Leading support for Oregon Art Beat is provided by Jordan Schnitzer and the Harold & Arlene Schnitzer Care Foundation Endowed Fund for Excellence... [ ♪♪♪ ] MAN: It's like a flower opening.

The structure of the wood gets freed to actually move in its own way.

WOMAN: There's a sensuality in the material that I really love.

There's a feminine connection.

It's just beautiful to set it free.

This is so exciting.

I love this play.

It's about joy, it's about empowering people's imaginations and doing plays that really touch people's hearts.

[ birds chirping ] Come on, let's go.

[ dog panting ] All right, everybody.

Yep, we're going.

[ laughing ] Oh, yes.

Oh, my God, you are so much fun!

You are so much fun.

Oh, my dear, you have a lot of milk this morning.

[ throat singing ] Throat singing is really healing.

It has become this ritual for me that, as I'm milking, I sing.

It's good vibration into their bodies.

Thank you, sweetheart.

I milk in the morning, I make cheese... It's fairly labor intensive.

...and I maintain these cheeses, and then I go in the shop.

Make some noise.

[ ♪♪♪ ] [ saw whirring ] My name is Christian Burchard and I am a sculptor in wood.

I've learned how to step back, not control it too much.

This saw is from about 1890... and is a wonderful machine.

[ saw whirring ] And then into the microwave.

I get these old microwaves that people leave by the side of the road, and I hope they're safe.

The microwave heats and pushes the water out of the wood.

Whoa!

And it is hot.

[ cat meowing ] [ blows ] This is my favorite part, you know, when it comes out steaming like that.

And then after a couple of days, they'll start moving.

[ ♪♪♪ ] It's like a flower opening.

The structure of the wood gets freed to actually move in its own ways.

I like its unpredictability.

It's like Lego.

I used to love Legos, obviously.

Oh, yeah, look, like right here.

How sweet is that?

You get into a zone where you don't think, you don't doubt, you don't question.

You just put things together that you know, and you walk back and you don't know how you actually did that.

[ ♪♪♪ ] I had them in a box, and I just pushed the box over and dumped them on the ground and I go, "Whoa.

It looks like a pyre."

And the title "Never Again" came from that.

[ ♪♪♪ ] The story of book burnings and book banning, not caring for the history, not caring for the love, the poems.

[ ♪♪♪ ] I was born in Hamburg, Germany, and I am from, like, an established family.

My dad's a lawyer and a banker.

I was expected to follow in the footsteps.

Handwork is judged as lowly.

When I got into woodworking, I got kicked out of the family for that.

When I was sent out of the house, it was very painful.

I was always kind of, you know, rebellious and I didn't want to be told what I was supposed to do.

The thing that got me into becoming a timber framer and a furniture maker is that I could find, you know, work anywhere.

[ playing softly, throat singing ] I traveled to Siberia a couple times.

I got into throat singing, I got into instrument making.

It was very different, and I do love that.

There were wolves.

We lived in a yurt.

We made Tuvan-style cheese.

I worked as a cowboy in Australia, met my first wife, came to Ashland, where her parents had bought some land.

[ ♪♪♪ ] My dad loved me, and so he came around.

I, um, have taken a lot of chances in my life.

Failure is your biggest teacher.

You have to go to an edge.

You know, if you go safe, you make work that looks safe.

I mean, you can make a thick bowl and it'll look like a thick bowl, or you can make a beautiful one.

Let's see how much flex we got here.

And there's also a sound that it makes just before it blows up if you get too thin.

Ooh!

[ machine scraping ] So now more light is shining through the sides here and you can actually see my hand through.

But if it doesn't blow up, there's a satisfaction.

There's a pride.

Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet.

Voilà.

[ ♪♪♪ ] So this has darkened over time, but that's the final result.

And something I do when there's an opening like this, I put a stitch in here and it adds to the story.

It's like it's not a defect anymore.

I gotta show you what I did today.

Come on.

Working together with your partner is like another set of eyes, another brain coming in.

Oh, gorgeous.

No cracks.

I met Christian in 2019, and he was interesting.

See, this one is still-- This is still wet.

