Jasper Goes to Hopscotch: Day 2

After the overwhelming nature of the first evening of Hopscotch, the second day can look a little foreboding. Not only does the official schedule start earlier--around 6pm outside on the City Plaza, where the festival’s biggest headliners perform--but a lot, and I mean a lot, of unofficial (and free!) day parties get going right around noon. There are apocryphal stories of people flying in to Raleigh just for the day parties themselves, taking in the free shows that take place around the festival proper and skipping out on the relatively modest sticker price of a three-day pass ($125).

While that obviously seems a bit silly, there is no denying that it’s a great couple of days for locals who are casually interested in the festival as well as a veritable boon for hardcore Hopscotchers who can double the number of bands they see and also occasionally spare themselves an agonizing scheduling decision if a band plays both a day party and has an evening slot. And, on a personal note, last year one of my favorite sets was at a day party--a fire-breathing afternoon performance from the Durham-based Red Collar.

Given the sheer number of acts we are talking about, I’m just gonna throw some bite-sized notes and takeaways here, along with Mr. Sharpe’s photos.

Jenks Miller Band - King’s Barcade

Miller, a guitar wizard who has probably a half-dozen projects going at any particular point, is probably best known for his work in Mount Moriah; This set featured an excellent quartet that he led down some lengthy, mostly instrumental tunes that take the basic language of Neil Young & Crazy Horse and imagine it for musicians that, you know, actually want to show off some skill and nuance. King’s is another great venue--think of something about twice as big as New Brookland Tavern, with a decent sized stage, high walls, and wonderful acoustics.

Roseland - The Hive @ The Busy Bee

A Greensboro country rock I’d never heard before, the four piece is embarking on a full tour along with former Winston-Salem-based alt.country songwriter Caleb Caudle. Their songs are fairly bouncy and straightforward, with a dedication to exceedingly pretty, Byrds-like harmony vocals that are instantly appealing.

Caleb Caudle - The Hive @ The Busy Bee

Caudle is a singer/songwriter with a deep, evocative voice and soulful delivery, along with first-rate songs. Backed by Roseland, he charged through some of his newer compositions with obvious passion, despite nursing a hangover and some difficulty hearing his own voice through the monitor.

Creedence Queerwater Revival - Cirque de Vol Studios

An all-women feminist CCR cover band. Yes, it was as awesome as you are imagining. Bonus points for the wackiest venue of the festival, a large studio space that promotes alternative, circus-style activities in lieu of the traditional gym.

Glenn Jones - King’s

Glenn Jones has played a few shows at Conundrum, but somehow I’ve missed them. An acolyte of the master fingerstyle guitar picker John Fahey, one of the central figures in the American Primitivism movement, Jones also has a long discography with the post-rock group Cul de Sac. His performance of his intricate, adventurous original compositions was spellbinding.

Swearin’ - Slim’s

A fun, heart-on-sleeve pop-punk act with indie leanings.

Spider Bags - Slim’s

Columbia music fans already sound stoked for this Triangle-based band’s upcoming performance at the (FREE!) Jam Room Music Festival, and rightly so--these snotty, rollicking garage rockers are loaded down with a slew of excellent tunes full of shout-along choruses and punk rock fervor, as well as a live show that makes their fans something akin to a cult. The tunes slide around from drunken country-rock to dizzying psychedelic sprawls, and frontman Dan McGee pretty much loses his shit in the process. While it fit the ambience of the tiny dive bar like Slim’s, it ought to be pretty freaking revolutionary on a big stage on Main Street too.

Future Islands - City Plaza

A synthpop band with an unusual line-up (synths and beats, a vocalist, and a bassist), these guys are based in Baltimore now but got there start in Greenville, NC, where the band attended college. So this show is a bit of a homecoming for them, and made all the sweeter by the fact that they’ve risen from playing a small club  slot at Hopscotch to the main stage in just a few short years. Even if it’s not your thing, it’s hard to deny the charisma of frontman Samuel Herring.

