BabsonARTS
Creativity and innovation have long been hallmarks of Babson College’s focus on entrepreneurship, and the arts provide a space to explore the intersection of creative vision and entrepreneurial thought
Here at BabsonARTS, we always have a full slate of engaging performances, exhibitions, films, and conversations. We also value the health and safety of our community so please review our COVID-19 Health and Safety Policies.
If you are interested in getting BabsonARTS brochures mailed to your home or if you’d like to join our email list, please send us a message.
IN THE NEWS:
Read about the Sorenson Visual Arts Center featured in Babson Magazine.
Photo credit: MASARY Studios
MASARY in Residence
CLICK HERE for a full listing of events during the residency.
Monday, September 23 – Sunday, September 29
MASARY Studios is a collective of transdisciplinary artists who create site-specific artworks in the public realm that deploys new media materials to compose compelling, unexpected stories. Their practice is often based in light, sound and the development and implementation of new technologies at architectural scale. The Studio continues to innovate and develop novel methods of media production in their practice incorporating spatial audio, artificial intelligence, data-driven light sculptures and beyond.
Photo credit: Aram Boghosian
ARTScapades
The ARTScapades program is an opportunity for current students, staff, and faculty to connect while attending amazing local performances and exhibits. Sponsored and subsidized by BabsonARTS, members of the Babson community can purchase discounted tickets to theatre, museums, music, dance and more in the Greater Boston area (transportation to events is not provided).
Tickets for students are $10 for all events and go on sale two weeks prior to each event.
Faculty/Staff tickets range from $15-20 and go on sale one week prior to each event.
Cash only, limit 2 per person. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit
Alex Brand in Trim 216 or email abrand@babson.edu.
Improv Asylum
Main Stage
September 19, 8:00 P.M.
216 Hanover Street, Boston
The Nutcracker
Boston Ballet
December 4, 7:30 P.M.
Citizens Bank Opera House, Boston
LIVE AT THE BLACK BOX
Thursday, September 19, 7:00 P.M.
Thursday, October 17, 7:00 P.M.
Sorenson Black Box
FREE and open to the public.
Registration available for September 19
Registration available for October 17
Walk-ins welcome.
Live at the Black Box features Babson student performers, providing an opportunity for them to share their talents. Multiple acts will be showcased at each event in short sets with the sound system and some equipment provided. Refreshments will be served. Stop in for a particular act or stay for the duration of the event. Run time approximately 60-75 minutes.
Students interested in applying to perform during a set should contact the BabsonARTS office at babsonarts@babson.edu for application materials and guidelines. We encourage all performers to apply and hope to showcase not only musicians and bands, but DJs, spoken word, comedy, and more!
Find an Event
Bringing to life both the classics and edgy new productions, theater through BabsonARTS is consistently relevant and thought-provoking. With performances from faculty- and student-led organizations, as well as renowned directors and actors, there’s always a new reason to visit the stage.
The Empty Space Theater Presents
Everybody
A Play by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
Directed by Beth Wynstra
October 23, 24, 26, 7:00 P.M.
October 25, 2:00 P.M.
Sorenson Black Box
Tickets $5
Embark on a theatrical journey like no other with Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ Everybody, a riveting modern adaptation of a classic fifteenth-century morality play. Follow the protagonist, Everybody as they traverse life’s ultimate adventure—facing death and seeking the true meaning of living. With humor and profound insight, this play explores themes of love, friendship, and the human condition, making audiences question if anyone is ever fully prepared for their final curtain call. In this groundbreaking play, roles are assigned by lottery each night, creating dozens of possible casting permutations, and ensuring a unique performance every time.
DOWNLOAD THE STUDY GUIDE FOR THE PRODUCTION
Everybody Study Guide
EVERYBODY is presented by special arrangement with Broadway Licensing, LLC, servicing the Dramatists Play Service collection. (www.dramatists.com)
Get immersed in the visual arts and design made available through BabsonARTS. Engage with both the artists and the art on display with exhibits showcased throughout the year. Babson, Olin, and Wellesley students, faculty, and staff are encouraged to take advantage of regularly offered workshops in ceramics, painting, and drawing and members of the Babson community are able to enjoy free or discounted access to exhibits and museums in the Greater Boston area.
