Experience

Stories

1812 Productions
Watch the video
1812 Productions has been making people laugh since 1997. Pete Pryor and Jennifer Childs founded this all-comedy theater, the only one in the nation, as a one-play-per-season company. More than a decade later, 1812 mounts adaptations and original works - four plays each season, including This Is The Week That Is.

Experience More:
1812 Productions: Philadelphia's All-Comedy Theatre Company

Abington Art Center's Sculpture Park
Watch the video
Discovery grows in this garden. Since 1990, Abington Art Center's Sculpture Park has provided a setting for emerging contemporary artists and their public. With nature as their palate, guest artists encourage encounters with art and ideas. It is a community venture woven of art, lectures, presentations, and workshops. In this video about Thomas Matsuda's new Purification Series, the artist engages visitors in the process that drives his work.

Experience More:
Abington Art Center's Sculpture Park

Amarna
Watch the video
Long before the discovery of Tutankhamun, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (also known as the Penn Museum) was exploring cultural heritage around the world. Their work at Amarna, the 3,300-year-old home of ancient Egypt's famous boy pharaoh, tells the story of a mysterious civic and religious experiment. We learn that Amarna grew, flourished--and then vanished.

American Philosophical Society
Watch the video
In the last two centuries since Charles Willson Peale's museum at the ancient and venerable Philosophical Hall shuttered its gallery, the Society continued to function and to grow. From Meriwether Lewis to Nelson Mandela, members gathered (as they continue to today) to share the best and brightest ideas that Founder Benjamin Franklin succinctly called "useful knowledge." In the last few years the Society has revived its exhibition program. Sue Ann Prince, Director of Exhibitions & Collections, tells the story of this old and excellent public program.

Experience More:
The Museum of the American Philosophical Society

Andrea's Music Salon
Watch the video
Andrea Clearfield's home-based Salon has been creating community through music for 20 years. This monthly performance and concert series started with friends invited by the musician/composer host and then expanded to a free email subscription service. Clearfield organizes the evening to achieve a warm, engaging concert experience featuring original compositions, jazz, electronic, improvisation, folk, experimental, poetry, dance, world music, and time-honored classical chamber music and opera. As to the performers, Clearfield says, "People want to come to a place where they can be really free to express themselves from the heart."

Experience More:
Andrea's Music Salon

Art Sanctuary
Watch the video
Located at the historic Church of the Advocate, a National Historic Landmark Gothic-Revival cathedral with spectacular murals of black history and struggle, Art Sanctuary transforms people with art. By bringing Black expression to the heart of North Philadelphia, founder Lorene Cary imagined a cultural commons where the nation's very best poets, writers, hip-hop artists, and filmmakers and musicians could comfortably share their work within a community setting. The idea is that art is not a luxury, but an essential element for life.

Experience More:
Art Sanctuary online

Arts in Motion
Watch the video
Classical music is not lost to the current generation of students, the first to grow up without learning about this genre in the schools. With the mission statement that begins: "Art is for everyone. That means you," Arts In Motion founder Eric Haeker, himself a composer, introduces underserved students to the connections between contemporary and classical traditions. Using computers armed with the latest software, students draw upon what they already know and like (hip hop being among the favorites) and develop their own original work. In the process, students create fugue-like blends and master basic principles of classical composition.

Experience More:
Arts in Motion

Astral Artistic Services — Watch the video
Mastering a musical instrument is one thing. Learning to become a working soloist is quite another. Founder Vera Wilson made it her mission, and that of Astral, to build careers for young classical musicians. Astral provides artists with guidance in the business of the performing arts as well as plenty of opportunities to perform.

Experience More:
Astral Artistic Services

Barnes — Watch the video
Barnes disregarded traditionally accepted barriers between artistic genres. He built around aesthetic strength creating assemblages from Europe, America and Africa, from village, city, salon and farm. With a viewpoint all his own, Barnes crossed all cultures and centuries embracing art, craft, and even horticulture with equal enthusiasm.

Experience More:
Barnes Foundation

Barnes Foundation — Watch the video
Albert Barnes believed that art done right could make people - all people - better members of society. He collected with an approach in stark contrast to that of mainstream museums. In the gallery of his Merion, Pennsylvania school, Barnes explored the visual language of form and color. Learning from his ensembles is key to the Barnes experience.