Thurston Moore, John Moloney, and Merzbow - King’s

This was a surprise, briefly-announced set via Twitter from Caught on Tape duo Thurston Moore (of the legendary Sonic Youth) and drummer John Moloney with Hopscotch improviser-in-residence Merzbow, a Japanese noise artist. Instead of letting the audience gradually fill up the room, the trio started up 1st so that every audience member would hear the music as they walked up the stairs to King’s. It was a viscerally violent jam as Moore tortured his guitar, shaping feedback and dissonance across some free jazz riffs as he headbanged with ferocity. Merzbow stood in front of a table full of knobs and electronic devices as he strummed on an odd, non-traditional string instrument that created suitably skronky sounds to match Moore. Surprisingly, despite the throbbing mass of sound created by the two, it was Moloney’s relentless, shapeshifting kit work that stole the show, as what felt like the most intense, adrenaline-fueled drum solo hardly slowed over the course of the 30 minute or so jam. A cool and unique Hopscotchian moment.

Holy Ghost / A-Trak - City Plaza

I missed these sets, but Mr. Sharpe got some excellent photos, so we are gonna share.

Spooky Woods - Deep South

I only saw a couple of songs of the Spooky Woods set, a North Carolina group created by Arbor Hill studio-runners James Wallace and Jeff Crawford. Nice vocal harmonies around plaintive, genre-loose songs.

Rose Windows - Berkley Cafe

Rose Windows is a Seattle-based band whose Sub Pop debut, The Sun Dogs, is lighting up on college radio at the moment. A 7-member, psychedelic-leaning band whose songs range from the quietly folky to rumbling ferocity, these guys really create a full sound live, and the prominent presence of a flutist and swooning lead vocalist Rabie Shaheen Qazi up the psychedelic aura quite a bit.

Lady Lamb The Beekeeper - Fletcher Opera House

Another day, another haunting female singer/songwriter armed with nothing but an electric guitar on stage at Fletcher. A bolder, if no-less-delicate singer than Olsen, LLTB (the moniker the Brooklyn-based Aly Spaltro performs under) writes similarly gorgeous songs, albeit ones that require a bit more commitment as she wanders from languid finger picking and crooning in to stridently raucous passages and can have surprisingly and sometimes puzzling lyrical shifts. Another great, attentive crowd in this intimate theater setting led to another great Hopscotch set.

Mount Moriah - Fletcher Opera House Following Lady Lamb at Fletcher was one of those special Hopscotch schemes--local favorites Mount Moriah, who spent most of last year on a national tour supporting their second full-length, the Merge Records-released Miracle Temple, were slated to play through their entire discography with the help of a few guest musicians, including a violinist and pedal steel guitarist. Given the approach, I was particularly psyched to have a guaranteed hearing of some of my favorites from their first record, particularly "Social Wedding Rings," a great song that captures the band's Southern/country/soul-flavored indie rock appeal and the exceptional songwriting of leader Heather McEntire ("The next time we would meet/ Would be a train wreck of nerves and sexless sleep/ Mistakes made, empty hymns.")

 I stuck it out through the last of my favorites from that record (a bouncy electric version of “We Don’t Need Very Much”) before skipping over to catch the last few songs of Waxahatchee. Fortunately, I would make it back to catch the latter half of Miracle Temple as well.

Waxahatchee - Kennedy Theater

Another of the acts I’ve been most looking forward to, Waxahatchee started out a the somber acoustic songwriting project of Katie Crutchfield, but has since become a muscular, three piece that give these emotionally arresting tunes some sonic heft. Crutchfield crafts frank songs full of regret and heartbreak, with a bruised voice that sounds almost brittle to the touch. The trio gave the few songs I heard a sincere reading, with Crutchfield’s voice and words appropriately given the spotlight.

Pig Destroyer - Slim’s

Ah, the best-laid plans. Instead of ending by night at the Pour House for the adventurous power-pop of frequent Ty Segall collaborator Mikal Cronin, where a packed house had a line running outside the club on a one-in-one-out entry policy, I took a chance on something I normally would never be interested in and got a dose of the crazed metal of Pig Destroyer, a grindcore outfit from Richmond. It was an, uh, experience, to  say the least. Metal is another one of those genres that seems to make so much more sense in a live setting, as the band and the crowd played off the mounting frenzy of the music in the best way possible.

...and that was a wrap on Day 2 at Hopscotch. Day 3 coming at you in a stagger...

(and here's Jonathan Sharpe's gallery of images again)

Jasper 2013 Artists of the Year Nominations -- Get Yours in Today

Sometimes--once in a blue moon, when the stars and planets align, when the gods are smiling down on you, sometimes--when you look back over the past twelve months, you realize happily, contentedly, sometimes surprisingly, that you have had a really good year. 

Sometimes it's not you, but maybe an artist that you know/love/admire.

