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Arts rising: Festivals of the ’60s

By Rebecca Downing

From Susan Sontag, to John Cage, to The Doors, some of the most significant figures of their genres came to campus for two major festivals organized by students in 1964 and 1968.

1960s
Poster for Fortnight, featuring stylized, amorphous text
Poster for Fortnight, featuring stylized, amorphous text

Logo and poster for the 1968 Fortnight of Active Arts

In the 1960s — not once, but twice — students organized extraordinarily ambitious festivals that reflected a renaissance in the arts on campus and the cultural ethos of the decade.

Both festivals featured current and rising luminaries on the cutting edge of art, architecture, music, literature, theater, dance, and criticism, in extensive programs of discussions, films, workshops, performances, and exhibitions.

Festival of the Creative Arts, 1964

With the 1964 Festival of the Creative Arts, students were doing their part in the drive to build the Dana Arts Center. Chairman of the festival Harold Snedcof ’65 told the Colgate Maroon they were “seeking to disprove the cries of our critics that we are a status-seeking, do-nothing, apathetic generation.”1 Their “anti-lecture” format placed students in direct contact with artists for spontaneous discussions about “what is currently preoccupying the mind of the creative artist” and featured an exhibition in Case Library including work by the likes of Josef Albers, Willem DeKooning, Jacques Lipchitz, and Jackson Pollock.

Cover of Poiesis magazine, produced during the 1964 Festival of the Creative Arts
Poet Denise Levertov with students at the Festival of the Creative Arts, Oct 1964
Students converse with poet James Dickey at the Festival of the Creative Arts, Oct 1964

Artists who visited

 

Norman Mailer

Susan Sontag

Milton Babbitt

Philip Roth

Gunther Schuller

W.D. Snodgrass

People should see where art fits in, and realize that art is a structuring of material that fits into our daily lives, not just paint and canvas.”

Barnet Kellman ’69

Fortnight of Active Arts, 1968

In 1968, the Fortnight of Active Arts shifted the focus to active collaboration between artists and students. Co-chair of the festival (with George Paul Brown ’68) Barnet Kellman ’69 said, “People should see where art fits in, and realize that art is a structuring of material that fits into our daily lives, not just paint and canvas.”2

Artists who visited

 

R. Buckminster Fuller

Merce Cunningham

John Cage

Joseph Chaiken (Open Theater)

Vienna Academy Chorus

The Doors

Notes & Sources

Editor’s Note: This story was originally published in the Colgate Scene, Winter 2011. 

Endnotes
References
  • The Colgate Maroon and Colgate Maroon News, A1165, Special Collections and University Archives, Colgate University 
  • Festival of the Creative Arts records, A1051, Special Collections and University Archives, Colgate University
  • Fortnight of Active Arts records, A1044, Special Collections and University Archives, Colgate University
Images in order of appearance
  1. Fortnight of Active Arts records, A1044, Colgate Special Collections and University Archives
  2. Photo by David L. Arnold, Colgate Office of Public Information, Festival of the Creative Arts records, A1051, Colgate Special Collections and University Archives
  3. Ibid.
  4. Fortnight of Active Arts records, A1044, Colgate Special Collections and University Archives
  5. Ibid.
  6. Ibid.
  7. Ibid.

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