Experience More:
Barnes Foundation

Battle of Germantown
Watch the video
Germantown's Cliveden, a National Trust Historic Site, is open to the public from April through December. The highlight of the year, every October, is the re-enactment of Philadelphia's only Revolutionary War battle. Dedicated participants re-create the battle exactly where it originally took place on October 4th, 1777.

Bloomsday at Rosenbach — Watch The Video
What happens on Bloomsday? Closed to traffic, leafy DeLancey Place is lined with rows of folding chairs, and a parade of readers, a who's who of the region's civic and cultural life, honor Rosy's Bloom. By bringing that work to life, Philadelphians also remember and restore the spirit A.S.W. Rosenbach on the street where he lived and collected.

Copyright to all manuscript and printed material by James Joyce is reserved by the trustees of the James Joyce Estate.

Experience More:
Rosenbach Museum and Library

Brandywine Workshop
Watch the video
More than 250 visiting artists from around the nation and from around the world have found their way to this Victorian firehouse on Philadelphia's Avenue of the Arts. Artist Janet Taylor Pickett enjoys working at Brandywine because she's working with artists she's always admired. Brandywine Workshop artists and students specialize in graphics, creating original, limited-edition artworks in modern, well-equipped studios.

The Burghers of Calais — Watch the video
The city of Calais commissioned Auguste Rodin to commemorate the legendary offer of sacrifice by six leaders to bring an end to the siege of the city by England in 1347. While earlier interpretations focused on a single figure from this story of courage and redemption, Rodin chose a far more complex presentation of all six figures in a display of emotion, restraint, sadness and civic pride.

Experience More:
The Burghers of Calais in France
Background from the Cantor Foundation

Cemeteries — Watch the video
During the rural cemetery movement of the 1830s and 40s, Americans rejected the traditional church burial grounds. They chose beautiful places outside of the city where deceased loved ones might be laid to rest and visited. Philadelphia has two of the very best of these in Laurel Hill Cemetery along the Schuylkill River and Woodlands Cemetery in University City.

Experience More:
Laurel Hill Cemetery
Woodlands Cemetery

A Centennial District
Watch the video
In 1876, when Philadelphia hosted the nation's 100th birthday, a World's Fair transformed West Fairmount Park. Today, planners and architects envision another transformation, this time embracing the city's past and its future in a district weaving connects between, open space, community and institutions such as the Mann Center for the Performing Arts and the Please Touch Museum in Memorial Hall.

The Chimneys that Inspired Kahn
Watch the video
Philadelphia's Louis I. Kahn, one of the most influential American architects of the 20th century, drew upon everyday scenes for his inspiration. WHYY's Ken Finkel recalls an unforgettable walk with Kahn on 10th Street.

Composing with Jennifer Higdon
Watch the video
Time for Three and the Philadelphia Orchestra premier Higdon's Concerto 4-3, for string trio and orchestra. Her works have been performed by symphonies in Chicago, Atlanta, Minnesota, Brooklyn, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Indianapolis, Tokyo and many more. She has produced dozens of CDs, one of which, Higdon: Concerto for Orchestra/City Scape, was nominated for 4 Grammy Awards.

Experience More:
Jennifer Higdon Online

Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts — Watch the video
How are rare and fragile objects preserved for posterity and prepared for exhibition? Expert technicians at Philadelphia's premier art conservation lab conserve artifacts from the regions many museums, libraries and archives. These treasures include all manner of drawings, books, photographs and maps, as well as the nation's founding documents and John James Audubon's Birds Of America.

Experience More:
Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts
Regional Alliance for Preservation (RAP)
Heritage Preservation
Art Conservation at the University of Delaware

Eastern State Penitentiary
Watch the video
What lies behind the forbidding walls of Eastern State Penitentiary? Memories of lives in isolation, art installations and more. The legacy of a Quaker-inspired movement in prison reform, Eastern State originally served as the worldwide standard for the "modern" institution. The goal was rehabilitation - as opposed to punishment - through reflection and useful work in solitary confinement. Over time, the founders' good intentions failed and the penitentiary evolved into a crowded urban crucible. Still, in an effort to provide for the life of the spirit, the city's religious communities built small chapels. Here we learn about the small synagogue, which is inaccessible to visitors.

