Mercer County Culture & Heritage's 2020 Winter Newsletter

Brothers on Broadway featuring Baritone Keith Spencer at Capital Philharmonic of New Jersey

Nationally recognized baritone vocalist Keith Spencer presents his tour de force musical showcase, Brothers on Broadway, in partnership with the Capital Philharmonic of New Jersey. This one-man celebratory tribute to Broadway’s African American leading men has kept audiences and critics alike clamoring for more. With a showman's flair, Keith leads us on a show-stopping musical journey from humble reflections of black minstrelsy through the undeniable progress afforded African Americans through musical theater. Brothers on Broadway, which will be performed February 22, at 7:30 p.m., pays homage to the concert works and musical theatre performances of artists such as Paul Robeson, Ben Vereen, Sammy Davis Jr., Gregory Hines, Brian Stokes Mitchell, and many other notable artists. This concert experience commemorating Black History Month includes well-known selections from shows such as Porgy and Bess, Ragtime, Pippin, The Phantom of the Opera, Hamilton, and more. Since its inception, Brothers on Broadway has continued to rise to critical acclaim. Now, for the first time, Brothers on Broadway will be presented as a full orchestral experience courtesy of the Capital Philharmonic of New Jersey and Maestro Daniel Spalding.

For more information or to get tickets, visit capitalphilharmonic.org.

Martin Koenig: Sound Portraits from Bulgaria

On January 25, at 2 p.m., the Lawrence Headquarters Branch of the Mercer County Library System will host a meeting with ethnographer and cultural documentarian Martin Koenig. Between 1966 and 1979, Mr. Koenig made half a dozen trips to Bulgaria and filmed, recorded, and photographed the lively, yet endangered aspects of Bulgaria’s traditional village culture due to modernization, globalization and emigration. In 1968, he co-founded and was a director of the
Balkan Arts Center in New York City.

This meeting with him will tell the story of this recording and will feature a film on traditional Bulgarian folk dancing from the period 1966 to 1979, followed by
a Q & A session.

This program is co-sponsored by the Friends of the Lawrence Library and the Bulgarian Cultural Center of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware. Registration is suggested. For more information about the library’s programs, call 609-883-8294 or visit mcl.org.

If These Quilts Could Talk, Workshop & Lectures at the Trenton City Museum

The Trenton City Museum at Ellarslie Mansion announces a juried exhibition of quilts by The Friendly Quilters of Bucks County and the Sankofa Stitchers. Featuring nearly 30 quilts across a range of sizes, styles and color schemes, the exhibition’s display of artistry, creativity, and story-telling will fill Ellarslie’s first floor galleries from Jan. 19 to April 19, 2020. There will be an opening reception on Sunday, Jan. 19, from 2 to 4 p.m. as well as a closing reception and Quilters Walk and Talk: Sunday, April 19, from 2 to 4 p.m.
The Friendly Quilters and Sankofa Stitchers work to keep the traditions of quilt-making alive by creating works of art that tell stories and strengthen historical and community bonds. The members of both groups are experienced quilters and have quilted individually and together for many years, bringing a wide range of styles to this exhibition.
In addition to the exhibition, If These Quilts Could Talk, Ellarslie will offer workshops and lectures on quilting and lectures on the history and traditions of quilts in the African American community.

Feb. 2: Underground Railroad Quilts lecture by Cassandra Stancil Gunkel

Feb. 8: Improvisational Quilting workshop led by Rose Miller (workshop will accommodate up to 15 participants; rain/snow date Feb. 9)

Feb. 16: Quilt Arts and Culture lecture by Gail Mitchell

March 7: Adinkra Stamping workshop by Cassandra Stancil Gunkel

March 29: Improvisational Quilting workshop led by Mada Coles-Galloway and Juandamaire Gikandi (workshop will accommodate up to 15 participants; rain/snow date March 30)

The museum located in Cadwalader Park, Trenton, is open Wednesday - Saturday from 12 to 4 p.m. and Sundays from 1 to 4 p.m. Parking is available in the park. There is no admission charge, but donations are appreciated.

For more information, visit ellarslie.org or call 609-989-3632.

