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(This week's Arts Blog covers two weeks, as I'm on vacation next week. Please watch for a special Picnic Day weekender the week of April 13. Enjoy! Karen Nikos-Rose, Arts Blog Editor)

Flute, viola in noon concert Thursday

Thursday, April 2, 12:05 p.m. – 1 p.m., free, Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center

Tod Brody, flute
Ellen Ruth Rose, viola

Program

Works by Josiah Catalan, Chris Castro, Mei-Fang Lin, Ellen Ruth Harrison, and Brien Henderson. 

California Native Community celebrates the Big Time

Friday, April 3, University Credit Union Center, 5-11 p.m.

This inaugural Big Time at 51�ԹϺ��� Davis will highlight California Native communities and traditions with shake-head dancing, Native vendors and community resource booths. Big Time gatherings, a tradition among many California Native communities, serve as spaces for celebration, cultural expression and community resilience. Free. 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. at the .

Colin Minigan: For Quail Ridge — an outdoor sound installation

Saturday, April 4, 1–2 p.m., Napa

For Quail Ridge is a live sound installation exploring the sonic qualities of space, ritual observation, and the boundaries between individuals and the non-human communities we inhabit.

This performance is not on the 51�ԹϺ��� Davis campus. It is located near Lake Berryessa. Reservations are required. 

Quail Ridge Natural Reserve, Napa

Art Spark: Mini Museum Pop-Up Book based on 'Backstory' exhibition

Saturdays, April 4, 11 & 25 | 1 – 4 p.m.

Spring into creativity at the museum’s Carol and Gerry Parker Art Studio with an afternoon of art making inspired by works on view. This month, create a pop-up book that unfolds into a miniature gallery and fill it with tiny versions of your favorite art from the museum. Discover works of art from the collection in Backstory: Digitizing the Museum Collection.

Powwow is Saturday

One of the longest-running, student-organized powwows in California, this 50th annual  celebrates Native student leadership, community and cultural continuity. It includes dance competitions, intertribal dancing, drum groups, gourd dancers, Native craft and food vendors, community organizations and a gathering space for Native families, students, alumni and the public. Free. 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.  Saturday at the .

Coming up

Multidisciplinary artists and photographer give art talks at 51�ԹϺ��� Davis

Three visionaries share their insight into their art at 51�ԹϺ��� Davis this April. The California Studio: Manetti Shrem Artist Residencies at 51�ԹϺ��� Davis explores the world of art through two presentations by artists Andre Keichian and Dyani White Hawk, while the Visiting Artist Lecture Series looks through the lens of photographer Mimi Plumb.

First up is Andre Keichian, an interdisciplinary artist and educator working across photography, video and sculptural installation. His art addresses issues of exile, trans identities, and diaspora and questions how these connections might speak to geopolitical and subjective understandings of migration. His talk is Thursday, April 9 at 4:30 p.m. in the Main Theatre, Wright Hall.   

Mondavi Center features Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater April 14, 15

Celebrating over 65 years of unparalleled artistry, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre is one of the most acclaimed dance companies in the world.

From the beginning, Alvin Ailey envisioned a company dedicated to enriching the American modern dance heritage and preserving the uniqueness of the African American cultural experience.

Embarking on its next era under the leadership of new Artistic Director Alicia Graf Mack, the company continues to be guided by Alvin Ailey’s pioneering legacy. Expect daring new works that promise to propel dance in exhilarating new directions alongside timeless classics like the soul-stirring masterpiece, Revelations. The production is at 7:30 p.m. both nights., April 14 and 15.

More

Coltrane 100 is April 16. Watch for more in future arts blogs. 

Preparing for Picnic Day

First-generation faculty artist turned 100 this week! He is still making art.

Painter of the Picnic Series, inspired by Picnic Day

(This story appeared on Roland Petersen's birthday in the 51�ԹϺ��� Davis Magazine. It's excerpted here and linked below)

Inside their home in Pacifica, south of San Francisco, Roland Petersen and Caryl Ritter Petersen have amassed a trove of treasures — an eclectic mix of fanciful hats, surrealist photography, original paintings and secondhand finds. It's clearly a home occupied by working artists. 

Turning 100 today (March 31, 2026), Roland Petersen, professor emeritus of the University of California, Davis, is still creating large, colorful, delightfully happy paintings, many inspired by his time at campus Picnic Days. His wife is nearly always in his scenes, in one (or several) of her many hats. 

“How would I describe my own paintings?” Petersen, sitting on a couch in their living room, pondered the question for a moment. 

“I describe the aura of sun and time,” he said. “And I usually have early morning lighting conditions and afternoon lighting conditions that I incorporate into one painting so, often, I have two suns in one painting and seven Caryls.”

The first painter to be hired on as a faculty member, Petersen taught art and art history at the university for 40 years from 1956 until 1996, helping build the art department under Founding Chair Richard L. Nelson. 

“That was the greatest period,” Petersen said of 51�ԹϺ��� Davis in the 1960s. “We had the best art department in the U.S.” 

The Picnic Series, which has continued for decades and is still being added to, is his most recognizable, well-known work.

First inspired by 51�ԹϺ��� Davis’ annual Picnic Day celebration, Petersen naturally gravitated to the combination of still life, landscapes and people all in one painting. 

Read the whole story by Maria Sestito in the 51�ԹϺ��� Davis Magazine.