Experience More:
Eastern State Penitentiary

The Fabric Workshop and Museum — Watch the video
Located on the 5th floor at 1315 Cherry Street in Center City Philadelphia, The Fabric Workshop galleries are open to the public Monday through Friday, 10am to 6pm and Saturday 12pm to 4pm. Since 1977, The Fabric Workshop and Museum has enabled artists "to work with new materials...to expand the frontiers of contemporary artistic practice and to educate the public about the significance of contemporary art."

Experience More:
The Fabric Workshop and Museum

First Friday — Watch the video
Fifteen years ago, a handful of galleries coordinated openings on the first Friday of every month. Now, Old City is transformed into a festival as more than 50 art galleries, design studios, workshops and performance venues open their doors. Every month, there is new work to see, from paintings at the 3rd Street Gallery to sculptures at the Clay Studio and bowls at the Woodturning Center.

Experience More:
Old City Arts
Old City Arts Association

Fonthill — Watch the video
From his Bucks County boyhood, Henry Chapman Mercer was absolutely fascinated by crafts and castles. By 1912 he had designed and built a castle of his own just outside Doylestown, Pennsylvania, and named it Fonthill. Mercer also built a museum in Doylestown for his collections of traditional American crafts. Mercer's Fonthill is unique, cast in concrete and encrusted with tiles from his nearby Moravian Pottery & Tile Works. It is a place to see a blend of collections, architecture and ideas.

Experience More:
Fonthill
The Mercer Museum
The Moravian Pottery & Tile Works
Henry Chapman Mercer & His Works

Franklin's Musical World II — Watch the video
Franklin was not alone in his fondness for Scottish folk tunes. One of the most successful Scottish composers of the time James Oswald, was appointed court composer to King George III. "The Reason why the Scotch Tunes have liv'd so long, Franklin observed in 1765, is "that they are really Compositions of Melody and Harmony united." Here Philomel Baroque performs a piece by Oswald.

Experience More:
Philomel Baroque

Franklin's Musical World — Watch the video
Franklin improved just about everything he touched. When it came to music, the every charming Benjamin elevated a popular dinner table trick into the realm of chamber music in 1761 with the invention of the glass armonica. Philomel Baroque's Bruce Bekker introduces us to this harmonious invention and its mesmerizing sounds.

Experience More:
Philomel Baroque

The Fred J. Cooper Memorial Organ
Watch the video
From its smallest pipe (about the size of a drinking straw) to its largest (as tall as a house) the 6,938-pipe Fred J. Cooper Memorial Organ is the largest concert hall organ in the United States. (It is one of the largest organs in Philadelphia, surpassed by the Wanamaker Organ and the Curtis Organ at Penn's Irvine Auditorium.) This 32-ton instrument, designed and built by the 20-person team at Dobson Pipe Organ Builders in Lake City, Iowa, completes the Kimmel Center, which opened in 2001. The first public event will be a recital marathon on Saturday May 13th 2006.

Experience More:
Kimmel Center Organ Festival
NPR Report: Organ Music: Pulling Out All the Stops

Hagley Museum and Library
Watch the video
Hagley's location is a fitting place for the birthplace of American enterprise. It started out, more than 200 years ago, as E. I. du Pont's gunpowder factory. Today, visitors take in the site's restored mills, workers' community, and the ancestral home and gardens of the du Pont family. But visitors to the gunpowder works only scratch the surface. At the heart of this 235-acre campus is a unique center for documentation and research about the nation's of business and technology. Hagley's records range from eighteenth-century merchants to modern telecommunications.

Experience More:
Hagley Museum and Library

Hip H'Opera
Watch the video
It's a fusion of hip hop and opera. It's collaboration between North Philadelphia's Art Sanctuary and the Opera Company of Philadelphia. Ten students penned poems in the hip-hop style. Then composers scored them for music and voice. It's an exploration of contemporary urban themes in a classical setting. Learn more »

Independence National Historical Park
Watch the video
Penny Hartshorne Batcheler, one of the original team of restoration architects at Independence National Historical Park, described Independence Hall as a puzzle to decipher. So much detail to understand. So much change over the centuries. After a two-decade long restoration process based on extensive forensic research, the Birthplace of Liberty was restored for millions of visitors. And today, half a century later, the Park's architectural study collection is itself considered worthy of display and interpretation.

