GISH AT THE MOVIES | february 2012

February 1, 2012

PLAYING WITH CINEMA It’s February and what always pops into my mind this month is “Black History Month.” Not everyone buys into it being just a month: You can meet Shukree Hassan Tilghman, a 29-year-old African American filmmaker, who is on a cross-country campaign to expand our study of black history in this month’s pick for HoustonPBS’s “Community Cinema” (www.communitycinema.org) series, presented in conjunction with Documentary Alliance (www.documentaryalliance.org). More Than a Month airs 2/22, 7pm, at Rice Cinema (www.film.rice.edu) and Mr. Tilghman will be in attendance. The Landmark River Oaks (www.landmarktheatres.com) has a fine lineup of midnighters – The Theatre Bizarre (2/3-2/4), The Room (2/10) and The Rocky Horror Picture Show (2/11) – and be sure to catch their special one-night-only event: the opera film, 3 Superstars in Berlin, on 2/1. Sundance Cinemas Houston (www.sundancecinemas.com) is also hosting special limited presentations this month – their new series of projected shows from the National Theatre of London features a screening of the play Traveling Light (2/13, 7pm and 2/18, 12:30pm).

LOVE and MUSIC My Heart Is an Idiot caught my eye, since it’s the month of l-o-v-e. It’s screening on 2/9, 7:30pm at the River Oaks Theatre and is part of this month’s schedule by the Aurora Picture Show (www.aurorapictureshow.org). This romantic documentary captures the road-tripping lifestyle of author, filmmaker, contributor to radio show “This American Life” and editor/publisher of FOUND Magazine Davy Rothbart who looks for love in all places. Prior to the screening, he’ll be presenting a special mini love-themed live performance. (This is the guy who made a “masturbation movie” so who knows what will happen!) It’s also time for APS’s annual “Soul Nite!” films at the El Dorado Ballroom on 2/24, 7pm; curator Peter Lucas will be in attendance and you’ll get to boogie to James Brown, Sam & Dave, Barbara Lynn, Rufus Thomas, Wilson Pickett and many more. Studio Movie Grill (www.studiomoviegrill.com) at City Centre (where the old Town and Country Mall was) has a couple of great art films this month: 3 Superstars in Berlin (2/1, 7pm) and ReGeneration (2/16 and 2/23, 8pm), a documentary with five of the most influential electronic producers/DJs in music today – Mark Ronson, DJ Premier, The Crystal Method, Pretty Lights and Skrillex. Grab your teens for that one!

MUSEUMS, FESTIVALS and AWARDS The Health Museum (www.thehealthmuseum.org) gets up close and personal with humans in Planet You 3D, a collaboration with the Museum of Science, Boston – catch it on the hour, every hour. Down the street, “Surprise Cinema!” is still happening at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (www.mfah.org). This month’s “surprise” film will unroll on 2/10 and 2/11. Other films they are unrolling are El Bulli: Cooking in Progress (2/3 and 2/4, 7pm); The Mummy (the1932 film is a perfect complement to the Museum’s King Tut show and it’s unrolling on 2/3 and 2/4 at 9pm) and Le Havre (2/18, 1pm and 7pm and 2/19, 5pm). If you saw Richard Linklater’s 1991 film Slacker, you’ll love Slacker 2011, a stream-of-consciousness chronicle by 24 of Austin’s top filmmakers (2/17, 7pm). Live and Become (2/20, 7pm) is the Menil Collection Director Josef Helfenstein’s choice for “Movies Houstonians Love.” It’s the story of an Ethiopian boy relocated to Israel during Operation Moses. And down yet another nearby street, the 19th annual “Iranian Film Festival” returns to Rice Media Center (www.ricecinema.rice.edu) February 3-5. The Houston Film Critics Society held their annual “Awards Show” at the MFAH last month; among the winners were The Descendants (Best Picture), I Saw the Devil (Best Foreign Film) and Your Highness (Worst Film). Both Mary Lampe, Executive Director of SWAMP (www.swamp.org), and Hunter Todd, Executive Director of Worldfest (www.worldfest.org), were given Outstanding Achievement awards. Congrats to my two friends!

ART FILMS ARE GOOD FOR THE SOUL…TAKE A FRIEND TO ONE.

By Sarah Gish

Filed Under: Gish At the Movies

MUSEUM DISTRICT | january 2012

February 1, 2012

1. The Menil Collection www.menil.org

Imprinting the Divine: Byzantine and Russian Icons for the Menil Collection, on view thru March 18, is widely regarded by scholars in the field as one of the most important exhibits of its kind in the United States. The group of more than sixty works, many of which were acquired by Dominique de Menil in 1985 from the noted collector Eric Bradley, spans 600 years, from the 13th to the 18th centuries, and encompasses a number of distinct cultures including Greek, Slavic and Russian. A Musical Tribute to the Byzantine Frescoes, Sunday, February 12, 2012, at 5:30pm at the Menil Collection Foyer. Concert begins at sundown with a procession from the Menil Collection to the Byzantine Fresco Chapel by singers from St. Paul’s Methodist Choir chanting sacred texts.  At the Chapel, a concert of Bach’s Cello Suite #2 in D Minor and Mariel, duet for marimba and cello by Osvaldo Golijov, will be given. A Scholarly Consideration of Sacred Art–Moderated by Josef Helfenstein, the Menil Collection Director, on Sunday, February 19, 7pm at the Menil Collection Foyer brings together an art historian, an anthropologist and a theologian for a discussion of the ways in which the Byzantine Fresco Chapel and the larger Menil campus reflect the vision of Menil founders.

