LOS ANGELES — Here, in the United States, piñatas are most commonly considered a fun, slightly violent activity at children’s birthday parties. A hollow papier-mâché form is filled with candy and small toys and then playfully bashed by partygoers with a stick or baseball bat, until it spews forth the […]
EAST LANSING, MI — Magic, much like stand-up comedy, is considered by neophytes to be a spontaneous or improvisational form, but true practitioners know it to be, like most other performance, based on a formal structure. The Transported Man, a group show at the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum […]
BIRMINGHAM, Mich. — “Every new project presents some version of basic order,” wrote Alexander Girard. “In it, the ingredients for the exercise of fantasy and magic may usually be found.” The quote, taken from one of Girard’s artist statements, was heavily referenced in a symposium devoted to his fantastic and fantastical […]
The 2017 Riverfront Arts Festival kicks off TODAY with these great events! While you’re out there, visit my Mood Totems and leave them an offering, if you want. They will reward you with the emotional energy of your choosing. Choose wisely! Thanks, one more time, to organizer Jaime Lutzo, redefining […]
This week, while you’re out at Riverfront Park in Jefferson-Chalmers, enjoying a spate of performances, workshops, and other programming associated with this year’s Riverfront Arts Festival, be sure to take a moment to track down four interactive sculptures I’ve installed, for your emotional needs. According to parable, we all contain […]
Any longtime resident of Southeast Michigan has a story about the Summer of 1967 and the infamous events that escalated to a citywide state of civil disobedience, known alternately as the Detroit Riots and the Detroit Rebellion. This divergence in naming is just one way of underscoring that everyone’s perspectives […]
DETROIT — To those who consume it, fruit may be among nature’s most delicious treats, but fruits are also reproductive bodies. “Its [fruit’s] entire design is to better produce the next generation,” said Mary Eddy, one of four participating artists in the group show May Contain Fruit at the Scarab Club. “That […]
Artist: Lynn Crawford Location: Commonwealth, Birmingham Breakfast: LC – Coffee (milk), Mediterranean Salad SRS – Coffee (black), Chorizo Hash It was very important to me that this BWTA with Lynn did not simply devolve into an outpouring of gushing devotion, because usually when Lynn and I get together, we just […]
Hey, Denizens of Toronto! I’ll be visiting your fair city for the first time in just a few short weeks to participate in this reading event, in support of the magnificent collection, SPLIT, off Fiction & Feeling Press, organized and edited by the incomparable Katie West. Ms. West will be […]
Detroit has a long history of innovative music, with roots in jazz and funk, multiple legacies in Motown, electronic and house music, as well as a wave of rock bands that created some of the definitive albums of their genres. All these and more directly influence yet another original sound: Detroit […]