curator’s note New York Live Arts has made the bold decision to devote at least one week each spring to Live Ideas, exploring the ideas, controversies and thinking informing a different bodily-oriented theme each time out. This year’s inaugural festival happens to be falling during the eightieth year of a veritable giant of the sort of body-generated thinking we intend to celebrate annually: the eminent and eminently well-beloved neurologist, chronicler and polymathically curious Dr. Oliver Sacks. He is prized both for the distinctive individual-patient (as opposed to conventional illness) focus of his practice and for the writerly elegance and brimming humanity with which he has chronicled such fates and struggles in such classics as Awakenings (1973), The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat (1985) and most recently, Hallucinations (2012). With a practice steeped in an insistence on the abiding sovereignty of the individual human spirit, Sacks has been a hero to a whole range of variously afflicted (or as he himself might sometimes characterize them, paradoxically gifted) communities: people with Tourette’s, or Parkinsonism, or memory loss, or incipient dementias, or the loss of hearing (or sight, or proprioception) and on and on. But it’s not just that, for in considering The Worlds of Oliver Sacks, one also needs to take into account such other quintessentially Sacksian passions as weightlifting, long-distance swimming, ferns, cycads, cephalopods, chemistry, stereoscopy and the like. Five days hardly seems enough time to begin to encompass the worlds that make up Oliver Sacks, but we will do our best, and we thoroughly welcome your joining us! – Lawrence Weschler, Curator Live Ideas: The Worlds of Oliver Sacks
*All photos taken by Ian Douglas, unless otherwise noted.
Live Arts employee Ryan Fogarty and Live Ideas guests peruse Oliver Sacks’ book collection in the lobby. Photo by Cherylynn Tsushima.
Guests gather in the lobby before the Opening Keynote Conversation, featuring Bill T. Jones, Oliver Sacks and Lawrence Weschler. Photo by Cherylynn Tsushima.
Live Arts’ façade, with special Live Ideas street lights. Photo by Cherylynn Tsushima.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013 Schedule of Events Body Work: Weight Lifting, Exercise & Long Distance Swimming Featuring: Lynne Cox, Colin McGinn, Elizabeth Streb, Lawrence Weschler 12 – 1:15pm, Theater Disembodiedness: Body Image & Proprioception Featuring: Ian Waterman, Dr. Jonathan Cole, Jennifer Hecht, Marsha Ivins 3 – 4:15pm, Studio Musicophilia & Music Therapy Featuring: Joseph LeDoux, Jeffrey Kittay, Aniruddh D. Patel, Connie Tomaino 5:30 – 6:45pm, Theater Opening Keynote Conversation: Oliver Sacks in Conversation with Bill T. Jones Featuring: Bill T. Jones, Oliver Sacks, Lawrence Weschler 8 – 9:30pm, Theater
Body Work: Weight Lifting, Exercise & Long Distance Swimming Apr 17 at 12pm Theater Partcipants Lynne Cox, Colin McGinn, Elizabeth Streb Moderator Lawrence Weschler
about the event Back in the early 1960s, Oliver Sacks was the California State heavyweight-lifting champion; he has also been a dedicated swimmer throughout his life. A few of his friends gather to discuss the profoundly embodied aspect of Sacks’ neurological practice, but also the wider challenge of keeping the body focused while under extreme physical and/or environmental pressure.
biographies Lynne Cox is an American long-distance open-water swimmer and writer. She has twice held the record for the fastest crossing of the English Channel and is best known for swimming the Bering Strait, and swimming more than a mile in Antarctica. Her book about the experience, Swimming to Antarctica, was praised by Oliver Sacks. Colin McGinn is a philosopher of mind. McGinn is currently Professor of Philosophy at the University of Miami with previous posts at the University of Oxford and Rutgers
Pictured: Colin McGinn, Lynne Cox, Elizabeth Streb and Lawrence Weschler
Disembodiedness: Body Image & Proprioception Apr 17 at 3pm Studios Partcipants Jonathan Cole, Marsha Ivins, Ian Waterman Moderated by Jennifer Hecht Event is open-captioned. Open captioning is being provided, in part, by a grant from Theatre Development Fund’s TAP Plus program in partnership with the New York State Council on the Arts.
