THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 30, 1995 TAG: 9511300050
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TERESA ANNAS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 90 lines
ON FRIDAY, Norfolk guitarist Sam Dorsey will perform an upbeat piece called ``Sunburst'' for the Day Without Art program at the Chrysler Museum of Art.
The midday event, which features a variety of readings and performances, marks the loss due to AIDS of many of the world's performing and visual artists, from dancer Rudolf Nureyev to Broadway director Michael Bennett.
Worldwide, 6,500 cultural institutions are participating in the seventh annual event sponsored by Visual AIDS, a nonprofit group based in Manhattan. Museums, theaters and other groups take various approaches, from shrouding art to staging performances.
Dorsey said he opted to play the Andrew York tune, instead of a sadder song, ``to remember the good things. To remember why it's all worth living.''
Among the performers:
Soprano Amy Johnson, representing Virginia Opera, will sing ``Salce, Salce'' and ``Ave Maria'' from Verdi's ``Otello.''
Norfolk actor G.F. Rowe will read from Dylan Thomas' ``Do not go gentle into that good night.''
Norfolk State University Dance Theater will perform ``Rock That'' to music by Earth, Wind and Fire.
Charlie Hensley, Virginia Stage Company's artistic director, will read Edna St. Vincent Millay's poem ``Dirge Without Music.''
A Virginia Symphony quartet will play music by the 18th century French composer Francois Devienne.
Between performances, Norfolk storyteller Lynn Ruehlmann and WVEC-TV anchor Jim Kincaid will read from Abraham Verghese's ``My Own Country: A Doctor's Story,'' about a Kentucky couple who contracted AIDS.
The museum's program was organized by Trinkett Clark, the curator of 20th century art, and education director Ann Vernon.
``I don't want this event to be completely somber,'' Clark said. ``I don't want it to be like a funeral. I want it more to be a gift from various artists in the community to mark the passing, mark the suffering people have gone through with AIDS.''
The performers felt the same.
``I have great friends who are HIV positive, and in and out of the hospital,'' Dorsey said. ``I know when I have my guitar there, I usually don't play'' something depressing.
``I'll play goofy music. Just positive, sweet pieces.''
In the dance world, ``we've lost a lot of people to this disease,'' said Frank Bove, head of Norfolk's Virginia Ballet Theater, which will present the ``snow scene'' from ``The Nutcracker Suite.''
One major loss was very close to home - Glenn White, the former Virginia Ballet director who died in 1992 of AIDS.
``My wife, Janina, and I have had a lot of friends who have passed away as a result of it. At least 20. I feel that it's very fitting that the arts set aside a day for this,'' Bove said.
But the program needn't be a downer, he said. ``This is a celebration of the contributions of the artists, and everybody's life. It's our third year doing it here, and it's always been dealt with in that way.
``And that's much of the reason we've been part of it. It's not a mourning. It is in celebration of life. And I think that's very fitting.''
One of the program's organizers, Tidewater AIDS Crisis Task Force, maintains statistics on recorded cases of HIV and AIDS but does not have figures on the number of local artists who have died of AIDS, said TACT education director Irma Hinkle.
In Hampton Roads, 1,896 AIDS cases and 2,881 HIV cases have been reported, Hinkle said.
A stretch of galleries in the 100 block of Granby Street in downtown Norfolk also are paying homage to Day Without Art. Calvin & Lloyd is darkening its big picture windows, and Palmer-Rae Gallery is shrouding a large painting. Zeitgeist Gallery is completely dismantling its exhibition, taking down all the Lesley Morgan paintings and setting them on the floor, facing the wall.
``I know people all over the place'' who have died of AIDS, said Wiley Francisco of Calvin & Lloyd. ``Maybe half a dozen. And two very close friends in the last two years.
``It's very strange . . . that they aren't here.'' ILLUSTRATION: TAMARA VONINSKI
The Virginian-Pilot
Norfolk guitarist Sam Dorsey will perform for Day Without Art.
JUST THE FACTS
What: Day Without Art, performances and readings in honor of
artists who have died of AIDS
Where: The Chrysler Museum of Art, 245 W. Olney Road, Norfolk
When: 12:30 p.m. Friday
How much: free
Call: 664-6200
by CNB