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In 1980 Myerhoff organized the 'Life not Death
in Venice' art and cultural festival at USC, "where
the elderly and their art works, and scholars and
artists who had worked in the same Eastern European
cultural traditions, were brought togehter. The
older people served as docents to their art works,
and their life histories, collected by students,
were presented along with the art."
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With the attraction of the festival's
"rather glamorous" evening events that included
celebrities like Isaac Bashevis Singer, audiences
viewing the art were "large, enthusiastic, and
heterogeneous. Many were young people who were
astonished at finding themselves for the first time
among so many old people. 'I never dreamt they had
so much energy!' was a commonly heard remark....'
Grandma, you never told me you could draw!' 'You
never asked', was the reply....
"The visibility we had hoped for
allowed us to present the exhibition and
celebration as a model, adaptable to people of any
cultural group. There is no doubt that there are
ethnic elderly people all over America, waiting to
be asked, to be discovered, whose art works sit on
boxes in the cellar, in trunks, in the attic, whose
poems are jammed in drawers, whose reminiscences
need to find a witness, a receiver, so that they
may complete the interchage that is requisite to
all cultural transmission."
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