From Wellesley College:

In honor of National Girls and Women in Sport Day, the Wellesley College Department of Physical Education, Recreation and Athletics will host Title IX: 40 Years & Counting, a panel event on Monday, Feb. 13.

The event celebrates 40 years of Title IX, the legislation that positively influenced the growth and culture of women’s sports in America. Three-time Olympian and International Soccer star Kristine Lilly (shown here) highlights a panel of outstanding women sharing stories of personal challenges and successes.

Other panelists include: Carol Stiff, ESPN’s vice president for programming and acquisitions; Amy Baltzell, former Olympic rower and noted sports psychologist; Melissa Ludtke, the former Sports Illustrator writer who made headlines when SI sued Major League Baseball on her behalf; and Laura Pappano, an award-winning journalist and author who is the founder and editor of FairGameNews.com.

The panel is free and open to the public. It will be held at 7:00pm in Wellesley College’s Diana Champman Walsh Alumnae Hall.

For more information, including full biographies on all five panelists, please visit: www.wellesleyblue.com/titleix

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The Wellesley College Botanical Gardens, in conjunction with the school’s Jewett Gallery, next week will begin hosting an art exhibit among its many plants.  Greenhouse Ghosts features life-sized white silhouettes of threatened, endangered and extinct species, presenting a stark contrast against the colorful plant life.

Opening Reception: Thursday, Jan. 26. 4-5:30pm, Botanic Gardens Visitor Center
Exhibit Dates: Jan. 26-June 8, 2012
Hours: 8am-4pm Daily

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More Wellesley College Spring Events

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Christmas comes but once a year with good reason, as Alan Ayckbourn’s dark comedy, “Season’s Greetings,” put on by The Wellesley Summer Theatre Company, reminds us.

Everything about the setting and circumstances seems typically English — relatives are gathered to celebrate Christmas. There is a well-stocked home bar and a nearby pub, which, under ordinary circumstances, should be enough to bubble everybody along through three days of closeness.  The Christmas tree, given pride of place, of course, towers over wrapped gifts of the noisy variety.

The adults claim to have given themselves over to the idea that Christmas is for children, after all, so what’s a bit of clamor and a few toy guns thrown in for good measure?  The audience is given to understand that there are plenty of children around, but we never see them.  Or not the chronologically aged ones, anyway.  The actual appearance of any children, and their accompanying antics would tip the play into full-out chaos.  Since the adults in this holiday fiasco hog up all the childish behavior for themselves, there is no need to completely exhaust the audience with the spectre of real children.

As the play moves along, each of the nine adults reveals their inner child, and a spoiled child it is.  Belinda, the lady of the house played by Ashley Gramolini, mood swings between martrydom and VERY warmly welcoming her sister’s love interest to her home. As Belinda’s determination grows to seduce (attack?) Clive, played by Dan Roach, she lets nothing stand in her way, not even her sister, who is, literally, standing in her way.  Clive may as well be a swing at the playground that Belinda is determined to have, and her sister, played by Christine Hamel, a not-very formidable obstacle.

Bernard, played by Derek Stone Nelson, effectively takes the play to its emotionally darkest place, even as the room itself is at its brightest and most cheerful.  As he becomes more bungling and short-tempered during dress rehearsal for a puppet show, his yearly contribution to seasonal jolliness,  he turns on his allies with contempt he should reserve for his foes.  Finally, all are either against him, disgusted by his behavior, or sobbing.

As the family members interfere with and tear each other’s projects apart, be they wrapped presents or dinner preparations, the audience would not be surprised if, when the Boxing Day scene came around, things suddenly got  very literal and the set was actually transformed into a ring.  The action goes futher than that, however, and Clive, dressed in grey in the early scenes, and looking perhaps a bit like the big bad wolfe in Bernard’s puppet show, may end up the scapegoat in family lore for this Christmas that won’t soon be forgotten.

Director:  Shelley Bolman
Designers: Ken Loewit (lighting design)
David Towlun (scenic design)
George Cooke (sound design)
Nora Hussey (directing consultant)

Ticket prices are $20 general admission and $10 for seniors and students

The play runs until Jan. 29 on Thursdays-Sundays at the Ruth Nagel Jones Theatre at Wellesley College

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“It’s Christmas in suburban London, and things couldn’t be going less well for Belinda and Neville and their disfunctional relatives. This black comedy features furtive trysts under the tree, a horrifying puppet show and a few madcap mistaken assumptions. Join us for the holiday festivities as we laugh at the darker side of family life. ”

by Alan Ayckbourn
January 5-29, 2012
Thu. at 7pm, Fri at 8pm,
Sat. at 3pm and 8pm,
Sun. at 3pm
Ruth Nagel Jones Theatre

Tickets:
$20 general admission
$10 for seniors, students, and members of the Wellesley College community
Wellesley Summer Theatre box office: 781.283.2000

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Wellesley College’s Davis Museum is ramping up for the northeast premiere of artist Radcliffe Bailey’s exhibit, called Memory as Medicine, running Feb. 15-May 6. A free opening reception will be held from 5-7pm on Feb. 15.

Museum director Lisa Fischman says in a statement: “Bailey’s art, informed by a strong social and historical consciousness and solidly grounded in family and community, combines a rich, narrative content with a high-level of abstraction and poetic resonance to explore questions of history and memory.”

Translation, uhh, go see the exhibit, which features mixed-media paintings and installations, including Windward Coast, seen above (it features hundreds of piano keys). The exhibit was on display June-September at Atlanta’s High Museum of Art.

Fun fact: Bailey is married to an actress/dancer named Victoria Rowell.

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We came across perhaps the ultimate Wellesley tattoo from Wellesley Underground — a 2008 Wellesley College grad’s ode to the classic lamp posts on campus AND to the inimitable Oscar Wilde (and came across another from a 2007 grad with just the lamp post, below)

Which of course leads us to ask: What other Wellesley-themed ink is out there?

Wellesley Raiders?

Wellesley PD and Fire Department?

Wellesley Zoning Board of Appeals?

Wellesley Mothers Forum?

The Swellesley Report? (We’d be honored, depending on where you put it)

If you’ve got a Wellesley Tatt that you just can’t keep to yourself, send along a picture here for us to share with the community: theswellesleyreport@gmail.com

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According to Wellesley, “2005 YU55, which is approximately 1,300 feet in diameter, sailed by at distance of roughly 201,700 miles. This is the closest known approach by an asteroid with an absolute magnitude this bright since 1976.”

If you missed the asteroid yourself this time around, mark your calendar for 2041, when it will next pass by Earth.

The public’s next chance to check out the telescopes at Whitin Observatory will be Dec. 2 from 8-10pm.

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From Wellesley College Theatre:

This three-generation drama about an inescapable ethnic legacy tells the story of an American college student choosing to visit Armenia after the death of her grandfather, heeding his call to seek out her ancestral history. Join us as we dance, sing, eat, make music, cry, laugh, scream, and support each other in this empowering tale of ethnic identity.

Performance Dates: Thurs. November 10 @ 7pm; Friday November 11 @ 8 pm; Sat. Matinee Nov. 12 @ 2pm; Saturday November 12 @ 8 pm; Sun. Matinee Nov. 13 @ 2pm

In the Ruth Nagel Jones Theatre of Alumnae Hall, Wellesley College

Ticket Prices are $10 general admission and $5 for Senior Citizens and Students; Free to the Wellesley College Community w/ID; Free to students with Wellesley, Babson, or Olin ID; To make a reservation: Box Office at (781)-283-2000; The theatre is handicap accessible. For disability services contact Jim Wice @ 781-283-2434

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