ARTS & CULTURE

ARTS &

CULTURE

From bottom left clockwise, artwork can be found on pages 98, 178, 194 and 128 of Wildlife: The Life and Work of Charles Harper.

PHOTO: COURTESY OF CHARLEY HARPER ART STUDIO, WILD LIFE, GESTALTEN, 2022

Midcentury Discoveries

A new book revisits Charley Harper’s impressive catalog of work with a glimpse into his international impact.

BY STEVEN ROSEN

As new generations continue to rediscover Midcentury Modernism as a beloved art, architectural and design style, the following for Cincinnati-based Charley Harper seemingly is on an inde nite spike.

Harper, who eventually landed in Cincinnati but was raised in West Virginia, created paintings, prints and illustrations that frequently stylized their nature-related subjects by deemphasizing depth and accentuating colorfulness and geometric characteristics, a common motif around the middle of the 20th century. He died in 2007 at age 84, just as Mad Men began and Todd Oldham’s celebrated Charley Harper: An Illustrated Life was being published.

Interest isn’t cooling o yet in this centenary year of Harper’s birth – including internationally – helped by the recent publication of the clothbound monograph Wild Life: e Life and Work of Charley Harper by Brett Harper (son and only child of Harper and his artist wife Edie), Margaret Rhodes and publisher gestalten. e Germany-based publishing house proposed the book to Brett, who directs the Charley Harper Art Studio. Publisher gestalten will distribute the Englishlanguage book internationally.

As the book’s title indicates, this isn’t just a collection of images; it also has a biographical narrative written by Rhodes, an editor at New York Magazine with a background in design stories. She spent time in Cincinnati last fall researching Harper’s life – including his time as a gifted Art Academy of Cincinnati student – as well as his owering as a modernist artist drawn to nature as a subject.

“One of the attractions was that I wanted a larger appreciation of Charley’s work in Europe,” Harper’s son tells CityBeat. “Knowing that there were customers in Europe of his prints and posters, I thought it would be a good thing to do it. And also, one of the attractions was that I felt they would have a portion of the book allocated to my mother, Edie, and her work.” ( e book includes some of Edie Harper’s work.)

Wild Life also features a biographical narrative about Charley Harper’s life.

PHOTO: COURTESY OF CHARLEY HARPER ART STUDIO, WILD LIFE, GESTALTEN, 2022

is is also the centenary year for Edie, who died in 2010 at age 87. She met Harper at the Art Academy, and they married shortly after their graduation in 1947. While her own work in various mediums wasn’t as well known as his during their lifetime, it has ourished recently. Covington arts venue e Carnegie gave Edie a 2017 retrospective, and ArtWorks created a distinctive public mural, on display now in Over-the-Rhine, called “Crazy Cat, Crazy Quilt.” e mural is based on one of her artworks.

“[Rhodes] spent some of the time at our archives looking at images we have that are unsold or we will not sell,” Brett says. “People have not seen a lot of those. She also worked with the National Park Service, getting photographs of early layouts for what would be larger posters.”

“I think the aesthetic qualities of Charley’s work make it seem like it’s quite simple — like there’s this naivete and picture-book quality to them,” Rhodes says. “Once I started digging into his process, his notes and his ideas, you start to see what’s going on is so deeply considered.”

She credits e Carnegie’s exhibition director Matt Distel, whom she interviewed, for comparing Harper to a metronome in the way he re ned one style over the years, pushing his approach toward a platonic ideal of perfection. e book is heavily in uenced by Harper’s design sensibility — even the table of contents is essentially an art element, appearing like a maze with the print forming circular black lines. Near it are the artist’s famous red ladybugs, simpli ed to any almost surreal level, with their eye-like black circles giving them an anthropomorphic quality.

Overall, the plentiful art reproductions do reinforce Harper’s reputation as a stylized colorist whose love for nature made him a kind of modern, streamlined Henri Rousseau. But the book also features work that surprises in terms of its minimalism, its restrained color choices or its subject matter. Who knew, for instance, that Harper once designed a trendy CoolRay sunglasses advertisement?

Rhodes and Brett chose quite a bit of fascinating archival material for the book, including a 1948 letter from Art Academy dean Robert Co n to the Louis Comfort Ti any Foundation that extolls the artist’s potential.

“Mr. Harper is one of the nest young men with one of the greatest potentials in ne arts that I have seen in my fteen years of association with young artists,” the letter reads.