The Princeton Public Library to Host Chinese New Year Celebration

Celebrate Chinese New Year, the Year of the Rat, on Feb. 8, at 1:30 p.m, at the Princeton Public Library, 65 Witherspoon Street, Princeton. This event is geared toward participants of all ages, the celebration features a traditional Chinese lion dance, Chinese painting, calligraphy, music and paper cutting. There will also be origami stations and martial arts performances throughout the day.

Presented in partnership with the Princeton High School’s Mandarin classes and Chinese Club.This event is free and open to the public. For more information, call the library at 609-924-9529 or visit princetonlibrary.org

Trenton Artists Workshop Presents "Mummers X 2" at theTrenton Free Public Library

The Trenton Artists Workshop Association (TAWA) will present the exhibition “Mummers X 2” at the Trenton Free Public Library from Jan. 11 through Feb.28.
A reception with the photographers is set for Saturday, Jan. 18, from 3 to 4:30 p.m.
“Mummers X 2” features 29 photographs of one of the oldest folk-art events in the United States, the annual Mummers Parade in Philadelphia.

Held on New Year’s Day, the Mummers Parade is rooted in ancient European customs and traditions that included exaggerated mime presentations.

The two in the title are two central New Jersey journalists united by their interest in observing and photographing the Mummers: Bryan Grigsby and Dan Aubrey.
Grigsby, of Bordentown, is a retired newspaper photographer who spent 40 years at news publications in Florida, Missouri, and Philadelphia, where he spent the last 30 years of his career as a photo editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer. A graduate of the University of Florida, he got his start in photography while covering the war in South Vietnam as an Army Photographer.

Grigsby discovered the Mummers Parade in the early to mid-1980s and says, “It was love at first sight. I thought this event was the most bizarre thing I had ever seen, and I was determined to bring an outsiders point of view to capturing the participants. I almost never photographed the actual parade, choosing instead to focus on the staging areas deep in South Philly, where I felt like I was seeing the primal gut of the Beast."

Aubrey, of Hamilton, is the arts editor for U.S. 1 Newspaper and editor of the monthly Trenton Downtowner. A former arts and theater columnist for the Trenton Times, Aubrey has also worked with nonprofit professional theaters and coordinated art exhibitions in New Jersey and New York City. “I realized that at its heart the Philadelphia Mummers were following an ancient human impulse to resist the darkness of winter and bring in new life with bright colors, joyful sounds, and plenty of alcohol,” says Aubrey. “The more I saw, the more the event spoke to me. And although it can be rude and ridiculous, the Mummers Parade also has a beauty and a spirit of fellowship.”

Taken during different eras, the photographs show changes in both the parade and in American society.

Grigsby’s 1980s black and white images capture a time when the Mummers were only men of European ancestry – many of whom dressed and paraded as “wenches.”

Aubrey’s digital color photographs shows the parade changing to include women, men and women of Latino and African backgrounds, and a gay brigade.

The Trenton Free Public Library is located at 120 Academy St., Trenton. Hours are Mondays through Thursdays, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Friday and Saturdays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information on the library, call 609-392-7188.

For more information on the Trenton Artists Workshop Association, contact tawaexhibits@aol.com / facebook.com/groups/1462432427334738/

The West Windsor Arts Council presents The Doom and Bloom Exhibition

The Doom and Bloom art show runs Monday, Jan. 6, 2020 to Friday, Feb. 28, 2020 at West Windsor Arts Center in Princeton Junction. The juried exhibition showcases 25 artists whose artworks consist of materials that would otherwise be discarded. The artists’ works highlight the crisis of trash on earth and how artists can have a positive impact on the environment through the partnership of art and recycling. The opening reception of the show is Sunday, Jan. 12, from 4 to 6 pm.

Vernita Nemec, (AKA Vernita N’Cognita), juror of the Doom and Bloom show, is a visual/performance artist/curator who has exhibited her art around the world. N’Cognita is currently the director of Viridian Artists art gallery in Chelsea, New York City. She has curated and organized exhibitions of art from recycled materials throughout the United States, including “Art from Detritus: Recycling with Imagination," for which she received a Kauffman Foundation Fellowship and a grant from the Puffin Foundation. Her artwork ranges across a variety of disciplines, including installations, collages, and tangible art objects.

