SANTA BARBARA — A capacity Arlington Theatre audience thrilled to a surprise appearance by Oprah Winfrey at last night’s UCSB Arts & Lectures Speaking with Pico event. Winfrey came out to celebrate the success of her friend Dr. Abraham Verghese, whose novel The Covenant of Water was an Oprah’s Book Club pick in 2023 and has been on the New York Times fiction bestseller list continuously since its release.
UCSB Arts & Lectures announces a new programming initiative for 2021-2022, CREATING HOPE, featuring a FREE keynote virtual event with His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama of Tibet. Creating Hope with His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama in conversation with Pico Iyer takes place on Tuesday, May 18 at 8:30 p.m. PDT (Wednesday, May 19 at 9 a.m. IST).
UCSB Arts & Lectures presents acclaimed producer and filmmaker, Mira Nair in conversation with Pico on Wednesday, May 26 at 5:00 p.m. Pacific.From her first feature, the Oscar-nominated Salaam Bombay!, to her recent six-part series, A Suitable Boy, Mira Nair has established herself as one of the freshest and most fearless directors working today. Raised in India and educated at Harvard, Nair takes viewers from Uganda to New York City to rural India in her work to illuminate worlds we’ve seldom seen before. Her groundbreaking films include Mississippi Masala, The Namesake, Monsoon Wedding and Queen of Katwe and frequently explore issues around identity and displacement. Away from the camera, she has worked to support filmmaking and young directors in both East Africa and South Asia and is known for her love of music, acting and literature.
Join UCSB Arts & Lectures as they present Vijay Gupta in Conversation with Pico Iyer The Healing Power of Music on Thursday, October 28th at 7:30 p.m. at Campbell Hall.
The recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, Vjiay Gupta is a celebrated violinist, speaker and citizen artist devoted to creating spaces of wholeness through music. He is the founder of Street Symphony, an L.A.-based nonprofit that brings music to homeless and incarcerated communities, and co-founder of the Skid Row Arts Alliance. Gupta has performed as a recitalist, soloist, chamber and orchestral musician for over 20 years, and his TED Talk, “Music is Medicine, Music is Sanity,” has garnered millions of views.