Other interesting artifacts shown in the book include Harper’s 1957 color rendering of his Midcentury Modern “dream home and studio,” designed by architect Rudy Hermes (it was built with changes from the rendering and is owned by Brett today). ere is also a 1960 photo of Harper hanging his paintings at the Ford Rotunda in Dearborn, Michigan. First built in 1934 for the Chicago World’s Fair, this daringly modern structure with its layered roof and circular sides was moved to Dearborn and used as a tourist attraction with exhibits until it burned down in 1962. Harper’s paintings, along with the mural that he created in the rotunda’s reception area, were lost in the re, according to motorcities.org.

What is left for Charley (and Edie) to posthumously achieve? His son has one big idea he’d like to pursue if anyone is interested — a museum in Downtown Cincinnati.

“I would really enjoy seeing that,” he says. “Ideally, I would like to see something downtown like the [Andy] Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh or Cly ord Still Museum in Denver.” It could connect with a trail that would lead to indoor ceramic tile murals that Charley created at the Duke Energy Convention Center and the John Weld Peck Federal Building, as well as to two ArtWorks outdoor painted murals created in remembrance of the Harpers — Charley’s ”Homecoming,” with two bluebirds near the Hamilton County Courthouse, and Edie’s aforementioned one, Brett says.

If a proper entity would run the museum, Brett says, it could also have the previously mentioned suburban house and studio, which might be open for occasional tours like the Paci c Palisades, California, home of the late Modernist designers Charles and Ray Eames.

“I think it would be a tourist attraction,” he adds.

Buy Wild Life: The Life and Work of Charley Harper at us.gestalten.com. Learn about Harper’s life and work at charleyharperartstudio.com.

ONSTAGE Cincinnati Opera’s Fierce and Castor and Patience Give Voice to Underrepresented Stories

BY ANNE ARENSTEIN

U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith and composer Gregory Spears, the creators of Castor and Patience.

PHOTO: MICHAEL PRIEST

Two world premieres originally scheduled for Cincinnati Opera’s 2020 centennial season will make their delayed debuts in July.

On July 6, 9 and 10, Fierce will feature a score by Cincinnati native and renowned pianist William Mene eld and libretto by novelist Sheila Williams. Later, Castor and Patience will mark the debut of award-winning 2017-2019 U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith as librettist, or the writer of text sung in an opera, as well as the return of composer Gregory Spears, who was behind the acclaimed Fellow Travelers. Castor and Patience will take place July 21, 23, 24, 28 and 30.

Both works o er characters whose voices have been ignored: young women, especially women of color, and Black families whose crises are rooted in the patterns of racist American policies and cultures. Moreover, both operas are part of Cincinnati Opera’s long-term commitment to commissioning operas that highlight underrepresented communities and their stories.

Fierce presents stories of teenaged girls channeling their artistry through a vortex of challenges, both personal and social.

Williams spent more than a year in conversations with young women convened by the Music Resource Center in Walnut Hills and WordPlay Cincy, a Northside non-pro t that fosters children’s and teens’ creativity through writing and arts integration.

“Nothing was o limits,” Williams tells CityBeat of the discussions that ensued. “I was the y on the wall.”

Williams, whose novel Dancing on the Edge of the Roof was adapted by Net ix for the 2019 lm Juanita, says that she used her screenwriting experience in crafting her rst libretto. She adds that after hours of deep conversations, a huge challenge was creating a text that could be sung.

Williams drew on her love of world mythology to name her four protagonists. All emerging artists, the teens struggle with parents, peers and a brutal cyber world.

Vesta “has one foot in childhood and the other poised to step into womanhood,” Williams said. Nyomi is an introvert in an extrovert’s shell. Rumer “is a 2022 version of Stevie Nicks, desperately trying to navigate loss and survival,” Williams said, and Morgan juggles her dreams with her parents’ expectations.

Although pianist Mene eld didn’t participate in the conversations that Williams had with local teenagers, attending the Music Resource Center showcase featuring the young artists provided a clearer sense of the motivations of the characters they created. “ ere were a lot of text messages and emails as the score took shape,” Mene eld recalled.

Armed with a creative toolbox that included stage performances at the School for Creative and Performing Arts, solo gigs at Cincinnati Opera’s popular series “Opera Goes to Church” and landmark East Walnut Hills jazz venue Greenwich Tavern, and compositions for instrumental and vocal ensembles (including for PRISM, commissioned by the Young Professionals Choral Collective, which was performed at Carnegie Hall in 2019) , Mene eld had con dence to transform Williams’ libretto into song, beginning with signature arias for the four leads.