2. Houston Center for Photography www.hcponline.org

2012 Print Auction, on view February 22. Each year, HCP holds an annual print auction where artists, galleries and collectors from all over the world contribute high caliber photographic art that is auctioned with 100% of the proceeds directly benefiting HCP’s operating fund.

3. The Rothko Chapel www.rothkochapel.org

The Rothko Chapel, founded by John and Dominique de Menil, was dedicated in 1971 as an intimate sanctuary available to people of every belief. A modern meditative environment inspired by the mural canvases of Russian-born, American painter Mark Rothko (1903-1970), the Chapel welcomes thousands of visitors each year, people of every faith and from all parts of the world.

4. Byzantine Fresco Chapel Museum www.menil.org/visit/byzantine.php

Intimate in scale, the Byzantine Fresco Chapel Museum is the repository of the only intact Byzantine frescoes of this size and importance in the Western Hemisphere. It’s also a manifestation of the redemptive power of art: The chapel was expressly built to house 13th-century Byzantine frescoes that had been looted from their original home in a small chapel in Lysi, Cyprus.

5. Houston Center for Contemporary Craft www.crafthouston.org

Bridge 11: Lia Cook, on view February 4, is a solo exhibition of the work by internationally recognized fiber artist Lia Cook. The exhibit presents large-scale woven images of human faces and introduces several works from a new body of work based on the artist’s recent art-neuroscience collaboration. Cook’s current practice incorporates concepts of cloth, touch and memory. With her use of a digital jacquard loom, she weaves the images and creates monumental works that blur distinctions among computer technology, weaving, painting and photography.

6. Lawndale Art Center www.lawndaleartcenter.org

Unfadeable So Please Don’t Try To Fade Me, on view thru February 25, features all new work by Texas-based artist Carlos Rosales-Silva. Through varied formal languages the work reflects the absorption and appropriation of minority culture by mainstream American society. Observations of mass-produced consumer goods, culturally specific aesthetics, social structure, pop culture and institutionalized education inform the work and raise questions about historical accuracy and social hierarchy. Rather than taking a specific stance, this body of work embodies a sense of cultural confusion through visual inventiveness and humor.

7. Buffalo Soldiers National Museum www.buffalosoldiermuseum.com

The Buffalo Soldiers National Museum pays tribute to African-American military history from the Revolutionary War to modern times. During the 1860s, soldiers of the 10th U.S. Calvary were nicknamed “Buffalo Soldiers” for their fierce fighting ability and bravery.

8. Holocaust Museum Houston www.hmh.org

Returning: the Art of Samuel Bak, on view February 17. Viewers encounter familiar imagery used in unusual, somewhat surrealistic ways as they are led on an astoundingly complex, beautiful and richly colorful journey to, through and from the Holocaust. Born on August 12, 1933, in Vilna, which is now Vilnius, Lithuania, Bak was recognized from an early age as possessing extraordinary artistic talent. The artist continues to deal with the artistic expression of the destruction and dehumanization which make up his childhood memories. He speaks about what are deemed to be the unspeakable atrocities of the Holocaust, though he hesitates to limit the boundaries of his art to the post-Holocaust genre.

9. Children’s Museum of Houston www.cmhouston.org

Cum Yah Gullah, on view February 25, features inspiring songs, candid folktales and African heritage preserved. Cum Yah Gullah (translated to mean Come here, Gullah) explores the rich West African culture carried to the US in the 1600s and uncovers the roots of millions of African-Americans today. Isolated from the mainland on the Sea Islands, along the coast of South Carolina and Georgia, the Gullah people have preserved more of their African cultural history than any other segment of African-American people.

10. The Health Museum www.thehealthmuseum.org

Cells: The Universe Inside Us, on view thru February, features the human body’s composition of millions of cells that are constantly working. Visitors are given the chance to see what happens inside their body every day. Walk through a giant cell, perform virtual experiments, make protein shapes with your shadow and more!

11. Houston Museum of Natural Science www.hmns.org

Discovering the Civil War, on view thru April 29, unveils the layers of time and memories obscuring the American Civil War in a smoky haze. The real human beings, military and civilian, who lived through these years of travail and sacrifice are lost to us, but the records they left behind give us a pathway back to the past. The exhibit is divided into 12 thematic areas that combine great original treasures, engaging touchscreen interactive and social media tools, selected to illustrate the breadth of the conflict and to ask, “How do we know what happened?”

12. Houston Zoo www.houstonzoo.org

Each summer, the Houston Zoo offers the wildly popular Camp Zoofari, weeklong day camps for kids ages 4 to 12. Each February, Houston Zoo members get the first opportunity to register their children for Camp Zoofari. Purchase a Zoo Membership on line at www.houstonzoo.org. Kids have the opportunity to catch a tiger being trained and then talking to the trainer; touching a giant rabbit, a snake and a bird; riding the carousel and eating ice pops; making new friends and having LOTS of fun.

