MGSA Celebrates MLK

BFA actor Noelle Young-Davis performs a scene from Katori Hall's The Mountaintop at MGSA's first MLK Celebration.

Amanda Brown

“As artists, we have a unique responsibility to use our talents to help bridge the divides that separate us and to help propel us toward achieving that Beloved Community that is part of President Holloway’s vision for Rutgers, and that itself channels the legacy of Dr. King. That’s why, for me, a moment like this one that brings together the university and the surrounding community to celebrate Dr. King’s vision through the arts is also an expression of hope.”

—Dean Jason Geary, at the school’s inaugural MLK Celebration. The event took place on February 6 at Nicholas Music Center and featured MGSA student and faculty reflections on the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s. legacy through film, dance, music, theater, and visual art.

Performers and guest speakers included: host Madalynn Heeren; Rutgers Scarlet Knight Jazz Trombones musicians Adam Machaskee, Ford Lambert, Matthew Rossi, Kieran Bonsignore, Melanie Shultz, Kyle Courter, Justin Farquhar, Ian Young, and Donald Solomon; chamber musicians Claire Oplinger, Anita Gosevska, and Georgia Wang, plus narrator Gabriel Lukijaniuk; the Rutgers Documentary Film Lab; Art & Design faculty Steffani Jemison; choreographer and dancer Cassidy Rivas; actors Malcolm Callender and Noelle Young-Davis; Rutgers University—New Brunswick Chancellor-Provost Francine Conway, and Rutgers University President Jonathan Holloway. Head of BA Theater and Mason Gross Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Committee chair Marshall Jones III served as artistic coordinator of the event.