UMich students explore the arts at Student Arts Org Fair
Sophomore Lauren Chi, member of Seven Mile, talks to prospective members at the Student Arts Org Fair in the Diag Friday afternoon. Ava Farah/DAILY .Buy this photo.
On Friday afternoon, student organizations focused on a variety of art forms tabled at the Student Arts Org Fair held on The Diag near the School of Kinesiology and Chemistry Buildings. Hosted by the University of Michigan Arts Initiative, the fair brought about a hundred students to explore the clubs.
The Arts Initiative’s mission is to promote creativity by funding projects and clubs that participate in or advance the arts. In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Arts Initiative employee Lana Oeschger said the program’s goal is to build a connected arts community across campus.
“The Arts Initiative is trying to create a large ecosystem of art on campus,” Oeschger said. “There are all these individual student orgs doing their own thing. They might get funding from the University, but they might not. So our job is to try and connect all of those organizations together and create workshops, events and other things that are unrelated, but still under that umbrella. We want to be like a big hub of art for the whole campus.”
One of the organizations present at the fair was Seven Mile, a club that offers Detroit youth lessons in music, art and coding through mentorship with U-M students. In an interview with The Daily, LSA sophomore Lauren Chi said the organization came to the fair to advertise their art branch.
“Today we’re here advertising for our arts branch,” Chi said. “We teach kids ages four through 12, and it’s been really rewarding working with the kids, making those partnerships week after week and getting involved in the local community. I personally volunteer for the music branch, where I teach kids how to play percussion.”
Another club at the event was MUSKET, the University’s oldest and largest student-run musical theatre organization. LSA junior Stella Frankel said her favorite memory as a member of the organization was the audience’s reaction to their production of the musical “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”
“I think my favorite memory was last semester when we produced ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’,” Frankel said. “On opening night, we had this big set where everyone came onto the stage at the end of a number, and people were clapping and cheering so loud. My heart was so full because I had been working on getting everything set for the entire semester, and it made me really happy to see everyone appreciating all the work we had put in.”
Near the Diag flagpole was the Latin@ Culture Show, a student-run annual performance that celebrates Latine culture through music and dance. In an interview with The Daily, Nursing sophomore Victoria Velazquez said La Casa, the student organization behind the show, came to the fair to show students their event is a space for cultural expression.
“We really just want to create a space where people can celebrate their identity, or even share their culture with other people who are interested in performing alongside them,” Velazquez said.
LSA freshman Chani Patterson who attended the fair told The Daily she enjoyed the reminder that plenty of people share her love for the arts despite an emphasis on academics on campus.
“Sometimes at a very academically rigorous school, it’s hard to remember that everyone is still very artistic too,” Patterson said. “Seeing these groups here really shows how gifted people are in different art forms.”
Daily Staff Reporter Caroline Wroldsen can be reached at cwrold@umich.edu.