“Establishing a musical identity for each character was essential,” Mene eld explains. “It made it easier to shape the other characters from a musical perspective.”

Fierce’s other characters include friends, teachers and a chorus of online trolls.

Mene eld and Williams forged a strong collaboration for Fierce, tweaking verbal and melodic lines and working with stage director D. Lynn Meyers, who is making her Cincinnati Opera debut. Williams praised her collaborator’s score. “Williams’ music is incredible, a perfect setting for the work.”

Mene eld tells CityBeat that he is especially excited to see his rst opera on the same stage where he performed nearly thirty years ago.

For Castor and Patience, composer Spears was eager to work on a new opera with his longtime friend Smith. e two met in 2008 while Smith was teaching at Princeton and Spears was a doctoral student.

“After the success of Fellow Travelers, I was more con dent about

Fierce librettist Sheila Williams.

PHOTO: TASHA PINELO

approaching Cincinnati Opera to take a risk on us for a new work,” Spears explains. “ ey had faith in us and gave us the time we needed to develop a story.”

Spears and Smith shared a desire to explore little-known aspects of American history, focusing on the e ects of racism and the exclusion of Black communities. Spears and Smith took several trips to South Carolina and coastal Georgia to interview people whose lives were a ected by policies restricting Black property ownership. As Spears and Smith traveled in South Carolina and coastal Georgia, accompanied by local historians, ethnomusicologists, and poet/photographer Rachel Elizabeth Gri ths whose work appears in the production, a story emerged. e accounts of communities victimized by policies directed against Black land ownership were a shock, especially for Smith, who grew up in Northern California.

“I didn’t know much about this,” Smith says. “But we just listened. We looked and learned. And soon the characters began to bubble up.”

Smith’s luminous poetry (Life on Mars, Duende) and memoir (Ordinary Light) frequently invoke home and memory, themes that are powerfully present in her libretto for Castor and Patience.

She describes the writing process as an act of faith. Spears calls it brilliant and beautiful.

“I was intimidated but surprisingly enough I found myself hearing voices and hearing wishes and needs and then the geometry of the story rose up,” Smith said.

In the opera, cousins Castor and Patience reconnect at a family reunion. It’s 2008, and Castor is a victim of the recession, cratered by job loss and a balloon mortgage. He’s eager to sell property that’s been in the family since the Reconstruction era in the mid1800s, but Patience’s commitment to the land and its legacy is equally strong.

Reviews in the New York Times and Opera News cited Spears’ ability to let words sing. Smith found that reassuring.

“ e way he’s able to transmit natural speech musically makes me feel safe,” she says.

Spears jotted down musical fragments that became puzzle pieces he t into Smith’s libretto, which he says loves. eir close collaboration and mutual trust allowed Spears to create music that supports the text and allows the singers to inhabit their roles.

Smith notes that Castor and Patience’s conclusion is open-ended and adds that Patience addresses the audience to what it means to be a witness to racism. Smith and Spears agree that the aria calls for confronting and dealing with history.

“We deliberately left the property’s location unnamed. e characters’ history is our history and we’re implicated in these systems that have great force on people’s lives,” Smith said.

Both creative teams are eager to take on another opera, they say. Smith and Spears already are working on a new commission. Mene eld, who teaches jazz piano at the University of Iowa looks forward to a second production, as does Williams, who is tackling her next novel.

All four express deep gratitude to Cincinnati Opera for taking risks with their new pieces and providing opportunities to work with emerging performers.

“Composers always worked with singers on new operas,” Spears says. “Our singers made such huge contribution, taking it to a new level. To be part of this tradition is such a gift.”

Fierce pianist William Mene eld.

PHOTO: SHAWNDALE THOMAS

Cincinnati Opera’s Fierce will run July 6, 9 and 10, while Castor and Patience will be performed July 21, 23, 24, 28 and 30. Info: cincinnatiopera.org.

ONSTAGE Haleh Liza Gafori to Bring Authentic, Intimate Translations of Ancient Persian Poet Rumi to Cincinnati

BY LEYLA SHOKOOHE

Haleh Liza Gafori will perform her translated versions of Rumi’s poetry in Cincinnati on July 13 and 14. R umi, the ancient and revered Persian poet, has had his work translated, diluted and misattributed in equal measure over the centuries since writing them, but Gold, a new translation collection published in March by Haleh Liza Gafori, sets right many of those wrongs.