13. Rice University Art Gallery www.ricegallery.org

Joel Shapiro, New Installation, on view February 2. Primarily known for his geometric, abstract sculptures that appear to bound across museum walls, floors and sculpture gardens, renowned American artist Joel Shapiro has been working over the past several years on a new body of work where he transforms entire gallery and museum spaces with room-sized installations of colorful geometric shapes and lines that hover in a kind of suspended animation.

14. The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston www.mfah.org

Revelation: Major Paintings by Jules Olitski, on view February 12. Widely regarded as one of America’s last classic modern painters, Olitski (1922-2007) created brilliant color harmonies and chromatic shifts that became one of the hallmarks of Color Field Painting. Olitski enjoyed enormous acclaim in the 1960s and ’70s, and in 1969 was the first living American artist to be given a solo exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. This exhibition offers a selective survey of approximately 35 paintings, ranging from the artist’s first forays into stain painting beginning in 1959 to his visionary last compositions in 2007.

15. Contemporary Arts Museum Houston www.camh.org

The Deconstructive Impulse: Women Artists Reconfigure the Signs of Power, on view thru April 15. This exhibit examines the crucial role of women artists in the development of deconstructivism in the 1970s and 1980s. The deconstructive impulse was propelled in significant measure by women who, through the appropriation of mass media and commercial images, sought to reveal the mechanisms of power present in popular representations of gender, sex, race and class. The exhibit features photographs, prints, paintings, videos and installations by various artists.

16. The Jung Center oF Houston www.junghouston.org 

Founded in 1958, The Jung Center is a nonprofit educational institution dedicated to the continuing education of the human spirit through psychology, the arts and the humanities.

17. Czech Center MUSEUM www.czechcenter.org
The Czech Center Museum Houston works to preserve, record and celebrate the language, scholarship and arts of Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia and Slovakia.

18. JohnC.FreemanWeather MUSEUM www.wxresearch.org
Exhibits email us at pixie@002mag.com

Filed Under: Museum District

SPACETAKER | february 2012

February 1, 2012

February is dedicated to love… or more specifically, the pursuit of love and the potentially fevered last-minute search for Valentine bouquets and gifts. In the sage words of love’s most sonorous troubadour (Barry White): “Too much of anything is not good for you, baby.” But while overdosing on Godiva has unfortunate repercussions for your waistline, there’s no such thing as too much art in our opinion! Take this month to celebrate those artists who make you swoon.

The Coast of Utopia
@ Main Street Theater
February 9 – March 11 (Times vary)
Main Street Theater presents Tom Stoppard’s trilogy chronicling a group of real-life Russian intellectuals dreaming of revolution. Set against the backdrop of Paris during the Revolution of 1848, philosopher Alexander Herzen articulates his search for a Utopia before he is thwarted by a series of personal catastrophes. In Shipwrecked, a disillusioned Herzen finds solace in London within a community of political émigrés including Karl Marx and Mikhail Bakunin.
MST Rice Village (2540 Times Blvd.)– tickets from $26. 713.524.6706 / www.MainStreetTheater.com

Dominic Walsh Dance Theater’s Winter Mixed Rep
February 9, 10 & 11 @ 7:30pm
DWDT presents a mixed rep showcasing the stunning 27’52” by icon Jií Kylián, the master of fusing classical and modern dance. This electrifying program also features the Texas premiere of Walsh’s Nessuno created for Hubbard Street 2, memorable duets from his award-winning The Trilogy: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart performed by Domenico Luciano, Stefania Figliossi and Japanese ballerina Hana Sakai, as well as a cameo appearance by beloved ballerina Tyann Clement.
Hobby Center for the Performing Arts, Zilkha Hall (800 Bagby Street)– Tickets $25–52. 713.315.2525
www.dwdt.org

ROCO in Concert
February 18 @ 5pm at
The Church of St. John the Divine
February 19 @ 5pm concert with Dinner at The Houstonian Hotel
ROCO (River Oaks Chamber Orchestra) welcomes guest conductor Kazem Abdullah to conduct Franz Schubert’s Symphony No. 4, Joseph Haydn’s Cello Concerto performed by Richard Belcher (of the Grammy-nominated Enso Quartet), and the world premiere of Lumiére Lunaire (refletée) by composer and jazz pianist Paul English. With a core of 40 local and national professional musicians, ROCO has made a name for itself in Houston and beyond as a chamber orchestra whose performances are “the most fun you can have with serious music.”
713.665.2700| www.rocohouston.org

Grown-up Story Time 44
February 21 @ 9pm
BooTown presents the 44th installment of Grown-up Storytime (GUST), a favorite for Montrose-bound theatricals! The formula: The public submits stories to be read by a rotating crack-squad of expert storytellers who’ll rock your socks off with their unique spin on each tale. It’s every third Tuesday of the month – what else are you going to do? An added bonus also in February: Boo’s nontraditional take on the Benshi show! In the tradition of Japanese performers providing live narration for silent films, BooTown will dub one of “the greatest pieces of American film history to date”: ROADHOUSE. GUST: Rudyard’s British Pub (2010 Waugh Drive)– $5. www.bootown.org

Filed Under: Spacetaker

RECORDING | february 2012

January 25, 2012

two star symphony

L-R: Margaret Hullum Lejeune, Debra Brown, Jerry Ochoa, Jo Bird

Local string quartet Two Star Symphony, which consists of Jo Bird (viola), Jerry Ochoa (violin), Margaret Lejeune (cello) and Debra Brown (violin), have a lot going on in 2012, their 10th year as a band. They recently completed a score for local filmmaker Mel House (with plans for another), next month they’ll make their 3rd straight appearance at SXSW and they’re planning a tour for this summer. Debra Brown talks 2012 and a bit of their process.