about the event One day, in the wake of a virulent viral infection, 19-year-old Englishman Ian Waterman suddenly lost his proprioception—which is to say any sense of the relative position of parts of the body. And yet, assisted by Sacks’ student Dr. Jonathan Cole, Waterman would come to achieve a remarkable accommodation to his condition. Waterman and Cole are joined by Sacks longtime friend astronaut Marsha Ivins, to discuss bodily awareness, both in and out of gravity.
biographies Jonathan Cole, a onetime student of Oliver Sacks’, is a clinical neurophysiologist. He has written extensively about living with sensory loss, facial visible difference and paralysis from the first person perspective. Cole is a consultant in clinical neurophysiology at Poole Hospital and Salisbury Hospital’s Spinal Center, a professor at Bournemouth University and a visiting senior lecturer at
Jennifer Hecht, Jonathan Cole, Marsha Ivins and Ian Waterman
Musicophilia & Music Therapy Apr 17 at 5:30pm Theater Partcipants Aniruddh D. Patel, Daniela Schillar, Connie Tomaino Moderated by Jeffery Kittay
about the event A deep love of classical music has characterized Sacks’ life from his earliest days, and an appreciation for music’s profound therapeutic potential came to characterize his practice as a doctor, as he recounts in his recent book, Musicophilia.
biographies Theoretical neurobiologist Aniruddh D. Patel’s work focuses on music and the brain, specifically on the cognitive and neural mechanisms of the relationship of music and language. Using magnetoencephalography (MEG), Patel explores brain dynamics during the perception of musical sequences. Dr. Patel holds a PhD in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology from Harvard University and is a Postdoctoral Fellow at The Neurosciences Institute and teaches at Tufts. Daniela Schiller is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience at Mt. Sinai Hospital. She investigates the neural mechanisms underlying emotional control and flexibility. She is particularly interested in how, given that our contemporary environment is constantly changing, we need to continuously update our emotional responses. Her research team uses neuroimaging,
Connie Tamaino, Daniela Schiller, Aniruddh Patel and Jeffrey Kittay
Oliver Sacks in Conversation with Bill T. Jones Moderated by Lawrence Weschler Apr 17 at 8pm Theater Event is open-captioned and interpreted in American Sign Language.
Interpreted by Bill Moody, Lynnette Taylor Special thanks to Kate Edgar and Hailey Wojcik Ferns and cycads on loan from the New York Botanical Garden. Open captioning is being provided, in part, by a grant from Theatre Development Fund’s TAP Plus program in partnership with the New York State Council on the Arts.
about the event A heartfelt discussion between three profound thinkers and writers, this keynote conversation will examine ideas of neurology and the soul, as well as current and past trends in neurological and choreographic research.
Oliver Sacks and Bill T. Jones
Sacks, Jones and Lawrence Weschler
Oliver Sacks signs books and greets guests at the opening night VIP reception.
Live Arts’ Chief Executive Officer Jean Davidson with Richard H. Levy (Chair, Board of Directors) and Lorraine Gallard.
Guests Corrie Pond, Lewis Merkin, Marlee Koenigsberg, Kim Weild, Terrylene Sacchetti, Alexandria Wailes and Kori Rushton.
Guests of the VIP reception received these goodie bags, with a signed copy of Sacks’ Hallucinations.
Live Arts’ Executive Artistic Director Bill T. Jones speaks with guests and panelists and the opening night VIP reception.
