'Dreaming of Timbuctoo'

To commemorate Black History Month, Cornell, Ithaca College and The History Center in Tompkins County are presenting "Dreaming of Timbuctoo" Feb. 3-21 at the History Center, 401 E. State St. An opening reception is Feb. 3, 5-8 p.m.

The exhibition and education project explores the 1840s abolitionist "scheme of justice and benevolence" in which 3,000 African-American men (including 17 Tompkins County residents) each received 40 acres of Adirondack land, granting them access to property to gain the right to vote in New York. Black homesteaders established the community known as Timbuctoo near present-day Lake Placid in 1847.

A symposium Saturday, Feb. 4, from 2-4 p.m. will feature professor of history Margaret Washington, Cornell Ph.D. candidates Candace Katungi and Daegan Miller, Ithaca College's Sean Eversly Bradwell and a performance by Chosen Generation Gospel Choir. Refreshments will be provided.

The History Center is open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Information: 607-273-8284, http://thehistorycenter.net.

Battle of Barton

Cornell teams will participate in a charity fundraiser, The Battle of Barton, Feb. 4 from 3 to 6 p.m. in Barton Hall. The event is an athletic competition to benefit wounded servicemen and women through the Wounded Warrior Project.

Coed teams of five will compete in a series of events including tug-of-war, equipment haul, sprint relay, pull-ups/flexed arm hang, and a final challenge. Information: https://support.woundedwarriorproject.org/group-fundraising/battleofbarton.

Ensemble X salutes Palmer

Professor of music composition Steven Stucky will direct Ensemble X in a concert in tribute to the late Cornell professor and composer Robert Palmer, Feb. 4 at 8 p.m. in Barnes Hall Auditorium. Free and open.

Palmer joined the faculty in 1943 and was named the Given Foundation Professor of Music Composition in 1973. He was Stucky's teacher in the early 1970s and his friend for nearly 40 years. Palmer founded the music composition program at Cornell, one of the first in the world. He died July 3, 2010, at age 95.

The program includes Palmer's Sonata for Violin and Piano (with Janey Choi and Mimi Solomon), Sonata for Two Pianos (Blaise Bryski and Andrew Zhou) and Quintet for Clarinet, Strings and Piano (performed by Richard MacDowell, Nicholas DiEugenio, Wendy Richman, Heidi Hoffmann and Miri Yampolsky). The program is funded in part by a grant from the Cornell Council for the Arts.

Yes, we Cannes

Cornell Cinema's Monday Night Classic Cinema series is featuring films that garnered the Cannes Film Festival's top honor, the Palme d'Or.

Highlights include Luchino Visconti's "The Leopard" (1963) in its most complete 35mm restoration to date, Feb. 26-27. Also screening: Federico Fellini's "La Dolce Vita" (1961), Feb. 6-7; Jacques Demy's colorful "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" (1964), Feb. 13-14; Francis Ford Coppola's "The Conversation" (1974), Feb. 20-21; and Bob Fosse's "All That Jazz" (1979), in an Academy Film Archive print, March 5-6.

The series includes a classic predating the Golden Palm's introduction in 1955, the recently restored Henri-Georges Clouzot thriller "The Wages of Fear" from 1953, April 7-10, also part of an upcoming Clouzot series.

The light fantastic

Choreographer and director Catherine Galasso '06 will stage a multimedia performance of "Bring on the Lumière!" Feb. 10 at 7:30 p.m. at the Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts. Tickets are $15, available at the box office, 607-254-ARTS or http://www.schwartztickets.com.

Galasso also presents a free workshop Feb. 3 at 4:50 p.m. in Room 320 at the Schwartz Center.

Inspired by pioneering French filmmakers Auguste and Louis Lumière, Galasso's live dance-theater-light spectacle is a meditation on transience and immortality and an ode to cinema, as it imagines the brothers trapped inside their own films. Dancers Christine Bonansea and Marina Fukushima portray the Lumières.

The production features music by Galasso's late father, Michael, a celebrated violinist and film and theater composer.

Cornell Cinema screens a program of Lumière shorts and later films inspired by their work, Feb. 2 at 7:15 p.m., notably "Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory" and "L'Arrivée d'un train" (both seen in Martin Scorsese's recent "Hugo"); and is offering a series of foreign films and shorts featuring Michael Galasso's music, including "Séraphine," "Secret Ballot" and Wong Kar-Wai's "Chungking Express" and "In the Mood for Love." The Johnson Museum is projecting Lumière films on its façade nightly through Feb. 20, from sunset to 11 p.m.

The programs are co-sponsored with the Cornell Council for the Arts.

Feminism Mapped

The Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program (FGSS) will celebrate 40 years at Cornell with "Feminism Mapped," a panel discussion and reception, Friday, Feb. 10, at 4:30 p.m. in Lewis Auditorium, Goldwin Smith 
Hall. Free and open.

Panelists include Joan Jacobs Brumberg, professor emerita of human development; FGSS Director Shelley Feldman, development sociology; Sally McConnell-Ginet, professor emerita of linguistics; Shirley Samuels, English and history of art; Judy Long, who proposed a women's studies program in the early 1970s; and Amy Villarejo, theater, film and dance. They will situate their work in a historical context and explore how to move feminism forward. Information: http://www.arts.cornell.edu/fgss/.

Juilliard strings

Violinist Joseph Lin, a former Department of Music faculty member, returns to Cornell to lead the Juilliard String Quartet in concert Friday, Feb. 10, at 8 p.m. in Bailey Hall. Presented by the Cornell Concert Series, the program will feature the quartet performing works by Haydn, Carter and Beethoven.

Tickets are $25-$35 for reserved seating; students $17, plus applicable ticket fees, available at or http://www.BaileyTickets.com; Ticket Center Ithaca, 171 The Commons, or by calling 607-273-4497. A Cornell employee and student discount is available online only with valid netID.

Lin is first violinist in the acclaimed ensemble. He joined the violin faculty at the Juilliard School of Music (his alma mater) and its resident quartet in fall 2011. During his Cornell visit Lin will be in residence at Carl Becker House, and he will teach a master class with violist Samuel Rhodes on the morning of Feb. 11 in Barnes Hall. Details will be available at http:www.CornellConcertSeries.com.

The short form

What does abbreviation mean in your life and your work? Thumbnail, a new campus organization operating as an open forum for the exchange of ideas, seeks creative submissions from the Cornell community for its debut event, Feb. 24 at 6:30 p.m. in Abby and Howard Milstein Auditorium, on the theme of "abbr." The format will be 20 slides shown for 20 seconds each.

"We want everything from your wildest interpretations to the most exacting investigation of abbr.," said Anh Tran, M.Arch. '14. "Share with us love letters, fetishes, poetry, dissections, seeds for thought."

Submissions are open to Cornell students, faculty and staff. Submit five images, an abstract of 300 words or less, and your name and department by Feb. 8 to thumbnailcu@gmail.com.