When Two Star Symphony is scoring something, do you practice together in the studio?
We have a projector, and we just project it on the wall in front of us and watch it over and over and over again.

So you don’t really discuss what you’ll do, you just let it kind of come out, kind of flow?
Well, sometimes … or if we’ve written something and one of us is questioning it … we’ll stop and be like ‘is that really the feeling of what’s happening?’

What happens if you’re scoring something like Harold Lloyd and you start laughing while you’re playing?
We love that. We’re kind of known as a little macabre or dark by some people, but there’s always humor in our music as well. Our main composer is our cellist – most music starts from the cello or the viola, like the lower ends come up with a lot of the bass lines, and then we write on top of that. But her dream from a little kid was writing cartoon music for spooky stories, so that’s basically what we’re doing.

How about when you score a dance piece?
We still watch everything, luckily. Dancers were in the studio as they’re choreographing the pieces, so sometimes, just like with the Fat Tony project, which I really like, sometimes they’ll ask us to play a piece that they’ve heard before, and we’ll play section by section, and they’ll stop us as they’re choreographing. And then other times, we’ll see the movement, and we have to write on the spot to the movement as it’s happening. But so far, with us scoring new films instead of old silent films, we score by the scene, which is a little bizarre, because there’s no pretext for what’s happening. [In Psychic Experiment], we score a scene where this man is walking into his apartment, and there’re clothes strung about, and you can tell he’s concerned about why there’re clothes everywhere … he’s saying this girl’s name over and over again, he’s following the clothing down to the bathroom, and there’s a girl and a boy in the bathtub together and it’s full of blood, and they’re making out. And obviously, the guy that’s standing there, it’s his girlfriend in the bathtub, but then you find out through the scene that it’s her brother that she’s in the bathtub with, making out. And she’s like ‘isn’t this how you always pictured it?’ or something, and then their flesh starts melting together, and then their heads explode, and that’s the end of the scene.

And you’re like ‘oh! I’ve got the perfect idea for what this sounds like!’ Speaking of the collaboration with Fat Tony last year – any more plans for that sort of thing?
I really love hip-hop music. Three out of the four of us really enjoy hip-hop music. Our violist is more metal and punk rock, but she did enjoy the project as well. I hope that some more will come from it. We actually got to meet – we’ve been a big fan of Devin the Dude for a long time and we were playing at a festival in Bergen, Norway, and Devin was playing around the corner and our cellist talked our way into a sold-out show by saying we were from Houston, and through everything getting lost in translation, they thought that we were friends of Devin The Dude because we were from Houston, so they let us in! Then, a good friend of mine, Matt Sonzala, was his DJ for the night … so we got to hang out. We haven’t gotten to collaborate with Devin the Dude, but we’re kind of stalking him.

Get him one of your tattoos.
We’re pretty sure we’re the only string quartet that has matching tattoos, and that now has 26 fans with our tattoo on their bodies (laughs).

That was for your Titus Andronicus record release last year, right? That all happened on that night?
No, I think maybe 15 people happened on that night?

That’s a lot of people to get a tattoo of your band.
Yeah! There were still people signed up, but we ran out of time that night, actually. There was a mother and daughter – a 17-year-old with her mother, who was like ‘okay, we’ll get it.’ It was her mother’s first tattoo, and then she agreed to let her 17-year-old daughter get her a tattoo also!

Two Star Symphony performs at Leon’s Lounge
(1006 McGowen) on February 28, from 8-10pm.

Filed Under: Recording

FOR’S ART SAKE | February 2012

January 24, 2012

Curtis Gannon

Is there an era, a cutoff point for an era of comics that interest you from which you tend to work?
Good question. Primarily the ’60s and the ’70s, I guess even the ’50s. What they would call the “Golden Age” is kind of ’50s, ’60s, and the “Silver Age” is primarily ’70s. They’ve been making reprints for quite a bit of these comics for about 10–15 years, and I make my work from these reprints. I love the colors they use. I love the way they were drawn back then, the simplicity of the printing… now, with digital, they’re almost photographic they’re so well printed. Plus, there’s something about the comics from that day and age. You know, you always knew the good guy was gonna win, no one ever really got killed, there was no cussing, there was no… a very latent sexuality – and comics today, it’s pretty much like cable television. They’re pretty over the top. So I like that innocence, you know?

Did you grow up reading comics actively? Were you really into it?
Oh, definitely. I grew up in a small South Texas oil town with nothing going on… little Alice, Texas. No one’s ever even heard of it unless you broke down there or got relatives. And I just ran into this guy down the street who had boxes of comics and before I knew it, I had a couple of boxes of my own and… I don’t know, I just read comics all the time. I just loved it. Always tried to find people who had stashes of them, would always try to go to garage sales and for a while even thought about being a comic book artist.

There’s something about comics that can’t be reproduced in film, etc. People either get comics or they don’t, but it’s difficult to explain that ‘it’ that comics has, isn’t it?
Definitely. It’s interesting you mention film, because film and comics are probably two of the closest-related medias.

