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|
EVENTS
AND PROGRAMS
at
the Mechanics' Institute
**** BOX
OFFICE INFORMATION
****
For RESERVATIONS BY PHONE: call
the 'Events Line' at (415) 393-0100
For RESERVATIONS BY EMAIL: rsvp@milibrary.org
Reservations are held at Box Office. Arrive 15 minutes
before event for seat selection
- OPEN SEATING- |
.
AUTHOR
& LITERARY EVENTS
|
Thursday,
July 10, 6:00 pm
In collaboration with William Stout Publishers
& AIA
Saarinen’s Quest:
A Memoir
Richard Knight &
Pierluigi Serraino |
|
|
|
 |
|
Joining
Saarinen’s office as a designer and growing
into the role of in-house photographer, Richard
Knight captured hundreds of images of the behind-the-scenes
process at Eero Saarinen’s office. This
unique personal account of the process, culture,
and history of Saarinen, is prefaced by a foreword
by Cesar Pelli, and a contextual essay by architect
Pierluigi Serraino, highlighting the critical
role of large-scale model building practiced
in Saarinen’s office. A traveling retrospective
work will culminate at Yale University in 2010.
Serraino is author of NorCalMod : Icons
of Northern California Modernism and Modernism
Rediscovered, co-authored with Julius Shulman.
Members
of MI and AIA Free; Public $10
NOTE: Additional event Wednesday,
June 23, 6:00 pm
RM Schindler: The Gingold
Commissions at American
Institute of Architects,
130 Sutter Street , SF. |
|
|
|
Thursday,
July 17, 7:00 pm - (café opens at 6:30 pm)
More
Stories by Tobias Wolff
Word for Word Theater Company |
|
| |
Word
for Word Theater Company previews their upcoming
production of More Stories by Tobias
Wolff with a dramatic reading of three
stories, “Sanity,” “Down to Bone”
and “Firelight”. Wolff’s typical
exploration of moral ambiguity and life-affirming
story-telling is brought from page to stage by this
unique ensemble theater. |
| Suggested
donation: Members $5; Public $15 |
|
|
Thursday,
July 24
6:00 pm Café opens ; 6:30 pm - PROGRAM
|
Argentinean
Tango:
The Dance in Depth
Luis Castro & Claudia
Mendoza
Author
program, dance demonstration and mini-milonga
|
|
|
Two
world-class teachers and stars of Forever
Tango bring together tango’s cultural
history, musical evolution and lore in a unique
new book which offers a panoramic view of this
dance phenomenon--- from the streets and bordellos
of Buenos Aires to its reincarnation on Broadway,
to the current passion for tango around the world.
Luis Castro
and Claudia Mendoza have performed
with the internationally acclaimed Tango Pasion
and Forever Tango, for which they were
nominated for best choreography for three prestigious
Broadway awards: the Tony, the Drama Desk and
the Outer Critics Circle. They teach and perform
in Europe, Japan and the United States and currently
make their home in Italy. |
|
Members
Free, Public $10 Eat, Read &
Dance!
Argentine
cuisine available in the café throughout
the evening. |
|
|
Thursday,
July 31, 6:00 pm
In collaboration with William Stout Publishers &
AIA
|
|
Appropriate:
The Houses of Joseph Esherick
Marc Treib |
|
|
|
Joseph
Esherick was arguably the foremost San Francisco
architect from the 1960’s until his death
in the late 1990’s, following the wake of
William Wurster. Esherick established his own
practice in the late 1940’s and the firm
produced a continuous stream of laudable buildings,
among them houses appropriate to their site and
time. Affected less by national and international
fashion than by exigencies of local climate, social
demands, and suitable technology, Esherick produced
a large number of truly classic residences.
