These students soar

For 28 years, YoungArts, the core program of the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, has been dedicated to identifying and cultivating the next generation of emerging artists in the performing, literary and visual arts.

YoungArts Week, the annual pinnacle event, is a fabulous opportunity for South Florida residents to see the future of the arts, when 143 of the nation's most talented young people, 17 and 18 years old, spanning nine artistic disciplines, are in Miami from Jan. 12-16.

These teens will be working tirelessly on their crafts, participating in master classes with world-renowned artists, workshops and interdisciplinary experiences. Each night, the students will show off their talents at free performances and exhibitions at the Gusman Center for the Performing Arts, University of Miami's Gusman Hall, The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse and News Lounge.

Cintas Foundation honors painter Carmen Herrera

Cuban painter Carmen Herrera , whose geometric abstraction is prominently featured in the Museum of Modern Art's collection, will be honored with the 2010 Cintas Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award in the Visual Arts.

The 95-year-old Cuban painter, who has lived in New York since the mid-1950s, has recently seen her work recognized in international circles. A retrospective exhibition opened in September at the nonprofit IKON Gallery in Birmingham, England, and is traveling to the Phalzgallerie Museum in Germany in January. London's Tate Modern and the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C., have recently acquired her works.

Herrera was previously awarded the Cintas Foundation Fellowship, given to Cuban artists who live outside the island, in 1966 and 1968. Born in Havana, she studied painting and art history at the Marymount School in Paris from 1929 to 1930, and, in 1939, married Jesse Loewenthal , a literature professor in New York and eventually went to live there with him

New World's Tilson Thomas wins Grammys

Lady Gaga 's shoulder pads and the armloads of statuettes Beyoncé and Taylor Swift hauled away may have stolen most of the spotlight, but Michael Tilson Thomas , the New World Symphony's founder and artistic director, was also a winner at the Staples Center. Tilson Thomas captured his ninth and 10th Grammys, winning Best Classical Album and Best Choral Performance for his recording of Mahler's Symphony No. 8 and Adagio from Symphony No. 10 with the San Francisco Symphony, the symphony's chorus and two young people's choirs. The recording also won for Best Engineered Album (classical).

The music of Mahler, a Tilson Thomas preoccupation, has been responsible for six of the conductor's Grammys, and he will lead performances of other selections when he returns to the NWS podium in April.

-- Miami Herald Staff

Time for seniors' moment

Graduating seniors in Miami's New World School of the Arts college theater program will demonstrate their versatility when they take the stage at Little Havana's Tower Theater to perform their original one-person shows.

Thirteen short plays will be presented in four programs. Among them are Renata Eastlick 's Yours Truly, Billie Holiday , a portrait of the jazz legend. In Superuseless , Ryan Didato plays a superhero wannabe rejected again by the Justice League. Ann Marie Olson performs Kindergarten Kiss-Off , a play about a sunny day turned gloomy. And Markenson Charles offers Ballad of a Child Soldier , the story of a former African child soldier.

Performances are at 5 and 8 p.m. Friday; 2, 5 and 8 p.m. Saturday and Dec. 13. Admission is free. The Tower is at 1508 SW Eighth St., Miami; 305-237- 3541 or nwsa.mdc.edu.

Miami Beach artist makes YoungArts show

More than 140 of the country's most talented teen painters, dancers, writers, musicians and filmmakers have descended on Miami for a shot at national stardom. On Monday, the 17- and 18-year-olds in the 29th annual YoungArts competition began displaying their work during five days of workshops and judging dubbed YoungArts Week. The contest is sponsored by the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, a program begun in 1981 by Ted and Lin Arison. "The purpose is to recognize and encourage young artists and preserve the culture of the arts," said Carla Hill, YoungArts program manager and a musical theater alum from Miami's New World School of the Arts. Finalists will get gold or silver designation, with gold finalists winning $10,000, silver, $5,000. The students will be honored Saturday night at a gala and will travel to New York for exhibitions, master classes and performances. Other participants judged to show excellence in their work will get $1,000 to $3,000. Several Miami-Dade artists