Experience More:
Independence National Historical Park

Institute of Contemporary Art
Watch the video
No two artists are alike. At the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania, no two exhibitions are alike. Since its founding in 1963, this modern version of a 19th century German Kunsthalle has thrived on adaptability, showcasing, one season to the next, both emerging and established artists. As Director Claudia Gould describes, the building's flexible spaces allow artists to make it work with their creative visions.

Experience More:
Institute of Contemporary Art

Intercultural Journeys
Watch the video
We hear from Philadelphia Orchestra cellist Udi Bar-David, the guiding force of Intercultural Journeys, who brings Arab and Jewish performers together in public to perform, to share their cultures, and to demonstrate our precious commonalities. Bar-David "wants Western players and listeners to stretch their minds and ears." He wants us to realize that Israelis, Arabs, and their respective music come from the same place geographically and artistically. We caught up with Intercultural Journeys at a performance at the Gershman Y on March 8th, 2005.

Experience More:
Intercultural Journeys

James A. Michener Art Museum — Watch the video
Whether in Paris, France or Doylestown, Pennsylvania, impressionist painters celebrate daily life in color and form. Work of the Pennsylvania Impressionists is found in Doylestown's Michener Art Museum, where artists of the Bucks County School, from the 1890s to the 1940s, found inspiration in quiet villages and rolling landscapes.

Experience More:
James A. Michener Art Museum

Japanese Tea Ceremony
Watch the video
A visit to Shofuso, the Japanese House and Garden, located in Philadelphia's Fairmount Park. A tea master leads a demonstration of a traditional Japanese Tea Ceremony at this authentic 17th century style Japanese house and garden.

Johnson House Historic Site
Watch the video
Here is Philadelphia's one and only Underground Railroad site open to the public. This Georgian Style Germantown street house served as a link in the loose and illegal chain of places where former slaves might make their way to freedom. After its rumored role became documented in the late 20th century (resulting in a National Historic Landmark designation) the site's interpretation morphed past its role in the Revolution. Today, the Johnson House Historic Site is a living illustration of the urban side of the nation's Underground Railroad story — a place where new audiences encounter a powerful fascination with long-whispered stories.

Experience More:
Johnson House Historic Site

Lewis and Clark — Watch the video
Where did President Thomas Jefferson send Meriwether Lewis to set scientific goals for his expedition? To Philadelphia, of course, where tutors included University of Pennsylvania botanist Benjamin Smith Barton. Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery ultimately assembled a professional herbarium of over 200 specimens of which 178 were new to science. The collection resides at the Academy of Natural Sciences, where, its curator tells us, the specimens continue to reveal secrets of the American Continent.

Experience More:
Academy of Natural Sciences-Lewis and Clark
Lewis and Clark as Naturalists
WHYY Marking Pennsylvania History: Lewis and Clark

Listening to the Philadelphia Orchestra - The Percussionist
Watch the video
Chris Deviney has the "best in the house." Hard by the back wall at Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts is where Deviney makes music as the Principal Percussionist of the Philadelphia Orchestra. But unlike the rest of his many colleagues, Deviney extracts sounds not from one, but from dozens of instruments by doing whatever it takes: striking, hammering, rapping and, on occasion, plinking. His instruments, to mention but a few, include the marimba, cymbal, timpani, xylophone, vibraphone, chimes, snare drum, bass drum, castanets, cowbell, and spoons.

Experience More:
The Philadelphia Orchestra

Making Music with a "Stomp Box"
Watch the video
South Philadelphia's Rick Iannacone has played guitar for a generation, often accompanying legends in rock and jazz. He created a unique sound by mastering a special-effects pedal nick-named the "stomp box."

The Mill at Anselma — Watch the video
This extraordinary artifact recently designated a National Historic Landmark is nestled along the Pickering Creek in Chester Springs, Pennsylvania. Constructed in the 1740s by Samuel Lightfoot, the Mill retains its original, Colonial-Era power train, as well as subsequent upgrades over the next quarter of a Millennium. Its a perfect illustration how agriculture, industry and commerce brought this region to life.

Experience More:
The Mill at Anselma

Mother Bethel AME Church
Watch the video
As our guide Clement Price puts it: "the Black Founding Experience in America" paralleled the more often told story of the White Founding Experience. And Mother Bethel AME Church, founded in 1797, is the place where the Black Founding Experience took root and flourished. Mother Bethel began when the Reverend Richard Allen and Absalom Jones encouraged black worshippers to resist being marginalized by the city's white churches. Allen purchased a wooden blacksmith shop and moved it to the site near 6th and Lombard Streets. This first church structure is long gone. What stands is, literally and figuratively, holy ground. This is the oldest parcel of land continuously owned by African-Americans, a place that has been a National Historic Landmark for more than 30 years.