The Doom and Bloom show includes N’Cognita’s “Endless Junkmail Scroll” installation. In a description of N’Cognita’s Endless Junkmail Scroll, Times Observer Writer Stacey Gross explains, “The dynamic nature of the piece allows it to morph and adapt to any space in which it is shown, allowing Nemec to 'fill the air with detritus transformed' and creating a physical space out of art itself...The installation confronts multiple social and environmental issues inherent in twenty-first century life... Human beings’ ability to end life as we know it by the process of production and consumption, is the ultimate thesis of the piece.” Visitors will have the opportunity to view and purchase artworks at the Doom and Bloom exhibition at West Windsor Arts Center, 952 Alexander Rd, Princeton Junction, NJ 08550. For more information, call 609-716-1931 or write info@westwindsorarts.org.

The New Jersey State
Museum Exhibits — "Fine Feathered Friends: Birds as Mainstay and Muse"

Birds are everywhere. They occupy our forests, fields, farms, beaches, backyards and even our homes. But many of us are largely unaware of the natural and cultural significance of these ubiquitous avian animals.

Opening Jan. 4, 2020 and running through to Sept. 13, the New Jersey State Museum brings birdwatching indoors, displaying our fine feathered friends and their role as both an ecological mainstay and a source of creative inspiration. Through nearly 200 original objects, the exhibition explores the wild, wonderful world of birds and their impact on New Jersey decorative arts – including needlework samplers, hand-carved duck and shorebird decoys, as well as the porcelain birds of Mercer County ceramist Edward Marshall Boehm (1913-1969).

Boehm loved birds so much that he built huge aviaries on the grounds of his Titusville home. This allowed him to study the anatomy and habits of his fine feathered friends.
At his studio in Trenton, the artist replicated the avian world in hard-paste porcelain. Boehm began by sculpting a model of each species. He used the model to create molds and make limited-edition replicas. Each bird was then hand-assembled and hand-painted by a team of artists. Boehm’s unique ceramic art form embodied technical mastery and grand artistic vision.

Boehm’s birds are exhibited side by side with scientific taxidermy mounts of the same species, allowing visitors to see the amazing level of detail in these magnificent porcelain creations. This exhibition also explores the science of birds and raises awareness of the need for bird conservation through the stories of two extinct bird species – the Passenger Pigeon and Carolina Parakeet.

Located at 205 West State Street in Trenton, the Museum is open Tuesday through Sunday from 9 a.m. to 4:45 p.m.; closed Mondays and all state holidays. Admission is free. For more information please visit state.nj.us/state/museum or call (609) 292-6464.

A Place In Time: Ely-Norton Farm

This farm is named for John Ely (1707-1795), who settled here in 1728, and Richard Norton (d.1855), who settled here in 1831. The farm is best known, however, for its most famous visitor, Clara Barton. Clara had met Richard and Ellen Wyckoff Norton's children, Charles and Mary, while they studied at a Universalist school in New York. She lived here with the Norton family from October 1851 to May 1852.

In a letter to her nephew, Clara recalled her first afternoon at the Norton's' "large, well-cultivated" farm. After a "good dinner," she joined Charles and Mary for "a stroll in the woods in search of chestnuts, gum berries, and persimmons, and found plenty of them." She also described the Norton's' "prettily furnished" sitting room with its "good piano" and "large window looking into the garden." Clara clearly liked the Norton's, later calling them "a sterling family, good as gold and true as the sun."

Clara decided to begin teaching at the Cedarville School, a one-room private school on Cedarville Road, East Windsor. Each of the 39 students paid Clara tuition, $2 for each 11-week quarter session. Clara found her students to be "quiet and obedient," arriving with "good honest cheerful faces every morning." The students later remembered Clara for both her interest in their progress and her informal methods. In late May 1852, Clara left the Norton's to open a school in Bordentown, New Jersey.

Shortly there after she took a job with the Patent Office in Washington, D.C. in 1854,
Clara Barton became the only American woman working in the federal government in the mid-19th century. Clara left Washington after the Civil War began in 1861 to nurse wounded soldiers at the front. Throughout the war, she continued to write Mary Norton, who sent Clara boxes of food and clothing for the troops. After the war Clara visited Mary again in 1878. When Clara began organizing the American Red Cross in 1881, Mary was one of its four charter members.

The Ely House is the HEW Historical Society’s headquarters as well as a circa 1850 house, museum and library. The museum is located on 164 N. Main St. in Hightstown.To arrange for a group tour, please call 609-448-0110.