Thursday, April 18, 2013 Schedule of Events The Natural World: Ferns, Cycads & Cephalopods Featuring: Roger Hanlon, Natalie de Souza, Robbin Moran, Dennis Stevenson 12 – 1:15pm, Theater Stinks and Bangs (Chemistry and Uncle Tungsten) Featuring: Roald Hoffmann, Bassam Shakhashiri, Paul Roossin 3 – 4:15pm, Studio Minding the Dancing Body Featuring: Bill T. Jones, Miguel Gutierrez, Colin McGinn, Alva Noë, Gwen Welliver 6 – 7:15pm, Studio Re:Awakenings (Dance) Featuring: Donna Uchizono Company 8 – 9:10pm, Theater
The Natural World: Ferns, Cycads & Cephalopods Apr 18 at 12pm Theater Partcipants Roger Hanlon, Robbin Moran, Dennis Stevenson Moderated by Natalie de Souza Ferns and cycads on loan from the New York Botanical Garden.
about the event Among Sacks’ many other passions, he evinces a special love for the biological world, particularly cephalopods (which is to say squid and octopi), ferns, and the primordially ancient cycads. Three of the country’s top specialists in these marvels join forces to ensorcel the rest of us.
biographies Roger Hanlon, Senior Scientist at the Marine Biology Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA, investigates the behavior of cephalopods and other marine organisms with an integrative biology approach focused at the organismal level. Currently, his research focuses on the highly interdisciplinary subject of camouflage and the visual perception processes that are involved. Robbin Moran is curator of Botany at the New York Botanical Garden and an expert on Ferns. He holds a PhD from The University of Illinois. He was the main writer for a volume of Flora Mesoamericana, the largest fern flora catalog ever written, containing over 1400 species. Periodically, he teaches a full-semester, graduate-level course in the study of ferns at The New York Botanical Garden. He is the President of the New York Chapter of the Fern Society (of which Sacks is also a member in fervent good standing) and serves as Associate Editor for Brittonia, the New York Botanical Garden’s journal of systematic botany, as well as for the American Fern Journal.
Robbin Moran
Dennis Stevenson
Roger Hanlon, Dennis Stevenson, Robbin Moran and Natalie de Souza
Stinks and Bangs (Chemistry and Uncle Tungsten) Apr 18 at 3pm Studios Panelists Roald Hoffmann, Bassam Shakhashiri Moderated by Paul Roossin
about the event As a boy, Oliver Sacks’ first great intellectual passion was for chemistry. Nobel Laureate Roald Hoffmann, along with two other of Sacks’ closest chemical friends, team up to evoke the lure of the elemental.
biographies Roald Hoffmann studied chemistry at Columbia and Harvard Universities. A professor at Cornell University since 1965, Hoffmann is currently the Frank H. T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters, Emeritus. He has received many of the top honors of his profession, including the 1981 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. “Applied theoretical chemistry” characterizes Hoffmann’s particular blend of computations stimulated by experiment and the construction of generalized models of frameworks for understanding. He is also a poet, a playwright (coauthor with Carl Djerassi of “Oxygen”) and the host of the monthly Entertaining Science series at the Cornelia Street Café in New York City.
Bassam Shakhashiri, Roald Hoffmann and Paul Roossin
Minding the Dancing Body Apr 18 at 6pm Studios Panelists Miguel Gutierrez, Colin McGinn, Alva Noë, Gwen Welliver Moderated by Bill T. Jones Event is open-captioned. Open captioning is being provided, in part, by a grant from Theatre Development Fund’s TAP Plus program in partnership with the New York State Council on the Arts.
about the event Two celebrated philosophers of consciousness, Colin McGinn, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Miami and author of The Mysterious Flame: Conscious Minds In A Material World, and Alva Noë, author most recently of Out of Our Heads, will discuss some of the intellectual foundations of dance with New York Live Arts’ Executive Artistic Director Bill T. Jones and fellow choreographers Miguel Gutierrez and Gwen Welliver.
