Saturday, February 17, 1973
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Saturday, February 17, 1973 I ;-~L M-~AIN LJAILY ruge inre~
Benefit exhibit helps rebuild
Nicaraguan cultural center
to
0
By JEFF SORENSEN
The local exhibit for artist
Alejandro Arostegui may not
make the fortune that the Rolling
Stones did in their Nicaraguan
benefit, but it does offer Ann(
Arbor residents a rare opportun-
ity to view the works of a major
international painter.
On Dec. 23, 1972, when an
earthquake devasted much of
Managua, Nicaragua, "I was
sleeping in my parents' home in-
stead of being at my studio as I
usually am at that time," Aros-
tegui says. Unfortunately his
studio, several of his paintings,
and a nearby cultural center
were badly damaged.
The cultural center, GAleria
Praxis, was nearly completely
lost. "The center contained the
paintings of myself as well as
four other artist-friends, some of
whom had their works damaged
even more severely than mine,"
says Arostegui in a heavy accent.
Because the center served as a
focal point of intellectual and
artistic activity in Nicaragua,
Arostegui and his friends are
starting an effort to rebuild it.
The Forsythe Gallery is help-
ing in this effort by displaying
some of his works in a benefit
that ends today. According to
gallery director Daniel De Graaf,
the influence of Arostegui's na-
tive country on his work should
be noted, "both in its subject
matter-the Nicaraguan lakes
and manifestations of local color
-and in its spirit, a keen sense
of drama being the dominant
I
L.
*CANNEDNEAT * T. REX
* JEI ES AU~ifI ~DA
,. ~ OR *18B~ JO D
® -Metrocolor
not continuous with
"The Valachi Papers"
MIDNIGHT SHOW
Friday and Saturday
plus Chapter 3 of
our continuing serial
"FLASH GORDON"
with Ming the Merciless
and Dr. Zarkov
starring Buster Crabbe
Doors Open 11:45
Admission $2.00
Next Weekend
Feb. 23 and 24
"ZACHARIAH"
plus "FLASH GORDON"
chapter four
sr.T1- PorUn
characteristics of his composi-
tions."
These works on exhibit have
been assembled from the Pan-
American Union in Washington,
D.C., from Arostegui's sister's
collection in Ann Arbor (She
was instrumental in suggesting
the benefit.), and also from
painting in his collection in Ma-
nagua which weren't destroyed.
"Some of the paintings were lost
in the disaster," explains Aros-
tegui, "but some also escaped
unharmed and some are saveable
because they can be retouched."
Arostegui, one of Nicaragua's
foremost painters, now has a
visa for a one-month stay in the
U.S. and is in New York at
present, although he was in town
earlier during the exhibition.
Many of the paintings will re-
main here for several weeks but
probably not be open for public
viewing.
The Gallery charges a one-
dollar minimum donation toward
the reconstruction project. Aros-
tegui says that the benefit hasn't
been particularly financially suc-
cessful but that it is very help-
ful and. appreciated nonetheless.
Arostegui was born in Blue-
fields, Nicaragua and first came
to the U.S. when he was 19 to
Tulane University. Therehe orig-
inally studied architecture, "be-
cause my parents wanted me to.
I'd always been interested in
drawing and painting, but I felt
at the time that it wasn't a good
way to make a living."
Nevertheless, after one year,
he made a final decision to take
up painting as a career and
attended the Ringling School of
Art in Sarasota, Florida. After-
ward he traveled to Europe to
study for several years and then
returned to Nicaragua about ten
years ago. Since then he has com-
pleted the works which are on
exhibit.
Ann Arbor may have to wait
quite a while for another treat
like Arostegui's display-a dis-
play that isedesigned not only to
entertain the viewer, but also to
reconstruct a cultural part of
Nicaragua that other relief ef-
forts cannot cover.
Have a flair for
artistic writing?.
If you are interest-
ed in re view in g
poetry, and music.
drama, dance, film,
or writing feature
stories a b o u t the
arts: Contact Arf
Editorcy do Te
Michigan Daily.
Daily Photo by TOM GOTTLIEB
Punch and pictures
Photographer Gregory Campbell poses himself-for a change-at a punch-and-cookies reception yes-
terday for his one-man show. The Union Gallery exhibit will run through March 2. Unfortunately the
cookies will not.