Because of the panels.
Yeah, and the sense of… the first panel on the left is going to be the first scene, and then the next, and there’s this kind of sequence of events and time… it just happens a lot faster in film. Those images are going by very quickly. Where in comics, it’s all still moments with time in between, and you know, the gutters are a very big element in my work – the white lines that separate the panels on a page – and from one panel to another; it can be the time of a breath or it could be literally a million years. The first panel could be dinosaurs fighting, and the next one could be a guy getting into a spaceship. Anything can happen. Time and space … you know, you can start on Earth, you can end up on Mars in the second panel. Anything can happen, and that sense of this perpetual time machine, almost, with limitless possibilities between panels is something that’s very attractive to me. I’m always kind of rediscovering that tool of this media.


Your work is sort of a commentary on how everything is being reappropriated these days – especially in digital form. How do you feel about that versus what you do, which is very physical, very craftlike with the material?
It’s so easy to walk that line between what is appropriating, what is using something legally and what is stealing it or misusing it, which is the worst of all possibilities. And that question always comes up about my work, and there’re two things: one, I’m actually using the comics books, which – they’re public property. Everything I use, you could go to Barnes & Noble or to Third Planet Comics, and find the exact same thing, and I like that about it. And also, these things are very much kind of an homage to these artists and writers of this time. I love Jack Kirby; I love Stan Lee. Stan Lee is my Mark Twain. And so these pieces are very much just kind of a nerdy, fanboy love of this material.

Is your Plexiglas stuff going to be in the show
coming up?
I’ve got a couple for this show, and this will be the first time these have been shown in an exhibition, the Plexi pieces. I’m also making some new pieces that have never been shown that I call “page mosaics,” where I’m cutting all the pages out of a comic… the first layer is just pages, and then I put layers in front of that that are the pages with the windows, overlapping and overlapping. But they’re just pinned to the walls, pinned over and over … so every time I reinstall the piece, it’s a new piece. I’m trying to break out of this rigidness of the system, and making something organic that I have to reinterpret every time. And then I’m also making these pieces that I’m calling “plot weaves,” where I’m cutting the comics into strips, and then I’m weaving the pages back together, and making almost like these little mats. It’s totally goofy. I just thought about simple childhood projects and what you do with paper. The projects you would have done in Sunday School or even the second grade. I try to keep my hands in multiple formats. I find that interesting. You go to an art show and you see one piece and they all look the same, just different sizes. And I try to keep reinterpreting it. It keeps me sharp, and I think it keeps the viewers interested.

“and everything in between.” is on view through March 2, and will also be open to the public on Saturday, February 11, from 2 to 5pm, in conjunction with Winter Street Studios Second Saturday Open Studios. Closing reception on Friday, March 2, 6-8pm.

Spacetaker ARC Gallery
2101 Winter Street, B11
Houston, TX 77007
www.spacetaker.org

Interview by Lance Scott Walker
Photography by Cody Bess

Filed Under: For Art's Sake

SPACETAKER | january 2012

December 31, 2011

It’s time to start fresh in the new year! Clean out your closets, kick your bad habits and renew your gym membership – or at least, vow to make good use of it, rather than writing it off as your charitable contribution to the fitness industry. As always, January is all about reflection and self-improvement… so among your New Year’s resolutions, consider dedicating more time to exploring your local art scene.

“and everything in between” @ Spacetaker
January 13 @ 6pm: Opening Reception
On view January 13 -March 2
“and everything in between,” a solo exhibition by Houston artist Curtis Gannon, showcases collages and constructions based on the deconstruction of the comic book medium. His various approaches to presentation and reassembly explore the fundamental mechanisms by which comics communicate their message. Incorporating intricate geometric patterns made of overlapping, cut-up and woven comic book pages (including Plexiglas installations), the work highlights the characteristics of American action comics: color, movement, dialogue, dramatic story lines and pop entertainment. Spacetaker ARC Gallery (2101 Winter)- Free! www.spacetaker.org


A Crack in Everything
January 19-21, 7:30pm: zoe|juniper performances
January 28, Feb. 4, 11, 18, 25, 1pm: Local performances
zoe|juniper (Princess Grace Awardee Zoe Scofield and Juniper Shuey) create an immersive environment of video, dance, photography and installation extending and expanding upon their touring dance work, A Crack in Everything (ACIE). Using the Greek tragedy The Oresteia to explore the emotional spectrum of justice and retaliation, the installation allows viewers to experience the performance from different perspectives simultaneously, providing insight into the physical and emotive realities of the performers. DiverseWorks ArtSpace (1117 East Freeway)- Free! www.diverseworks.org

Photo by Jim Allen

Inprint presents Booker Prize-winning author Margaret Atwood
January 23 @ 7:30pm
The Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series presents literary icon Margaret Atwood, author of more than 40 books and internationally celebrated novelist, poet, literary critic and environmental activist. Her tenth novel, The Blind Assassin, received the 2000 Booker Prize, a prize for which she has received five nominations. Her work includes The Edible Woman, The Handmaid’s Tale, The Robber Bride and her most recent novel, The Year of the Flood. The reading will be followed by an on-stage interview, book sale and signing. Cullen Theater in Wortham Center (501 Texas Ave.)- Tickets $5. www.inprinthouston.org

