Arts Showcase and Grand Re-Opening of the Visual and Performing Arts Center

Frederick Community College will hold an Arts Showcase and Grand Re-Opening of the Visual and Performing Arts Center from 2-6:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 12. The Art Showcase is free and open to the public.

The event will include a 2:30 p.m. dedication of the Walter Folger Art Corridor, among other scheduled events featuring performances, exhibits, demonstrations and displays by student, faculty and visiting artists.

Walter D. Folger was a professor in the Visual Arts and Photography Departments at Frederick Community College from 1989 to 2005. He published photography in a variety of publications including, Country Living, Victorian Homes, and Great Glass in American Architecture.

Folger’s paintings have been exhibited at The Peale Museum ("Life in Baltimore"), the Maryland Regional Exhibition Baltimore Museum of Art – where Folger was awarded the Governor’s prize – and ISC Gallery and Galleria Il Capitello in Rome, Italy, among other locations.

In addition to his tenure at FCC, Folger taught at community colleges and universities throughout Maryland and conducted children’s classes at the Baltimore Museum of Art.

Prior to the Folger dedication, The FCC percussion ensemble will perform “Take Three” by Anthony Cirone and selections from the “Anna Magdalena Notebook” by Bach arranged for percussion by Jaques Delecluse. The ensemble's director, Greg Herron, will also offer an up-close demonstration of FCC's large cache of high quality percussion instruments in the new percussion facility.

Student percussion performers include: Gilbert Rupp, Shawn Winpigler, and Shane Finkelstein.

Other afternoon showcase events include:

· 2:20-4:00 p.m. musical instruments, music and sound sculpture discussion and demonstration by Visiting Artist Brian Ransom

· musical performances by students and faculty

· music lab and graphic design lab technology demonstrations

· mixed media and illustrations by Visiting Artist Jamie Grubby (Mary Condon Hodgson Art Gallery). Grubby’s exhibit runs from April 5-April 30, with an opening reception from 5-7 p.m. on April 5.

· displays of student work

· monologues and scenes by Theatre FCC

Evening Showcase events include:

· 6:30 p.m. Jazz in the JBK, featuring faculty, guests, and alumnae (free admission)

· 8:00 p.m. “Reefer Madness” in the FCC Studio Theater. (General Admission: Adults $10; Students and Senior Citizens $7).

Classrooms, offices, and other spaces within the Visual and Performing Arts Center underwent renovations in Summer 2013. In addition to those renovations, The FCC Studio Theater, a new black-box style theater, was also constructed.

All renovated spaces opened for student, faculty and public use in Fall 2013. Classroom renovations included a new rehearsal room with acoustical wall and ceiling treatments and a sound-insulated percussion room.

"The new music rehearsal rooms are among the finest for community colleges in the state. They are spacious, well-insulated and carefully designed for optimum sound,” said Music Program Manager Dr. Jan Holly. “The percussion room is large enough to store our many traditional, orchestral and global percussion instruments, as well as rehearse our Percussion Ensemble, provide lessons--and give percussion students a super place to practice.

“It's a dream come true."