biographies Miguel Gutierrez, a dance and music artist based in New York, has been called “one of our most provocative and necessary artistic voices” by Eva Yaa Asantewaa of Dance Magazine. He makes solo and group pieces with a variety of artists under the moniker Miguel Gutierrez and the Powerful People. His work has toured internationally at several festivals and venues and has received support from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Foundation for Contemporary Art, United States Artists,
Bill T. Jones, Alva NoĂŤ, RoseAnne Spradlin, Colin McGinn, Michael Gutierrez, Gwen Welliver
Re: Awakenings (Dance) Apr 18 at 8pm, Apr 20 at 4pm Out of Frame (Premiere) Choreographed and Performed by Donna Uchizono Music by Frederic Chopin, Otis Redding Whispered Text by Oliver Sacks Costumes by Katherine Maurer Lighting by Vincent Vigilante Video by Josh Higgason Out of Frame is comissioned by New York Live Arts. Additional support was provided by Duo Multi-Cultural Art Center through a rehearsal residency. Selections from Awakenings by Oliver Sacks. Copyright Š 1973, 1976, 1982, 1983, 1987, 1990 by Oliver Sacks, used by permission of The Wylie Agency LLC
Donna Uchizono performs "Out of Frame"
Hristoula Harakas, Rebecca Serrell Cyr and Levi Gonzalez perform Donna Uchizono Company’s State of Heads
Gonzalez, Serrell Cyr and Harakas perform Donna Uchizono Company’s State of Heads
Friday, April 19, 2013 Schedule of Events Stereoscopy & Kinetic Vision Featuring: Susan Barry, Gerald Marks, Luke Mitchell, Walter Murch 3 – 4:15pm, Studio Sacks on Film Featuring: Bill Morrison, Lawrence Weschler 6 - 7:15pm, Studio Re:Awakenings (Music) Featuring: Aletta Collins, Daniel Hay-Gordon, Samuel Bill, Orchestra of St. Luke’s 8 – 9:10pm, Theater
Stereoscopy & Kinetic Vision Apr 19 at 3pm Studio Participants Susan Barry, Gerald Marks, Walter Murch Moderator Luke Mitchell
about the event Another lifelong passion of Oliver Sacks has been for stereoscopy, both the bifocal experience of depth and the various techniques for provoking the artificial experience of pop-up 3D. Susan Barry, whose late-life acquisition of bifocal depth perception comprises one of the most moving chapters of Sacks’ The Mind’s Eye, will be joined Gerald Marks of the New York Stereoscopic Society and film editor Walter Murch, whose particular fascination is in Sacks’ account of episodes of kinematic vision among some of the patients in Awakenings.
biographies Susan R. Barry received her PhD in biology from Princeton University and is a professor of neurobiology in the Department of Biological Sciences at Mount Holyoke College. She had been crosseyed and stereoblind since early infancy but learned to see in three dimensions at age forty-eight by retraining her visual system with optometric vision therapy. Her story was first described by Oliver Sacks in his New Yorker article, “Stereo Sue”, and then greatly expanded by Sue in her book, Fixing My Gaze: A Scientist’s Journey Into Seeing in Three Dimensions.
Susan Barry
Walter Murch and Barry
Gerald Marks and Barry
Sacks on Film: Bill Morrison Discusses Re:Awakenings (Film) Apr 19 at 6pm Studio Moderated by Lawrence Weschler Re: Awakenings (Film) is made possible by The Opaline Fund.
about the film Across the entire 1969-70 period as the young Dr. Sacks worked with the remarkable “human statues” at Beth Abraham in the Bronx, bringing them suddenly back to life through his administrations of the drug L- Dopa—the story he would go on to chronicle a few years later in his masterpiece Awakenings—he was filming developments the entire while. Recently a box containing seventeen reels of super-8 footage—over six hours worth—resurfaced, and New York Live Arts commissioned Bill Morrison, the master behind Decasia and other such classic quickenings of long lost filmstock, to fashion a brief lyric distillation of the Sacks trove. Footage of patients, 1969 at Beth Abraham Hospital, Bronx, courtesy of Dr. Oliver Sacks. Music by Philip Glass performed by Andrew Sternman, saxaphone.