Marc Treib
is Professor Emeritus of Architecture at the University
of California, Berkeley, and a practicing designer. |
|
| Members
of MI and AIA Free; Public $10 |
|
|
|
.
| CINEMALlT
FILM SERIES |
Michael
Fox, Curator |
|
|
ABOUT CINEMALIT: Film
lovers and aficionados enjoy an ongoing feast of classic American
and international films at the Mechanics' Institute. CinemaLit programs,
which are presented nine months a year, were created to complement
and highlight the Mechanics' Institute Library's vast collection of
more than 2500 videos and DVDs including classics, drama, comedy,
foreign films and documentaries. The CinemaLit Film Series is open
to members and the public. Each
program begins with an introduction of the movie, genre and themes
by curator Michael Fox or well-known local film writers and critics
such as David Thomson, Eddie Muller, Joe McBride and others. The
evening concludes with a salon discussion involving the audience
and speakers. Films are shown on large screen in the best available
format, DVD or video.
The
Mechanics' Institute's charming meeting room/cafe space, which seats
up to eighty people, provides an intimate, informal atmosphere for
film viewing, lively conversation and congenial socializing. The
cafe offers light refreshments and freshly popped popcorn.
Location:
Mechanics’
Institute,
57 Post Street (near Market St), San Francisco
Transit: MUNI/BART- Montgomery Station
Time: Every Friday. Mechanics’ Café opens
at 6:00 pm
Program begins at
6:30 pm. A salon style discussion follows the film.
Admission: Tickets available at the door.
MIL members: free ; Public suggested donation $10
For more information and reservations: Call (415) 393-0100
or email us
at rsvp@milibrary.org
/ Reservations are required - Limited seating |
.
.
SUMMER
MOVIES - FLIGHTS OF FANCY |
Friday,
July 11
My
Fair Lady
(1964)
170 minutes
Directed by George Cukor ; starring Rex Harrison,
Audrey Hepburn
A Cockney flower girl, along with George Bernard Shaw's 1913
London, receives a musical makeover. |
|
Friday,
July 25
The
Smiling Lieutenant (1931)
88 minutes
Directed by Ernst Lubitsch ; starring Claudette
Colbert, Maurice Chevalier, Miriam Hopkins
A randy lieutenant's misplaced wink lands him a repressed royal
bride in this Pre-Code, Viennese-set, oh-so-continental romantic
comedy.
|
|
Friday,
August 8
The
King and I (1956)
133 minutes
Directed by Walter Lang ; starring Deborah
Kerr, Yul Brynner, Rita Moreno
In the 1860s, a British widow hires on as governess to the children
of the King of Siam in this adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein's
Tony Award-winner. |
|
Friday,
August 22
The Story of Vernon and Irene
Castle (1939)
93 minutes
Directed by H. C. Potter ; starring Fred Astaire,
Ginger Rogers
This RKO Astaire-Rogers musical depicts the loving relationship
between the ground-breaking ballroom dancers of the pre-World
War I era.
|
|
|
| CinemaLit
Film Series
Guest Speaker Biographies |
| Michael
Fox has written about film for more than 50 regional
and national publications since 1987. He created and authored
the “Reel World” column in SF Weekly for more than
a decade, and hosted the first season of KQED-TV’s short-lived
program on independent film, “Independent View.” He
has sat on juries for the San Francisco International, Mill Valley,
Cinequest and United Nations Association film festivals and the
Independent Television Service (ITVS), and contributes notes to
the San Francisco, Mill Valley and SFILGBT festival programs.
He also teaches courses in documentary film at the Osher Lifelong
Learning Institute at San Francisco State’s downtown campus. |
|
| |
Terrance
Gelenter
is a nationally syndicated film critic, lecturer and interviewer.