Party Like It’s Mardi! – Music Doing Good Jazz Series
January 27: Pre-Show Party @ 7pm; Performance @ 8pm
Grab your friends, snag some beads and King Cake, sip a Hurricane and celebrate the grand spirit of Mardi Gras. Music Doing Good director of jazz and trombonist Delfeayo Marsalis gathers his crew of legendary jazz musicians including saxophonist “Preacherman” Mark Gross and jazz all-star drummer Adonis Rose, along with Big Chief Gerard Bo Dollis and Big Chief Smiley Ricks to lead the parade. Don’t hesitate to don your beads and costumes and bask in bold sounds and elation of this rich tradition. All ticket sales benefit the Musical Instrument Aid and Scholarship Fund. Zilkha Hall (Hobby Center)- $25.
www.musicdoinggood.com

Filed Under: Spacetaker

GISH AT THE MOVIES | january 2012

December 31, 2011

Yikes! It’s 2012…the year the Mayans and Nostradamus say will end it all. I prefer to shine a positive light – the world ain’t ending, ya’ll – it’s just a new beginning for us! I am knocking on wood and hoping that part of our new world is a strong economy and in my magical crystal ball, I see Houston’s small businesses leading the way down the green brick road. Since I focus on the film faves of notable Houstonians each January, this year I turned to successful small biz retailers.


Thankfully, Denise Welling of Body Mind & Soul sees this year as a spiritually positive one so it’s no surprise that she loves the 1947 film The Bishop’s Wife. “The story is quite simple: a bishop (David Niven) prays for help in building a grand cathedral while trying to satisfy the needs of the demanding patron who is backing the project. An angel by the name of Dudley (Cary Grant) arrives in answer to his prayer, but shows him that what he really wants is not a cathedral, but a deeper relationship with his wife, Julia (Loretta Young). This movie is beautiful to me on so many levels – the most obvious is that you get help from a higher source when you ask for it and that sometimes what you think you want is not what you are truly yearning for.”


Danish woman Karen Blixen (Meryl Streep) is darn sure she yearns to leave her womanizing husband in Debbie Scholl’s favorite movie, Out of Africa (and who wouldn’t, when cute Denys Finch-Hatton, played by Robert Redford, is waiting for her?!). The owner of FUNdamentally Toys says, “I’m attracted to the movie because of Blixen’s strength and courage and her diplomacy and her passion, all of which are mixed with a deep love and respect for Finch-Hatton. Filmed in Kenya, the photography is breathtaking and the musical score punctuates the intensity of events as they unfold.”

“One of my favorite films ever is a documentary called Seamless,” says Chloe Dao, fashion designer and owner of Lot 8 boutique. “It’s about well-known designers, including Proenza Schouler and Doo-Ri Chung, who were competing to win the CFDA award in 2005. I love this film because it shows the nitty-gritty part of fashion and the brutal reality. You can have tons of press and celebrities wearing your clothes and still be in debt. The film shows some of the personal and private struggles of very talented designers that I relate to. It lets me know I am not alone. I would recommend this film to all aspiring fashion designers or anyone who is interested in that industry.”

The most surprising film choice I ran across?
Lucy Chambers, book maven and Editorial Director at Bright Sky Press, would put on a boxing mask for Jack Black’s hilarious Nacho Libre. It just goes to show you: you can’t judge a book girl by her cover.

Happy 2012 and may your light shine bright all year long!

Filed Under: Gish At the Movies

RECORDING | january 2012

December 31, 2011


hollywood floss

You have a band [The Fabulous Pinecones] that you play with sometimes when you play live. Do you get to do a lot of practicing with them?
I use the band for more festival environments and high-profile shows. I’m always preparing two different sets. I have a DJ set and then I have the band set, so if it’s like Summerfest or ACL, I’m gonna bring out the band and practice on what we need to do and have extra songs just in case the crowd’s not feeling the direction we’re going in at that moment. We try to mix it up with blends and mashups of like The White Stripes or Green Day or Weezer… you know, just to have fun with those types of festivals that allow for that audience. For the DJ set, which are more kind of like the cool people who really just go to shows to be on the scene – they’re not really there for the music – we have the songs that appeal to that audience as well.

Do you feel like you’ve got a different energy when you play with a band versus playing with a DJ?
Nah, not at all! You would think so because live energy also brings just that different level of energy, but I mean, I still do push-ups and I’m still on the floor with the DJ, I’m still trying to jump on something, I’m trying to crowd surf in a mosh pit. For me, I don’t have a drop-off. It’s just… what do you prefer? It’s hard at small venues to get the band to sound as good as the big venues, so it’s kind of like… I don’t wanna bring out this band and then no one can hear the words or the music the way it’s supposed to be heard. But it’s like… go to the DJ set and have the same energy, it’s not a drum or anything else. It’s just already mixed music.

Do you find your rhythmic sensibilities of the way you rap changes at all when you’re playing with a band and you’ve got that natural shift in the tempo rather than having it locked in like a record?
Right, of course, as you know, when the drummer’s off or the drummer goes slower than what the record is played, because the way they quantize and everything’s ready to go, you have to make up for that. So if the drummer’s off, you can’t just stop and yell at ’em, or he can’t yell at you. You just have to adjust. There’s been a lot of times when people thought that was just supposed to go like that, but… it really wasn’t supposed to go like that, we have to adjust on the fly.

Those are the things that make
you better, too.
Because you prepare for that. Whatever’s thrown your way, you gotta be good. You gotta be professional enough to handle that.