Heart to Heart? A Curious Human-Machine Dialogue
ARTIST TALK AND RECEPTION
Tuesday, September 10, 5:00 P.M.
FREE and open to the public. Registration encouraged.
Walk-ins welcome.
Exhibit On View September 10–October 18,
M-F 9:00 A.M.–5:00 P.M.
ARTIST-LED TOUR OF EXHIBIT September 18, 3:00 P.M.
Hollister Gallery
Machines can generate content such as text, sound, imagery, and video that are human-like. But how deeply can machines “perceive” content? When shown an image, is the depth of machine’s perception comparable to how some humans may feel about an image? Can a machine’s interpretation of an image be as elegant, poignant, emotional, witty, or thought-provoking as when shown to a human?
In this exhibition, Davit Khachatryan invites the viewers to answer those questions for themselves by reflecting over a collection of images that he co-created with the help of generative AI. The images displayed in this collection represent visual artistic renderings of literature – such as poems and quotes – that are inspirational to the artist. It is hoped that viewers will find this offbeat human-machine interaction beneficial and walk out with a renewed appreciation of what it means to be human in the age of AI.
Davit Khachatryan is an Associate Professor in the Mathematics, Analytics, Science and Technology Division at Babson College who teaches data science, machine learning, and statistics in both the undergraduate and graduate programs. He is enthusiastic about the potential of AI in original research, innovative pedagogy, and creative self-expression.
Learn more about Davit Khachatryan by clicking the QR code.
Photo credit: MASARY Studios
MASARY in Residence
Monday, September 23 – Sunday, September 29
MASARY Studios is a collective of transdisciplinary artists who create site-specific artworks in the public realm that deploys new media materials to compose compelling, unexpected stories. Their practice is often based in light, sound and the development and implementation of new technologies at architectural scale. The Studio continues to innovate and develop novel methods of media production in their practice incorporating spatial audio, artificial intelligence, data-driven light sculptures and beyond.
Photo credit: Aram Boghosian
This is an Audio Memory
At the center of this week-long residency is a new method of media performance and installation. The Glavin Family Chapel will be transformed into The Chapel Lab: a participatory media performance lab inviting the Babson community to learn and contribute sound to the headline performance by MASARY on Wednesday evening of the residency. The sound and visual work produced through this experimental audio analysis process will generate a durational “audio memory” which will be displayed at architectural scale on the exterior walls of the Glavin Chapel from Thursday through Sunday evening.
The Chapel Lab (times subject to change)
Monday, September 23, 4:00 P.M.–5:30 P.M.; 8:00 P.M.–9:00 P.M.
Tuesday, September 24, 4:00 P.M.–6:00 P.M.
Wednesday, September 25, 10:00 A.M.–1:00 P.M.
Glavin Family Chapel
FREE. BOW Students, Faculty and Staff Only
Students, staff and faculty from Babson, Olin and Wellesley are invited to join the artists in the creative process, exploring how sound might produce visual languages directly. This lab environment welcomes speakers, musicians, poets and more to experience a real time audio-analysis to video system. This custom hardware/software system is designed to analyze audio on many levels (spectral, musical, etc.) at extremely low-latency and deliver this real-time data to digital video animation software. Thus, speakers, musicians, and others can produce sound and see it incorporated into large-scale projected video environments almost instantly. Those interested in further engagement are welcome to return to The Chapel Lab to join the performance in real-time on Wednesday evening.
Photo credit: Hanno Dall
Live Performance and Installation Debut
Wednesday, September 25, 7:00 P.M.–9:00 P.M
Glavin Family Chapel
FREE and open to the public.