biography Over the past twenty years Bill Morrison has built a filmography of more than thirty projects that have been presented in theaters, museums, galleries and concert halls worldwide. His work often makes use of rare archival footage in which forgotten film imagery
Screening of Bill Morrison’s Re: Awakenings Film
Lawrence Weschler and Bill Morrison
Marnie Breckenridge, Mischa Bouvier and John Easterlin rehearse MichaHl Nyman's "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat"
The Orchestra of St. Luke’s in rehearsal
Daniel Hay-Gordon performs a solo by Aletta Collins while The Orchestra of St. Luke's plays Tobias Picker's "Awakenings" ballet
Bill Morrison’s Re: Awakenings Film is screened during the Re: Awakenings Theater program
Saturday, April 20, 2013 Schedule of Events Screening of “Awakenings” Documentary Featuring: Oliver Sacks 11:30 – 1:00pm, Theater Featuring: Chris Adrian, John Bennet, Dan Frank, Wendy Lesser, Lawrence Weschler 2:30 – 3:45pm, Studio Re:Awakenings (Dance) 4 – 5:10pm, Theater Neurologists & Philosophers Consider Sacks at 80 Featuring: Orrin Devinsky, Jennifer Hecht, Alva Noë, Aniruddh Patel, Lawrence Weschler 6 – 7:15pm, Studio Re:Awakenings (Theater) Two versions of Harold Pinter’s A Kind of Alaska Featuring: Kim Weild, Karen Kohlhaas, Reed Birney, Lisa Emery, Rebecca Henderson, Lewis Merkin, Terrylene Sacchetti, Alexandria Wailes 8 – 10pm, Theater
Screening of “Awakenings” Documentary Apr 20 at 11:30am Theater Moderator Oliver Sacks Special thanks to Kate Edgar and Hailey Wojcik Ferns and cycads on loan from the New York Botanical Garden.
about the event Oliver Sacks introduces a screening of the 1974 Yorkshire Television documentary “Awakenings,” which chronicles the post-encephalitic patients described in his book of the same name. Screening will be followed by Q&A with Sacks.
Oliver Sacks introduces the Yorkshire Television Documentary “Awakenings�
Sacks the Writer: Process & Influence Apr 20 at 2:30pm Studio Participants Chris Adrian, John Bennet, Dan Frank, Lawrence Weschler Moderator Wendy Lesser
about the event Across twelve books and hundreds of articles, Oliver Sacks has established himself as one of the most distinctly recognized and beloved doctor writers of our time. This panel, moderated by Wendy Lesser, will evoke Sacks-the-Writer both through the eyes of two of his editors, and through those of two fellow writers.
biographies Chris Adrian received his M.F.A. from the University of Iowa Writer’s Workshop and his M.D. from Eastern Virginia Medical School. He completed his residency in pediatrics in San Francisco before starting a divinity degree at Harvard Divinity School. He then interrupted these studies to return to San Francisco to complete a pediatric fellowship. Adrian published Gob’s Grief the same year he earned his medical degree, following that up with two other novels, The Children’s Hospital and The Great Night. He received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2009 and in 2010 and was named as one of The New Yorker’s “20 Under 40” list of writers worth watching. John Bennet has worked as Associate Editor of Promenade Magazine, Editor at Backpacker Magazine and Copy Editor and then, for the past
Lawrence Weschler, Chris Adrian, Dan Frank, John Bennet and Wendy Lesser
Chris Adrian, Dan Frank and John Bennet
Oliver Sacks and audience members
Neurologists & Philosophers Consider Sacks at 80 Apr 20 at 6pm Studio Participants Orrin Devinsky, Jennifer Hecht, Alva Noë, Aniruddh Patel Moderator Lawrence Weschler
about the event Sacks sometimes refers to himself as a “clinical ontologist,” a practicing neurologist whose fundamental question, when facing each new patient, is often quite simply “How are you?”. A panel of leading neurologists and philosophers will consider the impact and influence of Sacks’ work.
biographies Orrin Devinsky is Professor of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry at NYU School of Medicine. He directs the NYU Comprehensive Epilepsy Center and the Saint Barnabas Institute of Neurology and Neurosurgery (INN). He received his B.S. and M.S. from Yale University, M.D. from Harvard Medical School and interned at Boston’s Beth Israel Hospital. He has published widely in epilepsy and behavioral neurology, with more than 250 articles and chapters and more than 20 books and monographs. He has chaired several committees of the American Epilepsy Society and has served as a Board member. He is active in the American Academy of Neurology and the Epilepsy Foundation. He is the Co-Editor of Reviews in Neurological Diseases, Epilepsy and Behavior and Epilepsy.com.