Pavlo Hummel:
Exploiting anti-war sentiment
tonight
6:00 2 4 News
7 Golf Tournament
9 TI Is Is Your Life
50 Star Trek
56 Thirty Minutes With
6:30 2 CBS News
4 NBC News
9 Fishin' Hole
56 Consumer Game
7:00 2 Truth or Consequences
4 George Plerrot
7 News
9 Untamed World
50 Hee Haw
.56 U.S. Industrial Film Festival
7:30 2 Young Dr. Kildare
4 Adventurer
7 Town Meeting
9 Detroit Diesel
56 Eye to Eye
8:00 2 Al in the Family
4 Emergency!
7 Here We Go Again
9 NHL Hockey
56 Movie
"Ivan the Terrible," Part I,
(1943)
50 That Good Ole Nashville
Music
8:30 2 Bridget Loves Bernie
7 A Touch of Grace
50 Nitty Gritty
9:00 2 MaryTyler Moore
4 Movie
"The Alamo" Part 1
7 Julie Andrews
50 Black Omnibus
9:30 2 Bob Newhart
10:00 2 Carol Burnett
7 Jigsaw
56 Cambridge Debate on Women's
Lib
50 Lou Gordon
10:30 9 Document
11:00 2 4 7 9 News
56 Net Opera Theatre
11:15 7 ABC News
9 Provincial Affairs
11:20 9 News
11:30 2 Movie
"Assault on a Queen" (1966)
4 Johnny Carson
7 Movie
"All in A Night's Work" (1961)
9 Movie
"The Rare Breed" (1966)
50Movie
"Godzilla" (Japanese, 1956)
1:00 4 News
1:30 2 Movie
"The Flesh Eaters" (1967)
7 Movie
"The Uninhibited" (Spanish,
1965)
3:00 2 7 News
wcbn
listings
9:00-Maranatha Music
12:00-Radio Prison
2:00-Basketball: UM vs Northwestern
4:00-Jazz
S:09-Progressive Rock
11 :00-The Potato Show
A
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I -- I
COMING SOON
1
By MITCHELL ROSS
David Rabe's Basic Training
of Pavlo Hummel, presented this
weekend as a Showcase Produc-
tion of the University Players,
exploits popular sentiments con-
cerning the Indochina war. Now
that the Wvar is concluded and
46,000 Americans are in their
graves, this infantile rant should
soon be buried too, though far
from the soldiers whose loss is
honestly mourned.
Nevertheless, I recall the re-
views hailing Pavlo as the first
great drama to come out of Viet-
nam, written by a veteran with
a burning sense of guilt. The
average New York drama critic,
who knew less about the war
than a Vietnamese mongoose,
was nonetheless anxious to utilize
Pavlo as a trumpet to call Amer-
ica to a sense of moral outrage.
The opening, at Joseph Papp's
theatre in Greenwich Village, was
so ballyhooed as to give one the
feeling that, were we all to go
down and look in on Pavlo's sad
story, our souls might undergo
a general resurrection, with
Righteo'isness reigning once more
in the Republic.
Alas, dear friends, 'tis not so.
Pavlo Hummel is petty and pal-
try, a mere impertinence which
exploits morality much less than
it does language. One is not re-
quired to have believed in "peace
with honor" in order to deplore
this play. Literacy alone will do.
Rabe's favorite noun in Pavlo
Hummel, is "shit." The same
word is, in addition, Rabe's fav-
orite adjective, verb, adverb, and
past participle. Such chastity of
diction strikes me as the only
consistent aspect of the play.
With almost military discipline,
it shoots forth from the mouth
of each soldier as the work pro-
ceeds from incident to incident.
While this bogus drama is so
amorphous as to lack any sem-
blance of climax, there is one
speech, at the evening's close,
which might be described as a
summary of all that has occurred
until thatmoment. It is delivered
by Pavlo - from his coffin,
strangely enough, and after he is
dead, at that. It goes, simply,
"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit."
Requiem aeternam!
What to say about all this?
Nothing if you ask me, unless
we are to borrow from the
author's rich vocabulary. If I
have given very little in the way
of a summary, that is because
I do not feel it is my duty to
clean up other people's messes.
Suipposedly, the work accounts
for the activities of a vague and
uninteresting fellow named Pavlo
Hummel, first in basic training
camp in Georgia, and later in
Vietnam itself. However, the
whole matter is badly muddled
by a series of crudely devised
flash-backs, while the characters
surrounding the central figure are
so unsavory in outline that the
author does not bother to color
in any of the details-for fear, I
suppose, that he might discover
humanedimensions whichswould
force him to depict something
other than a race of foul-mouthed
imbeciles.
All of which brings us to the
particular production at hand.
Director David Kelley has botch-
ed it badly, succeeding in some-
thing I should have thought im-
possible by darkening what is
already obscure. The trouble is
that Kelley can make no more
senseofRabe than myself, and
so allows confusion to degenerate
into hysteria. We find actors
screami"g at the tops of their
voices for no particular reason,
except, perhaps, to accentuate
the rampant neuroses. What is
worse, we find actors who do not
even know their lines, and so
mumble their way into unintel-
ligibility.