Building on residency-prepared audio and visual languages, the live performance will be led by MASARY and feature guests from the BOW community and Babson archival audio recordings. Atmospheric soundscapes blend towards contemporary electro-acoustic production as an invitation to jam in this novel audio-visual landscape. Real time video projections in the chapel on specialty screens will immerse attendees in a hybrid media environment. This durational performance installation will remain open, loose and inviting throughout the evening. There is no prescribed formal start or end, chaptering or shape - rather all will be discovered together, in real time.
Visual Installation on View
Wednesday, September 25 to 7:00 P.M. –10:30 P.M.
Thursday, September 26 – Sunday, September 29,
7:00 P.M.–11:00 P.M.
Glavin Family Chapel
FREE and open to the public.
The audio driven video elements produced through The Chapel Lab sessions and live performance will be captured and live-streamed at architectural scale nightly on the Glavin Family Chapel façade, without sound, proposing an audio memory of this unique collaboration for the community to consider.
#FierceLatina
by Nayda A.Cuevas
ARTIST TALK AND RECEPTION
Thursday, November 7, 5:00 P.M.
FREE and open to the public. Registration encouraged.
Walk-ins welcome.
EXHIBIT ON VIEW
November 7– January 3, M–F 9:00 A.M.–5:00 P.M.
Hollister Gallery
Our society presents a fixed identity or illusion of Latina women. Positive role models are invisible and unspoken about. This series by socially engaged artist Nayda A. Cuevas showcases a small group of women made visible/popular by social media. From engineers to activists to politicians, these women demonstrate strength in a society that makes visible negative stereotypes that lead to discrimination, injustice, and barriers that exclude Latinx from opportunities.
Nayda’s exploration of her identity produces a visceral exchange of personal and political identity while cultivating an awareness of “otherness.” Her passion emerged from unearthing a visual language to better articulate through visual arts her observation and interpretation of her Latina American experience. Her artwork represents a continuous search to make connections with the people around her and in the place she lives.
Artist website: www.naydacuevasart.com
There are many dynamic artists in the world of film and television, and BabsonARTS strives to showcase a representative array of fresh creative voices. Award-winning documentaries, classics from the silver screen, and the works of daring international filmmakers are all screened and discussed.
Global Film: Perfect Days
Directed by Wim Wenders
Tuesday, October 22, 7:00 P.M.
Rated PG. Run time 123 minutes.
Carling-Sorenson Theater
FREE and open to the public. Registration encouraged.
Walk-ins welcome.
The wonders of everyday life come into breath- taking focus in this profoundly moving film by Wim Wenders. In a radiant, Cannes-award-winning performance of few words but extraordinary expressiveness, Koji Yakusho plays a public-toilet cleaner in Tokyo whose rich inner world is gradually revealed through his small exchanges with those around him and with the city itself. Channeling his idol Yasujiro Ozu, Wenders crafts a serenely minimalist ode to the miracle that is the here and now. Post-film discussion will be held immediately following the screening.
Co-presented by the Global Film Series and the Arts and Humanities Division.
Whether modern, ethnic, classical, or a fusion of all three, music at Babson takes a variety of forms, all of which can serve as powerful conduits for entrepreneurial thinking. Regardless of the setting, music performances through BabsonARTS are engaging and innovative displays of talent and creative vision. Learn more about Performance Venues and Practice Rooms.
LIVE AT THE BLACK BOX
Thursday, September 19, 7:00 P.M.
Thursday, October 17, 7:00 P.M.
Sorenson Black Box
FREE and open to the public.
Registration available for September 19
Registration available for October 17
Walk-ins welcome.
Live at the Black Box features Babson student performers, providing an opportunity for them to share their talents. Multiple acts will be showcased at each event in short sets with the sound system and some equipment provided. Refreshments will be served. Stop in for a particular act or stay for the duration of the event. Run time approximately 60-75 minutes.
Students interested in applying to perform during a set should contact the BabsonARTS office at babsonarts@babson.edu for application materials and guidelines. We encourage all performers to apply and hope to showcase not only musicians and bands, but DJs, spoken word, comedy, and more!
