The Meeting School Blog

This fall the Research and Performance Art class put together a festival of the arts with a focus on reflections of place. You may have read an article in the Monadnock Leger Transcript leading up to the event with a big picture of the class on the front page of the arts section. The festival, called: Four Day Café, was a Wednesday to Saturday event in downtown Jaffrey, NH at the Women’s Club, and across the street at the Civic Center. Both buildings had events scheduled for each night, which were all organized and put on by the class.
Wednesday the Women’s Club was open to view local artist’s work that was set up around the room, including some projects done by members of the research and performance art class, the drawing class, and faculty.
Thursday night at the Women’s club several speakers presented papers to an audience of Meeting School students, and local visitors. Frederick, our history teacher gave a paper on Thomas House, and its history before being a part of The Meeting School. Alex, a member of the Research and Performance Art class read his paper about his experiences and observations of place in and around The Meeting School. The final speaker’s were Howard Mansfield and John Harris talking about their book,” Where The Mountain Stands Alone: Stories of Place in the Monadnock Region.”
On Friday night the Women’s Club provided a meal of soup and bread made by Meeting School staff with ingredients from the farm. Following the meal was an open mic which turned into a concert later in the evening when Lunatic Fringe took the stage. Over at the Civic Center several singing groups performed including the Jaffrey Grade School, All Saints Choir, Franklin Pierce Gospel Choir, and Monadnock Chorus Chamber Singers.
Saturday at the Women’s Club there were performance art pieces and a featured performance by Kazu Nakamura. At the Civic Center Dan Hurlin, performance artist, presented six performances of "The Day the Ketchup Turned Blue", a 12-minute toy-theater piece followed by discussion.
On top of planning and running a smooth show each night members of the Research and Performance Art class did their own project that reflected on place. Andy researched the program Second Life and its effect on people and their place. Alex wrote a paper about his experiences with place and the woods of The Meeting School. Devin made a card game that is based on the research of early civilizations. Olivia put together a collection of short clips that played during the Four Day Café, and helped Scott in the management of the event. You can check out the MySpace page that the class put together as part of advertising for the event.