Jasper wants to help you celebrate this magnificent accomplishment--this milestone--this raining down of good fortune/reward/award/credit due--by shining the spotlight on you and yours for all the world to see.

If you are--or if you know/love/admire--an artist who can look back over the time period between September 15, 2012 and September 14, 2013 and  reflect happily on the way those twelve months have turned out, then please consider nominating yourself or the object of your admiration/affection for the title Jasper 2013 Artist of the Year in Dance, Literary Arts, Music, Theatre, or Visual Arts.

Artists, 18 and older, working in the greater Columbia arts community are eligible for the title based upon their artistic accomplishments during the period from September 2012 until September 2013.*

Nominations should be sent to editor@JasperColumbia.com with the subject heading “Artist of the Year” and should be accompanied by

1)   a single paragraph explaining why the nominee should be considered — this is the place where you wax poetic & sing the praises of your nominee in terms that will touch our hearts

2)   a brief, but comprehensive list of work produced, performed , published, or presented during the September 15th, 2012 – September 14th, 2013 time period — this is the place where you get serious. You know all that stuff you said in the paragraph above? We don’t need to hear it again. What we need to hear are the specific enumerated accomplishments your nominee has made over the past 12 months and the dates of accomplishment. (Note:  it broke our hearts last year when we weren’t able to include highly deserving candidates whose nominators failed to list their nominees’ many accomplishments. For our sake, please follow the instructions.)

3) a sentence stating that you have consulted your candidate and she or he has agreed to participate in the competition.

Nominations must be received online by midnight September 14, 2013.

Results will be announced in the November issue of Jasper Magazine.

Upon closing of the nomination call, a panel of judges will select the top three candidates in each field and, from these three finalists, the public will be invited to vote online for each of their top choices at the Jasper website.

• There is no fee to enter.

• Artists may nominate themselves.

• Artists should be made aware of their nomination and agree to participate in the competition.

The category Dance includes:  performance, choreography, or direction of any form of dance including, but not limited to ballet, contemporary, jazz, tap, ballroom, Latin, or folk.

The category Theatre includes: directing or acting in one or more local performances.

The category Music includes: conducting, directing, writing, or performing any style of music in one or more local concerts or recordings; both individuals and groups are eligible.

The category Visual Arts includes: the completion and presentation of any form of non-performing or non-literary arts, such as painting, sculpture, ceramics, photography, print-making, mixed-media, and (new this year) set design, etc.

The category Literary Arts includes: the completion, publication, and/or presentation of any form of prose, poetry, or non-fiction writing, as well as playwriting and the writing of executed screenplays.

*Jasper 2013 Artist of the Year Awards will not be awarded based on achievements accomplished prior to September 15th, 2012. The purpose of the awards is to recognize artistic achievements accomplished within a calendar year, not over a lifetime.

Congratulations to our outgoing

Jasper 2012 Artists of the Year

on a year well-served!

Regina Willoughby – Dance

Kwame Dawes – Literary Arts

Morihiko Nakahara – Music

Chad Henderson – Theatre

Susan Lenz – Visual Arts

Fine Print

• Previous winners of Jasper Artists of the Year are not eligible for nomination for a three year period following the year in which they won.
• Previous nominees who did not win are eligible to be nominated in subsequent years.
• Artists must have resided in Columbia, SC during the September 2012 – 2013 time period. Artists who are from Columbia, but no longer live here, are no longer eligible for Jasper Artists of the Year Awards.
• Works in progress will not be considered.
• Employees of Jasper Magazine and clients of Muddy Ford Press are not eligible for competition.

Jasper Goes to Hopscotch: Day 1

 

This is Jasper’s 2nd year at Hopscotch, a three-day music festival in Raleigh that features an extraordinarily eclectic lineup of over 170 acts scattered at 14 venues in the downtown area. With a pointed inclusion of everything from folk singers, country bands, and indie pop  to hip-hop, avante garde jazz, and death metal, the festival demonstrates a breadth and depth of selection that is quite simply astonishing. This festival also seamlessly blends a significant amount of North Carolina acts in with a wide-ranging group of national and international acts as well. Starting to see why it’s called hopscotch?

While we covered the festival last year a bit in Vol. 2 No. 002 in the context of Columbia’s festival scene, this time around we just want to give you a taste of what the whirlwind experience of Hopscotch is like. So…here we go!

(Note: I (Kyle Petersen) am using the “I” here, although staff photographer Jonathan Sharpe was along for most of the shenanigans as well. Check out a slide show of some of his photos from the day at the bottom of the post!)