Jennifer Hecht, Alva NoĂŤ, Aniruddh Patel, Orrin Devinsky and Lawrence Weschler
Patel and Devinsky
Re:Awakenings (Theater) Re:Awakenings (Film) Apr 20 at 8pm, Apr 21 at 3:30pm performed with one intermission
A Kind of Alaska (voice cast) Harold Pinter Directed by Karen Kohlhaas Set Design by Joseph Gourley Costumes Designed by Paul Carey Wig Design by Dave Bova Lighting by Vincent Vigilante Interpreted by Anna Carter, Jon Wolfe Nelson Cast Deborah Hornby Pauline
Lisa Emery Reed Birney Rebecca Henderson
Re:Awakenings (Film) Filmmaker Bill Morrison Music by Philip Glass Performed by Andrew Sternman, saxaphone
A Kind of Alaska (ASL Cast) Harold Pinter Directed by Kim Weild Assistant Director Marlee Faye Koenigsberg Set Design by Joseph Gourley Costumes Designed by Paul Carey Wig Design by Dave Bova Lighting by Vincent Vigilante Consulting Producer Kori Rushton ASL Consultant Howie Seago Cast Deborah Hornby Pauline
Terrylene Sacchetti Lewis Merkin Alexandria Wailes
A Kind of Alaska is presented by special arrangement with Dramatist Play Service, Inc., New York. A Kind of Alaska was inspired by Awakenings illness which presented itself in innumerable forms–as delirium, mania, trances, coma, sleep, insomnia, restlessness, and encephalitis lethargica, or sleeping sickness.
asylums or other institutions.
The Director is a member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, a national theatrical labor union. Costumes provided by Helen Uffner Vintage Clothing LLC. Re:Awakenings (Film) is made possible by The Opaline Fund. Special thanks to Beth Prevor and Hands On.
Reed Birney, Lisa Emery and Rebecca Henderson perform the voiced version of Harold Pinter’s A Kind of Alaska
Terrylene Sacchetti and Lewis Merkin perform the ASL version of Harold Pinter’s A Kind of
Alaska
Sacchetti and Alexandria Wailes perform the ASL version of Harold Pinter’s A Kind
of Alaska
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Sunday, April 21, 2013 Schedule of Events The Tourette’s Community Featuring: Lowell Handler, Tobias Picker, Lawrence Weschler, Jumaane Williams 10:30 – 11:45pm, Studio The Deaf Community Featuring: Teresa Curtin, Aaron Kubey, Lewis Merkin, Terrylene Sacchetti, Janice Rimler 12 – 1:15pm, Theater The Parkinsonian Community Featuring: Carol Enseki, Steven Frucht, David Leventhal 1:30 – 2:45pm, Studio Re:Awakenings (Theater) Two versions of Harold Pinter’s A Kind of Alaska 3:30 – 5:30, Theater Robert Krulwich of Radiolab Celebrates Oliver Sacks Featuring: Robert Krulwich, Oliver Sacks 8 – 9:30pm, Theater
The Tourette’s Community Apr 21 at 10:30am Studio Participants Lowell Handler, Tobias Picker, Jumaane Williams Moderator Lawrence Weschler
about the event Beyond the often-transformative impact of his work with individual patients, Oliver Sacks has left a remarkable impression on the lives of entire communities of the variously abled. This panel will highlight Sacks’ contribution to the experience of those living with Tourette’s syndrome. A composer, a photographer and a New York City councilman will detail their personal experiences of living with the condition.