Experience More:
Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church

Sebastienne Mundheim
Watch the video
Performance artist Sebastienne Mundheim makes "lyrical, educational performances" out of "complex, sophisticated academic content." Nothing is more complex than James Joyce's Ulysses. Mundheim produced The Potable Joyce: A Watered-down Version of Ulysses. Few subjects are more academic than Benjamin Franklin's world of print. Currently Franklin: The Story of a Paper Boy crosses disciplines blending scholarship with puppetry, literature with movement.

Mütter Museum
Watch the video
Curator Anna Dhody introduces an impressive, and occasionally disturbing, collection of human medical oddities. On display is an array of skulls, a cast of the famous Siamese twins Chang and Eng, and a once-secret presidential tumor. Started 150 years ago with the donation of personal objects collected by Dr. Thomas Mütter, the museum was founded for the education of physicians. More recently, the Mütter Museum has become a popular, informative attraction.

Pasion y Arte — Watch the video
Elba Hevia y Vaca, Bolivian-born co-founder of this all female dance company, describes the dichotomy of Flamenco. While graceful energy is released through the hands and fingers stomping feet express power. We learn how this centuries-old dance form is being influenced by modern dance sensibility with influences including jazz, modern dance, and ballet.

Experience More:
Pasion Y Arte
History of Flamenco
Carlota Santana Spanish Dance Company

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
Watch the video
For more than 200 years, this school and museum has embraced art and anatomy, realism and imagination. In life classes that feature human models but occasionally include horses, Fine Art students grow into artists in an proven approach to art education that goes back centuries more. Observation becomes cultivated as a discipline as students learn to sketch, paint and sculpt. When they need inspiration they have the the museum galleries where the best American painting is offered up: Charles Willson Peale, Cecilia Beaux, Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer, and much more.

Experience More:
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts online

Philadanco
Watch the video
At the forefront of modern dance, this 40-year old troupe has a look and feel all its own. On any given day, Philadanco's West Philadelphia studio bustles with scores of student dancers. Throughout the year, Danco's professional troupe travels the world, sharing interpretation of Lauryn Hill, Led Zeppelin, Bobby McFerrin, and others. "Eclectic," says founder Joan Myers Brown.

Experience More:
Philadanco

Philadelphia Boys Choir
Watch the video
From Phillies games to the White House to international music festivals, the Philadelphia Boys Choir and Chorale is known as "America's Ambassadors of Song." For nearly forty years, and now under the artistic leadership of Jeffrey R. Smith, the raw talent of hundreds of young boys is coached into a distinctive sound. Students progress through stages of rigorous training to earn their red blazers.

Philadelphia Folklore Project
Watch the video
Sometimes the most meaningful stories go untold. And sometimes they are saved and shared. That's where the Philadelphia Folklore Project makes a difference by working as a catalyst to preserve unique stories, traditions and things. At the Folklore Project's new headquarters on 50th Street is a permanent re-installation of the Crawford Dining Room - a homemade pastiche of posters, pamphlets and clippings depicting 4 decades of social struggle. Explore the 20th century by way of this signature example of modern folk art.

Experience More:
Philadelphia Folklore Project

Philadelphia Live Arts Festival & Philly Fringe
Watch the video
In this "Experience" mini-doc, you'll hear how the barstools of Fergie's Pub provided an important setting for a conversational play. And our taste for place-based theater continues to expand. The 2005 Philadelphia Live Arts Festival, September 2 to17, features all manner of performances. Yes, its new, but it also draws deeply from history. Punchadelphia is performed on the streets - just as its progenitor - Punch and Judy - was performed hundreds of years ago. Could it be true that the more things change, the more they stay the same?

Experience More:
Philadelphia Live Arts Festival & Philly Fringe

Philadelphia's First Cultural Institution
Watch the video
More than 275 years ago, the young Benjamin Franklin recognized the importance of books. By starting the Library Company of Philadelphia, Franklin and others created a collection that provided access to many more books than any one person could afford to own. Today, this research institution provides access to the story of the nation.

