Notable Events Across L&S and UC Davis This Month
The flowers are in bloom, the sun is starting to stay out and, with the start of the spring quarter, comes many events throughout the College of Letters and Science. From lectures and workshops to music, art shows and tea gatherings, there is something to learn, see and do wherever you go in Davis this month.
Join us as we explore this month's events, organized thematically for whatever mood this new quarter brings you:
Music & theatre performances
Ghost Ensemble
April 3, 4 | Ghost Ensemble, a mixed chamber ensemble dedicated to experimental music, will perform two free concerts alongside UC Davis students. Both performances will be in the Recital Hall at the Ann E. Pitzer Center.
- Thursday, April 3: 12:05 - 1:00 p.m.
- Friday, April 4: 5 - 6:15 p.m.
Find more events from the Department of Music.
Diving into Math
April 9 | Mathematics and theatrics combine in Diving into Math with Emmy Noether, a play about the pioneering and influential mathematician who is often referred to as the “mother of modern algebra.”
Sponsored by the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis and the Department of Mathematics, the play will be performed at the Wyatt Pavillion Theater as part of portraittheater Vienna’s spring 2025 USA tour.
- Wednesday, April 9 at 6 p.m.
Read more about Noether and the story behind the play coming to UC Davis.
California Studio artist lectures
April 10, 24 | The California Studio: Manetti Shrem Artist Residencies brings two Brooklyn-based artists to UC Davis this month. Marie Lorenz, a multimedia artist who uses printmaking, sculpture and filmmaking in her work; and Byron Kim, who creates paintings that double as portraits and landscapes, will each speak at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art. Both events are free and open to the public.
- Thursday, April 10: 4:30 – 6 p.m. | Maria Lorenz
- Thursday, April 24: 4:30 – 6 p.m. | Byron Kim
Art exhibitions
Manetti Shrem Museum
The Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art at the University of California, Davis, unveils the first U.S. presentation of Italy’s renowned Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Collection, and the first solo museum exhibition of artist Ruby Neri. Light Into Density, a student-curated exhbition, continues.
- Through Their Eyes: Selections from the Sandretto Re Rebaudengo Collection is on view until June 22.
- Ruby Neri: Taking the Deep Dive is on view until May 5.
- Light into Density: Abstract Encounters 1920s–1960s | From the Collection of Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem on view until May 5.
Read more about these three exhibitions.
Gorman Museum
'Olé Ham Nees: We Call Him Coyote' Harry Fonseca Works from the Shingle Springs Band Collection runs through Aug. 21.
The solo exhibition now on view at the Gorman Museum of Native American Art features the artwork of Harry Fonseca drawn from the Shingle Springs Band Collection. Embracing the lifework of this tribal citizen, the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians acquired an important collection of works spanning Fonseca's career.
Design Museum
Since the first iteration of “Design in Europe," a study abroad program at UC Davis, students have kept visual journals of their travels — six to eight pages per day — that are a mix between a scrapbook, sketchbook, travelogue, collage and diary. The journals have been exhibited in Iceland, Scotland, England and the Netherlands. Now, for the first time, these journals are being exhibited all together right here in Davis.
Visual Journals: 2010-2024 is on display, in parts, at both the UC Davis Design Museum and the International Center through April 25.
Read more about this exhibition.
The intersection of art, tea and taste
A Journey into Chinese Tea
April 17 | America-China Talk (ACT) and East Asian Studies present A Journey into Chinese Tea, with Wei Li, author of Chinese Tea: Science Behind the Leaf and founder of the Chinese Tea Alliance, in the Andrews Conference Room, Social Science and Humanities Bulding (SSH)2203. Tea and snacks will be served.
- Thursday, April 17: 4 - 5:30 p.m.
Artist Talk: Tea and Peace
April 23 | Artists Amber Ginsburg and Aaron Hughes will discuss the Tea Project, part of which is now featured in the UC Davis Global Tea Institute’s Tea and Peace spring exhibition in the Collections Classroom at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art. Each porcelain cast Styrofoam teacup represents the story of one individual detained in the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp.
- Wednesday, April 23: 3 - 5 p.m.
Tea and Peace explores the role that tea and material tea culture serves in creating space for conversations, building community and cultivating connections that transcend barriers of difference. The exhibition is on view until June 15.
Thinking Food at the Intersections
April 19 | Chef and artist Minh Phan invites audiences to a performance that takes place in her transcultural and transmedial garden. MÁT MÁT MẮT (Cool cool eyes), an immersive and collective commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon, offers a multisensory encounter with trauma, memory and a taste of letting go. The performance will be followed by a Q&A with Elizabeth McQueen, a postdoctoral fellow at UC Davis, as part of the Mellon Foundation Sawyer Seminar, Thinking Food at the Intersections.
- Saturday, April 19: 3 - 4 p.m.
Find more Thinking Food events.
Get outside at UC Davis
Picnic Day
April 12 | Picnic Day is one of UC Davis’ most revered traditions and serves as the university’s annual Open House for prospective and current students, families, alumni, staff, faculty, and the greater Davis and regional communities.
Check out the full line-up of Picnic Day events.
Powwow
April 19 | Powwow, as practiced today, is a social gathering intended to provide the campus and local community a space to learn about, engage with, and celebrate the traditions and cultures of Indigenous peoples, and bring visibility to the vibrancy of Native American music, dance, and arts. In its 49th year, the UC Davis Powwow is student-run and student-planned, standing as one of the longest running student powwows in California.
- Saturday, April 19: 11 a.m. - 9 p.m. on the UC Davis Quad
Hear from L&S faculty
What do a mathematician studying the geometry behind refractions, a technologist creating wearables for the chronically ill and a science historian revealing the complex history of sociogenomics all have in common? They're all in the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis. Hear enlightening perspectives from these three Dean’s Faculty Fellows in the Public Talk Series this month.
Each talk is free, open to the public and via Zoom from 4 to 5 p.m. Thursdays in April. Learn more and register here.
April 3 | "The American Pursuit of Intelligence Genes" from Associate Professor Emily Merchant, Department of Science and Technology Studies, traces the long history of efforts by American social scientists to identify a genetic basis for intelligence, examining how these efforts naturalized socioeconomic inequality, challenged multiracial democracy, and legitimated eugenic projects, without ever finding the still-elusive intelligence genes.
April 10 | "Empowering Health and Wellbeing: Transdisciplinary Design in Wearable Technology" from Associate Professor Gozde Goncu-Berk, Department of Design, will showcase how collaborative research across engineering, healthcare and design fields can lead to textile based wearable technology solutions in enhancing health and wellbeing. The presentation will highlight electronic textiles and smart clothing to monitor health, provide sensory feedback, and adapt to various environmental and activity-based contexts.
April 17 | How does sunlight reflect on a cup of coffee? How do rays of light bounce of the walls of a room? This is an all-welcome talk, "Singularities and Rays of Light," from Associate Professor Roger Casals, Department of Mathematics, about the beautifully singular bright spots that light creates when interacting with everyday objects.
Find even more events on the L&S calendar and follow the UC Davis Arts Blog for weekly and monthly event listings!
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