Babson Music Collective Concert
Saturday, November 16, 2:00 P.M.
Carling-Sorenson Theater
FREE and open to the public.
Registration encouraged.
Walk-ins welcome.
The Babson Music Collective is rooted in the jazz traditions of improvisation and creative expression. The group finds inspiration in a range of musical styles, from pop and afro-beat to classic jazz standards. Drawing on each member’s personal playing style and experiences, the Collective creates unique arrangements for all the music it plays. The Babson Music Collective performs at several concerts and events throughout the year, with the goal of fostering a community of Babson’s many student musicians and listeners.
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Get Involved with Babson Music Collective!
The Babson Music Collective is rooted in the jazz traditions of improvisation and creative expression. The group finds inspiration in a range of musical styles, from pop and afro-beat to classic jazz standards. Drawing on each member’s personal playing style and experiences, the Collective creates unique arrangements for all the music it plays.
The Babson Music Collective performs at several concerts and events throughout the year with the goal of fostering a community of Babson’s many student musicians and listeners.
Led by Clayton DeWalt, the group rehearses weekly on Fridays from 12-2pm, and performs several concerts per semester, both on campus and within the surrounding community.
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Babson Music Collective Fall 2022 Concert. Photo by Nile Hawver.
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Babson Music Collective Spring 2023 Concert. Photo by Emily Wang.
With multiple rehearsal spaces and the Babson Dance Ensemble—the largest student-run organization on campus—there’s never a shortage of performances through BabsonARTS. With shows featuring everything from hip hop to tap, dance is an energizing way to experience innovative thought in action.
Celebrating the vast and eclectic stories to be told, Literary Arts at BabsonARTS showcase the works of renowned writers, poets, and literary experts reaching new and captive audiences at Babson with their words and stories.
Waterline Reading Series Showcase
Tuesday, October 29, 5:00 P.M.
Hollister Gallery
FREE and open to the public.
Registration encouraged.
Walk-ins welcome.
Waterline features a fast-paced hour of literary works from Babson College faculty and staff fiction writers, poets, and essayists. The selection is always intriguing and often includes works in progress not yet in publication. Recently featured authors: Steve Bauer, Jordan Escobar, Wes Miller, Mary O’Donoghue, Mary Pinard, Asiel Sepulveda and David Youtz.
Co-presented with the Arts and Humanities Division.
BabsonARTS conversations showcase dynamic speakers ranging from prominent arts leaders to literary luminaries. They discuss their work and share their insights, engaging with the audience in an intimate setting.
Come explore your creativity! Workshops are in-person and open to current Babson, Olin, and Wellesley students, faculty, and staff. Materials and instruction are provided; no prior experience needed.
Registration is required and will open two weeks prior to each workshop.
Workshops fill quickly. If sold out, email babsonarts@babson.edu to inquire about a wait list.
Making Art with AI: Presented by BabsonARTS and The Weissman Foundry
Tuesday, September 17, 5:00 P.M.–7:00 P.M.
Weissman Foundry, Workroom
FREE. Registration opens September 3.
Delve into the cutting-edge world where artificial intelligence meets creativity as we learn how to harness the power of AI tools and platforms to generate captivating visuals, produce stunning designs, and push the boundaries of traditional artistry. Whether you’re a seasoned artist intrigued by new mediums or a tech enthusiast eager to explore the creative potential of AI, this workshop offers a hands-on journey into the future of art. Participants are encouraged to bring their own laptop; additional materials and instruction will be provided.
Fluid Acrylic Painting on 3D Objects
Thursday, October 3, 5:00 P.M.–7:00 P.M.
2D/3D Studio (Trim 215)
FREE. Registration opens September 19.
Dive into the fascinating world of fluid art as we explore the unique challenge of painting on three-dimensional surfaces. Learn how to manipulate vibrant acrylic paints to create mesmerizing patterns, captivating textures, and stunning color gradients that flow effortlessly across your chosen objects. From vases and sculptures to everyday items transformed into works of art, join us and let your creativity flow beyond the canvas! No prior experience required. Materials and instruction will be provided. This workshop is messy, please dress accordingly.
