by Sandy | Sep 10, 2013 | Art, Arts, Entertainment and Music, Blogroll, Events, Exhibits, Museums
San Francisco’s Legion of Honor museum presents Impressionists on the Water. On view are a large assortment of paintings “that explores the significant role sailing played in the lives of the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists.” 
“Experience the artistic side of nautical life through more than 80 remarkable paintings and works on paper by Impressionists such as Monet, Caillebotte, Renoir, and Pissarro and Post-Impressionists such as Denis and Signac—artists whose breathtaking artistry reflects their own deep understanding and engagement with pleasure boating and competition”
Impressionists on the Water
Until October 13, 2013
Legion of Honor – Lincoln Park
34th Avenue & Clement Street, San Francisco, CA
by Sandy | Sep 6, 2013 | Arts, Entertainment and Music, Blogroll, Culture, Live Performance
Mr. Wilson is one of my favorite playwrights. He wrote plays for every decade of the 20th century that would chronicle some part of the black experience in America. Through the use of his great ear for dialogue, Wilson was able to give us some insight into the daily life, both struggles and triumphs, of an assortment of universal characters that his audience could easily recognize. In 2005, August Wilson completed a ten-play cycle that is now being recorded to be enjoyed by future generations.
Tickets are sold out for just about all the live performances at the tiny Greene Space Theatre in NYC, however, the plays can be viewed online via webcast. I thoroughly enjoyed “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone” a few days ago. True, the actors sit in seats in front of microphones, but they were so good and August Wilson’s stories are so compelling, that the imagination kicks in and provides the scenery and action. (For those of you not old enough to remember, we did this during radio programs all the time back in the day:)
“The Piano Lesson” is next on Monday 9/9/13 at 7PM EDT. The Greene Space site has a calendar of events, actor lists, etc.
August Wilson’s American Century Cycle
The Greene Space, 44 Charlton Street, New York, NY
BTW – the recordings are done in the order that the plays were written, not in chronological order as listed above
by Sandy | Aug 26, 2013 | Art, Blogroll, Exhibits, Museums
Riding Tall: The Cowboy in Art at the Phoenix Art Museum. 
The image of the lone man on horseback has intrigued us for decades. “Few characters personify a region in quite the same way the cowboy atop his trusted horse represents the American West. Long a standard subject in popular culture, the cowboy has come to symbolize everything from the hard-working, chivalric individualist to the heavy-drinking, thieving gunslinger. Whether wearing the symbolic white hat of the good guy or the villain’s black hat, the cowboy is recognized world-wide, instantly identified by his unique style of clothing. From the 19th century to today, artists have played to and against the stereotypes, helping to further the collective fascination with this Western American icon.”
Riding Tall: The Cowboy in Art
Phoenix Art Museum / Lyon Gallery Until 9/15/2013
Phoenix, Arizona
by Sandy | Aug 19, 2013 | Artist, Arts, Entertainment and Music, Blogroll, Exhibits
The De Young Museum in San Francisco presents Richard Diebenkorn: The Berkeley Years, 1953–1966
“During his years in Berkeley, Diebenkorn was deeply engaged with the unique setting of the Bay Area, saturating his works with color, light, and atmosphere. More than 130 paintings and drawings, beginning with the artist’s earlier abstract works and moving through his subsequent figurative phase, display his profound influence on postwar American art.”
Richard Diebenkorn: The Berkeley Years, 1953–1966
Until September 29, 2013
De Young Museum, Golden Gate Park, S.F.
by Bob Martin | Aug 15, 2013 | Art, Blogroll
Tom Cruise in Minority Report
What is “probable cause” ?
In the year 2013 and in the many years that will follow the question of “What the Founding Fathers intended” becomes less meaningful and in some instances useless. It’s increasingly more difficult to “make believe” that back in 1786/7, the vision held by those at the beginning of the formation of United States of American had any clue about a telephone, television or a computer much less an e-mail” or “DNA”.