Among his many interviewees are Billy Wilder, Sidney Lumet,
James Ellroy, and Isabel Allende. He is founder of Paris
through Expatriate Eyes, a firm specializing in designing
and escorting literary and cultural tours of Paris. The CinemaLit
title is used with permission of Terrance Gelenter.
|
| Matthew
Kennedy teaches anthropology at the City College
of San Francisco and film history at the San Francisco Conservatory
of Music. He is a film critic for Bright Lights Film Journal
online and has written three books on classic Hollywood: Marie
Dressler: A Biography, Edmund Goulding's Dark Victory,
and Joan Blondell: A Life between Takes. For more information,
please visit his website. |
|
| |
Eddie
Muller
is film-noir expert and author of Dark City: The Lost World
of Film Noir, Dark City Dames, and co-author of Grindhouse:
The Forbidden World of Adults Only Cinema. His mystery
novels include The Distance and Shadow Boxer. |
| David
Thomson’s
writing has appeared in Film Comment, Movieline, The New Republic
and Vanity Fair. He is a regular contributor
to Esquire and The New York Times. He is
the author of A Biographical Dictionary of Film, Showman: The
Life of David O. Selznick, Rosebud, the award winning
biography of Orson Welles, Beneath Mulholland and Nevada. |
|
|
.
SALONS
AND SPECIAL PROGRAMS
Republic
of the Imagination
Play Reading and
Discussion Salon
The Greeks : the Duality of Comedy and Tragedy
Mondays, 7:00 - 8:30 pm July 21
- August 25, 2008
Moderated by Professors Saul Galin
and Lois Spatz (on alternate dates)
| July
21 |
Oedipus
the King, by Sophocles |
Galin |
| July
28 |
Birds,
by Aristophanes
(optional
reading: The Knights by Aristophanes)
|
Spatz |
| August
4 |
Medea,
by Euripides |
Galin |
| August
11 |
Lysistrata,
by Aristophanes
(optional
reading: Thesmophoriazousae
(a.k.a. The Poet and the Women) by Aristophanes |
Spatz |
| August
18
|
Oedipus
at Colonus, by Sophocles |
Galin |
| August
25 |
Frogs,
by Aristophanes |
Spatz |
| Read
plays in advance of each session.
For comedies, read
Four Plays by Aristophanes (Meridian)
with translations by William Arrowsmith, Richmond
Lattimore, and Douglass Parker.
For tragedies, read translations by Robert
Fagles.
Fee
per session: Members
$10 ; Public $15
Six session series: Members $50 ; Public
$75
|
|
|
ART
EXHIBITION &
The
Color of Spring
Paintings by Jucivaldo Tavares
| Exhibit
Hours: M-F weekdays 10:00 am - 5:00 pm , 4th
floor Meeting Room and Hallway
|
| |
Tavares
is an emerging artist from Salvador da Bahia, Brazil,
whose bold vivacious painting gives expression to
work marked by a profound harmony between the composition
and the colors.
"My
type of Abstractionism comes out of an emotional,
realistic movement of life. Through composition and
vibrant colors I express all of my sentiments. Everything
I see and feel inspires me to create shapes, lines
and contrast, a colorful circle that explores art
and completes my composition."- J.T.
"Composition
yearns for a realism of strong color. Flowers, with
diverse lines and form, highlight the beauty of the
landscape with a defined contrast. I see colorful
brushstrokes of emotion residing in nature; I hope
to fill your knowledge with the desire to search for
your essence in the painting. Like an endless dream.
"- Jucivaldo Tavares
Jucivaldo
Tavares completed his first studies
at MAM, Museum of Modern Art, in Salvador da Bahia,
Brazil, 1996. He later continued with Advanced Studies
at MAM in São Paulo, 1999 and received his
MA at the University of São Paulo, 1998-2004.
Tavares’ art has been seen and exhibited around
the world including Canada, Italy, United States,
Germany, Austria, Chile, Switzerland, Costa Rica,
Portugal, Spain, Finland, Sweden, Great Britain, Japan,
New Zealand, Australia, Luxembourg, Argentina and
Holland. |
|
|
.
| Volunteer
Opportunities:
Volunteers are needed for our Events and CinemaLit
Film Series.
Call Laura Sheppard, Director of Events at (415) 393-0114
or Pamela Troy, Events Assistant/CinemaLit Coordinator at (415)
393-0116. |
Revised: July 3, 2008
|