CIRCLE CITY INTERNATIONAL FIVE INTERNATIONAL EVENTS GIVING INDIANAPOLIS A GLOBAL PRESENCE BY BRAD HABERMAN
Indianapolis, like other cities around the world, is engaged in a competitive pursuit to secure some of the world’s most coveted events. Why? Economic impact, of course, but it’s also an opportunity to further enhance our global prestige and, again, place the international spotlight on the Circle City. Our most recent success was securing the Super Bowl in 2012, adding to the list of events Indianapolis has successfully hosted, including the U.S. Olympic Festival in 1982, the Pan Am Games in 1987, multiple NCAA Final Fours, and the World Gymnastic Championships. But, in the nonprofit community, there are five gems that return year after year, bringing both economic impact and international media attention to Indianapolis. Each with a mission to enrich our community and our world.
“the ultimate violin contest...” writes the Chicago Tribune.
“Violin fever” describes this “truly remarkable violin experience,” according to London-based magazine, The Strad.
International Violin Competition of Indianapolis [September]
Since 1982, the IVCI has utilized its world prominence to bring international attention to Indianapolis, having hosted seven Competitions, and is now regarded as the Western Hemisphere‘s “Olympics of the Violin.” After its debut, the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis was recognized by the World Federation of International Music Competitions, headquartered in Switzerland and remains the only violin competition so recognized in North America. Every four years for seventeen days, forty of the world’s brightest talents come here to perform some of the most beautiful music ever written to compete for prizes and awards valued at more than $250,000, including engagements worldwide. Perhaps the greatest prize, however, is the loan of the 1683 “ex-Gingold” Stradivari violin which will be made available to one of the competition’s Laureates for four years. The First Laureate will receive a Carnegie Hall recital and a debut CD recording, in addition to $30,000 and a 24k gold medal. The repertory of the IVCI establishes an especially broad survey of the violin at performances throughout the city including the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana History Center, Christel DeHaan Fine Arts Center and Hilbert Circle Theatre, where finalists perform with the world-class Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. According to organizers, “the Competition is a unique showcase for the world’s most gifted young violinists and a demonstration of Hoosier hospitality and American volunteerism.” Each Competition generates significant national and international media coverage for the artists and the Indianapolis area. Furthermore, the influence of the Competition continues through the performances of its winners for years afterward in cities all around the world. The mission of the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis (IVCI) is to recognize, reward, and promote the world’s finest young classical violinists, and encourage understanding, appreciation, and support of the violin repertoire by a large and diverse audience. This year, the International Violin Competition returns September 10 through 26 at the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana History Center’s Frank and Katrina Basile Theater.
_____________________________________
Indianapolis International Film Festival [July]
Founded in 2004 as a three-day “celebration of film” event featuring 27 films, the Indianapolis International Film Festival now boasts more than 130 films from nearly 50 nations, taking place over an 11-day period. Since inception, the festival [viewing] attendance and film entries has also skyrocketed, by 270 and 716 percent, respectively. The mission of the Indianapolis International Film Festival (IIFF) is to present films that inform, enlighten, and educate the community by providing a vivid reflection of the rich cultural diversity of Indianapolis and the world beyond our doors. Still known as an annual celebration of films, the event also celebrates the people who make them and according to organizers, “is the largest [film festival] in Indiana and is one of the fastest-growing cultural events in the Midwest.” Like other film festivals, the IIFF hosts celebrity actors and filmmakers during the event. In recent years, the IIFF has hosted Famke Janssen (X-Men Trilogy, Nip/Tuck), Chris Eigeman (Malcolm in the Middle, The Last Days of Disco), Dan Butler (Frasier, The Silence of the Lambs), and Academy Award-nominated director Albert Maysles (Gimme Shelter and Grey Gardens). Additionally, IIFF films have garnered 15 Academy Award Nominations across several categories, including Best Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Documentary, and Best Foreign Language Film. This year, the Indianapolis International Film Festival takes place July 15 through 25.
Paulistas [Directed by Roberto Moreira / World Cinema Features] Aspiring actress Marina arrives in Sao Paulo with dreams of independence and fulfillment. She shares an apartment on Avenida Paulista with Suzana, a lawyer with an air of mystery. A few floors up lives Jay, a frustrated author seeking for meaning in his life. At a nightclub, Marina becomes obsessed with a singer, Justine. At the courthouse, Suzana begins a relationship with a colleague, Gil. In the streets, Jay takes a prostitute named Michelle as his muse. At the breakneck pace of the city, the three Paulistas will live the euphoria of passion and its flipside, taking the audience along on a journey full of surprises. Featuring songs by Radiohead.
