Arts Paper
As the editorially independent arm of The Arts Council of Greater New Haven, the Arts Paper seeks to celebrate, explore, and investigate the fine, visual, performing and culinary arts in and around New Haven.
Sirat Gonzales. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Anne Tyler Calabresi and Roslyn Milstein Meyer, the ladies of the evening. Judy Sirota Rosenthal Photos.
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Kate Estevez / Yale Schwarzman Center Photos.
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Jordan Cunningham and Alder Honda Smith, who he will forever call "Ms. Honda," a term of respect, no matter how old he gets. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Hill champion Ann Boyd with members of her family. Abiba Biao Photos.
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Top: Anne Cubberly's Giant Puppets at the 2024 International Festival of Arts & Ideas, which lost $65,000 of NEA grant funding. Bottom: Young cellist Amiel "AJ" Johnson, a sixth grader at Nathan Hale School and a student at Music Haven. Lucy Gellman File Photos.
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Patricia Bellamy-Mathis. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Sharmont "Influence" Little performs with the New Haven Symphony Orchestra in Nov. 2024. Photo by Matt Fried, courtesy of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra.
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Semi Semi-Dikoko, David Sepulveda, and Aleta Staton at the Arts Awards. Judy Sirota Rosenthal File Photo with permission from the Arts Council of Greater New Haven. The second photo in this story is from the photographer Leigh Busby, used with permission.
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Top: Johnny Rivera and Elena Hogan-Perez. Bottom: The Queen gets her moves on. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Meredith Truax Photo, courtesy of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas. In addition to Joy, musicians included Evan Sherman, Paul Sikivie, Donavan Austin, David Mason, Connor Rohrer, Jason Charos, and Kendric McCallister.
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Esther Chiang (right), Melanie Barocas Mayer, and Sherry Pocknett (left) make corn cakes. Photos Kapp Singer. Esther Chiang added a few cups of cornmeal, some baking soda, and a touch of salt and pepper to a bowl. She slowly poured in water until the mixture was the consistency of thick pancake batter. After stirring in a few scallions and cranberries, she scooped it into a hot pan. “I want to cook, I want to eat, and I want to hear the stories,” said Chiang, the food justice education coordinator at Common Ground High School. As she made corn cakes alongside two other volunteers, Chef Sherry Pocknett looked on, giving them tips—a little more water, a little hotter pan, “too much oil!” On Tuesday, the two came together at an Indigenous cooking workshop and dinner with Pocknett, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe and the first Indigenous woman to receive a James Beard award. Held at Gateway Community College’s Cafe Vincenzo as part of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas, the event brought in roughly fifty people. Diners enjoyed samples of venison skewers, salmon bites, and turkey meatballs. As they ate “Indian tacos” with fry bread and beef, blueberry fritters, and quahog fritters, Pocknett told stories about Indigenous cuisines of the Northeast and her own journey to becoming a chef. Diners line up to try the food. Her first food memory came on a trip she took with her father when she was eight, to Washburn Island off the southern end of Cape Cod. Her father dropped her and her siblings off on the island, gave them some matches and fishing line, and told them to fend for themselves. She remembers picking blueberries and digging for clams, quahogs, and mussels. “There was an abundance of food,” she said. “I learned well, and I try to teach my children the same.” Back at home, after receiving a Suzy Homemaker oven, she began cooking. She remembers stealing all the food out of the fridge at home and making a meal for her brothers. “I knew then I was going to be a chef,” she said with a laugh. As she grew up, she learned to cook at The Flume, her family’s restaurant on Cape Cod. Her uncle was the chef and her grandmother the baker. She eventually became the food and beverage director at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center in Ledyard, Connecticut. There, she transformed a menu of hotdogs and grilled cheese into one with dishes like turtle soup, venison, and smoked fish. In 2023, she received the prize for best chef in the Northeast category for her Charlestown, Rhode Island restaurant Sly Fox Den Too. The restaurant, which she opened in 2021, was meant to be a simple stepping stone for a larger farm-to-table location that she is planning to open in Preston, Connecticut. But while she fundraised to open the larger restaurant, her food started turning heads. “I got nominated and I was like ‘what the heck is the James Beard Award?’” she said. Pocknett. With the restaurant she is developing in Preston, she hopes to bring new life to the traditional foods of the Northeast. In addition to the dining room and kitchen, her plans include a cultural center and a two-and-a-half acre farm, which she’s already begun planting with raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, and sassafras. “I’m hoping to bring the beach plums back,” Pocknett added. “I don’t notice so many on the Cape anymore.” Pocknett recounted that, since she grew up on Cape Cod, she’s seen the toll that environmental degradation takes on Indigenous food systems and traditions. The ponds she swam in as a child have since been contaminated by the area’s septic systems and fertilizer runoff from lawns and golf courses. Combined with warmer water temperatures, frequent blooms of toxic algae make swimming dangerous. “My grandkids can’t swim in that lake anymore,” she added. “It just makes me so sad what’s happening with the water.” Not only does the algae cause the pond to be unswimmable, but it also kills fish, frogs, and other animals and plants, disrupting traditional Mashpee Wampanoag foodways. “Instead of making that grass green, just plant some food. That grass is poison,” Pocknett said. Despite this, Pocknett’s visit to Arts & Ideas was one of hope. Just a week before coming to New Haven, she found out that she was cancer-free after a years-long battle with the disease. She is finishing her chemotherapy treatment next week, just as she turns 64. “I’m gonna live to see my new restaurant open,” Pocknett said, as tears welled up in her eyes. That hope found its way into the food on Tuesday. Diners scraped their plates clean and fresh corn cakes were passed around. “My mom always says you have to put love into your cooking,” said her daughter and business partner Cheyenne Galvin-Pocknett. “That energy goes into your food.”
