Chautauqua Institution officially turned 144 years young with its annual, all-day Old First Night and Annual Fund Day festivities Tuesday. The activities began on Bestor Plaza with the Family-friendly Chautauqua Birthday Celebration. That day, donors to the Chautauqua Fund were entered into a drawing for a half-day pontoon boat rental. The winner was 4-year-old Lily Hird (every gift, regardless of size or the size of the Chautauquan, matters!), and her family, of Youngstown, Ohio. Thanks to the collective birthday gift of this community throughout Annual Fund Day and the evening of Old First Night, over $26,000 was raised in support of the 2018 Chautauqua Fund. Later that evening in the Amphitheater, the traditional Old First Night included such beloved traditions as the Drooping of the Lillies and a Vespers litany penned by Bishop John Heyl Vincent. The day featured something from both new and longtime Chautauquans alike, all in the spirit of honoring and celebrating the continuous, lived mission set forth by the Institution’s founders:
A shared space for learning, for recreation in every sense of the word, and for community.

Curated by School of Dance Director of Contemporary Studies Sasha Janes, An Evening of Pas de Deux featuring Alumni Artists on Wednesday, Aug. 1, in the Amphitheater featured former students who have gone on to become company members at such esteemed troupes as New York City Ballet, Joffrey Ballet, Aspen Santa Fe Ballet, Alvin Ailey Dance Theater, and The Washington Ballet, among others. The evening highlighted the incredible grace and technical skill these dancers possess, and provided an opportunity to showcase an additional art form.

The process of creating these photographs combines several techniques. All photos were made entirely in-camera; no fancy post-processing work was used. Traditionally, a fast shutter speed is used to stop motion and ensure sharp photos. For these photos, a slow shutter speed was used — anywhere between half a second to a full five seconds — to capture the graceful motion of the dancers. A technique called multiple exposures was also used. This process allows multiple frames, between two and nine, to be stacked, in-camera, into one image.

Children’s School students have messy good time at the first-ever Mud Day.

Leonard Bernstein’s operetta Candide demands a smorgasbord of sets and costumes, as the title character traverses more than eight countries, each with their own stylistic air. Teams of carpenters, seamstresses and wigmakers put in weeks of work for only two shows. Candide opened Friday, July 27, and will run once more Monday, July 30, in Norton Hall.

Chautauqua Opera Company’s crew built all of this season’s sets in Norton Hall’s backstage workshop. For the week of Candide dress rehearsals and performances, they share the space with the cast as a series of choral quick changes turn the sawdust-covered shop into a de facto dressing room.

“It’s a frenetic show backstage,” said Martha Ruskai, wig and makeup designer.

She designed hairpieces and accessories that come on and off easily between scenes. “We have wigs on top of wigs,” she said. “We have wigs with magnets and hats with magnets.”

Days before opening night, crew workers clad in plastic bags finished spray-painting a vignette on the backdrop amid clattering drills and hammers.

By the end of the week, backstage was a whimsical storm of their collective efforts. Trays of fake cake and feathered wigs wait alongside raw plywood and rows of tools. But when the curtain rises, their labors assume supporting roles to the artists onstage.

A job well done is a job unnoticed by the audience, Ruskai said: “Ideally, they don’t even know that we’ve done anything.”

Along with Bird, Tree & Garden Club naturalist Jack Gulvin, community members tagged resident purple martins before their seasonal migration from Chautauqua Lake to Brazil.

Conservation Technician Elyse Henshaw and Twan Leenders, president of the Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History, bands a purple martin prior to its migration south on Friday, July 20, 2018, near Chautauqua Lake. Banding allows scientists, researchers and bird lovers alike to track the migration path of certain species.

Twan Leenders, president of the Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History, assists Jack Gulvin in the final purple martin chat.

From Stockholm, Sweden, to St. Petersburg,Russia; L’AnseauxMeadows, Newfoundland, to Chautauqua Lake. The Norseman’s journey hasn’t always been smooth sailing.

The 40-foot replica Viking ship nearly didn’t get the chance to set sail on Chautauqua Lake after the 1997 GMC 3500 truck that tows the vessel caught fire in Jamestown.

That setback didn’t stop Heldegard Lindstrom, membership chairwoman and events coordinator for Leif Ericson Viking Ship, Inc., and her Viking cohorts from plundering along the shores. The group was in the area for the Jamestown Scandinavian Folk Festival, and docked at Pier Club last Friday afternoon.

Members of the group mostly come from the Philadelphia area, Baltimore and New York City, and travel with the intent of educating people about the Vikings.

“They were not just plunderers and marauders,” Lindstrom said. “They were the first to have parliament; women were allowed to own land. They were far advanced for the era in which they were living.”

In a week exploring “The Art of Play,” Chautauquans of all ages were invited to take part in the CHQ Olympics. The friendly competition included an inflatable swan race, obstacle course, blindfolded longest-drive competition, Color Sprint, and a number of other events across the grounds. Winners were announced Friday, and we are pleased to publish the teams who placed in the top 10. (We would also like to note that a team from the Daily placed 14th out of 39 registered teams.)

“I am offering this poem to you, since I have nothing else to give,” read Vanessa DeStevens, a Jamestown High School student, on the steps of the Colonnade. The words, written by Jimmy Santiago Baca, rang out from the blue-haired DeStevens with palpable emotion.

Jamestown High School students visited the Poetry Makerspace on Wednesday to learn about poetry as part of both the CLSC Young Readers program and a new event called Stanzas on the Plaza. Several students had the opportunity to read poems to a crowd.

The Poetry Makerspace currently houses the Traveling Stanzas exhibit from Kent State University’s Wick Poetry Center.

The exhibit allows people to experience poetry in an accessible and tactile way, with iPads that let guests create blackout poems and word blocks to display on the wall.

“It’s a great opportunity to write poetry,” said Linda Poelma, a Chautauquan. “It’s difficult and I never liked it. But this sounds fun to me. I’ll try it.”

Chautauqua Literary Arts is also reaching out to area high school students, so they have an opportunity to experience the Makerspace, something they would not get to do in a classroom.

Poetry was something Anthony Weber, a sophomore at Jamestown High School thought about before, but this year those thoughts were much stronger. Weber credits his teachers with introducing him to the programs at Chautauqua.

Poetry has given Weber and many high school students like him an outlet for their thoughts and emotions.

“It helps me talk about my feelings in a different form,” Weber said.