_____________________________________
Drum Corps International World Championships [August]
The Drum Corps International (DCI) World Championships mark a week-long celebration of the “very best” in the world of marching music. Headquartered in Indianapolis, DCI is touching lives around the world, delivering the message of “excellence in performance and in life” to more than 7.2 million young people, ages 13-22, involved in performing arts in the United States. Active participants in the U.S.-based drum and bugle corps hail from more than 15 countries around the globe, each taking part in an annual tour made up of more than 100 events throughout North America, to some 400,000 fans who attend the events. The last [and most important] stop on the tour…Indianapolis! Although an exclusive number of students participate on the field with a DCI drum corps, millions participate in DCI by attending competitions, participating in DCI-sponsored educational programs and events, purchasing merchandise, or simply being fans. According to the organization’s web site, fans of DCI--following the exploits of their favorite corps--are reminiscent of the Grateful Dead’s Deadheads, or the Boston’s Red Sox Nation. There is also the more than 14 million adults and family members from around the world who are associated with targeted performing arts students. This year, the DCI World Championships take place at Lucas Oil Stadium with the World Class Quarterfinals on August 12, World Class Semifinals on August 13, and World Class Finals on August 14.
Showcasing the best of the best, by the numbers • More than 8,000 students audition annually • Fewer than 3,500 positions are available in top-tier DCI member corps • More than 5,000 members participate annually • 66 percent are male • Average age is 19.4 • 72 percent are full-time college students • 59.6 percent of the current college students arepursuing music education degrees • 65 percent of those that indicated they are high school students intend to major in music education
_____________________________________
OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini Marathon [May]
Already boasting titles of the largest half-marathon and fifth largest running event in the United States, the OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini-Marathon, now in its 35th year, has been praised by Runners World magazine as one of “A Half Dozen Hot Halfs” in the world, based on participant experience in the 13.1-mile half-marathon. The field of 35,000 registrants [which sold out five months prior to the event] represents participants [and in many cases, media coverage] from all 50 states and as many as 13 other countries around the world. Both winners [in the male and female categories] were from Kenya. Starting with a modest 800 participants in 1977 and held in conjunction with the Indy 500 [on race weekend], the “Mini” has been nurtured by the Indianapolis market to become one of the greatest spectacles in half-marathons in the world. In fact, the spectacle is also recognized by the International Festival & Events Association (IFEA) as one of the world’s top events, receiving peer-based [Silver Pinnacle and Bronze Pinnacle] awards. The OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini Marathon is an event of the 500 Festival, a not-for-profit volunteer organization created in 1957 to organize civic events celebrating the greatest race in the world--the Indianapolis 500. Over the past 51 years, the 500 Festival has grown to become one of the largest festivals in the nation, boasting a half-million participants throughout their various activities during the month of May. In doing so, the 500 Festival has also developed community programs that focus on youth education such as their 500 Festival/Indianapolis 500 ® Education Program, striving to educate and foster creativity in Hoosier fourth-grade students by using the historical, social and economic significances of the 500 Festival, Indianapolis 500 ® and the thriving Motorsports industry of Indiana in the curriculum. The Education Program first started as a pilot program in 2003 with 5,400 students participating. This year’s numbers boast more than 18,240 registered students.
_____________________________________
Indianapolis Prize Gala [September]
The Indianapolis Prize, first awarded in 2006 to Canada-native Dr. George Archibald, co-founder of the International Crane Foundation based in Wisconsin, is the largest individual monetary award for animal species conservation in the world. The winner, chosen every other year from a slate of internationally recognized conservationists, is given an unrestricted gift of $100,000 and celebrated during a gala event in Indianapolis, drawing international attention to conservation issues and receiving extensive media coverage. According to organizers of The Indianapolis Prize Gala, “it is not designed to be a quiet, academic, scientist-focused event, but instead an energetic and spectacular celebration of conservation victories. The goal is to inspire the general public to start caring about conservation, and to place heroes, who live in tents in danger of both wild beasts and poachers, on the pedestal that we usually reserve for sports and entertainment stars.” This event, hosted by international celebrity conservationists, focuses on the stories of the men and women who have contributed so much throughout the world to preserve the Earth’s most endangered and threatened animals. In 2008, the Indianapolis Prize went to Dr. George Schaller, a native of Berlin, Germany, known as the world’s pre-eminent field biologist, studying wildlife throughout Africa, Asia and South America. Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Company Foundation provides funding for The Prize in addition to the prestigious Lilly Medal, a beautifully designed cast bronze commemorative medal featuring original art that reflects the relationship between man and the natural world. The completed three-inch diameter medal features artwork on the front and a quote from naturalist John Muir on the reverse side. “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.” The 2010 Indianapolis Prize Gala, a visible component of the internationally recognized conservation efforts being undertaken by the Indianapolis Zoo, is set for September 25, 2010, at the Westin Hotel in downtown Indianapolis. This year, Iain Douglas-Hamilton, founder of Save the Elephants, will be honored for his life-long conservation efforts.
[Pictured Above] 2008 Indianapolis Prize Gala Co-host Sam Waterston, Indianapolis Zoo president & CEO Michael Crowther, then Zoo Board of Trustees president Pawel Fludzinski, honoree Dr. George Schaller, Indianapolis Prize chairperson Myrta Pulliam, and Jane Alexander. Photo by Rob Banayote.