You can see how heavy it is.

Right.

My partner became very sick suddenly from cancer and he passed away.

So it was very sudden and surprising and tragic.

Christian's wife had left.

I was just crushed, so sad that he was alone and that someone would choose to leave.

This is my favorite here.

These two here, they're like a couple.

Look at them.

And then I think we just fell in love.

[ chuckles ] [ meows ] Hi.

This is Kazan.

I'm Kristy Kún and I'm a feltmaker.

Come to work with me today?

My imagination is sparked by this incredible environment that I'm surrounded with.

[ Kristy coos ] [ ♪♪♪ ] Many of the pieces have a flow to them.

It might be the movement of water... the flow of a landscape.

Some people have an emotional response to the work.

It's an abstract piece, but it will jar a memory.

And it can be a beautiful experience and very touching.

I spend about four to six weeks working on a single piece.

[ ♪♪♪ ] The design that I laid out is taken from insect wings, little creatures that I've found in the studio.

And then I'm starting with colors that are around me on a daily basis, putting this place into the piece right at the beginning.

All of these wools, when they're felted, will mingle and migrate through the layers.

[ machine whirring ] I process those through the needle felting machine.

I take those panels to the cutting table and I segment it into strips.

And those strips, they're spaced evenly and covered with the cheesecloth fabric and needle felted so they become a single piece again.

This takes probably five to seven days, and it's so very meditative.

I've traveled to several countries to teach techniques that I developed, and it's so rewarding.

[ steam hissing ] What I'm doing with the very hot water and soap solution is I'm agitating those wool fibers so they tangle and tangle and tangle as tight as they possibly can be.

The result that I want is a very dense felt.

That is a complete felt.

My background is in furniture construction.

I became a single mother and I needed a material that I could work with in the home and be close to my daughter.

My body, with these materials, expressed something I couldn't do through the wood shop.

There's a sensuality in the material that I really love.

There's a feminine connection.

[ whirring ] This is a plate compactor.

You might use it for compacting the gravel under a patio.

And I'm interested in how something becomes better or stronger under stress.

When I'm putting my energy and my strength into it, I come out renewed.

I feel stronger.

[ water dripping ] I like having my body in the water with it and so connected to the piece.

It becomes a very intimate partnership.

I feel the release.

I feel the release for this textile that I've pushed and pounded and rolled.

I feel the release from my own body that I've pushed and pulled just as much.

It's just beautiful to set it free.

I'm observing these forms and I'll take that with me when I go back to shape it.

[ ♪♪♪ ] I'll come in on a Sunday morning when I have a clear head and a quiet day ahead to do the shaping.

I usually get it in one try, because it's that initial instinct of what the material is saying and how I'm responding that's the right one.

If I take it apart after that first shaping, then I'll usually struggle for a while to get it back where I wanted it.

I think about the shadows and the light moving through it.

I'm looking for balance and energy.

CHRISTIAN: This is what I got.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

So they're all finished, they're all done.

No, I think this was good.

It's nestled.

It's, like, perfect.

KRISTY: Okay.

CHRISTIAN: Look at that.

KRISTY: Yeah, I kind of like that folded under a little more.

Okay, where are we cutting?

A little here, right?

Yeah.

Yeah, even like that.

It just seemed a little too square up there.

Sort of trapezoidal.

Mm-mm, less.

I'm happy.

[ ♪♪♪ ] KRISTY: He inspires me to trust myself and to go further with the work.

CHRISTIAN: Look at that.

And I go, "Don't touch it.

"Don't-- Don't touch it."

Yeah, you do that, you do that.

"Don't!

Leave it.

This is perfect."

CHRISTIAN: [ scoffs ] It was-- Okay.

KRISTY: No, it was too flat.

And then what do I do?

And then I get crushed because she completely takes it apart.

Change it, I change it.

And I'm like... [ giggles ] I can't always listen to you.

Well... I have to trust what I-- You could, but you don't.

[ laughs ] Oh!

[ goat bleats ] CHRISTIAN: Go to Kristy.

Come on, come on.

KRISTY: Siggy.

