Waste Not: Alexandra Kleeman, American Academy in Rome, July 2021

 Aluminum Forest: Sound Installations at the American Academy in Rome, May 20, 2021

I curated this open-air program in collaboration with three Fellows from the American Academy—Katherine Balch, William Dougherty, and Steve Parker—along with composer and improviser Ted Moore and AAR Programs Associate for the Arts Lexi Ebersbacher. The installations and performances responded to the spaces of the Villa Aurelia and the need for social distancing.

If you missed it, you can download the installation brochure here and catch some clips on video.

Alexandra Kleeman, Rome Prize winner in Literature, organized a multimedia evening of poetry, visual arts, music, and food to call attention to the sense of lost time we all experienced during the pandemic. During a five-course meal made from scraps such as breadcrumbs and vegetable peelings, she read poetry that focused on themes of salvage and the possibility of making something meaningful out of loss. She collaborated with other American Academy Fellows who dressed the table and prepared music of “secondary sound,” and with the Rome Sustainable Food Project and chef Kyle Pierce to design the menu. It was a fitting send-off to a group of Rome Prize winners who had spent their fellowship year at the Academy during the height of Covid, and I was honored to support it as the Academy’s Arts Director.