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Archive for October, 2008

David Greenberger (of Duplexplanet.com fame) is nearing the end of his Residency in Applied Arts at the Center on Age & Community (which I direct) at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee.  We’ll miss his elvish humor and deep-souled good-guyness.  Today, he and local collaborator Paul Cebar (and a couple of Paul’s musician friends) played about 5 of the songs they’d created, inspired by David’s conversations with local Milwaukee folks with memory loss.

The venue was less than ideal – a big banquet hall with low ceilings and no stage – even giant pillars blocking the view of the 300 folks gathered for the Milwaukee Aging Consortium’s annual Networking Fair.  But the short musical pieces, built of Paul’s soulful guitar, drums, keyboard and horns, and David’s perfectly tuned jazz-styled readings, were echanting.  Delicate, unique jazz improv snowflakes capturing the delicate conversations that are gone once they hit your hand. Thank you David, thank you Paul.  We hope to bring them back in May for a fully staged show that can really do justice to the beauty of what they created in their three month collaboration in Milwaukee.

David Greenberger and Paul Cebar

David Greenberger and Paul Cebar by Jimherrington.com

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I haven’t seen it yet…but I hope to soon (don’t I always write that? I must have kids or something…).

Choke, a 2008 film by Clark Gregg, is based on a novel by Fight Club author Chuck Palahnuik.  In it, Angelica Huston plays a woman with dementia, whose son is the lost protagonist of the film.  Here’s what the NYT’s Stephen Holden said about her portrayal:

“Playing both the reckless, headstrong younger Ida and the frail but still-demanding older woman who mistakes Victor for everyone but himself when he visits, Ms. Huston gives a compelling portrayal of someone whose mind may be shredded but whose ferocious willpower remains undiminished.”

Dementia is definitely showing up more and more in the indie film world – it has significant metaphoric appeal, as well as real life appeal to those families going through the experience.  I look forward to the film version of The Story of Forgetting – which I hope signs on a visionary director!

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You are what you do…

In the search for clues about how to avoid dementia…here’s the latest article on the topic, which explores your choice of career.  Looks like we are most protected by extensive and continuous intellectual challenges and relatively low stress.

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An article in the NYT’s today shows that how we speak to older adults does in fact matter.  In Forget Memory, I talk about this in depth – and it’s great to see more research coming out about how people with dementia respond to demeaning language, which is so rampant in our care facilities.

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A curator friend of mine from up at the John Kohler Center of the Arts in Sheboygan, WI sent me this email with a link to a recent exhibit that explores memory and forgetting.  Very thought provoking…

“I was searching our Resource Library for additional catalogs on the
subject and found an interesting one titled “The Lining of Forgetting:
Internal and External Memory in Art”  it was for an exhibition featured
at the University of N. Carolina at Greensboro (Weatherspoon Art
Museum).  Deborah Ascheim is featured in it, as well as Dinh Q. Le, Louise
Bourgeois, Rachel Whiteread, Janice Caswell and others. The link to the
gallery and exhibition info is below:”

http://weatherspoon.uncg.edu/exhibitions/exh_detailp.asp?WamExID=103

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