A recent New York Times headline about waning American influence in the context of the G20 summit caught my eye the same day I saw the Walton Ford show at Kasmin. Somehow I was surprised that we were admitting on the front page the long obvious fact that decreased US leverage entails a prudent policy shift away from Bush’s unilateralism. “We can’t write checks the way that we once could; More …
The 18th Annual Austin Film Festival ended last week, and Austin is still reveling in the films, conferences, parties and special appearances. AFF kicked-off on October 20th with films screening all over the city. This year’s films ranged from marquee screenings to foreign documentaries. I got to see a wonderful variety as well as hear a few of the filmmakers speak about their work. I had the pleasure of seeing More …
Transmedia is one of those new words (birthdate: 2007) you may not have heard of: Here’s the wiki. And it may not be bedtime but transmedia storytelling is the multisyllabic hot phrase your kids might learn about before you do. It’s a mouthful – but stay with me here. (Or go with Beyonce, whose concert diagram puts into a very crazy picture this idea that her personas and website extend her brand of herself More …
Ben Redman (drums, 12-years old) and his brother Max (bass, 11-years old) began playing gigs around Austin in 2008 under the moniker The Redboys. They met Deven Ivy (guitar, 13-years old) at rock camp during the summer of 2009. Then, in late 2010, they were introduced to Grace London (vocals, 11-years old). Residual Kid honed their chops by covering some of their favorite artists such as Muse, Radiohead, Rush, White More …
On October 1, 2011 the Salon wrote that the “Creative Class Is a Lie;” no less than 5 days later Richard Florida of The Atlantic retorted, saying, “The Creative Class is Alive.” Discrepancy? Yes. And, the question, which is more right? The overall sentiments of Scott Timberg’s article at the Salon read like a direct hit to Florida’s theories in his book “The Rise of the Creative Class” (2002). Quoting More …
On September 22, I took a hard-hat tour of the Brad Cloepfil-designed Clyfford Still museum in Denver. The 28,000-square foot, two-story structure— a rooted concrete cube—sits behind its more outlandish neighbor, the Denver Art Museum. By way of transition, a pastoral park moves visitors from the glacier-slick surfaces of Daniel Libeskind‘s Hamilton building to the elemental elegance of Cloepfil’s Still museum. The latter is modern, cool, and earthy—Adele to the Hamilton’s Lady More …
Writing in The New Yorker in October of last year, Malcolm Gladwell queried the influence of social media on social activism and concluded that the superficiality of social networking alliances is not the stuff from which change agents emerge. Or, as Gladwell more succinctly says, “…weak ties seldom lead to high-risk activism.” Gladwell’s points of comparison are the historic—and Facebook/Twitter-free—events of the 1960s Civil Rights protests in the south; specifically, More …
Collaborators Eiko and Koma performed three dances from their Retrospective Project Saturday night at the North Fourth Arts Center in Albuquerque. This brave little venue has brought unparalleled national and international avant-garde dance to our state through its Global DanceFest, Out of the Ordinary, Wild Dancing West and other events. Taos Pueblo musician Robert Mirabal accompanied the first two pieces on percussion and flute. Raven (2010) opens the evening. A More …
I am usually not one to play favorites, but I will say that The Sour Notes have been my favorite Austin band for the last three years. (And in the self-proclaimed “Live Music Capital of the World” they obviously have a lot of competition.) It is worth noting that I discovered The Sour Notes in a very roundabout kind of way. I was at the [now defunct] Dobie Theater with More …
There are plenty of music-related events going on this weekend; you know, with the ACL Music Festival and all of its bastard offspring… And, well, it is one of those bastard offspring gigs that really caught my eye (and ear) this week: the Learning Secrets Party on Saturday, September 17th at The Beauty Bar (RSVP here: www.learningsecretsmusic.com/rsvp). Presented by Silverton Partners (and sponsored by Lamebook) the party’s main attraction is More …
“Archaeology and The Shape of Time” at Fisher Press (August 26-Sept. 27) is an exhibition of small scale black-and-white photographs by Richard “Chip” Benson and Edward Ranney. The exhibit spans work made from 1968 to 2009, from Peru to Connecticut to Paris, and is timed with the release of a book by the same name. If you like your photography straight, rigorous, modest, patient, handsome, faithful, and traditional, you will More …
The word from Aspen this month proves to nobody’s amazement that Aspen remains the Rockies resort town where hedge-fund managers and A-list partygoers and pundits show up in August to ante up for art. The weekend of August 5th found the art fair Art-Aspen in its second year, (as it was last year), held to coincide with Aspen Art Museum’s fundraiser, Art-Crush, that raised a whopping $1.7 million. While exhibitors More …