You’ve gotten some buzz over the last year and a half, with the blogs writing about you, XXL and The Source… how do you keep your head straight? Because it seems like you have. You’re working as hard now as before you got any attention.
I think it’s seeing my older cousins lose focus. I don’t know if it was 2000 or 2001, but my older cousins were on a small label called Unified Entertainment, and I saw them get to that radio status, and then once they got on the radio, just on the radio in Houston, they stopped working. They would go to the clubs and they would sit in the trailer and I remember back then it was The Roxy or Coco Loco, and they would stay in the van. Fans were trying for autographs and I was like ‘man, what are you guys doing? You’re blowing your opportunity.’ I mean, not knowing it, I’m just there, observing it, but looking back I’m like ‘man, y’all really blew an opportunity.’ I mean, looking back now, XXL is nothing compared to the radio. I gotta keep going until I can do this for a living. I still have a day job, so I have to make sure I’m doing everything in my power to make this happen for me and my team, so I’m doing it for a living. When I see XXL… most people think ‘ah, I made it.’ You haven’t made anything.

You have to work 10 times harder because now if you put out a song and it’s wack: ‘why did he deserve XXL?’ So you have to work harder in this day and age. Someone’s always around the corner to take your spot. You can take my spot, but I’m just gonna be right there battling for it. I’m not just gonna hand it off.
Do you have a day job that provides a nice balance, where you can write a bit while there?
Not really! I mean, I’m a school teacher by day, so not really. I’m dealing with kids from 9-5. They really test your limit, and you know, maybe on my off period – maybe – but that’s just 40 minutes. Maybe get an idea, or surf the net to do something, but, no, it’s a 40-hour job and then I come and have to really get into that zone, so I have to work that much harder.

What age kids do you teach?
7th and 8th, Special Education and middle school.

It’s amazing you find any time
to write at all.
It’s crazy, but when you get off, after they give you the run and they wear you down, it’s like ‘okay, this is more of a reason why I want to do music full time!’

What’s your New Year’s resolution?
I’m gonna put out some mixtapes, and then I’m gonna put out an album in the summer. My birthday is August 4th, so I wanna put out an album in the summer. It’ll be just under a year for a new album, so I’ll put out a new album on my birthday. Other than that, I’m gonna put out some mixtapes and then go to South by Southwest. So I wanna make sure that I’m doing videos and I’m doing music every month to get to the fans, whether it’s a 5-track mixtape or videos to accompany those…

I wanna get more involved with my videos and more music to the fans.

By Lance Scott Walker
Photography Anthony Rathbun

Filed Under: Recording

FOR ART’S SAKE | january 2012

December 31, 2011

Last houston Days of the Byzantine Frescoes
The Byzantine Chapel closes on Sunday March 4, 2012.
For special farewell program details, visit www.menil.org or www.byzantinefrescoeschapel.com


Set between the sprawling campuses of University of St. Thomas and The Menil Collection (of which it is part), the Byzantine Fresco Chapel is a monument to a very ancient culture and fantastic stewardship. The Byzantine Frescoes housed inside will leave in March after 15 years in Houston, completing a journey decades in the making. The following is an email exchange between Menil Director Josef Helfenstein, Communications Director Vance Muse and me, about that journey.

How did Dominique de Menil come across the frescoes originally?
Dominique de Menil first learned about the frescoes in 1983, when a colleague, a scholar of the Byzantine period, showed her photographs of these 13th-century works of art, which had been taken from their home, a small Greek Orthodox chapel near the village of Lysi on the island of Cyprus. The frescoes by then were with an art dealer in Munich, and Dominique, who recognized the exceptional quality of the work, arranged a trip to view them. Once there, she became suspicious of the frescoes’ true origins and resolved to rescue them. Sure enough, research revealed that the frescoes had been taken from their home when Lysi was looted following the Turkish invasion of 1974. In partnership with and on behalf of the Church of Cyprus, she negotiated to purchase the frescoes, for $520,000. Remember, the frescoes were very badly damaged.
 
Because they had been looted?
Yes, thieves had torn them from the walls of the chapel and hacked them into
38 pieces.
 
She paid more for the restoration than she paid for the pieces, right?
An additional $530,000 was spent to restore them.
 
How were they originally displayed? Did you have them up on mounts?
The Menil and the Church of Cyprus also agreed that the frescoes must be restored to their original spiritual purpose, and exhibited in a consecrated chapel. Dominique commissioned her son, Francois de Menil, a New York-based architect, to design a chapel building to house the frescoes. The design of the Byzantine Fresco Chapel, which opened in 1997, evokes the frescoes’ original home. It is an ideal setting for the frescoes, letting the viewer imagine and experience the spiritual space and power of their original home. The chapel was designed with special panels to allow for the easy removal of the frescoes, to facilitate their eventual return to Cyprus.
 
Did the museum ever have any idea of how long you would have them?
The original loan was extended and we are honored to have been able to display the frescoes for fifteen years since the chapel opened. More than 400,000 people – Houstonians and also visitors from all over the world – have been able to see and experience the restored frescoes.

How involved is the Church of Cyprus in the exchange?
Very. It has been a wonderful relationship and partnership, from the rescue and restoration of the frescoes to the opening and consecration of the chapel to this moment, when we prepare for their return. And it has brought us closer to the Greek Orthodox community here in Houston.
 
