Category: Features

Abby Gehlhausen

Imagine walking downtown in a mid-sized city, seeing countless murals and art installations. Flyers on the windows of local businesses advertise local artists and bands. Then, you wander upon a performing arts theater for the Philharmonic, and you decide to sit in for the performance; the chandeliers, the red velvet, the wine.

That’s what it feels like to be in Fort Wayne, Indiana. If you seek it out, a whole world of arts and music exists in this city.

From the Embassy Theater to public art, the Fort Wayne Museum of Art, local artists, The Civic Theater, and Sweetwater Sound, there is something to fit everyone’s interests.

Art and music are important because it allows us to express ourselves and create something we are proud of. In return, it often boosts people’s confidence, gives people purpose, and can even help us learn about different cultures.

Maddie Mory, a music student at Purdue Fort Wayne, says that as a music educator, music is powerful and even increases our critical thinking skills.

“Studying music has allowed me to be constantly challenged while gaining an appreciation for past cultures and composers’ work,” Mory said.

Art aids in forming many developmental skills, builds math concepts and allows for social experiences with others, starting in childhood.

According to the American Psychological Association, “…high schoolers who take music courses score significantly better on exams in certain other subjects, including math and science, than their nonmusical peers.”

With the benefits of the arts in mind, here is a bit of what Fort Wayne has to offer.

For those passionate about music, Sweetwater Sound is a great place to start. As the country’s largest music retailer, they offer products and services for any aspiring musician, such as music lessons.

“Sweetwater has equipped me with the tools and knowledge to pursue my dreams,” said Aidan Bahre, a long-term customer from Fort Wayne. “When you walk in, it’s like Disney World.”

Sweetwater was founded in 1979 by Chuck Surack as a recording studio and has since reached 1 billion dollars in revenue. Many say Sweetwater’s motto sets the company apart from the rest: “Always do the right thing.”

If you prefer to listen to music, the Philharmonic at the Embassy Theater, the Clyde Theater, and a variety of local bands will be your go-to spots to visit.

According to Emily Shannon, the director of marketing and community relations for the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, they have been focused on providing musical experiences to the Fort Wayne community and inspiring musicians since their first performance in 1944.

“We love to host events focusing on famous composers, help our youth orchestra flourish, invite the public out for holiday performances, and offer free tickets to students so that they may retain a passion for the musical arts,” Shannon said.

Fort Wayne has a large scene of local artists and bands. Some of the up-and-coming bands are a part of Purdue Fort Wayne’s Gold Top Music Group, a new record label with the university.

The group hosted an Indie Music Night in May, where three bands performed: Los Galaxy, Man of the Flood, and Los Lemons.

Supporting the work of local artists is important because it allows us to connect with our local community and financially support their work.

Quentin Wright, a member of the local indie rock band Disco Curls, said his band recently performed at The Ruin and The Muse on Band, two local venues for performers.

“Playing in Disco Curls has let me grow creatively and musically,” Wright said. “I love getting to meet new people, build my relationship with my bandmates, and produce new music.”

If you are more interested in art, the public art map of downtown Fort Wayne will be your best friend.

There has been a huge push for making downtown more beautiful by painting old buildings and creating art installations in the past few years. You can even sign up for the Fort Wayne Public Art Trail, which provides exclusive information and maps right from your phone.

While you’re in the area, the Fort Wayne Museum of Art and the Arts United Center are fantastic places to check out.

The museum’s recent featured exhibits are ‘The Art of the Skateboard’ and ‘Color X Color: Selections from the Chuck Sperry Archive’. Arts United Center hosts a variety of events at many of the locations already mentioned. More recently, they started a podcast called “Art Unites Us” which currently has three episodes and is growing into a series.

Let’s not forget theater productions! Fort Wayne’s Civic Theater strives to nurture the creative soul, promote diversity, and educate the community. Upcoming productions include ‘Noises Off’, ‘Steel Magnolias’, and the ‘25 Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee’.

