Graphic Design alumni Kevin Cantrell (BFA '08) and Arlo Vance (BFA '09) were featured in Communication Arts Typography Annual 5 this month for their 7 Days Series. Cantrell's craftsmanlike nature shines through in his meticulous design details. The Terra poster (above) is third in the series. The text quotes the first few verses in Genesis on the creation. The four corners of the work represent the seasons. Cantrell and Vance bring text and image together with the blossoming type face reading, ' let the earth bring forth.' In the corner representing the transition between summer and fall, the typeface begins to wilt. The 7 Days Series if printed in fourteen versions, including a laster etching on cherrywood. To see more of Cantrell's work click here. for Vance's work, click here. Visit Kevin Cantrell's HFAC 50th profile

Funded by $2 million NSF grant, BYU-Maryland team targets STEM learning for teens

PROVO – While most students at Brigham Young University were studying for final exams and readying themselves for the winter break, a team of students was busy producing comic pratfalls and double-takes.

Congratulations to our CFAC Theatre and Media Arts Alumnus, Christian Jensen, for the Oscar nomination of his film White Earth in the Short Documentary category. Jensen was also awarded the Jury Special Mention for Cinematography in a Documentary Short for White Earth, screened at the 2014 SlamDance Film Festival. White Earth also received the Full Frame Jury Award for Best Short at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham, North Carolina. About White Earth Thousands of desperate souls flock to America’s Northern Plains seeking work in the oil fields. White Earth is the tale of an oil boom seen through unexpected eyes. Three children and an immigrant mother brave a cruel winter and explore themes of innocence, home and the American Dream. About the filmmaker J. Christian Jensen graduated from Brigham Young University in 2009 with a degree in Media Arts Studies. Jensen began working in media as a journalist — a passion that evolved into more creative work as a documentary and hybrid filmmaker. Between 2002 and 2006, he filled a variety of production roles on several short and feature-length fiction films including Together Again for the First Time and The Flyboys. In 2006, while pursuing a degree in Media Arts Studies at Brigham Young University, Jensen was awarded an Oscarson Discovery Grant which enabled him to relocate to Washington D.C. where he interned for National Geographic Television & Film. He also worked on PBS FRONTLINE and American Experience, and with the co-production of The Mormons. Between 2006 and 2010, Jensen continued to work in non-fiction helping to create The Soul of Kalaupapa, a documentary about the remote Kalaupapa leprosy (Hansen's Disease) colony on Molokai, Hawaii. He also worked as an editor and camera person at BYU Television International and was an editor on Messiah: Behold the Lamb of God, and Storytellers, which were both produced for BYUtv by Kaleidoscope Pictures. In 2008, Jensen received funds from ORCA, The Laycock Center for Creative Collaboration in the Arts, and the Kennedy Center for International Studies, to write and direct a broadcast-length documentary called Sou da Bahia (I’m from Bahia) about art and Afro-Brazilian identity in Northeastern Brazil. He also co-curated a multiple medium art exhibit by the same name to accompany the film’s television premier throughout the U.S. and Latin America. In 2011, after a year living abroad in China, Jensen was accepted to Stanford University's MFA Program in Documentary Film & Video where he received the Carmen Christensen Fine Arts Fellowship. He also received graduate fellowships to attend The Robert Flaherty Film Seminar (2012), the Telluride Student Symposium (2013), and the annual University Film & Video Association (UFVA) Conference (2013). Within Stanford's program, he produced and directed the following documentary and experimental short films: Out of Body (2011), Between Land and Sea (2012), ALPHA & OMEGA (2012), and White Earth (2013). The films have since played at major festivals throughout the United States including Napa Valley, DOC NYC, Palm Springs ShortFest, Mill Valley, and NextFrame. ALPHA & OMEGA was also a finalist in the Student Academy Awards. White Earth was a national recipient of the Carole Fielding Student Grant and was screened at the 2014 Slamdance film festival. Jensen received his Master of Fine Arts from Stanford University in 2013. After graduating, Jensen was a finalist for the International Documentary Association, David L. Wolper's Student Documentary Award, with his film, Between Land and Sea. In 2014, Jensen was awarded the Jury Special Mention for Cinematography in a Documentary Short for White Earth, screened at the 2014 SlamDance Film Festival. White Earth also received the Full Frame Jury Award for Best Short at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham, North Carolina. Jensen also won second place in the Student Academy Awards in 2014 in the documentary category for White Earth.

The BYU Jazz Legacy Dixieland Band will kick off the new year with a free concert at 9 p.m. on January 16. The concert will take place in the Madsen Recital Hall in the Harris Fine Arts Center. The BYU Jazz Legacy Dixieland Band specializes in 1920s jazz, bringing swinging beats and complex tunes to stage.

