Classes may only have been in session since Tuesday, but it is more than likely that students are already itching for Summer Break. But if the end just seems too far away, perhaps students should set their sights on Thursday and make their way down the E Line. This Thursday, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum will host its monthly Third Thursday program, and this month’s unique theme, “All the Feels,” will provide attendees with a reprieve as yet another stressful week comes to an end. The best part? The event is completely free of charge for anyone with a Boston College ID.
Beginning at 5:30 p.m., “All the Feels” will be a night filled with music and dance—various performances that Jessie Smith, the director of program planning, and Abigail Geringer, the assistant programs director, hope will fill visitors with emotion and give them, well, “all the feels.” Scattered throughout the palatial galleries of the Gardner Museum, these performances will include music from Stringalong, a group that has previously performed there with enormous success. The musical duo, comprised of cellist Aaron Fried and violinist Josh Knowles, will be situated in the Gardner Museum’s famed Courtyard, showing off their unique contemporary pop and R&B sound.
Visitors will also have the chance to appreciate the work of dancer and choreographer Aysha Upchurch as she performs in the Gardner Museum’s special exhibition space, the Hosetter Gallery. There, Upchurch will respond to the current sound-art installation housed in the gallery as part of the Gardner’s Listen Hear exhibition, which asks viewers to consider the auditory arts. Smith and Geringer, who met with Upchurch to show her the space, explained that even Upchurch’s immediate improvised response to the work was “incredible,” and something that will delight viewers when the night itself arrives.
But Upchurch’s performance is not the only way through which attendees will have the opportunity to connect with the Gardner Museum and its wildly popular sound-art exhibition. In many of the other galleries throughout the museum, visitors will have the chance to participate in activities intended to elicit even more “personal responses” from attendees. In past Third Thursdays, these activities have included games such as scavenger hunts, but for “All the Feels,” attendees will engage both their visual and linguistic skills that connect to the larger sound-art exhibition.
In the Gardner Museum’s Tapestry Room, a wordplay activity will invite participants to craft a poetic response to the work of sound-art that is housed in the space. In another space, visitors will also create their own physical works of art. Inspired by carefully chosen songs that organizers will play in the gallery space, visitors will create a mosaic and make personal connections with the Gardner Museum.
“The gallery activities are really just playful ways to connect with the collection,” Smith said. “You know, they’re games and they’re playful and lighthearted, but they’re also are really fantastic to get to understand what this museum is all about, and get, a taste for the incredible collection.”
And “All the Feels,” like the many other Third Thursdays that have come before it over the decade since the Gardner Museum first launched the program, will not only connect visitors more deeply with the museum itself, but also more intimately with the Boston community around them. Geringer explained that the monthly night, which often draws young professionals and students who call Boston home, is also a “social evening.” Visitors can take advantage of the bar located in the Courtyard, or even the Gardner Museum’s café if they are feeling peckish, and bond with their friends in this tranquil oasis that is nestled within the city. Geringer also noted that these nights offer students the perfect way meet people outside of their “normal circle,” and to “just experience what the city has to offer as a college student.”
Smith also explained that nights like “All the Feels” often serve as the perfect decompression tool after a long week.
“April can be a very busy time for students, so having a night at the Gardner Museum is a really beautiful way to take a break and recharge,” Smith said. “Especially as classes are getting really intense, this is a really nice way to spend time with friends and maybe make some new ones in an incredibly beautiful location.”
And for those unable to make this “All the Feels,” May’s Third Thursday is only a month away.
Featured Image by Madeleine D’Angelo / Heights Editor