“My ear is tuned to the music of contemporary American poetry, and one of the jobs of the translator is to make new music in the language they’re translating into, because you cannot preserve the music of the original language,” Gafori says. “To be steeped in both cultures, I think, is what makes for a good translator.”

Gafori, a New Yorker of Persian descent, is a translator, poet and performer who will be in Cincinnati July 13 and 14 as part of a bene t for local nonpro t e Well. Gold is a collection of 32 Rumi poems, some previously translated and some not.

“He has over 3,200 poems in the Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi [one of Rumi’s de nitive works],” Gafori tells CityBeat. “It was about which poems I connected to, which I found interesting. I found the images evocative and the messages were sometimes speaking to me and speaking to our times.”

One such poem is referenced in the book as “Whatever the Ways of the World.” It is translated from a ghazal, which is a form of poetry that features a string of ve or more couplets. ese couplets can often stand as distinct units themselves.

“When I looked at the translations, there were clearly some errors made, and I thought the importance of the poem – a poem about an intense generosity – it was lost,” says Gafori. “He sets up these apocalyptic visions and asks us, ‘What are you going to do in the face of crisis? Who are you going to be? How much generosity are you going to show? Are you going to rise to the occasion?’ at’s an important question for us to ask at this point.”

Before Gafori’s translation, the foremost translators of Rumi included a 19th century Englishman, Arthur John Arberry and Coleman Barks, an American who does not speak or read Persian.

Arberry translates the opening line of “Whatever the Ways of the World” as, “Whatever comes of the world’s a airs, how does that a ect your business?” Barks, whose translation is based on Arberry’s, is, “What happens in the world, what business is that of yours?”

Gafori’s translation is richer, more nuanced, taking into account common Persian expressions and colloquialisms.

Gold is a collection of 32 Rumi poems, some previously translated and some not.

PHOTO BY ABIGAIL DUNN

She also considers cultural shifts over the years since Rumi wrote his poetry while paying respect to his overall poetic vision. Gafori translates the opening line as, “Whatever the ways of the world, what fruits do you bring?”

“I felt a responsibility,” Gafori says. “I feel a love for the poetry – that’s the rst thing – and translation is the most intimate way to engage with a poem. I wanted to [translate], but also there were times when I felt like it was my duty.”

Gafori’s appearance in the Greater Cincinnati area will include two days of readings and singing performances of the poetry in Gold as part of theRumi Nights: Poetry, Song and Friendship event. On July 13, she will participate in an evening of yoga and mindfulness with Embra Studio. e following morning, she will join e Hive for an intimate conversation about Rumi and poetry. e culmination of Gafori’s time here will take place that evening in a special performance at the Woodward eater bene tting Bellevue, Kentucky nonpro t e Well.

“It really is a celebration of our community,” said Stacy Sims, founder of e Well. e Well is home to di erent programs that put mindfulness front and center, including Mindful Music Moments, a program now in more than 300 schools that leads school children daily in a mindful response to a different musical selection. Incubated in partnership with e On Being Project, created initially in celebration of National Poetry Month, Mindful Poetry Moments similarly uses poetry as a mindfulness prompt. e program features invited guests who share poetry and o ers space for attendees to write and read their responses. Gafori was an invited guest to the program when it moved into the virtual realm for the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic. When Sims learned of her newly-published book, she invited Gafori to Cincinnati. e ultimate goal is to share Rumi’s timeless work with an expanded audience, Gafori says.

“ e more the merrier, in terms of translation,” says Gafori. “I’m not someone who’s going to sit here and judge, or tell someone not to translate. It’s an intimate experience, and when you’re dealing with a poet like Rumi or [Austrian poet Rainer Maria] Rilke, for instance, they grab you. Many people who read them feel a desire to translate. It’s in the plethora of translations, I think, that we might get very close to the poet.”

“I felt a responsibility,” Gafori says. “I feel a love for the poetry – that’s the rst thing – and translation is the most intimate way to engage with a poem.”

Rumi Nights: Poetry, Song and

Friendship will be held July 13 and 14. To learn about Gafori or to purchase Gold, visit halehliza.com. For event information, visit thewell.world.