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The Whitney Water Treatment Facility. Photos Kapp Singer.
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Shayla Streater, Amayah Smith, Nevaé Brightly, Lilah Jackson and Santana Brightly. Abiba Biao Photos.
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The Kevin Harris Project performs at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
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Reese Mcleod, Diane X. Brown, and Nick Wantsala take a moment to pose together in the midst of the celebration. Alisha Martindale Photos.
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The family of community activist and former Hill Parents Association President Fred Harris poses for a portrait together in honor of the 40 years he has been serving the Hill Neighborhood. The International Festival of Arts & Ideas held its celebration of the Hill neighborhood last Saturday. Alisha Martindale Photos.
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Quiala talks about all things Arts & Ideas Festival 2024 at the kickoff reception. Markeshia Ricks Photos.
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Santana Brightly, who later took first place in the "Afro Future, Afro Chic" fashion show. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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DJ Dooley-O Jackson and Ch'Varda. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Photo courtesy of Kristina Wong.
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The company in Heidi Latsky Dance: D.I.S.P.L.A.Y.E.D. The work ran last Wednesday and Thursday at the Iseman Theatre as part of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas. Kamini Purushotham Photos.
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Angélique Kidjo and the New Haven Symphony Orchestra (NHSO). Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Sheree Baldwin-Muhammad. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Lucy Nalpathanchil and Leah Penniman. Judy Sirota Rosenthal Photo.
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James Keene, who was a Harmony Fellow with the New Haven Symphony Orchestra in 2018. Lucy Gellman File Photo.
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Jason Ramos and Amanda Duvall of Baila Con Gusto CT. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Image Courtesy of the International Festival of Arts & Ideas. Mindy Tucker Photo.
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Hollis Ngai introducing his podcast project. Screenshot from the event.
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Kot performing earlier this year, at the Le Duc des Lombards in Paris. Marion Ruszniewski Photo.
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Monk Flake Family performing on stage.
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Photo from the panel. Screenshot via YouTube.
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Kiki Lucia, who became the host, historian, storyteller and spiritual support during Sunday's show. Lucia's role as emcee included nine costume changes. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Cynthia Rojas. Leah Andelsmith Photos.
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Jamie Belton at the Hair & Art Show. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Kennedy of the Kennedy Administration. Lucy Gellman Photos.
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Top row: John Dankosky, Ian Leung, and Destiny Thomas. Second row: Norman Garrick, Seung Namgoong, ASL Interpreter Anita Benjamin. Bottom: ASL Interpreter Brynn Hickey. Screenshot from the event.
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Manny James and the Soulclectic Experience. Screenshots from YouTube.
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Clockwise from top: Eriel Deranger, Diana Montano and Kyle Whyte. Screenshot from the event.
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Judy Sirota Rosenthal Photo. Tom Griggs and Liz Fisher kept the International Festival of Arts & Ideas running through some of its leanest years. Now, they’re preparing to say goodbye.
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Dar Williams on her book tour. “I grew up with a downtown and a lot of people grew up with a downtown, and there are all sorts of economic arguments for why it’s so important to have that collection of stores who sponsor little leagues, have apprentices," she said in her talk last Sunday. Photo Courtesy of the artist and her website .
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“I grew up around a generation of people who I, wrongly, thought of as permanent,” Ain Gordon said during an audience talkback Tuesday night. “I just thought they were always going to be there. Many of them also had been … had been seminal in some way, or seemed to be a big deal. And then slowly they were not a big deal. And then slowly, they were no deal.” Paula Court Photo Courtesy International Festival of Arts & Ideas.
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Griggs, Fisher and Herzog (with former director Mary Lou Aleskie) at an A&I event last year. Photo courtesy Festival of Arts & Ideas.
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