I’ll be playing a short solo acoustic set, for the first time in about six months, this Saturday at my friends’ house. Come, it’s free.
March 31st 7pm at the Island of Children’s Children (1508 Jewett)
Michael Anne Erlewine
Timothy Mephi
The Blades of Grass
Boxcars
FREE, all ages
The next Shadow Art Fair will be Saturday, July 14th, from noon to midnight, at Ypsilanti’s Corner Brewery. Mark your calendars.
Artists can submit an application by April 14. We’ll let you know whether or not you’ve been accepted by May 1.
Designers can submit a poster design and win $50, their design screen-printed by VGKids, and a few copies of the poster. For details, click here.
This time the music will happen outside under a tent in the beergarden. Confirmed acts so far are Annie Palmer, Lyman Rhodes, and Martes Martes. Interested bands please email timothy at mongo deco dot com.
Media people can read our lastest press release.
Last summer I was a Burn Crew volunteer for the Prescribed Ecological Burn Program of Ann Arbor’s Natural Area Preservation.
As a Burn Crew volunteer, you learn all sorts of nerdy stuff about weather and how fire can be controlled and impress your friends with your knowledge of arcane fire lore; you don important-looking yellow suits equipped with powerful water guns attached to a watertank backpack; you feel all commando as you talk to other Crew members on walkie-talkies while trudging through a forest; you set fire to meadows and leaf litter and old punky logs with cool drip-torches; and you meet the staff of NAP’s Burn Crews and the other regular volunteers, who are really a fun bunch to work with.
I helped set fire to my favorite local parks to protect them from invasive species and keep them looking handsome. If you’ll be in town this Summer and you might be interested in volunteering, or you just want to know more about controlled burning and our local parks, check out the events listed below.
March 7, Wednesday
Public Meeting - Prescribed Ecological Burn Program
7:30 to 9:00 pm
Leslie Science Center Nature House - 1831 Traver Road, Ann Arbor
Fire is used as a restoration tool in some of Ann Arbor’s natural areas. This meeting will provide information and an opportunity for discussion about the Prescribed Ecological Burn Program conducted by Natural Area Preservation. Burns will be conducted in City Parks throughout the spring and fall.
March 8, Thursday
Prescribed Burn Crew Training
12:00 noon to 5:00 pm
Leslie Science Center Nature House - 1831 Traver Road, Ann Arbor
This is the required yearly training session for all new volunteers interested in assisting with the prescribed burns held this spring and fall. Burns take place Monday through Friday sometime between 12:00 noon and 5:00 pm. Pre-registration is required by March 2, as enrollment is limited. Please call the NAP office at 734.996.3266 to register or for more information.
To learn more about NAP volunteer opportunities, call (734) 996-3266 to speak with the Outreach Coordinators or to listen to their 24-hour stewardship events “hotline.”
So I’d been meaning to write a roundup of Ann Arbor microcinema offerings when I find out a few weeks ago that the Current has gone and done their own little “Cheap and Free Film” writeup. Well, turns out they missed a few things, and not just the Bluish Barn. (Actually, we’re trying not to promote our screenings much until the Summer, when we can handle more guests.) Anyway, here’s a slightly more exhaustive list of alternative movie options in and around Ann Arbor. All events are free and open to the public unless otherwise noted.
The Smithee Award Ceremony is held (semi-?)annually in Ann Arbor. The Smith-ka-teers present scenes from the year’s worst films and audience members vote for the winners in several hilarious categories. I went to the last one, and let me tell you, this is a rollicking good time, especially for dorks like me.
A few microcinema options might have been left out of the Current’s article because they don’t appear to be screening much at the present moment. But check the websites of Projectorhead and Cinema Guild for more information, because both of these student groups has been up to much good in the past.
Also not mentioned: WCBN hosts Free Movie Night on the second Tuesday of every month (this semester at least) at Live @ PJ’s.
Cinema Slam, in addition to screening mostly local short films at the Screening Room of the Michigan Theater the second Tuesday of each month (tickets are $5), also has some part in running the Microcinema Gallery in the lobby of the Michigan Theater. The Microcinema Gallery screens “work by visual artists working with moving pictures around the world”, especially work “which would be more appropriate in a gallery setting”. Local filmmakers are encouraged to submit your own work to both of these venues.
