From the Hillel Drama Society's production of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice to a puppet musical of West Side Story , Harvard and Radcliffe students are creating innovative projects for the seventh annual ARTS FIRST festival, with the help of funding from the Office for the Arts. The Harvard Council on the Arts has awarded 24 grants (representing two-thirds of the applications) to student projects that have artistic merit, originality, cultural diversity, and a high level of visibility. (The Council includes chair Robert Kiely, Allen Counter, Thomas Kelly, Arthur Loeb, Claire Mallardi, Myra Mayman, Jeff Nichols, and Marcus Stern.)

ARTS FIRST is a festival that celebrates Harvard and Radcliffe undergraduates and faculty in the arts and seeks to galvanize the Harvard-Radcliffe arts community. This year it will be held May 6-9. Please call the Office for the Arts at (617) 495-8676 for more information about ARTS FIRST. The following projects are receiving funding:

DANCE

Aquilinity , Expressions Dance Company, Manuela Arciniegas '01: $250 for production of a student-choreographed and student-danced piece on the theme of water. It will be performed at the Lowell Lecture Hall.

ARTS FIRST Dance Festival, Margarita Miranda '01: $1,050 for a collaborative production integrating different dance styles and disciplines from across the Harvard-Radcliffe dance community.

Salpuri Chum , Korean Folk Dance, Asian American Dance Troupe, Jessica Leung '00: $160 for the performance of this traditional Korean folk dance. The dance will be developed under the instruction of Loretta Kim '99 and will debut at the ARTS FIRST Dance Festival.

TAPS FIRST, TAPS, Juraj Hlavac '00: $70 for two student-choreographed tap dance pieces in the Dance Festival.

LITERATURE

Harvard Advocate Senior Reading, Harvard Advocate , Franklin Leonard '00: $150 for the Harvard Advocate 's annual Senior Reading. On May 8, graduating members of the magazine's staff will read selections of their original poetry and fiction.

INCREASE Literary Magazine, Students of Mather House, Niki Santo '00: $200 for this publication specifically designed for ARTS FIRST that showcases the original fiction, poetry, drawing, and black-and-white photography of undergraduates in Mather House.

MULTIDISCIPLINARY

Black and Gold , Education for Action, Jacqueline Soohen '00: $250 for a presentation mixing a student-produced video piece with live hip-hop performances by students. The piece uses fast-paced montages and beats to tell the story of young Latinos in New York City. Black and Gold will be performed in a space showcasing student photographs of graffiti and hip-hop culture.

Cascando, Les Welter: $300 for a presentation of Samuel Beckett's Cascando , a piece for voice and music. Harvard College musicians will perform the live and prerecorded music for the piece.

HRTV ARTS FIRST Presentations, HRTV, Jonathan Vatner '01: $200 for HRTV's production of its new sitcom, Asylum , and the annual HRTV marathon in the Science Center, including new shows from this year, classics from past years, and four new film projects.

Temples, Times, and Text , Harvard-Radcliffe Latter-Day Saints Student Association, Michael Morris '01: $250 for a multimedia installation using 2-D and 3-D visual art, video presentations, music, and dance to explore the ways that Orthodox Judaism, Catholicism, and Mormonism set apart certain times, texts, and spaces as sacred.

West Side Story: A Puppet Musical , Onion Weavers Puppet Theater, Heather Jezak '99: $364 for the production of this puppet show. They will modify the plot, possibly scripting a murder mystery to run through the original story.

MUSIC

Funk Concert, FinkFankFunk, Alex Scammon '01: $75 for the performance of a funk concert at the Performance Fair.

JenRation: The Birth of Pop , James Wilson '00: $200 for the undergraduate art-pop band Jenr8r (read "Generator") performance of an original pop music operetta on the Holyoke Center stage.

Tchaikovsky Serenade , Brattle Street Chamber Players, Jennifer Lee '01: $275 for this new group, which will perform the Tchaikovsky String Serenade at the Performance Fair during ARTS FIRST.

Two Premieres: Old and New , Eliot Chamber Orchestra, John Allanbrook '99: $300 for the premieres of two works of non-mainstream contemporary composers: "Kaleidoscope" by John Stewart (senior preceptor in music) and "3 Love and Death Songs" by Douglas Allanbrook '48.

THEATER

After Abyssinia : a play reading at the Pudding, Monica Henderson '99: $160 for the reading of After Abyssinia , a play written for her senior thesis in the Afro-American Studies Department. She plans to put on a reading of the play at the Hasty Pudding during ARTS FIRST.

Androcles and the Lion , Radcliffe Sunken Garden Children's Theater, Edith Bishop '00: $300 for the production of Androcles and the Lion , written in the famous style of commedia dell'arte: rich with slapstick comedy, archetypal characters, and spirited song. The ARTS FIRST performance will be free and open to the public.

Captive Audience, The Immediate Gratification Players (IGP), Justin Krebs '00: $100 for an IGP improv show. The idea behind Captive Audience is to fully erode the fourth wall by taking the audience "captive" at an IGP improv show. They will play the scenes on all sides of the audience, in a sense trapping them in a circle of performers.

Five Chinese Brothers , Adams Chinese Theater Series, Elliot Marks '99: $100 for the production of The Five Chinese Brothers , a children's story first published in 1938 by Claire Huchet Bishop and Kurt Wiese. It will be performed free of charge during ARTS FIRST.

Merchant of Venice , H-R Hillel Drama Society, Josh Edelman '00: $600 for this modern take on the Shakespearean classic, combining a Judaic look at how hate can disfigure both the hater and the hated with an examination of gender roles and violence. Original music and fight choreography will be featured. Presented May 6-15, Beren Hall in the Hillel Building.

Triad , Maria Kiely '99: $260 for Triad , a one-act play Maria Kiely wrote for a course taught by visiting playwright Adrienne Kennedy. Kiely has woven music and photographs into the script to create a piece that wavers between fantasy and reality. She intends to direct it in the outdoor space above the main entrance to Adams House during ARTS FIRST weekend.

VISUAL ARTS

Advocate Art Show, The Harvard Advocate , Flora Zhang '00: $230 for this art show, which will consist entirely of artworks by Harvard students. The show will include a mix of paintings, prints, drawings, photographs, sculptures, installations, mixed-media works, and art books.

ARTS FIRST Translucent Net Installation, Sarah Hulsey '00: $425 to construct a site-specific installation produced from sewing white nylon mosquito net. Viewers will be able to physically enter the sculpture.

Student Life, Lucas Arribas Layton '00: $125 to design and build simple life-size human figure sculptures out of bent pipe. These will be displayed throughout Adams House during ARTS FIRST. Statues will be designed and arranged to reflect student life and students' relationships with their physical surroundings.