biographies Lowell Handler is a former Black Star contract photographerjournalist. As the star, narrator, guide and associate producer of the Emmy-nominated PBS television documentary Twitch & Shout, Handler reached a mainstream audience and set the stage for his 1998 memoir, Twitch & Shout: A Touretter’s Tale, published by Penguin. Handler is on the faculty at Dutchess Community College. Tobias Picker, described by BBC Music Magazine as “displaying a distinctively soulful style that is one of the glories of the current musical scene,” has had works commissioned and performed by the New York Philharmonic, The Philadelphia Orchestra, the San
Lawrence Weschler
Tobias Picker and Jumaane Williams
Lowell Handler, Tobias Picker, Jumaane Williams and Lawrence Weschler
The Deaf Community Apr 21 at 12pm Theater Participants Teresa Curtin, Aaron Kubey, Lewis Merkin, Terrylene Sacchetti Moderator Janice Rimler Interpreted by Stephanie Feyne, Bill Moody, Jon Wolfe Nelson, Lynnette Taylor Ferns and cycads on loan from the New York Botanical Garden. Event is open-captioned. Open captioning is being provided, in part, by a grant from Theatre Development Fund’s TAP Plus program in partnership with the New York State Council on the Arts. Special thanks to Beth Prevor and Hands On.
about the event Oliver Sacks travelled to Gallaudet to witness the tumultuous events and subsequently chronicled them with remarkable sympathy and insight in his book Seeing Voices. This panel, moderated by Kim Wield, the director of our staging of the Sign version of A Kind of Alaska, will focus a variety of such voices on Sacks’ contributions to the wider discourse between the hearing and the Deaf.
biographies
Teresa Curtin is an experienced attorney with 25 years experience in complex civil litigations at trial and appellate level. A 1988 New York University School of Law graduate, she is admitted in the
Lewis Merkin, Terrylene Sacchetti and Aaron Kubey
Sacchetti and Kubey
Teresa Curtin, Lewis Merkin, Terrylene Sacchetti, Aaron Kubey and Janice Rimler
The Parkinsonian Community Apr 21 at 1:30pm Studio Participants Carol Enski, Steven Frucht Moderated by David Leventhal
about the event A theme to which Oliver Sacks has returned again and again across both his writings and his practice is the ordeal of Parkinsonism, but not just the ordeal, for here too Dr. Sacks has found a way to engage both his patients and his readers in a wider voyage of surprise and discovery, and a celebration of courage and character beyond mere affliction. Helping us to evoke these aspects of Sacks’ work, and also recent developments in the field, will be the neurologist Dr. Steven Frucht, director of the movement disorders clinic at Mount Sinai; David Leventhal, with the Dance for PD initiative at the Mark Morris Dance Center.
biographies Carol Enseki is currently an independent museum and education consultant. In 2009, Ms. Enseki stepped down from her position as president of the Brooklyn Children’s Museum where she served for more than 20 years. She led the museum’s efforts to increase educational opportunities for urban children through interactive science and cultural exhibitions and programs, innovative use of collections and strategic collaborations with both local community organizations and national partners. In 2005, she was appointed
Steven Frucht, Carol Enseki and David Leventhal
Frucht, Enseki, Leventhal and audience members
Robert Krulwich of Radiolab Celebrates Oliver Sacks Apr 21 at 8pm Theater Special thanks to Kate Edgar and Hailey Wojcik Ferns and cycads on loan from the New York Botanical Garden.
about the event Robert Krulwich has been chronicling Dr. Sacks and his spellbinding tales across myriad incarnations both on radio (NPR) and television (ABC) since the early 1980s, and now more recently on a regular basis on WNYC’s award-winning national science program Radiolab, which he cohosts with Jad Abumrad. For this special presentation, Krulwich will delve deeply into Sacks’ early years.
Oliver Sacks and Robert Krulwich
Jones presents Sacks with a birthday cake
festival sponsors
Additional support is contributed by The Rockefeller Foundation NYC Cultural Innovation Fund, The JJC Foundation, The Opaline Fund, Daniel and Joanna S. Rose, The Samuel M. Levy Family Foundation, Judith Zarin, Mortimer B. Zuckerman and the Theatre Development Fund.
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