Arts

Millbrook middle school’s drama club took the audience to a land of coconuts, legends, magic, love and ancient beliefs Friday and Saturday night in their modified presentation of Once on this Island.

Alexis Breshnahan, choir teacher for grades 6-12, directed and produced the middle school’s production; the Millbrook Education Foundation contributed significant support to make the musical possible.

Once on this Island, a one-act musical, takes place on a Caribbean island, where three worlds converge: the peasants, the rich Beauxhommes and the gods.  

Rachel Becker is a graduating senior of Bard’s five-year dual-degree conservatory program. She is a cellist also majoring in physics. Bard intrigued her because of the conservatory’s dual-degree program. She said it was a perfect fit for her because going into college she wanted to continue academics at a high level as well as music.

Becker comes from a musical family. Her grandmother, a violinist, taught her and her sister at a young age. At age six she switched to cello. Her mother, a pianist and father, a trumpeter, attended the New England Conservatory.

Growing up in New Jersey, she attended high school at the Marine Academy of Science and Technology (MAST), while simultaneously taking cello lessons at Manhattan School for Music Prep Division. Taking instruction there allowed her to play with students at a similar music a level and commitment as her.

One of the more neglected and underappreciated periods is the arts and crafts movement that happened in the U.S. and in England in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A Millbrook School art history class taught by Bill Hardy and David Greenwood brought this movement to light. The class produced the exceptional exhibition With Noble Hands: necessity made beautiful.

Eckert Fine Art on Main Street in Millerton is exhibiting distinguished American Expressionists through May. Jane Eckert has been selling and distributing art for 15 years in Indiana, Florida, Connecticut and New York. Some of the artists in this show include Jack Roth, Larry Rivers, Lynne Mapp Drexler, Bill Barrett, Ralph Della-Volpe, Michael Kalish, John Greene and Alexander Calder.

While Roth and Calder might be the names most recognized, Ralph Della-Volpe is no stranger to the Millbrook community. He studied painting at the National Academy of Design before entering the Army in World War II. After the war, he accepted a teaching position as the artist-in-residence at Bennett College, where he worked ­­for 28 years, serving as chairman of the Art Department.