Renowned Performance Artist to Speak at Cuesta

An internationally acclaimed performance artist will kick off a new-sprung lecture series that honors a beloved Central Coast artist.

Billing herself as an interdisciplinary performer, Rachel Rosenthal will be at Cuesta in November as the inaugural speaker for The Ruth Fash Memorial Lecture Series. Fash was tireless in enlivening culture in San Luis Obispo County, and to that end, taught in the Art Department at Cal Poly, as well as serving on the Board of Directors of the San Luis Obispo Art Center. Fash was living in Big Sur when she passed away last year of breast cancer, and friends at the San Luis Obispo County Arts Council and Cuesta’s Art Department have created the once-a-year lecture series to praise her spirit and memory.

Rachel Rosenthal was born in Paris, but has called California home for five decades. Based in Los Angeles, she was a leading figure in that city’s l970s women’s art movement and, since l975, has focused primarily on creating new works, as well as writing, performing and teaching. Rosenthal is also a National Endowment of the Arts,
J. Paul Getty Foundation and California Arts Council Fellow, as well as an Obie Award recipient – the off-Broadway equivalent of the Tony – for her play “Rachel’s Brain.” In addition to her United States appearances, Rosenthal has performed all over the world, including venues in Canada, Finland, Australia and Germany.

“As a way of honoring Ruth, we definitely wanted a woman for the first lecture,” says Fine Arts instructor Marta Peluso. “And while Rachel is a performance artist, we’re not necessarily limiting the people who will speak at future events. It might be an art critic or art historian, or a museum curator or another kind of performer.”

Rosenthal will speak at Cuesta in Conference Center Room 5401 on Sunday, November 6, at 3 p.m. Entitled “Spanning Three Centuries,” her lecture is free and open to the public. There is also no charge for parking. An artist’s reception, also free of charge, will immediately follow the event. For more information, contact Marta Peluso at 546-3100, ext. 2468. Additional information about Rachel Rosenthal can be accessed via her web site, www.rachelrosenthal.org.