They’re going to the Makarios Cultural Center first. Do you know how they’re going to display them? Are there plans for that?
The frescoes are returning to the Archbishopric of Cyprus, which will decide on their further disposition.
 
A show of very good faith.
And a promise kept. This has proven to be a new model of cultural heritage. In fact, the Menil recently hosted a symposium –“Cultural Heritage 2.0”– with experts from the arts, bioethics and other fields, who explored issues of stewardship. You can view that symposium at www.byzantinefrescochapel.org.
 
What will become of the chapel?
Working with David Chipperfield Architects of London and Berlin, the Menil has completed a master site plan, which of course includes the chapel. Over the years, whenever possible and practical, we have acquired property around and adjacent to the museum campus, in the interest of preserving the tranquility of this urban oasis and also adding to our green space and, eventually, for the addition of new buildings devoted to art. We are carefully studying how we might “re-purpose” the chapel once the frescoes have left and the space has been deconsecrated.  
 
What are your fondest memories of the frescoes as they go away? What are you going to remember most?
These are the largest intact Byzantine frescoes in the Western hemisphere, and being able to share them on such a long-term basis has been an enormous privilege. We will miss the beauty and power of the frescoes and the sanctuary of their consecrated setting – and the rare experience they gave visitors to the Menil.
 
Heavy hearts.
Yes, but also full hearts. This is a bittersweet moment: we say farewell to the frescoes, while being grateful for the wonder and richness they brought to Houston during their time here.

Filed Under: Arts + Entertainment

RECORDING | december 2011

December 2, 2011

Tyagaraja

Tyagaraja plays acoustic guitar and sings, and Gunjen Mittal employs a mixture of classical and modern Indian dance onstage when they perform, often joined by a wide cross section of Houstonians on everything from sitar to lap steel. This month, they are off as a duo on their second trip to perform in India in as many years.

By time folks are reading this, you’ll be on Indian soil and you’ll have performed a couple of dates after a long preparation. Where will your head be at that point? Do you plan for that part of it?

Tyagaraja: Wow, well… I try my best to completely live in the present moment. Especially going to India, whether I am performing or seeking pilgrimage and silence, I simply concentrate on my breath and allow my feet to feel the rhythm of the earth and be guided toward the path that opens up to us. I do also recognize that this is very special and I respect this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity enough to know what is at stake. It is my responsibility to conjure motivation and make use out of every single second we spend in India and to make use of the support we have received from back home to even get here in the first place. We intend to completely make the most of it. The moments that pass in India are absolutely precious; I have so much unfinished business, so many places to see and rocks left unturned. We are making loads of plans, and still the majority of it will be done once we reach India itself. It’s a total experiment, and to me that’s truly Living…  

Gunjen: At that point there’s really no telling where our heads will be. As Tyaga mentioned, we’ll just go wherever the path unfolds for us or wherever we feel drawn to at the moment. Mainly though we’ll be hitting the ground running once we get there, continuing to make contacts and planning for more shows. I do feel that there won’t be much time to stop and reflect much in Mumbai because it’s such an epicenter of Indian pop culture, art, music, film, dance, etc., and we have to keep up! After all, we’ll be in the “Big Apple” of India!

What’s the biggest difference between the audiences over there and anywhere here in the States?
Tyagaraja: India’s audience is hungry for music and art. The people there are also constantly blossoming and flowering with it. India has its own obstacles and struggles just like any place on earth, and at the same time it’s completely booming right now. There is a huge underground indie rock scene; of course hip-hop and dance music is there too. The mass audiences are way more open to experimental and avant-garde music and performance art. That’s where I think we fit in. As diverse and interesting as music is here in the U.S., I feel that the style of show that we share will be more understood by the Indian audience, and hopefully that will help spawn the interest and understanding we need in our U.S. audience. 

Gunjen: From my experience in the dance and now music scene, it seems that the U.S. has a lot of catching up to do. I don’t necessarily mean that in a bad way, but there’s a cornucopia of music, art and dance artists and events going on outside of the States that Americans aren’t even aware of and they’’re being followed by thousands and millions of people. And the kinds of things going on are far more advanced and/or progressive. Once it reaches its popularity elsewhere, America usually catches on after the fact. On the other hand, I know that Americans (including myself) are also just as hungry for intellectual and progressive art, music or dance and there are a lot of amazing things happening right here in Houston as well. But sometimes we really have to seek it out as opposed to having full and easy access to the arts. Not to mention, our public transportation system (or the lack thereof) doesn’t help in this equation of linking the public to the arts or any other necessary social services for that matter! In many foreign countries the artists have a lot more governmental support to fund huge festivals/events no matter how underground the scene. There’s an appreciation for art that goes beyond the audience or the individual artist, which is integral to its success. Indian audiences also have that sort of access to all kinds of music and dance. There’s an intense underground fusion alternative art and rock scene brewing in India for the past decade or longer that may even be considered a sort of artistic rebellion, which is good for us because we’re all about the Revolution! So the audience is definitely ready for something crazy to come along with some depth and unique individuality to take them on a “Glory Ride” (title of one of Tyagaraja’s songs) because we bare our souls when we perform and we can only hope that they experience that as well.

By Lance Scott Walker
Photography Anthony Rathbun

Filed Under: Recording
« Older Posts