I kicked things off at 8:30pm on Thursday with Nathan Bowles (Black Twig Pickers, Pelt), a plaintive banjo player from Blacksburg, Virginia. (The first day’s line-up doesn’t get going until the evening, giving folks time to get off from work. Friday and Saturday are a different story.) Bowles actually has a stronger background in drums and percussion in indie and progressive rock bands, but picked up the banjo a few years ago and has become quite devoted to it, mixing the traditional clawhammer style with a strong progressive bent. Playing a mix of originals and covers, Bowles created a warm, nuanced sound that meandered easily through the attentive crowd in Fletcher Opera Theater, a 600-seat venue where every seat in the house feels intimate. (Fletcher is part of a larger performing arts triumvirate that includes Memorial Auditorium and the Kennedy Theater, making it one of the hotspots of Hopscotch.)

Next I bumped over to The Kingsbury Manx right next door at Memorial, a cavernous 2,000 seater that allows festival goers to really stretch out and for the bands to get seriously loud. A Chapel Hill indie rock cult favorite, KM mixes neo psych and folk with luxurious power pop, and live their is a laidback joy to their performance, with an assured confidence that gives their intricate, occasionally delicate songs a bit of a swagger. Their set left me feeling like, in another world, KM could be as big and as critically lauded as Wilco.

After KM, I sauntered back over to Fletcher, where the Chicago-based singer/songwriter Angel Olsen was running a bit late. I didn’t mind, though, since as soon as she started playing you probably could have knocked me over with a feather. Olsen rose to prominence (as far as I know) from her role in Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s Cairo Gang, where she contributed some pretty otherwordly vocals, but I really wasn’t prepared for her vocal presence here. The inadequate comparisons I could come up with are to people like Antony Hegarty or Joanna Newsom, but neither does justice to the aching, sighing swoon that Olsen employs, moving in and away from the microphone so much and so skillfully that her distance from it was almost an integral part of the song. What she sang about was nearly as enchanting, reflecting on the nature of love and relationships with steely, sad-eyed lenses. This was a set to remember.

Sylvan Esso, a surprising collaboration between Mountain Man’s Amelia Meath and Megafaun’s Nick Sanborn, was pulsating next door (this was the first moment where I was really, really glad I brought earplugs), and I was able to catch the last few songs of their set as well. Their music feel like something that shouldn’t work--electronic dance music backing up free-form freak-folk songs in lieu of any other instrumentation--and yet somehow it does. It also seems like odd music to play live, but Meath and Sanborn were giving it their all, uninhibitedly dancing and swaying to the idiosyncratic beats and baffling choruses as if they’ve found their very own pop nirvana. And maybe they have.

After that I made my way over to the Irish bar Tir Na Nog, located a few blocks away from the glamour of those auditorium spaces, where it shares a block with the Pour House Music Hall and is right  around the corner from Slim’s and The Hive @ Busy Bee; these four clubs form the other hotspot of Hopscotching set-hopping. Despite that fact, I was sitting tight at Tir Na Nog, though, for two of my favorite alt. country bands, both of whom happen to be from Raleigh.

The Backsliders were up first, a group that was a big part of the wave of 1990s alt. country acts that made it seem like the genre was going to be a much bigger force in the music world than it is today. Although some would argue that The Backsliders were one of the best of the lot, they didn’t have as much success as Whiskeytown or Old 97’s, and they disbanded in ‘99, and only recently reunited for a few live gigs. Led by Chip Robinson, still full of as much (maybe more?) piss and vinegar and rock and roll energy as ever, The Backsliders blasted through a set of their classics as if it were 1996 instead of 2013. The original lineup all looked pretty stoked to be playing again, as lead guitarist Steve Howell provided effusive, blistering solos and keyboardist Greg Rice favorably channeled Benmont Tench and Garth Hudson.  Special highlight: Robinson invited up BJ Barham (of American Aquarium) to help him out with “Abe Lincoln,” a tune that AA recorded on their last album and that, last year at Hopscotch, Barham invited Robinson to join AA to sing on.

American Aquarium were up next, and clearly were feeding off the energy the Backsliders left on stage. The last couple of times I’ve caught them in Columbia, they’ve felt a little rougher after coming off hard stretches on the road--here, they were polished and poised, and gave the hometown crowd every little bit of awesomeness that their songs have got. Barham’s vocals, which many of the band’s detractors take issue with, were in particularly fine form. I also got front row seat’s to the Whit Wright experience, where the young multi-instrumentalist spent some heavy time on the lap steel before rotating back in the pedal steel guitar.