Color Theory and Collage
Thursday, November 14, 5:00 P.M.–7:00 P.M.
2D/3D Studio (Trim 215)
FREE. Registration opens October 31.
Unleash your creativity as we explore the principles of color harmony, contrast, and composition. From understanding the psychology behind colors to learning the art of combining textures and patterns, this workshop will equip you with the tools to create visually stunning collages that captivate and inspire. Whether well-practiced or just beginning your creative journey, join us for an enriching experience where you’ll learn, experiment, and bring your artistic visions to life through the kaleidoscope of color and collage. No prior experience required. Materials and instruction will be provided, but you are welcome to bring items to add to your collage.
The Babson Ceramic Studio is located in the Sorenson Visual Arts Center within Trim Hall. Memberships are available on a semester basis during the Academic Year to current Babson College, Olin College of Engineering and Wellesley College students, staff, and faculty. Members pay a flat fee of $100 at registration, which covers moderate use of clay, glazes, and other supplies and equipment. Members have access to the studio via Babson OneCards from 8 a.m.–10 p.m. daily including weekends and breaks. A regular firing schedule is posted and the Ceramics Studio manager and monitors have weekly studio hours to assist members as well as weekly drop-in tutorials on hand building and wheel throwing. Previous experience is not required to join The Babson Ceramics Studio relies on student staffing and members working to keep the studio clean, well maintained, and learning together.
Supplies and staffing provided are based on moderate use of the studio and materials and cannot support large volume production, personal or otherwise. Users who are working at a high-level of output beyond personal use may be asked to provide or purchase additional materials as approved by the Ceramics Studio Manager. Production for retail purposes is prohibited.
Registration, open on a tiered basis, usually opens the week prior to the start of each semester using the Babson College academic calendar. Each member must register individually, and payment is due at registration. Slots are limited and go quickly. For more information or to be added to the notification list to receive an email announcing when registration will open each semester, please email babsonceramics@babson.edu. If you wish to be added to the notification list, please provide your name, school email address, and year of expected graduation.
The BabsonARTS Student Arts Grant program provides funding, mentorship, and support from BabsonARTS resources, staff, and affiliates toward specific projects proposed by individual or multiple students. While not as intense as most artistic grant processes, students are offered assistance beginning with the application process through the execution of the project. The arts grant program was created to encourage any interested Babson College student to pursue a creative project, whether identifying as an artist or not, to explore and enhance their engagement with creativity and the arts. Approved projects have included a wide-range of genres including film, visual arts such as painting, ceramics, felting and photography, podcast and video series, and fashion.
Application Deadlines
Applications are due by 5 p.m. on the dates listed.
- Fall Semester or Academic Year-long Projects: September 15
- Fall Semester or Academic Year-long projects that require more lead or project time can be submitted by April 15 for the following fall/academic year.
- Spring Semester Projects: November 15
Successful proposals typically demonstrate clear goals, specific proposed timelines, a strong narrative regarding what the student(s) hope to learn and explore through the proposed projects, and engagement with the resources available throughout the project. The Selection Committee reviews applications the week following each deadline and generally notifies applicants of approval/denial or if there are additional questions within two weeks of the submission deadlines. We fully anticipate projects will hit challenges, pivot, and sometimes end up in a very different place than originally proposed. That is the beauty (and sometimes frustration) of the artistic process—and we embrace that.
Any currently enrolled Babson College student, undergraduate or graduate, is eligible to apply. The application form and guidelines are available here. Students are encouraged to schedule an appointment to speak with a member of the BabsonARTS staff about their ideas and proposal before submitting the application. For more information or to schedule an appointment, please email babsonarts@babson.edu.
Sorenson Arts Scholars Spotlight 2024
The Sorenson Arts Scholarship is awarded to incoming first-year students with demonstrated talent who are interested in maintaining their artistic pursuits while at Babson.