Michaela Mooney, a 2021 Carroll High School graduate who heavily participated in theater and show choir, said that she loves being able to be in productions past graduation.

“Theater and singing are a huge part of who I am, and I am grateful that I still have somewhere to call home.”

By Brianna Datta

“Hobnobben is on its sixth annual festival which is absolutely amazing for Fort Wayne and the community. We continue to grow every single year. This year we received a record number of film submissions, so we love to see how this festival has evolved and changed from the beginning”, said Amanda Hille, co-chair of the Hobnobben film festival for the last three years.

Hille explained the significance of this event taking place in a town like Fort Wayne, extending the invitation for those unfamiliar with independent filmmaking to share their art and their perspective with the Northeast Indiana community.

“One thing we’re excited about with Hobnobben is that it is very much a Fort Wayne event. We accept films from high school all the way up to more professional type projects. We have several awards that emphasize the locality of Fort Wayne. So, this year we had a quarter of our films that were submitted that were tied to Indiana in some way, whether its being in Indiana or that they were Indiana-specific. So, we are excited to nurture and grow filmmaking in the Fort Wayne area because it is an important art form, where you can not only share your story but it’s a way to allow people from diverse groups and perspectives to showcase what they want to say in a succinct way. With this particular type of programming, we rely on the Fort Wayne community members to show up and participate in seeing films, we rely on community businesses and organizations to help sponsor Hobnobben, and this festival is really about bringing people together in an inclusive way to make sure that everyone is seen and heard and that we can really celebrate other perspectives which is so unique.”

Hille also highlighted the ways in which Hobnobben sets itself a part from other film festivals, describing how Hobnobben actively celebrates diversity beyond just the content of the film selections. Many of the films submissions selected were directed by women, and the Hobnobben festival itself was led by women. In addition to this, Hobnobben offers a special award, the Jen and Lynn award, to celebrate LGBTQIA representation in the films.

“For me, being a part of Hobnobben during my second year, one of my co-chairs said that there aren’t many festivals that are led by women it’s only, I believe, twenty-eight percent of festivals. So, for us to provide that understanding is so important. We have a new award called the Jen and Lynn award that is specifically to highlight and celebrate LGBTQAI films, and that’s one way to make sure that we are bringing representation to Fort Wayne. Forty percent of our films that were in this festival were directed by women-which is unheard of when you compare it to your mainstream Hollywood films.”

To stream the films from this event visit hobnobben.org

For more information on the Hobnobben film festival visit hobnobben.org

By Brianna Datta

Fort Wayne’s annual Hobnobben film festival celebrated its sixth year at the Embassy theatre in Fort Wayne over the weekend. Members of the Fort Wayne community showed their support for independent filmmaking by attending the festival, enjoying the wide selection of submissions from filmmakers around the world, as well as panel discussions, live events, and more.

“I think what separates Hobnobben from other film festivals is that we really do strive for diversity and inclusivity in the stories that we highlight in our festival. So, we try to showcase films that you wouldn’t see on any mainstream media”, said Christi Hille, one of the co-chairs of the festival.

Christi Hille has been involved with Hobnobben since its first year. She started out bartending the first event, then volunteered with the hospitality and marketing teams, eventually working her way to become one of the three co-chairs of Hobnobben film festival. Hille highlighted the importance of supporting independent films and filmmakers in the Fort Wayne community.

“This year we had one hundred and five films were submitted to the festival, most of those were shorts in some way shape or form, and those are the types of films you can’t see streaming on Netflix or turning the channel, but there’s a lot that you can do in five minutes to tell a story and you wouldn’t know it unless you had access to a festival like this that happens to be in Fort Wayne, and it’s a really unique opportunity.”

When asked what her favorite film out of the festival line up was, she had trouble deciding, but did describe a few submissions that stood out to her, as well as the “love love” block, a block of time dedicated to romance films.