The last stop of the night was at the Lincoln Theater, a great mid-sized rock club where Kurt Vile & the Violators were a little late getting on stage, allowing me to catch most of their set as well. While I’m a fan of Vile’s work, particularly this year’s Wakin on a Pretty Day, I was hoping for a bit more guitar fireworks than I actually got. Live he pretty much sticks to the unhurried, spacious 70s rock sound filtered through 90s slacker indie rock vibe that he’s always gone for. His acoustic guitar work, just like on record, is what keeps you going here, as he wanders through his laconic songs not unlike J. Mascis does when he straps on an acoustic.

All in all, an excellent first evening, although disturbingly tiring given the onslaught of day parties and outdoor headliners that awaits us over the next two days...

Building Bridges: Artists enable a new conversation within the African-American community at Sumter County Gallery of Art by Jackie Mohan

 

Isaac Newton once said, “We build too many walls and not enough bridges.”  The two newest exhibitions opening at the Sumter County Gallery of Art this September work to build more bridges as they explore an important issue: African-American identity and community.  Question Bridge: Black Males uses video to create a conversation among African-American men about issues important to their view of themselves and of their world.  The second exhibition, BLACK, BURST and BOOM! utilizes mixed media to explore these issues even further and the inner conflict these issues provoke.  Together, these exhibits strive to bridge the many gaps that face society today, from social status to age to the issues that haunt the entire community.

An official selection at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, Question Bridge: Black Males is a collaborative video project seventeen years in the making by artists Hank Willis Thomas, Chris Johnson, Bayeté Ross Smith, and Kamal Sinclair.  Johnson first imagined the concept in 1996 in San Diego, seeking a way to build a conversation within the African American community across boundaries of socioeconomics, generations, and distance.  All four artists spent the past few years traveling the country, accumulating videos of over 150 black men answering and asking questions across twelve cities.  The result is a compilation of 1,500 questions and answers.  Altogether, these videos form an inner look at black male consciousness and act as a conversation about issues including love, family, community, violence, interracial relationships, and the past and future of black men in America.  Question Bridge is a five-channel video installation that provides a transmedia exchange for African-American males about issues that have often divided but also united.

The Sumter County Gallery of Art is also hosting the exhibit BLACK, BURST and BOOM! by Stacy Lynn Waddell, an engaging complement alongside Question Bridge.  Created using mixed media, the installation features techniques including collage, drawing, and the burning and singeing of paper and fabric.  Through these innovative means, Waddell explores issues in the African American community including inner conflict, cultural history and heritage, and personal identity across generations.

Karen Watson, director of the Sumter County Gallery of Art calls both installations “two of the most important exhibitions the gallery has ever presented.”  Question Bridge: Black Males and BLACK, BURST and BOOM! open at the Sumter County Gallery of Art on Thursday, September 5, with an opening reception from 5:30 – 7:30 pm, and both exhibits close on November 1.  For non-members, there is a $5.00 charge for the reception.

A Conversation with Stacy Lynn Waddell, with Frank Martin, will be on Thursday, September 19, 6:00 – 7:30 pm.  Panel discussion Question Bridge: Black Males – Blueprint Roundtable between nine local African American men, ages 16 to 91, moderated by Rick Jones, director of the Millican Foundation, with artist Bayeté Ross Smith, will be on Thursday, September 26, 6:30 – 8:00 pm in the Patriot Hall Auditorium.

The Sumter County Gallery of Art is located at 200 Hasel Street in Sumter, adjacent to Patriot Hall Auditorium.  For more information, visit sumtergallery.org.

-- Jackie Mohan, Jasper Intern

Jasper 2013 Artists of the Year Nominations -- Open Now!

Jasper Magazine is accepting nominations for the title “Artist of the Year” in each of the following five categories:

• Dance
• Theatre
• Music
• Visual Arts
• Literary Arts

Artists, 18 and older, working in the greater Columbia arts community are eligible for the title based upon their artistic accomplishments during the period from September 2012 until September 2013.*

Nominations should be sent to editor@JasperColumbia.com with the subject heading “Artist of the Year” and should be accompanied by

1)   a single paragraph explaining why the nominee should be considered -- this is the place where you wax poetic & sing the praises of your nominee in terms that will touch our hearts

2)   a brief, but comprehensive list of work produced, performed , published, or presented during the September 15th, 2012 – September 14th, 2013 time period -- this is the place where you get serious. You know all that stuff you said in the paragraph above? We don't need to hear it again. What we need to hear are the specific enumerated accomplishments your nominee has made over the past 12 months and the dates of accomplishment. (Note:  it broke our hearts last year when we weren't able to include highly deserving candidates whose nominators failed to list their nominees' many accomplishments. For our sake, please follow the instructions.)