Philadelphia's World's Fair
Watch the video
One hundred years after the start of the American Revolution, Philadelphia threw a huge theme party. Millions came to West Fairmount Park to celebrate the Industrial Revolution in hundreds of buildings that transformed the landscape. The Free Library of Philadelphia presents the Centennial Exhibition through the massive documentation of the Centennial Photographic Company.

The President's House
Watch the video
When George and Martha Washington lived in Philadelphia theirs was the biggest house in town. To manage this first presidential mansion, they brought several enslaved Africans from Virginia. How is Independence National Historical Park interpreting this chapter of a history long buried?

Experience More:
Independence Hall Association

Public Art—The Fairmount Park Art Association
Watch the video
We explore two contemporary works of public art: Jody Pinto's 1987 Fingerspan in the Wissahickon Valley and Pepon Osorio's 2003 I have a story to tell you, at Congreso de Latinos Unidos. Each highlights very different and quite fleeting impressions. Each reinforces shared memories. Without them, we would be floating through the present, probably unseeing, most likely unknowing. With them, we become familiar with substance, private and public. Could the result be the creation of community soul?

Photograph: James B. Abbott ©2004 Courtesy of the Fairmount Park Art Association

Experience More:
The Fairmount Park Art Association

Rodin Museum — Watch the video
This collection of sculptures by Auguste Rodin, the largest outside of Paris, is the legacy of Philadelphia movie theater magnate Jules Mastbaum. A gift to the City, this museum on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway by architect Paul Philippe Cret openend in 1929. It is a gem-like setting for 124 Rodin bronzes including The Thinker, The Gates of Hell, to scores of studies, busts and The Burghers of Calais.

Experience More:
The Rodin Museum
Musee Rodin (Paris, France)
Rodin Biography - Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation

Jeanne Ruddy Dance
Watch the video
A former Principal Dancer with the Martha Graham Company, Jeanne Ruddy's dozen dancers is based out of 1515 Brandywine Street. Over the last several years, this new company has performed works choreographed by Ruddy and others at the Wilma Theatre, Painted Bride, and Mandell Theater, among other venues, but the "Performance Garage" in Philadelphia's Spring Garden neighborhood remains Jeanne Ruddy Dance's community home.

Rumble Ensemble
Watch the video
The bucket is good for sound - but can it be music? With the Rumble Ensemble, the bucket is definitely an instrument, and so are pipes, whistles, soda cans and even toilet seats. In this video, Marc Dicciani, Director of the University of Arts School of Music, Phil Pardell, and Greg Guzevich introduce the ensemble's bold rhythms. Last year, the ensemble performed at the Philadelphia Arts & Business Council's 25th anniversary luncheon. See their performance on YouTube.

Sarnoff Library and Museum
Watch the video
David Sarnoff arrived from Russia speaking no English. By 1950 he was Chairman of the Board for RCA. The Sarnoff Library in Princeton, New Jersey, tells this story, and more. Visitors learn about the man, RCA Laboratories, and how 19th century era of the telegraph expanded into the 20th century era of broadcast. As Museum director Alexander B. Magoun puts it: Sarnoff changed communications.

School of Rock
Watch the video
Paul Green claims his is "the original and best rock program in the country." Green's tough-love approach in teaching 7-to-18-year-olds, combined with his hard-driving style, has resulted in a national network of more than fifty rock schools. Students learn the music of legendary bands: the Beach Boys, U2, and the Beatles. Some graduate to live concerts. A few have found their way to famed festivals such as Lollapalooza.

Experience More:
School of Rock

Stained Glass
Watch the video
Thousands of stained-glass windows made in England, France, Germany and here in the United States survive in the Delaware Valley's churches, chapels, and institutions. From Philadelphia's Gothic Revival First Presbyterian Church at 21st and Walnut Streets, stained glass expert Jean Farnsworth tells the story. Of course, there's the popularity of the famous Louis Comfort Tiffany. Then there's the lesser known Fanny Sweeney. Her recently restored angel figure in the northeast tower is best seen at night from Walnut Street.

Stenton — Watch the video
Few sites are as old, as venerable and as steeped in deep history as is Stenton. When Pennsylvania was really Penns Woods, Stephen Hague tells us, James Logan built this rural retreat. As William Penns secretary, Logan conducted official business of the colony in his sumptuous, paneled office, while visitors awaited his attention in the adjacent brick-paved hall.