“It’s so difficult for me to choose a favorite film of the festival because we watch all of the film submissions and as a committee, we decide which ones make it into the festival after our program team watches all of them and rates them to begin with. So, I think of all of them as my true loves and I’m so passionate about each of them, but I do have a couple favorites. Six Angry Women is well-done. It’s a lovely documentary feature that investigates a crime that took place in New Zealand and that was unsolved for years, while also highlighting the rise of feminism in New Zealand and safety on campus issues. It’s a really well-done film. I also did enjoy the “love love” block. It has a bunch of little romantic vignettes and features that are cute and sweet. So, romance stories that again, you’re not really seeing on mainstream media, lots of queer representation in them, lots of different types of relationships that we can form, some meet cutes and all that kind of jazz too.”

 

You can stream the films from this event at hobnobben.org

For more information on Hobnobben film festival visit hobnobben.org.

By Sydney Hamblin

When the dance teachers gave her permission to buy her very first pair of pointe shoes, Katie Graber, a 17-year-old dancer at TC Dance Academy for the Performing Arts, noticed there was something odd about the dance shoes when she wore them. They didn’t match her skin tone like they matched her classmates’ skin tone.

Black dancers, especially female, are still a rarity when it comes to ballet. Although there has been a recent increase in awareness for diversity within the dance community, black dancers remain barely represented in the field.

Graber said that she had only ever seen pink pointe shoes growing up at her dance studio in northeast Indiana because there weren’t many black dancers on the team.

Pointe shoes were invented in the 1820s to allow dancers to dance on the tips of their toes with a block at the base of the shoe. They extend the dancer’s lines and help create the illusion that they are floating on air.

Graber said that, for a long time, she thought that all dancers wore the same color of pointe shoes, regardless of what their skin color was. It wasn’t until she saw a picture of Misty Copeland, an African American professional ballerina, wearing pointe shoes that matched her skin tone on social media that she started asking questions.

After seeing Copeland’s shoes, Graber immediately started researching black pointe shoes to see if they existed.

“I was disappointed and honestly kind of frustrated when I found out that those shoes weren’t something I could order online or buy at the dance store in Fort Wayne,” Graber said. “The way these girls were getting their shoes that color was from pancaking, as we call it in the dance world.”

A New York Times article describes “pancaking” as using foundation or acrylic paint to change the color of a pair of pointe shoes so they match the dancer’s skin tone. Typically, professionals use this method more often than young competition dancers.

Although Graber is not a professional ballerina in the corps, she still participated in the pancaking method that has been used to change the color of pointe shoes for dancers of color.

“I felt left out. I wanted to have shoes that matched my skin just like all my friends did. So my mom and I looked up videos on how to do it on YouTube and we attempted it.”

For dancers like Graber, the Black Lives Matter movement that followed the death of George Floyd changed a lot of things for African Americans, including things within the dance community.

The Black Lives Matter movement caused major pointe shoemakers such as Bloch, Capezio, Repetto and Suffolk to release statements saying that they were going to start making pointe shoes in a variety of shades for dancers of color, according to Pointe magazine.

Bloch was the first major pointe shoemaker that announced this news to the public, saying that the new shades would be available last fall.

“We have been intently listening, reflecting on what we are doing and what we can do better and acknowledge we have not been moving fast enough,” the company said in a statement. “Due to the outbreak of COVID-19, product development was severely slowed down, however we are fully committed to following through with these plans and confirm we will be introducing darker shades into our pointe shoes.”

Donna Winters, owner of Standing Ovation Performance Apparel in Fort Wayne, says that her store sells these pointe shoes for people of color in a variety of brands. Her store also sells tights and undergarments in various skin tones, which are frequently purchased by her customers.

“We do sell pointe shoes for people of color, but we do not carry them in our store,” Winters said. “If anyone is looking to buy a pair, we can place a special order and have them shipped to the store as soon as possible.”