BTF costume designer receives NEA career development grant

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STOCKBRIDGE - Olivera Gajic, one of the Berkshire Theatre Festival's resident designers since the 2001 season, is the 2004 recipient of the NEA-TCG Career Development Program for Designers, Festival Executive Director Kate Maguire announced this week. Under a cooperative agreement with the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), Theatre Communications Group (TCG) administers the Career Development Programs for Directors and Designers. Each year six emerging directors and designers are chosen by an independent national panel of theatre professionals to receive a $17,500 grant to be used for activities such as assisting senior artists and observing theatre productions. Gajiic, who holds a Fine Arts degree from her native Yugoslavia, received an MFA in costume design from the University of Connecticut, where she met another BTF artists, director Eric Hill who has chosen her as his costume designer for several of his productions at the BTF's Main Stage and Unicorn Theatre, including The Einstein Project, Camelot and My Fair Lady "I hope that this grant will help me in my search for directors and theaters that have a similar sensibility and creative energy as I do," explains Gajiic, whose costume designs for A Dream Play were included in the United States entry at the prestigious Prague Quadrennial in 2003. "I believe that collaboration with more artists will help my own artistic growth. I wish to become a world designer. I don't mean famous, but rather a designer who does boundary-breaking art. I want to speak a universal language that anyone can understand - the visual language of theatre." Admittedly emotion-driven when it comes to her art, Gajiic says, "I never, ever think rationally. I read the play for emotional response, to see what it does to me." Gajiic enjoys big projects she can start from scratch, and behind all that irrational and emotional drive, lies a sincere desire to "create theatre for a new kind of audience, theatre that is not just for entertainment, but a pace to learn, to sense, to have eyes opened and to be enlightened." "I followed Olivera's work closely when she was working on her MFA with Laura Crow, the head of the costume design program at UCONN, " explains Maguire. "Olivera's designs resonate most profoundly when she is working with Eric Hill, one of the BTF's most creative directors. She is that rare combination -- a very imaginative and fantastical who is also extremely practical." Top on Gajiic's agenda for 2005 is a return to the Berkshire Theatre Festival, where she will be designing the costumes for David Mamet's American Buffalo on the Main Stage, and August Strindberg's The Father, featuring Eric Hill in the Unicorn Theatre. For more information or to contact Olivera Gajiic, or for photographs of Ms. Gajiic or her award-winning designs, please call Eileen Pierce at 413-298-5536, Ext. 14.
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Lanesborough Fifth-Graders Win Snowplow Name Contest

LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — One of the snowplows for Highway District 1 has a new name: "The Blizzard Boss."
 
The name comes from teacher Gina Wagner's fifth-grade class at Lanesborough Elementary School. 
 
The state Department of Transportation announced the winners of the fourth annual "Name A Snowplow" contest on Monday. 
 
The department received entries from public elementary and middle school classrooms across the commonwealth to name the 12 MassDOT snowplows that will be in service during the 2025/2026 winter season. 
 
The purpose of the contest is to celebrate the snow and ice season and to recognize the hard work and dedication shown by public works employees and contractors during winter operations. 
 
"Thank you to all of the students who participated. Your creativity allows us to highlight to all, the importance of the work performed by our workforce," said  interim MassDOT Secretary Phil Eng.  
 
"Our workforce takes pride as they clear snow and ice, keeping our roads safe during adverse weather events for all that need to travel. ?To our contest winners and participants, know that you have added some fun to the serious take of operating plows. ?I'm proud of the skill and dedication from our crews and thank the public of the shared responsibility to slow down, give plows space and put safety first every time there is a winter weather event."
 
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