben Kaufman of Brattleboro, B.F.A. in theater production and design; and Brett Swanson of Wilmington, B.S. in business administration. • The following local students graduated in May from Curry College in Milton, Mass.: Thomas Carroll of Vernon, B.A. in community education and Tyler Godin of Vernon, B.S. in biochemistry. • Daniella Edwards of West Dover...
Engaging in usual forms of commerce makes one believe that the pandemic is a thing of the past. I find it extremely frightening that more people are not wearing masks in public, because the science does tell us that not enough people have been vaccinated to provide the kind of herd immunity that we might need to protect all of us. Fifty-four percent of the U.S. population has received a first dose of vaccine, and 47 percent have received a...
On March 8 - more than 100 days ago - more than 700 nurses at Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester, Mass., went on strike for better patient care and safer staffing levels. This situation is not news to me. As a registered nurse who is a former member of the bargaining team for United Nurses and Allied Professionals at the Brattleboro Retreat, I know that no one takes going out on strike lightly. The nurses in Worcester are currently being...
If you have ever hiked on Mount Mansfield, you are probably aware of the Wampahoofus Trail, and maybe you've even heard stories of the elusive Wampahoofus creature. When I was in college, spending my summers as a camp counselor, the unknown Wampahoofus was an indispensable ally in my efforts to keep groups of energetic 11-year old boys from scattering across Underhill State Park. Told from the campfire at night, scary tales of the creature guaranteed my campers would be sticking...
Prior to the pandemic, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the nation's arts and culture sector comprised 4.3 percent of the economy and represented a $919.7 billion industry with 5.2 million jobs. The World Economic Forum in May 2020 reported that the music industry lost approximately half its revenue with the cancellation of concerts and other performances. Globally, the industry was worth more than $50 billion, with live music making up half the industry's revenues, the forum estimated.
On Saturday and Sunday, July 17 and 18, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., the Rock River Artists will open their studios to the public for their annual Open Studio Tour. “With a wealth of creative talent tucked away in its hills and valleys and the lushness of the summer landscape on display, the Rock River Artist Tour offers a close-up look at the richness of life and art-making in this unique region of southern Vermont,” the collective of professional...
Please bear with me as I do my historian thing and take us quickly through the origins of the United States of America's so-called democracy. Thomas Jefferson's famous words in the Declaration of Independence, that all men are created equal and have inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, were at the time common jargon. These fine words passed like wildfire, from Parisian salons to Scottish Rite Masonic Temples to Boston's Faneuil Hall. They were code words...
July 11 marks the 200th anniversary of the death of Lucy Terry Prince. A group of dedicated individuals - public intellectuals, scholars, historians, and other key stakeholders - have been working to ensure that Lucy and her husband, Abijah Prince, are recognized and seen within a state that has not often recognized the depth of the diverse history within its landscape. Abijah Prince (c.1706–1794) and Lucy Terry Prince (c.1730–1821), formerly enslaved in Deerfield, Mass., established a homestead in Guilford and...