All different kinds of art, from a cappella to the visual and literary arts, will be coming together on March 7 to showcase the arts community at UNC.
Senior Will Leitch, an executive officer for the event's host organization, the Student Arts Movement, said that the aim of the showcase is to foster collaboration between different art groups. He said while the communities borrow from each other, they want to create a more supportive environment.
“This event is really supposed to just bring all of those arts groups together to pay attention to each other and show support to each other, and then that way, that can foster a better community among arts groups overall moving forward,” Leitch said.
Leitch said that the first two hours will be dedicated to performance-oriented groups, such as dance teams Bhangra Elite and Moonlight Dance Crew. After this, there will be an hour-long reception dedicated to visual and literary arts.
“I think the most exciting thing is that it is one of the few opportunities on campus to see some of the great, talented work that happens for free,” Leitch said. “And you’re not only supporting one type of art or one group, you’re supporting the arts overall.”
Many different kinds of organizations will be at the showcase, including Blank Canvas, the largest student-run dance group on campus.
“Blank Canvas is an organization that allows dancers from all different backgrounds to come, so some people are dancing for the first time and some people are dancing for the tenth year of their life.” said first-year Cayla Ifill, a member of Blank Canvas. “... I think that it’ll show audiences that anybody can dance.”
Ifill said that this showcase helps show students that they don’t have to have professional training and hopefully inspires them to try something new.
“This is a liberal arts institution, so it’s really important that we bring to light not just visual art, but things like dance and music that are also considered art,” said Ifill. “That’s what we stand for at Chapel Hill.”