Come on, I know you want to play.

Ah, we played so much today.

[ sighs ] KRISTY: The baby goat, Siggy, that lived in our bedroom in a box for her first weeks.

She lost her mama in my arms.

She was very sad.

CHRISTIAN: Kristy's a beautiful person and is a beautiful person to be with.

[ scoffs ] We're done.

Come on.

She's out of here whenever I get like that.

So she-- There's differences.

You see here, we have a difference.

Oh, my God.

Oh!

CHRISTIAN: One of the long lost Frisbees.

What you got?

KRISTY: Come on, come on.

CHRISTIAN: Living here with all these animals, it's not stressless, but it's rich.

It's just... It feels complete.

It's what I always dreamt about.

There we are.

Yeah.

Look at them.

They are so beautiful.

[ ♪♪♪ ] [ ♪♪♪ ] TIM: Oregon Shakespeare Festival is a national treasure.

It is destination theater that has one of the largest budgets and seasons that is done in North America.

What OSF does and what plays do is create a sacred place where people can come and reconnect to their humanity.

It's about joy.

It's about empowering people's imaginations and doing plays that really touch people's hearts.

My name is Tim Bond and I'm the artistic director of Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

This is my 17th season overall, but I spent 11 seasons as Associate Artistic Director.

[ ♪♪♪ ] OSF started in 1935.

Angus Bowmer created it with the idea from the very beginning that it was gonna be an annual Shakespeare Festival, which was a very bold choice, to believe that here in Southern Oregon, up in the mountains, in a very small town, that they were gonna, one, want to see theater, much less Shakespeare.

ANGUS: I hope you'll join the thousands who have turned Ashland and the Oregon Shakespearean Festival into an annual vacation adventure.

TIM: And it grew every season until the pandemic, really.

We just kept growing and growing and growing.

Oregon Shakespeare Festival, like many theaters nationally, has been struggling with coming out of the pandemic, which, for theater, was really a tough blow.

We had almost two years of absolute stoppage, and then people got out of the habit.

So our membership numbers are growing again, but they suffered significant losses in the pandemic.

We went from 17,000 members to below 7,000 members.

I came back at the end of the '23 season, and what we've really been working on is getting back to rotating repertory theater, which has been the real hallmark of Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

This is so exciting, I love this play.

I just have to say, I love "A Midsummer Night's Dream."

I have loved it ever since I first encountered it.

We do three Shakespeares every year minimum, and that's out of nine shows a season.

There's probably three or so that are either American classics or other world classics... and then three other plays that are very contemporary.

♪ I'm an islander I am an islander ♪ ♪ I'm an islander I am an islander ♪ ♪ I'm an islander I am an islander ♪ TIM: We sold out opening weekend.

It was a phenomenal experience, like, the energy was unlike anything I've ever experienced truly in all my years.

[ upbeat music playing over speakers ] So that's the good news.

The good news is our audiences are happy.

Our artists are feeling really supported.

Our attendance is up more than 100% of what it was in 2023.

We're up 20% so far this season over last season.

[ audience cheering, applauding ] And there are people still just coming back after the pandemic, just this year.

I've talked to many people who are like, "I haven't been back since 2019 and I didn't know how much I missed it."

[ ♪♪♪ ] I don't know if it's in the water, I don't know if it's the mountains here, but storytelling and making this a pilgrimage to kind of tap back in to what matters about being human, our indomitability, the human spirit is just something that really is alive here in the Rogue Valley and in the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

[ ♪♪♪ ] To learn more about Oregon Art Beat, visit our website... And to see what we're working on now, follow us on Facebook and Instagram.

No, I think this was good.

WOMAN: That is so cool.

Okay, can we get an O?

Can we get a P?

B!

[ all laugh ] Yeah, hi.

[ meowing ] Hi.

Really?

Yeah.

[ sniffs ] [ Christian laughs] Leading support for Oregon Art Beat is provided by Jordan Schnitzer and the Harold & Arlene Schnitzer Care Foundation Endowed Fund for Excellence... Additional support provided by... Funding for OPB arts and culture coverage is provided by... and OPB members and viewers like you.