This one’s almost too obvious to mention, but the Ann Arbor Summer Festival’s screens big family-friendly Hollywood hits during Top of the Park from June 15 - July 8th outside at Ingalls Mall, in front of Rackham Auditoriium. Bands play before the films.
And here again are the rest of the offerings that the Current’s article did mention:
EMU Office of Campus Life screens “big movies before they’re on DVD” now through April at the EMU Student Center Auditorium Friday nights and Monday middays. FREE for EMU students, faculty, staff, and their family and friends all fall and winter semesters. Schedule.
M-Flicks, the U-M student group, screens anything “from special sneak previews to older (20+ year old) classics” during Fall and Winter semesters at various campus locations, usually Angell Hall and the Natty Sci.
The Center for Japanese Studies screens Japanese films well-curated into various Series during the U-M Fall semester at Askwith Auditorium in Lorch Hall.
The Center for Chinese Studies screens Chinese films occasional Saturdays 7pm at Angell Hall Auditorium A. Schedule.
The Center for Russian and Eastern European Studies sometimes has a Film Series as part of their department events. This term it’s three Wednesdays in March 7pm at Angell Hall Auditorium A.
And then there’s our house, which screens whatever the hell we feel like screening during 8-10-week programs each season, usually Thursdays 9pm.
Let me know if I’ve left anything out or gotten anything wrong.
Groundhog day, sadly, has changed a bit since I was a youngster. This morning I took a little stroll through Wheeler Park, ready to snap a shot of a local critter, making a predictive reading for the spring. Unfortunately, groundhogs in the park (Wheeler Woody, who was a big fan of my basil plants, etc.) were feeling shy this morning, and I don’t blame them since these days, stepping out of the hole is like Vegas sensory overload with the blinking police kiosk on 4th and large neon column that have cropped up as part of the new “Depot neon district.”
As a kid, we a lot of hungry little groundhogs hung out around our house, although my mama usually chased them out of the yard and garden, clanging pots together. But we were often able to get a Feb 2nd groundhog reading from the kitchen window when they skittered out of their holes in the morning.
In today’s commercialized version, regional prophetic groundhogs are pampered celebrities, free-loading yuppie hogs who live in castles and order fresh baguette from Zingerman’s Mail Order and have serious media connections. The groundhogs don’t “emerge” or “wander” out of their “hole.” Penn’s Punxsatawny Phil is “pulled out of his heated stump-shaped home by handlers.” in Georgia, General Beuregard Lee is “enticed out of his antebellum mansion with Waffle house hashbrowns*.”
What a weird world.
Anyway, geographically closest “official reading” I could find comes from a prognosticating woodchuck in Howell, (apparently lives in a paper-mache house on a stage?) who says spring is around the corner. I sure hope we get some sledding in before that.
*Note: while famous groundhogs are eating well, kids suffer. Sort of. The traditional groundhog shaped cookies given to elementary school kids in Northern Cambria, Pennsylvania were banned when the school board members realized the cookies have 37% fat content, 2% over the allowable fat limit of the Pennsylvania wellness program. WWGNDD? Replace the oil with applesauce? Eat the fatty cookies anyway? You can probably guess.
UPDATE: As I write this, a small army is working to cut the limbs that fell in our neighbor’s backyard and restore power by tonight! (The friendly workers even agreed to let the wood drop onto our side of the fence so I could cut it up into firewood.) So tonight’s screening of Dead Man is on!
Huge thanks to our new hardcore roommate Christina and Girl Next Door for sticking it out with me for 4 days of 40-degree temperatures inside our house. All our other neighbors were smart - though unadventurous - and left.
Now I’ll be the first to admit that 40 degrees doesn’t sound all that cold. We’ve all spent a night or two camping in that kind of weather. But when it’s inside your house, all day long, and the high outside is in the 20s, and there’s no light for most of the time, it can be very taxing.
And in the middle of all this, what arrives in the mail? An energy bill from DTE. Sorry if I don’t exactly hurry to pay that one.
So anyway, we’ll be truly celebrating tonight. Come join us.
ORIGINAL POST:
When freezing rain hits just before a deep freeze, everyone has a good few days to pull out our phones - I mean our cameras - and take pictures of things like this:
But something like 36,000 powerless DTE customers also have a good few days to freeze our asses off. Mid-day temperature reading inside the Bluish Barn today: 40 degrees.