3) a sentence stating that you have consulted your candidate and she or he has agreed to participate in the competition.

Nominations must be received online by midnight September 14, 2013.

Results will be announced in the November issue of Jasper Magazine.

Upon closing of the nomination call, a panel of judges will select the top three candidates in each field and, from these three finalists, the public will be invited to vote online for each of their top choices at the Jasper website.

• There is no fee to enter.

• Artists may nominate themselves.

• Artists should be made aware of their nomination and agree to participate in the competition.

The category Dance includes:  performance, choreography, or direction of any form of dance including, but not limited to ballet, contemporary, jazz, tap, ballroom, Latin, or folk.

The category Theatre includes: directing or acting in one or more local performances.

The category Music includes: conducting, directing, writing, or performing any style of music in one or more local concerts or recordings; both individuals and groups are eligible.

The category Visual Arts includes: the completion and presentation of any form of non-performing or non-literary arts, such as painting, sculpture, ceramics, photography, print-making, mixed-media, and (new this year) set design, etc.

The category Literary Arts includes: the completion, publication, and/or presentation of any form of prose, poetry, or non-fiction writing, as well as playwriting and the writing of executed screenplays.

*Jasper 2013 Artist of the Year Awards will not be awarded based on achievements accomplished prior to September 15th, 2012. The purpose of the awards is to recognize artistic achievements accomplished within a calendar year, not over a lifetime.

Congratulations to our outgoing

Jasper 2012 Artists of the Year

on a year well-served!

Regina Willoughby - Dance

Kwame Dawes - Literary Arts

Morihiko Nakahara - Music

Chad Henderson - Theatre

Susan Lenz - Visual Arts

Fine Print

• Previous winners of Jasper Artists of the Year are not eligible for nomination for a three year period following the year in which they won.
• Previous nominees who did not win are eligible to be nominated in subsequent years.
• Artists must have resided in Columbia, SC during the September 2012 - 2013 time period. Artists who are from Columbia, but no longer live here, are no longer eligible for Jasper Artists of the Year Awards.
• Works in progress will not be considered.
• Employees of Jasper Magazine and clients of Muddy Ford Press are not eligible for competition.

Arts and Activism: Changing the Culture of Rape -- a guest editorial by Alexis Stratton

From my work as co-director of The Vagina Monologues to my time spent with fellow writers and artists, I’ve gotten into a lot of discussions about the arts, media, and representation. Many of these discussions follow the same patterns:

Art is meant to provoke thought and discussion. We can’t govern the imagination.

People just write what they know. He’s a white guy writing about his experiences—he’s not purposely excluding people of different colors/genders/etc.

Sure, all of these characters are based on stereotypes, but at least this film gets people talking about sexual violence/gender stereotypes/race/etc.

As a writer, I have to admit that there is something to be said for some of these arguments. Many of the characters I create are representations of the various facets of my own identity, and while I try to step out of the boxes of my experience and imagine someone else’s, doing so is often a perilous adventure. What if I misrepresent this community? Do I really have the right to write what I don’t know but have only imagined, researched, and tried my best to represent?

Yet, as an artist who is also an activist and a feminist, I think that questions of art and representation must be constantly considered and go beyond my individual experiences as an artist.

As the Prevention Education Coordinator at Sexual Trauma Services of the Midlands, I am invited into schools and community groups to teach our six-session Youth Violence Prevention Program. The first lesson that I facilitate is about gender stereotypes and the normalization of sexual harm. In that lesson, we look at the pervasive ways in which the media perpetuates gender stereotypes and also, in the end, promotes rape culture and makes sexual violence “normal.” Think of these Dolce and Gabbana and Calvin Klein ads, or this Rick Ross song, or any movie in which rape or abuse is eroticized (something that’s often hard to avoid on film).

