Cornell Cinema premieres “Two Trains Runnin’,” about the search for blues legends Son House and Skip James during 1964’s Freedom Summer in Mississippi, Feb. 8 with Africana studies professors Kevin Gaines and Riché Richardson.

Things to Do, Feb. 2-9, 2018

Schubert recital

Professor Emeritus of Music Malcolm Bilson will be joined by violinist Ariana Kim and pianist Shin Hwang in an all-Schubert program, Feb. 2 at 8 p.m. in Barnes Hall Auditorium.

The performance is free and open to the public and presented by the Department of Music. Selections in the program will include “Sonata in A Major,” “Three Moments Musicaux” and “Marche Militaire.”

Kim is an assistant professor of music at Cornell; Hwang is a doctoral student in musical arts performance practice and winner of the first International Westfield Fortepiano Competition.

Books and black history

Frederick Wiseman explores a national treasure in his 2017 documentary “Ex Libris: The New York Public Library,” showing at Cornell Cinema Feb. 3 at 5:30 p.m. and Feb. 4 at 3:15 p.m. in Willard Straight Theatre.

The film is Wiseman’s 42nd documentary and was shown in competition at the 74th annual Venice International Film Festival. Film critic Manohla Dargis of The New York Times calls it “one of the greatest movies of Mr. Wiseman’s extraordinary career and one of his most thrilling.” His films also include “Titicut Follies” (1967), “Hospital” (1970) and “Central Park” (1989).

Also showing: A free screening of Alexander Kluge’s “Yesterday Girl” (1966), introduced by Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow Erik Born, Feb. 5 at 7 p.m.; and a Black History Month series including Reginald Hudlin’s “Marshall,” Feb. 8 and 11; and the local premiere of “Two Trains Runnin’,” Feb. 8 at 7 p.m., featuring a discussion with Africana studies chair Kevin Gaines and associate professor Riché Richardson.

Learning from specimens

Learn how natural history collections are used to teach, conserve and inspire new ideas at a public lecture, “A Night at the Museum (of Vertebrates),” Feb. 5 at 7:30 p.m. in the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Fuertes Auditorium.

Vanya Rohwer and Casey Dillman, curators of the Cornell University Museum of Vertebrates (CUMV), will discuss how the best natural history collections are vibrant, dynamic places revealing new insights into the workings of the natural world. After the talk, they will bring the audience into the museum collections for a behind-the-scenes peek at the specimens and spaces of the CUMV.

Art informs architecture

A selection of architectural work and the art collection of William Lim, B.Arch. ’81, M.Arch. ’82, is featured in “William Lim: The Architect and His Collection,” through March 15 in the John Hartell Gallery in Sibley Hall.

Lim gives an artist talk Feb. 7 at 5 p.m. in Hartell Gallery, followed by a reception. The events are free and open to the public; the gallery is open weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The exhibition includes drawings and models done while Lim was a student in the Department of Architecture, as well as several of his installation projects. His works include the experimental constructions “Ladders,” shown at the 2006 Venice Biennale of Architecture; and “Lantern Wonderland” (2011) and “Bamboo Wind Pavilion” (2013), both displayed in Hong Kong.

Lim is founder and managing director of the architecture and interior design firm CL3 Architects. He has been collecting art, with a focus on works by Hong Kong artists, for more than a decade. His collection was opened to the public in 2015 during Art Basel Hong Kong and is a major destination for contemporary Asian art.

As he has noted, “Design and art are very closely related – the way that I collect and the way that I look at art inform the way that I design.”

Archives “In Silence”

A new exhibition in Milstein Hall explores the theme of archives through the medium of photography.

“Doug Hall: In Silence,” through March 15 in the Bibliowicz Family Gallery, includes still images and video and spans more than 20 years and four different bodies of Hall’s work. His subjects range from ancient archives in Naples and Rome to works by Marcel Proust and Ludwig Wittgenstein and the private letters of Franz Kafka.

Hall will give a public lecture Feb. 8 at 5:30 p.m. in Abby and Howard Milstein Auditorium.

Innovation in clothing design

Textiles created by combining physical and chemical technologies and Asian aesthetics are a key focus of the work of Kinor Jiang, a professor at Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

Work by Jiang and his collaborators is on display through Feb. 8 in the Jill Stuart Gallery in the Human Ecology Building.

The design collection, “Surface Design in Fashion,” is the result of a team of fashion designers working with Jiang on the fusion of design and technology to produce metalized textiles with sculptural and fashion possibilities. Their work is shedding new light on innovations in future clothing and textile art, opening a new route to improve textile functions and enhance apparel aesthetics.

Cleaveland Reading

Fiction writer J. Robert Lennon and poet Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon, critically acclaimed writers on the Department of English Creative Writing Program faculty, will read from their work Feb. 8 at 4:30 p.m. in Rhodes-Rawlings Auditorium, Klarman Hall.

The annual Richard Cleaveland Memorial Reading is free and open to the public as part of the Spring 2018 Barbara and David Zalaznick Reading Series. A reception and book signing will follow in the English Department Lounge, 258 Goldwin Smith Hall.

Lennon is the author of the story collections “Pieces For The Left Hand” and “See You in Paradise” and eight novels including “Mailman,” “Familiar” and the recent “Broken River.” His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, The Paris Review and Harper’s; and his criticism and essays in The London Review of Books, The New York Times Book Review, The Guardian, Salon, Slate and The New York Times Magazine.

Van Clief-Stefanon is the author of the 2009 National Book Award finalist “Open Interval,” 2001 Cave Canem Poetry Prize winner “Black Swan,” and the chapbook “Poems in Conversation and a Conversation,” a collaboration with Elizabeth Alexander. Her third poetry collection, “The Coal Tar Colors,” is in progress. She has written plays and lyrics for Ithaca arts collective The Cherry, and was one of 10 poets commissioned to write poems inspired by artist Jacob Lawrence in conjunction with the 2015 Museum of Modern Art exhibit “One-Way Ticket: Jacob Lawrence’s Migration Series and Other Works.”

The Cleaveland Reading was created in 2002 by family and friends in memory of Richard Cleaveland ’74. For information or accommodations to attend this event, email creativewriting@cornell.eduor call 607-255-7847.

Media Contact

Lindsey Knewstub