40 degrees! We can see our breath quite well.
DTE says - but doesn’t promise - that power will be restored by Thursday afternoon. If it’s not, Thursday’s 9pm screening of Dead Man might have to be cancelled.
We will not be having a New Year’s party this year here at the Barn. The basement just isn’t ready for dancing right now. But we’re helping to organize something with our friends at the White House. Join us for a tribute to James Brown and more.
Come as early as 10pm or as late as 2am. We’ll be there.
So we’re hoping to host a Pecha Kucha night in Ann Arbor on Thursday December 14th. We’re looking for 10 artist/designer/architect/types to present. If you are interested in presenting on this first night please email Zack Denfeld at zcd@umich.edu by this Friday Dec. 8th. First come first served, but with enough interest this will become a regular event in 2007, so there should be lots of chances to participate.
Pecha Kucha Night, devised by Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham (Klein Dytham architecture), was conceived in 2003 as a place for young designers to meet, network, and show their work in public.
But as we all know, give a mike to a designer (especially an architect) and you’ll be trapped for hours. The key to Pecha Kucha Night is its patented system for avoiding this fate. Each presenter is allowed 20 images, each shown for 20 seconds each - giving 6 minutes 40 seconds of fame before the next presenter is up. This keeps presentations concise, the interest level up, and gives more people the chance to show.
Pecha Kucha (which is Japanese for the sound of conversation) has tapped into a demand for a forum in which creative work can be easily and informally shown, without having to rent a gallery or chat up a magazine editor. This is a demand that seems to be global - as Pecha Kucha Night, without any pushing, has spread virally to over a dozen cities across the world. Find a location and join the conversation.
Please spread the word.
This Friday 8-midnight (with music) and Saturday 11-8pm at the Corner Brewery in Ypsilanti, come visit me and Eric at our Sappycards / Prefabdomains / Eric’s screenprints / etc. table at the the Shadow Art Fair.
There’ll be all kinds of stuff from all kinds of local artists and nonprofits, plus free (donation) gift-wrapping. Gift-wrapping! And 9 thousand gallons of good local beer.
Also, the Fair could still use a few volunteers for things like goodie-bag stuffing and working the door and setting up tables and stuff. Volunteers get drink vouchers and goodie bags and Fair coupons. Let me know or email info at shadowartfair.com if you’re interested.
UPDATE from Jimmy:
we have a web site! jimmyrigged.com… i’m trying to get an idea of how many spoke cards and game boards to print up. so, if you’re planning on attending, drop me a line. this will help me prepare a little more efficiently. still need people to run checkpoints. if you want to volunteer, we’ll be meeting tuesday night at starbucks on state at 7pm.
Start/finish will be here at the Bluish Barn.
Sunday December 3rd, high noon
$5 entry fee
jimmyfix writes:
another ann arbor alleycat. thisone will be a little different. thanks to dennis and nils of fixed gear gallery fame for their permission to “borrow” their idea. it’s gonna’ be called skids and sprockets. i know not as cool as night of the living tread, but they can’t all be winners. it’s a take on chutes and ladders. regardless of the name the race is gonna’ kick ass.
here’s the basics. everyone will receive a board game/manifest. on one side will be a map listing all the checkpoints. on the other side will be a game board. you will roll the dice and count off the spaces on the game board. that will determine your first checkpoint. once you reach your first checkpoint you’ll roll again. again, to determine your next checkpoint (you”ll roll at every checkpoint). you will continue until you’ve completed all the checkpoints, then proceed to the finish. there will also be time bonuses and deduction spaces on the game board. this means that first to finish does not necessarily mean first place.
as always, i could use volunteers to run checkpoints. anyone
interested? e mail holdfast3000 at gmail dot com.
checkpoints:
1. the big house. ne corner of main st. and stadium
2. ann arbor cyclery. sw corner of dewey ave and packard st.
3. washtenaw dairy. sw corner of madison and s. ashley
4. west park band shell. seventh st. to the east, chapin st. to the west, miller to the north, huron to the south.
5. nichols arboretum. washington heights entrance, off medical center dr.
6. gazebo at the end of island dr., entrance to cedar bend nature area
7. bandemer park. underneath m14 overpass. main entrance to the park is where whitmore lake rd. meets barton dr.
8. the spinning cube. next to the michigan union, w of state st., e of thompson, n of madison, s of william.