One might try to argue that “The Arts” rise above this fray of marketing and populism. But it doesn’t, and I’m reminded time and time again that it doesn’t. From perpetuating the myth that “no really means yes” to supporting gender stereotypes (i.e., equating masculinity with violence/dominance or upholding the madonna/whore binary) to pigeonholing female characters/subjects as nothing more than romantic interests, “The Arts” are not immune to these issues of misrepresentation and the promotion of rape culture.

When I bring this up, though, my friends and colleagues often ask me, “Why throw the baby out with the bathwater? Isn’t it enough that this work has this great character of color/Trans* person/ Strong Female Character/etc.?” And my answer is that it’s not. Yes, art is art, art provokes, and I will not control another artist’s work. I may even praise artists’ use of X, Y, or Z, but that won’t stop me from challenging them to reconsider their (mis)representations of race, class, gender, etc. I won’t stand idly by while those works promote the rape culture I work to dismantle on a daily basis.

The film Miss Representation makes it clear that the socio-cultural and economic powers that be will make it difficult to create and distribute art/media that represents the voices of populations that are sidelined by those who dominate such industries. I cannot stop Robin Thicke from telling women what they want and objectifying the female body. I cannot get Adam Levine’s label to decry the intimate partner violence in the music video for “Misery.” I probably can’t even convince the beloved (and self-proclaimed feminist) Joss Whedon that just because The Avengers’ Black Widow is a Strong Female Character doesn’t mean she isn’t still overly sexualized. (Even for those who cheer on Whedon’s female characters, The Avengers still fails the infamous Bechdel Test.)

But as educators and artists, we have a choice. As an educator, I can teach others to be critical readers, viewers, and thinkers, celebrating the successes of art and media while also being willing to voice what is problematic about certain works. And I can encourage others to create works that speak out against privilege and that recognize both rape culture and inequalities that occur in the arts and media.

As an artist, I can create art that tells a different story—one that resists stereotypes, creates space for different voices, fights rape culture, and talks back to the racist, classist, sexist, ableist, heterosexist messages we receive day-in, day-out. I can create art that doesn’t think rape is a joke and perhaps instead calls out injustices and maybe even reflects the realities of the violence that many women face. I will make mistakes, but I can listen when those mistakes come to my attention. I can be self-reflexive, enter into conversation, and recognize where my own privilege creates blind spots.

In Miss Representation, Katie Couric says that the media (and I’ll add the arts to it, too) “can be an instrument of change: It can maintain the status quo and reflect the views of the society or it can, hopefully, awaken people and change minds. I think it depends on who’s piloting the plane.” I challenge you to pilot that plane, creating art that resists rape culture—and changing that culture in the process.

Alexis Stratton is the Prevention Education Coordinator at Sexual Trauma Services of the Midlands, a Columbia-based organization that supports survivors of sexual violence and educates the community to identify and prevent sexual violence. As a graduate of the University of South Carolina’s MFA in Creative Writing Program and Women’s and Gender Studies Program, she has spent years working in the Columbia community (and beyond) to raise awareness about issues of gender-based violence and to empower community members to change the world around them.

Before I die ... Guest Blog by Karl Larsen

In February of 2011, visual artist and motivational speaker Candy Chang struggled to cope with the loss of a loved one. During this difficult time, she found herself lost, searching for a way to express herself and to make sense of death. Eventually she turned to her friends and community for inspiration. Little did she know that what she was about to create would not only serve as a personal escape, but would be a source of inspiration and public expression for the entire world for years to come.

Chang’s canvas? An old abandoned building in the Upper 9th Ward, New Orlean’s largest and most distinctive region devastated by the floods of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The exterior wall chosen spanned a length of approximately 40 feet, and would become the site of the very first “Before I Die…” wall. With the help of friends, the entire wall was painted end to end with chalkboard paint. Then, in the top left corner, in big white stenciled letters, the words “Before I Die…” set the tone for this soon-to-be interactive public forum. To allow the curious and the brave to interact, “I want to _______________.” was repeatedly stenciled across the wall, inviting the passing public to complete the phrase; soap trays were mounted to hold chalk.

Chang didn’t know what the coming days would hold for this project that was so close to her heart. What she saw the next day left her astounded. Dozens of colorful reactions decorated the once-dilapidated wooden wall, turning it into the purest form of public art… transforming an eyesore into an attraction.

Within days, the wall was completely filled. In the months following its public début, the wall collected hundreds among hundreds of wishes, dreams and personal aspirations — some funny; others, uplifting and motivational. The newly revitalized corner of Burgundy and Marigny streets became a hub for the weary wanting to love again and the ambitious wanting to keep their undying passions alive in a world filled with unrest and uncertainty.

