The Well-Tempered Ear

Classical music: The inaugural LunART Festival — celebrating women creators and performers — will take place this coming Thursday through Saturday

By Jacob Stockinger

The timing couldn’t be better or more relevant, given the rise of the #MeToo movement and the increased attention being paid to the role of women in the creative and performing arts.

So The Ear is pleased to post the following announcement about the inaugural LunART Festival, which will take place this coming Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

The announcement comes from festival co-directors flutist Iva Ugrcic (below top) and oboist Laura Medisky (below bottom). Both women are doctoral graduates from the UW-Madison Mead Witter School of Music, and both are members of the Black Marigold woodwind quintet and have played with the Madison Symphony Orchestra and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra.

The first-ever LunART Festival will be held in Madison, Wisconsin, from this Thursday through Saturday, June 28-30, with the mission to support, inspire, promote and celebrate women in the arts through pubic performances, exhibitions, workshops and interdisciplinary collaboration.

The festival — showcasing 40 international women artists — will provide accessible, high-quality, engaging concerts and events with diverse programming through various arts fields. All artistic creators represented at LunART (composers, visual artists, writers, speakers) will be women.

To showcase women in the arts and bring their work into the spotlight, this three-day event includes a variety of FREE and ticketed concerts, outreach events and educational programs.

The artistic goal is to share works of women artists, and ensure the progress women have made will continue to flourish and grow, overcoming issues of gender inequity in the Arts. LunART supports artistic development of all aspiring regional, national, and international artists, whether emerging or established in their fields.

“This festival will raise awareness of the position of women in the arts through engaging, accessible concerts and events,” says founder and executive director Ugrcic. “The LunART Festival offers diverse programs representing current and relevant women in the arts,and we are committed to expanding and strengthening community ties through public performances and exhibitions. As we establish the festival’s reach into our local community and beyond, we see tremendous potential for growth in future years, with opportunities to expand our vision to theater, dance, opera and the visual arts, creating an interdisciplinary festival dedicated to women in all the arts.”

Through LunART’s mission and vision, the greater Madison community, audiences, festival musicians, artists, and the global music community will be directly impacted by:

•  Raising awareness of the position of women in the arts
•  Empowering women artists and creating a sense of unity and community
•  Establishing artistic relationships and opening doors for future collaborations
•  Creating lines for global connections rooted in Madison
•  Introducing underrepresented artists to Wisconsin audiences
•  Reaching diverse audiences, and drawing from underserved populations
•  Providing opportunity for local businesses to be involved in the arts, supporting an 
organization with a specific social cause. 
The inaugural festival includes three ticketed evening Gala concerts of contemporary classical music and two “Starry Night” late-night performances featuring a local woman hip-hop artist, singer-songwriter, and a rock band.

Also on the schedule is an outreach concert featuring emerging women composers, a lecture about the influence of women in the arts, and a panel discussion about collaboration in the arts.

The festival’s 2018 Artist-in-Residence is award-winning composer Jenni Brandon from Long Beach, California. Brandon’s instrumental and vocal works will be showcased at the Gala concerts, including one world premiere. (You can hear a sample of her work in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

To connect with women composers globally, the festival held a call for scores, from December to March, that was open to women composers of all ages and nationalities, and received scores from over 90 applicants from more than 20 countries.

• LunART Festival has partnered with area art organizations including Overture Center for the Arts, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, First United Methodist Church, Madison Public Library, Capitol Lakes Retirement Center, and First Unitarian Society of Madison, as well as local businesses Robinia Courtyard, Bos Meadery, and Field Table. LunART is supported by Dane Arts and Madison Arts Commission, won second place at the 2018 UW Arts Business Competition, and is a finalist for the 2018 National Flute Association’s C.R.E.A.T.E. Project Competition.

For a complete schedule of the varied events, go to this website and click on Learn More:  https://www.lunartfestival.org/events

The main concluding event is the gala concert of “Women’s Voices” on Saturday, June 30, at 7 p.m. in the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive. Tickets are $20 for general admission, $10 for students. They can be purchased in advance by going to the website for the concert, which is below.

The website also has the full list of performers and the full program – including works by Hildegard von Bingen, Fanny Mendelssohn and Amy Beach and many contemporary women composers.

Go to: https://www.lunartfestival.org/womens-voices