Book Fair

When:    Wednesday & Thursday, May 20th and 21st
               
Where:   The International Center
                Lounge

On Wednesday and Thursday, May 20th and 21st, BookLink, a book distributor specializing in ESL and multicultural books, will be in the lounge with a variety of books for sale.  Included will be books on grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and idioms, as well as story books, TOEFL study guides, employment books, and much, much more.  There will also be a special sale of books available for $4 to $5.

Art Exhibits

When:   May 7 and June 1

Where: The International Center

Throughout the year, the Center walls are decorated with the works of both established and up-and-coming artists.  We are pleased to announce two new shows at the Center, one in May and one in June.

On May 7, we will welcome photographer Charles Martin, and painter and master jazz trombonist Dick Griffin, for a two-man show entitled Civil Search. Griffin’s paintings are described by some as abstract expressionist, though Griffin sees them more as “splashes of ecstasy.” Martin offers a portfolio of impressionistic cityscapes in color. Both artists are acutely aware of the contribution made to society by the civil rights movement. Griffin, a personal friend of the slain civil rights organizer Medgar Evers, was raised in Mississippi and lived through the oppression of the ‘colored’ and ‘white only’ rules of the old South. Martin, of the next generation, was raised in Pennsylvania by southern parents who saw few improvements in civil rights in the North. Both artists see that our human condition requires a continued search for harmony and civility. Civil Search is a celebration of the potential of human spirit for civil expression, creativity, and introspection.

On June 1, volunteer Corrine Purtill will be displaying her photography in the lounge. The show, entitled People of the Spirit Forest: Photographs of Cambodia's Indigenous Hill Tribes, features photographs taken in Ratanakiri, Cambodia’s northeastern province bordering Laos and Vietnam. The people portrayed are all members of Cambodia's indigenous ethnic minority hill tribes, whose collective societies have practiced animism and subsistence swidden farming for centuries. The photos were taken as part of an upcoming book about a tribal family who spent 25 years in total seclusion in the forests, hiding from a war they did not realize was over.