In the title role, John Coneland
is simply incompetent. Rabe's
writing, however awful, at least
suggests several possibilities
around which the character of
Pavlo might take form. There
are hints of roguishness, though
none, to be sure, of humor. There
is a trace of the restless young
man, who might, perhaps, be
driven towards action by all the
holler over saving the world for
democracy. As I say, in the end
it is all very hopeless anyway,
but Copeland might at least make
an effort. Instead, we are forced
to watch the maneuvers of a
mere cipher with a taste for
witless vulgarism and childish
tantrum.
The rest of the cast is not
much better, norhareastage set-
tings of John Oertling, which go
the director one step further in
losing all grasp of time and
place. Indeed, in a charitable
mood we would be inclined to
regard Pavlo Hummel in much
the same terms as many con-
sider the late, lamented war it-
self-as a virulent disease which
infects each person whom it
touches. Dona nobis pacem.
I
CUL TURE CALEIDR
FILM-Cinema Guild presents Forman's Loves of a Blonde
at 7 and 9:05 in Arch. Aud.; Cinema II shows the Marx
brothers'. A Day at the Races in Aud. A, Angell at 7, 9;.
New Morning Films presents Allen's Bananas at,7, 9 in
Aud. 3, MLB; Couzens Film Co-op shows Vampire Lovers
in the cafeteria at 7, 9; UAC-Mediatrics plays Nichols'
Catch 22 at 7, 9:30 in Nat. Sci. Aud.
DRAMA-South Quad Players present The Apple Tree, a
musical comedy in Dining Rm. 4 at 7:30, 10; U Players
offer Rabe's The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummuel at 8
in Trueblood.
MUSIC-The Music Schgol features Ross Miller playing trum-
pet at 8 in SM Recital Hall; The Musical Society brings
Marcel Marceau, pantomimist to the Power Centerat 8;
John Denver gives a concert at Hill at 8-sold out.
ART-The Union Gallery presents photographs by Gregory
Campbell from 12 to 5.
WEEKEND BARS AND MUSIC-Ark, Paul Siebel (Fri., Sat.,
Sun.) admission; Blind Pig, Brooklyn Bluesbusters (Fri.,
Sat.) cover, String Trio (Sun.) no cover; Del Rio, Jazz
(Sun.) no cover; 'Golden Falcon, Fifth Revelation (Fri.,
Sat.) cover; Mackinac Jack's, Lightin' (Fri., Sat., Sun.)
cover; Mr. Flood's Party, Garfield Blues Band (Fri., Sat:)
cover, Diesel Smoke and Dangerous Curves (Sun. at. 3
p.m.) cover; Bimbo's on the Hill, Full Force (Fri., Sat.)
cover; Odyssey, Stone Front (Fri., Sat.) cover, Okra,
(Sun.) cover.
DETROIT HAPPENINGS-Charles Mingus gives a concert at
the Strata Concert Gallery, 46 Selden at 9:30, 11:00,
12:30; Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks appear at the Ma-
sonic Temple at 8 with special guest Bob Seger and
group; Fisher Theatre presents Two Gentlemen of Ver-
ona; yiolinist Zino Francescatti plays with -the Toledo
Symphony Orchestra at the Museum Peristyle at 8:30;
guitarist Gove appears at 10:30, 12:00 at the Raven
Gallery.
The Crackers .
.. hold-up
NEW WORLD FILM COOP
665-6734
UU
j
TUESDAY, FEB. 20, 1973
Ij IA 8TNIITAL
IOZ S.FIRST STREET 63401 4O
PRESENTS THE
SLAVIC FOLK
DANCERS
40 Dancers, Singers, Instrumentalists
in Authentic Costumes
PERFORMIN, DANCES OF
RUSSIA
An all-Slavic POLAND
CROATIA
tAUAnnDAIIWA IAiEnADI' rnena
9
+,
Y
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14
A DAY
AT THE RACES
SATURDAY 17 FEBRUARY
,',
^ ;:
1937 Sam Wood. THE MARX BROTHERS
Take Over A Sanitarium
AUDITORIUM A * 7 & 9:00 * ONE DOLLAR
I
3
2 w _1 -
Woody
Allen's farce
Been Screwed by a Charter Airline.
SGC Wants To Know!
COME TO OUR OFFICES AND TELL US ABOUT IT
LEGAL ACTION IS POSSIBLE!
STUDENT GOVERNMENT COUNCIL
ROOM 3-X, MICHIGAN UNION
?
I
Y3 UAC-DAYSTAR presents
HERBIE HANCOCK
septet
and
FREDDIE HUBBARD
jn DIf l i s hkrn
.N' ~ ~ E .d*~~ MM".