Experience More:
Stenton

Tania Isaac Dance
Watch the video
Tania Isaac believes that dance is a social platform with history and responsibility. It celebrates, communicates and occasionally agitates. A contemporary choreographer and a native of St. Lucia, Isaac's work often hints at her inspiration from folk traditions: Zouk, Quadrille, Soca/Calypso, and Reggae. Isaac's "stage picture," according to one critic, "is intelligent, voluptuous, witty, and political, all in the same breath."

Experience More:
Tania Issac

Tattoo Festival
Watch the video
Ancient, sometimes venerable and occasionally taboo, skin art is also wildly popular. Tattoo artists Lakei Herman and Adam Goldstein discuss the implications of being artists whose canvases are alive, and tell stories of their own involvement with tattooing.

Very Special Collections
Watch the video
In research libraries, such as the Library Company of Philadelphia, visitors and staff develop a unique brand of interactivity. Which artifact will best answer a researcher's question? Will it be a book, a periodical, or a newspaper? Librarians and curators serve as guides through the collections.

Violins and Bows
Watch the video
What makes a violin sound exceptional? The instrument's "voice" depends on its shape, its wood, the artist, and the bow that extracts life from it. It is a question asked and answered for the last 500 years, ever since the art of violin making was perfected in 16th century Italy. But bowing dates as far back as Central Asia's horse cultures of the 10th century, so the question of how best to make this sort of music actually dates back more than a millennium. Today, these age-old questions are faced by Philadelphia masters. Explore the violin with Richard J. Donovan and the bow with Elizabeth Vander Veer Shaak.

Experience More:
William Moennig & Son, Ltd
Mount Airy Violins and Bows

Wagner Free Institute of Science
Watch the video
Recent renovations at the Wagner perpetuate the comforting illusion that this place and its thousands of artifacts have not been touched since the day they were installed, more than a century ago. As ever, this great wooden hall remains lined with all manner of birds, beasts, blossoms and bones. A rare, palpable and welcome authenticity carries from the displays illustrating natural history to the science curriculum. Here, in addition to a vintage museum, is the nation's oldest free adult education program.

Experience More:
Wagner online

Wharton Esherick Museum — Watch the video
At the home of craftsman Wharton Esherick we find an environment in wood created by this accomplished American master. Esherick was determined to be a painter, but his expressive works in wood proved more popular. In 1913, Esherick and his family left the West Philadelphia home to create another in rural Paoli where the artist continued to experiment with designs inspired by nature.

Experience More:
Wharton Esherick Homepage
Visitor Information
The Book Illustrations of Wharton Esherick

Where the Books Are
Watch the video
Scholars from around the nation and from around the world come to Philadelphia - because that is where the books are. This region is home to more than twenty research libraries, the oldest of which is the Library Company of Philadelphia. At the 275-year-old Library Company, American history and culture are documented and illustrated by the real thing, the accessible artifact.

Wood Turning Center — Watch the video
What does an Old City location mean to an arts organization? Albert LeCoff moved the Wood Turning Center from Germantown a few years ago for the rich and diverse creative community. At 5th and Vine Streets, the Wood Turning Center presents work in its gallery and promotes the art form with classes, a research library, conferences and publications.

Experience More:
The Wood Turning Center
Links to the world of wood turning

Workshop on the Water — Watch the video
From his busy riverfront workshop, John Brady reminds us that the Delaware was once Philadelphias highway to rest of the planet. What takes place at this little-known destination at the Independence Seaport Museum? Brady works with his staff and others who hope to experience the ancient and sophisticated craft of boat building and restoration.

Experience More:
Workshop on the Water

Wyck and the Quaker Aesthetic
Watch the video
Wyck is one of those National Historic Landmarks that tells its story in the dining room, in the parlor, in the attic and in the garden. Since 1690, the site has accumulated more than 10,000 objects and 100,000 documents. One might pass by unawares along cobble-stoned Germantown Avenue, but the original house, with 1824 alterations by William Strickland, offers a remarkable opportunity to know its owners and witness the changing character of Philadelphia."

Experience More:
Wyck online

Artist Isaiah Zagar
Watch the video
A visit with Isaiah Zagar, longtime artist-visionary and Philadelphia mosaic artist. Zagar describes the beginnings of the Eyes Gallery, founded with his wife, Julia, and tours his "Magic Garden," on South Street in Center City Philadelphia.