Community Calendar

Course description:

College is a crucial institution in which our society works through its expectations for young people. This course explores the purposes of college education through the first great book on the philosophy of education, Plato’s Republic. We read The Republic in conversation with other thinkers including Aristotle, Confucius, John Stuart Mill, Virginia Woolf, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. For the 325th anniversary of Yale’s founding, we also explore the changing conception of college education at Yale over the centuries and read some of the college’s and the university’s key founding documents. Themes include the development of personal character, participation in a community, preparation for citizenship, and conversation with others on intellectual matters. We also explore some of the social and economic functions of college education.

The 2026 DeVane Lecture series will be led by Pericles Lewis, Dean of Yale College and Douglas Tracy Smith Professor of Comparative Literature

The class is free and open to the public and will run on Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:30 to 3:20 p.m., from September 2 to December 9, 2026.

Chicago, 1927. Tensions and temperatures rise during a blistering recording session as the legendary “Mother of the Blues,” Ma Rainey, and her ambitious trumpeter, Levee, clash over control of her music, exposing the emotional and economic exploitation Black artists faced in America. An exploration of dreams deferred, cultural identity, and the power of the blues, August Wilson’s electrifying masterpiece, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, returns in a brand-new production more than 40 years after it first raised the roof of the American theater in its world premiere at Yale Rep.

Keeping sharp and staying active is vital for older adults.

The AFA Barbara Rabinowitz Center offers free, dementia-friendly activities for Long Island seniors every weekday in Amityville.

The Center’s free programs help seniors strengthen their brains, be creative, and socialize.

Programs include arts & crafts, music, games, chair yoga, dance, and movement.

Visit afalongisland.org or call 631-223-4000 to learn more.

The Tremaine Gallery at Hotchkiss presents Field Notes, an exhibition of works by contemporary artist Eve Biddle, curated by Terri Moore.

Drawing on the symbolism of snakes as signs of life and fertility and referencing archaeological artifacts across time, Biddle's work explores the ways memory, perception, and presence transform our understanding of the natural world. Her images follow a meandering path, reminding us that neither history nor our own lives move in straight lines. Nature appears ambiguously alive or dead, abstracted and literal at once.

Rather than documenting a specific place, Biddle reshapes the landscape genre through layering, translation, and physical intervention. The resulting works invite viewers to consider the connections between nature, memory, time, and transformation.

Upcoming Events

Artist Talk
Thursday, September 17 | 7:00–7:45 p.m.
Join Eve Biddle for a conversation about her work and the ideas behind Field Notes.

Artist Reception
Saturday, September 19 | 4:00–6:00 p.m.
Celebrate the exhibition and meet artist Eve Biddle at the Tremaine Gallery.

The exhibition and events are free and open to the public.

Field Notes remains on view through October 18.

The Tremaine Art Gallery is located at 11 Interlaken Road, Lakeville, CT, and is open Tuesday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. The Gallery is closed on Mondays.

Hieroglyphs to Hype: The Modern Afterlife of Ancient Egypt will explore the enduring fascination with ancient Egyptian art and culture (dubbed “Egyptomania” by 19th-century Europeans) through a selection of paintings, prints, photographs, and decorative art ranging from the early 19th century through the present day. These objects, from the humble to the refined, from the shamelessly commercial to the Afrofuturist, represent the range of artistic responses to – and misconceptions about – ancient Egyptian visual culture.
Paradoxically, this enthusiasm for Egyptian symbols and motifs contributed to the erasure of the ancient Egyptian people themselves, as their beliefs and customs became exoticized in popular memory. The exhibition will examine how these objects reflect the phenomenon of “Egyptomania” over the last two centuries and will position their oversimplified or stereotypical narratives in conversation with current archaeological understandings of ancient Egyptian culture.
Hieroglyphs to Hype: The Modern Afterlife of Ancient Egypt is curated by Megan Paqua (adjunct instructor of ancient Egyptian archaeology and art history and Fairfield University Art Museum Registrar) and will be on view from September 18 - December 12, 2026 in the Bellarmine Hall Galleries.