Recently, the Supreme Court ruled that it is legal for police to collect DNA samples of anyone arrested for what is believed to be a serious crime. Note, being arrested is not the same as being convicted. The Justices aligned DNA to having your finger prints taken which should be shocking to most of us. But aside from some journalist and maybe by a congressmen/congresswomen here or there the scope of what had just happened escaped the public at large. When you have your fingerprints taken what law enforcement has is your fingerprints. When they have your DNA they now have a digital record about all of you, your predecessor and your descendants.
After 9-11-2001, the National Security Agency was allowed, with some restrictions, to collect and mine digital data in search of possible terrorist threats. The placing of the restriction by legislators highlights their unfamiliarity with the technology and that for the NSA to do an impossible job it would need access to all of the data. It would need to know everything.
It is impossible to know everything.
by Sandy | Aug 12, 2013 | Art, Blogroll, Exhibits, Museums, Photograhy
The Art Institute of Chicago / AIC offers “Abelardo Morell: The Universe Next Door”: 
“Over the course of the past 25 years, Cuban-born American artist Abelardo Morell has become internationally renowned for works that employ the language of photography to explore visual surprise and wonder. This exhibition of over 100 works made from 1986 to the present is the first retrospective of Morell’s photographs in 15 years. Showing a range of works and series—including many newer color photographs never exhibited before—the exhibition reveals how this persistently creative artist has returned to a photographic vocabulary as a source of great inspiration.”
Abelardo Morell: The Universe Next Door
Until September 2, 2013
The Art Institute of Chicago, 111 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago, Illinois
(Image: Abelardo Morell. Motion Study of Falling Pitchers, 2004)
by Sandy | Aug 9, 2013 | Art, Arts, Entertainment and Music, Blogroll, Exhibits, Museums
With Intersecting Modernities, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston offers a look at their collection of Latin American art. “…more than 100 masterworks created by artists at the height of their careers—including Wifredo Lam, Roberto Matta, Diego Rivera, and Joaquín Torres-García—from The Brillembourg Capriles Collection of Latin American Art.”
“…This extraordinary exhibition brings together artists who were influential in avant-garde movements in Europe, Latin America, and the United States and whose contributions to art bridge aspects of Modernism from both sides of the Atlantic.”
Intersecting Modernities until September 2, 2013
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 1001 Bissonnet St, Houston, TX
(Image: El Reto (The Challenge), 1954, David Alfaro Siqueiros)
by Sandy | Aug 5, 2013 | Blogroll, Books, Culture, Education, Events, Exhibits, Learning
LABBX, the Los Angeles Black Book Expo, returns on Saturday August 17, 2013. This free event, at the L.A. Convention Center, will have “authors, storytellers, spoken word and poetry performances, musicians, exhibitors, children’s book authors, emerging writers, publishers, booksellers, panel discussions, editors, book reviewers…” all in support of having a glorious reading experience.
LABBX 2013
L.A. Convention Center – Saturday August 17, 2013
by Bob Martin | Aug 1, 2013 | Art, Exhibits
First Annual
RIP WOODS STUDIO PROJECT
Exhibit
80th Birthday Celebration
OF THE LATE RIP WOODS
@ 934
934 E. Southern, Phoenix AZ 85040
Saturday, August 17th, 2013
7:00PM-11:00PM
Live Music/DJ 1Period
RSVP by, August 10th, 2013
@ 602.486.4272 •
Dee Dee Woods, Collection Curator
Satellite Show
Bill’s Custom Frames – Gallery 11-14
910 S. Hohokam Drive, Suite 105 Tempe, AZ 85281
July 22nd – September 15th, 2013
by Sandy | Jul 25, 2013 | Actors, Arts, Entertainment and Music, Blogroll, Books, CDs, dvd
Everyone knows who Mr. Belafonte is – just listening to a few chords of “Day-O” or “Ma-tilda” brings his handsome face to the mind’s eye. At 85, he is still attractive of course, but Harry Belafonte: Sing Your Song, a fascinating documentary on DVD, fills in and rounds out the well lived life of the entertainer to be more than a man in a sexy shirt and tight pants. Besides being a singer, actor, husband and father, Mr. Belafonte is an activist, a pioneer and a humanitarian. A full life.
BTW: There is a book My Song: A Memoir and a CD, Harry Belafonte Sing Your Song: The Music that also celebrate this man’s life and music.
