2017 AHA! Festival

“Storytelling: What Our Stories Tell Us About Ourselves” was the theme of the inaugural Arts and Humanities Alive! (AHA!). Presented by Cleveland State University in partnership with Playhouse Square.

By Cleveland State University

Held June 7-9, 2017, on campus and in the neighboring theatre district, the AHA! Festival featured captivating performances and thought-provoking presentations by luminaries from the worlds of literature, music, theater, dance and more.

Check out the coverage by Ideastream, Cleveland Jewish News, cleveland.com and Cool Cleveland.

Book Fair

At the outdoor book fair on Euclid Avenue, festivalgoers could stock up for their summer reading lists and enjoy presentations by the likes of Japanese storyteller Kuniko Yamamoto and Grocery author Michael Ruhlman.

Yvette Nicole Brown

The actress from East Cleveland, whose TV credits include "Community" and "The Odd Couple," was the keynote speaker at the Arts Education Day Luncheon at Playhouse Square's State Theatre, where she reflected on the arts as a tool for personal growth.

AHA! Festival director Katie Shames welcomed guests to the luncheon.

Attendees also were treated to performances by students from Campus International School as well as the best actress and best actor finalists for Playhouse Square's Dazzle Awards.

The luncheon also saw the premiere of a new video celebrating the arts and the humanities at CSU.

Karina Smirnoff

The "Dancing with the Stars" star gave a fun dance lesson to hundreds of fans at Playhouse Square's State Theatre.

The Vietnam War Preview & Discussion

The Vietnam War, a new documentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, airs on PBS in September 2017. The AHA! Festival brought Novick to town for an exclusive local preview in the CSU Student Center, where she discussed the project with festival curator John Frohnmayer, former chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.

AHA! FESTIVAL DAY TWO: JUNE 8, 2017

Isabel Wilkerson

The Pulitzer Prize winner packed CSU's Waetjen Auditorium for a powerful talk based on her best-selling book The Warmth of Other Suns, which chronicles the Great Migration of African-Americans in the 20th century.

Delia Ephron

The award-winning author, playwright and screenwriter gave a presentation on "Creativity and Collaboration" in CSU's Drinko Hall. Also on the AHA! agenda: two showings of Love, Loss and What I Wore, the hit play that she co-wrote with her sister Nora Ephron.

Lucianne Walkowicz

Direct from the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, this engaging astronomer presided over a TEDxClevelandStateUniversity Salon at Playhouse Square's Idea Center that was equal parts science and storytelling.

Jonathan Safran Foer

The acclaimed author of Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close headlined CSU's Waetjen Auditorium, where he read an excerpt from his latest book, Here I Am, a novel about a Jewish family in disarray.

AHA! FESTIVAL DAY THREE: JUNE 9, 2017

Jon Meacham

Presidential politics, past and present, made for a stimulating talk in the CSU Student Center's Glasscock Family Foundation Ballroom by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House, Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power and Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush. Ideastream interviewed Meacham.