Charles-Théodore Frère, Along the Nile, ca. 1870, oil on panel. Fairfield University Art Museum, Gift of Michael T. Vigario’08, 2023, 2023.11.01

This exhibition focuses on more than 60 recent works by photographer James Welling (American, born 1951). From the artist’s Cento and Personae series, these photographs of ancient sites in Italy and Greece, as well as antiquities in museums around the world, underwent digital and painterly alteration to achieve transformative effects. The photographs will be exhibited alongside a selection from the Museum’s extensive collection of historic plaster casts of Greek and Roman sculpture.
As Welling explains, he is interested in “reanimating” the men and women of the ancient past through these works and connecting them to our own time in a fresh way through his innovative combination of photography and painting. Visitors to the exhibition will feel their curiosity piqued by his elusive and often haunting evocations of the ancient Mediterranean world.

James Welling, Fragment of a gold leaf wreath, 2020, oil pigment, oil pastel, and wax over electrostatic print on polypropylene substrate. Courtesy of the artist and Regen Projects. © James Welling

UMC Monroe is partnering with the American Red Cross for a blood drive on Thursday, October 15, 2026 from 12:00 pm - 5:00 pm. We invite you to participate in this life-saving, well-known cause.

Streamline your donation experience and save up to 15 minutes by visiting RedCrossBlood.org/RapidPass to complete your pre-donation reading and health history questions on the day of your appointment OR download the Blood App from the Apple or Google app stores.

Each pint of blood we collect can help save up to three lives and will touch the lives of so many more -- The need is constant. The gratification is instant. Give blood.

Drive Details:

Location: United Methodist Church of Monroe, Fellowship Hall, 515 Cutlers Farm Road
Date: Thursday, October 15, 2026
Time: 12:00 pm – 5:00 pm

Click here to make an appointment: https://tinyurl.com/mw7arfsc

The need for blood is constant and only volunteer donors can fulfill that need for patients in our community. Nationwide, someone needs a unit of blood every 2 to 3 seconds and most of us will need blood in our lifetime. Please join our lifesaving mission and schedule an appointment today!

Please consider making a donation … and feel free to spread the word. It’s not every day that we do something that has such a lifesaving impact. With your help, we can do just that!

Thank you for supporting the American Red Cross blood program!

Contact: Darlene Dobler-Palin
Church Office: 203.268.8395

Click here for an event flyer: https://umcmonroe.org/events/american-red-cross-blood-drive-at-umc-monroe-fall-2026/

Course description:

College is a crucial institution in which our society works through its expectations for young people. This course explores the purposes of college education through the first great book on the philosophy of education, Plato’s Republic. We read The Republic in conversation with other thinkers including Aristotle, Confucius, John Stuart Mill, Virginia Woolf, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. For the 325th anniversary of Yale’s founding, we also explore the changing conception of college education at Yale over the centuries and read some of the college’s and the university’s key founding documents. Themes include the development of personal character, participation in a community, preparation for citizenship, and conversation with others on intellectual matters. We also explore some of the social and economic functions of college education.

The 2026 DeVane Lecture series will be led by Pericles Lewis, Dean of Yale College and Douglas Tracy Smith Professor of Comparative Literature

The class is free and open to the public and will run on Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:30 to 3:20 p.m., from September 2 to December 9, 2026.

Inaugurated in 1867, Street Hall—today part of the Yale University Art Gallery—housed the first collegiate school of art in the country. Its curriculum permitted students from a variety of disciplines to sketch from live models and original works of art. Take part in this centuries-old practice by joining Tuere Nicole Lawton, M.F.A. candidate in Painting/Printmaking, Yale School of Art, for an evening of guided drawing in the exhibition "Nguni: Migrant Nations of Southeast Africa." Generously sponsored by the Martin A. Ryerson Lectureship Fund.

Open to all ages and levels of drawing experience. Materials are provided.

Go Behind the Headlines

What was really happening inside Israel’s war room after October 7?

Join us for a fascinating behind-the-scenes conversation with Elliot Kaufman, Wall Street Journal editorial board member and co-author of the new book 'In the War Room: The Inside Story of Israel’s Fight Against Hamas and the Iranian Axis'.

Drawing on extraordinary access to senior Israeli and U.S. officials, Elliot will take us inside the leaders, debates and decisions that have shaped Israel’s war and explore what they mean for Israel and the Middle East going forward.

The conversation will be followed by audience Q&A.

$30 per person • Includes a copy of 'In the War Room'