All upcoming programs

For Ages 5 to 10.  Explore the origins of our planet, sing about the water cycle, and understand our vital role to protect the ecosystem in this Discovery Theater original play.

For Ages 5 to 10.  Explore the origins of our planet, sing about the water cycle, and understand our vital role to protect the ecosystem in this Discovery Theater original play.

Explore the basis of abstraction by studying color, line, and shape as they relate to composition. Learn to create exciting, innovative works of art, using a series of drawing and painting exercises designed to examine nontraditional ways of handling traditional materials and subject matter.

Explore the basics of color theory, including temperature, value, and harmony-creating color schemes. In hands-on projects, learn to use a color wheel with tinting and toning, color charts, and color harmony studies.

Using watercolor, learn the strategies Morisot, Turner, Monet, and Cézanne employed to harness light in their images. (World Art History Certificate elective, 1/2 credit)

Ernest Hemingway’s 1952 novella The Old Man and the Sea received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and was also singled out when Hemingway was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. Literature professor Joseph Luzzi guides the audience through a close reading of this masterpiece, highlighting Hemingway’s brilliant characterization, detailed depictions of the natural world, and inquiry into the relationship between the human and animal worlds.

Enjoy a unique opportunity to explore four of England’s most beloved cities, each possessed of intriguing history, magnificent architecture, rare treasures, and famous residents. From York’s bustling medieval streets and Oxford’s beautiful colleges to the splendid vistas of Cambridge and the Georgian elegance of Bath, cultural historian Lorella Brocklesby showcases what has long made these cities unforgettable.

Join fellow Broadway lovers in a choral program celebrating some of the great songs from the Great White Way. Drawing from shows such as West Side Story, Hair, and Wicked, choral conductor and music educator Ernest Johnson leads the ensemble in arrangements of the tunes you know and love. No audition is required. Rehearsals culminate in a free performance on June 6.

Through the 1950s and 1960s, the world witnessed a first in its history: Two global superpowers armed with enough thermonuclear weapons to destroy the planet several times over. While many Americans repeated the idea that nuclear war was too terrible to contemplate, a group of scholars and theorists within the defense and policy worlds thought deeply and carefully about how to wage—and win—such a conflict should it ever erupt. Historian Chris Hamner examines the thinking of scholars like Herman Kahn and those at RAND Corporation as they puzzled out how to deter World War III or, failing that, how the U.S. could emerge victorious—as well as how to understand what everyday Americans were thinking about the monstrous possibility of nuclear war.

During this all-day tour with horticulturist Chelsea Mahaffey, spend the morning at Oak Spring, the former home of philanthropists Paul Mellon and Rachel “Bunny” Mellon, usually closed to the public. The nearly 700-acre estate includes the main Mellon residence, its extensive gardens with examples of Bunny Mellon’s landscaping, and the formal greenhouse. The afternoon takes you to the University of Virginia’s Blandy Experimental Farm on the former Tuleyries estate, which includes the State Arboretum of Virginia.