CFAC's Laycock Center for Creative Collaboration in the Arts is the hub of a major project engaging disciplines from all over campus–trying to teach STEM subjects to the rising generation by using the same technology that normally distracts kids away from learning, and get them back into learning.

The BYU Department of Theatre and Media Arts and interdisciplinary Music Dance Theatre program will present the U.S. premiere of The Count of Monte Cristo, a new musical from Tony Award-nominated composer Frank Wildhorn and Tony Award-nominated lyricist and book writer Jack Murphy. It will be presented in the de Jong Concert Hall of the Harris Fine Arts Center and will run from Thursday, Jan. 22 to Saturday, Jan. 31, 2015.

The KCACTF Region VIII board has extended an invitation to TMA’s production of Our Town, directed by Stephanie Breinholt, to perform at the festival in February. Our Town was one of eight productions invited to the festival which will be held in St. George at Dixie State University, February 10-14 in the Cox Theatre, the only production that will be performed that evening.

PRWeek

Encompassed by the cold of winter’s night, soldiers on both sides of the line gradually peered beyond their own trenches, captivated by a violinist’s tune of “Silent Night.” One hundred years ago, a series of widespread but unofficial ceasefires along the Western Front of World War I led to what is now known as the Christmas Truce of 1914. In commemoration of this historic centennial, the work of Brigham Young University Illustration professor Robert T. Barrett has been chosen to bring to life what happened that Christmas as part of a worldwide peace initiative called the Christmas Truce and Flanders Peace Field Project. As part of the initiative, eleven of Barrett’s illustrations have been presented to the mayor and people of Messines, Belgium. “Most people think that the Christmas truce was a small, incidental event,” Barrett said. “But it actually went about two thirds up the militant line, all the way into Germany, France and Belgium. It was a massive showing of Christmas spirit, with Messines as the epicenter.” Having found motivation and meaning from his own family’s relationship with the events surrounding World War I, Barrett encapsulates the sober background of war-torn Europe with the powerful and poignant story of soldiers who laid down their weapons to exchange gifts and special holiday traditions. “If you can make the project personal to you, you will see it reach more people and it will be much more meaningful. My family’s ties to World War I did that for me on these illustrations,” Barrett said. “The thought of a German soldier standing up to play the violin when he could have been shot touched me. That kind of message reaches people.” Barrett first developed the illustrations for a children’s book, “Silent Night, Holy Night,” which includes choral additions from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and narration from Walter Cronkite. “It’s not often that your illustrations have a second life,” he said. The illustrations have since been used for additional harmonious celebrations such as Peace Quest, an organization that seeks to mark the anniversaries of World War I with commemorations that emphasize peace. Soon the eleven original pieces will be permanently installed in the crypt of St. Nicolas Cathedral in Messines, Belgium. It was in the crypt of St. Nicolas that Adolf Hitler recovered from wounds he received at the “Bethlehem Farm,” a farmhouse that continues to stand erect in Messines. Although he was based in Messines at the time, Hitler refused to take part in the spontaneous Christmas truce because he considered it dishonorable. Don Mullan, the force behind the Christmas Truce and Flanders Peace Field Project, said about the history and hope of Messines, “We intend to make Messines the antithesis of all that Hitler represented. And, as we remember World War I, commemorate peace.” Barrett hopes this project will illustrate the truce for what it really was, an epoch of peace in a time of war, inspired by a sense of common humanity and the Christmas spirit.

This Christmas eve marks 100 years since a Christmas truce took place on Flanders Fields in Belgium during World War I. BYU students collaborated to write, produce, photograph, edit and compose for a video to commemorate the event. The video is hosted by the nondenomenational, interfaith group Faith Counts. 'The story of The Christmas Truce of 1914 has been told and retold over the past century, and deservedly so,' said Faith Counts spokesperson Kerry Troup. 'It is a true story of how faith has the power to bring hope, even in the darkest times. The video that the students of BYU, one of our many faith partners, have produced showcases this story in a beautiful, creative way that we know others will enjoy and hopefully share.' Graphic design and animation students used original photography from that day in 1914, enhancing and adding motion in the video. Film students spent time in Belgium shooting the video from current-day Flanders Fields earlier this month. The BYU Men's Chorus composed and sang a special arrangement of Silent Night, a song that was sung during the Christmas truce. “FaithCounts works with a variety of content creating partners from many faiths,' Troup said. 'We’ve been very impressed with the BYU students’ creativity, professionalism and ability to give voice to stories of faith in profound and innovative ways.” The project was coordinated and organized at BYU through the Laycock Center for Creative Collaboration, with the cooperation of Don Mullan, creator of the Christmas Truce and Flanders Peace Field Project. Download the BYU Men's Chorus Silent Night soundtrack Play the BYU Men's Chorus Silent Night soundtrack See more at BYU News>>>>

Largest U.S. Collegiate Men's Choir Supports LDS Missionaries Through Song