I want to learn another language.

I want to live my best life.

I want to abandon all insecurities.

I want to teach yoga.

I want to see equality.

I want to be published.

“Before I Die… I want to _______________.”

It was a phrase I knew all too well and what initially attracted me to Candy Chang’s work. The topic of personal desires is a tricky one and the inspiration behind my first book, published in October of 2011. “W a n t.,” as it is titled, is a glance back at my life as I struggled to come to terms with an identity crisis, the decisions I had made as a young adult and the consequences that followed. Lost, and desperate for inspiration, I turned inward to find that I had the answers hidden deep within my long-forgotten desires, leading me to become the last thing I’d ever believed I could become: an author. It was then that I began to harness the energy of my positive desires and turn them into positive actions. The “Before I Die” wall is the perfect visual representation of the messages conveyed in my book. Simple, compelling, captivating.

Today, less than three years after its début, more than 250 walls have been installed around the world, embraced in over 50 countries and translated into more than 20 languages. Though the original wall “died” in October 2011, it’s evident that the “Before I Die” legacy is still being written. Paris, Tokyo, Los Angeles, Montréal… the list goes on. Name a major city; more than likely, a wall has been hosted there. Even Charleston had one of their own from October to December 2011. The message is universal, making Candy Chang’s social experiment a wild success for years to come.

In March this year, after stumbling upon this amazing project and its undeniable ability to capture the hearts of many, I made it my mission to bring it here to the Capital City. With the help of OneColumbia, Mark Plessinger of First Thursdays on Main and many others, “Before I Die” is officially coming to downtown Columbia. The location? The 1600 block of Main Street in front of the future Agapé Senior Headquarters. Set to be unveiled at a 2 p.m. press conference held by Mayor Steve Benjamin, Columbia will have its chance to build the “Before I Die” legacy for the duration of September and, perhaps, longer. As part of an installation for September 5th’s First Thursday on Main, it is expected to attract a considerable crowd, possibly making it the largest and most-anticipated First Thursday ever.

The timing couldn’t be any better. There will be three “Before I Die” walls in Columbia to choose from on September 5. Yes, three. Beginning August 22nd, another installation will open to the public from 5:30–7:00 p.m. in the Goodall Gallery at Columbia College as part of pARTicipate: Projects from the Community Arts Program’s Urban Studio. Jasper Magazine is also hosting a preview and introduction to Main Street’s wall during their monthly Salon Series, 7:00 p.m. on August 27, located in the historic Arcade building. As the highlighted artist for the Salon, I’ll be there to talk about my book and the “Before I Die” project. Jasper’s “Before I Die” wall will also be accessible to the public on September 5th. Whichever location you choose, be sure to reserve your spot and be a part of the worldwide sensation that is the “Before I Die” wall.

-- Karl L. Larsen

 JOIN JASPER THIS TUESDAY NIGHT AS WE LAUNCH OUR FALL 2013 SALON SERIES WITH A VISIT FROM KARL LARSEN WHO WILL TALK ABOUT HIS BOOK W A N T AS WELL AS DISCUSS THE UPCOMING PUBLIC ART PROJECT "BEFORE I DIE ..."

TUESDAY, AUGUST 27TH 7 PM

JASPER STUDIOS IN THE ARCADE

1332 MAIN STREET, SUITE 75

Review -- A Woman with Keys: Nikky Finney’s Rice by Jonathan Butler

 

Nikky Finney’s Rice, originally published in 1995 but available in a new edition from TriQuarterly Books, is literature performing  the functions of oral culture: the transmission of stories, legends, warnings, and a sense of history and community. Finney’s topics are the lives and experiences of Black folks in coastal South Carolina, and Rice presents us with speakers from different eras, consistently giving a sense of a living voice, often speaking out of the past, but always with the urgency of the present. Some things are remembered for inspiration and strength, and others as cautions, as with the tale of a white doctor who drunkenly births a child with disastrous results in “The Afterbirth, 1931”:

And because he came with his papers in his pocket

so convincing

so soon

after his Ivy graduation

asking us hadn’t we heard

telling us times had changed

and the midwife wasn’t safe anymore

even though we had all been caught

by tried and true Black grannies

who lay ax blade sharp side up

and placed the water pan underneath the bed

The poem’s ache is especially poignant because of the promise, represented by the doctor’s race and education, that this birth would be a step forward for the family, a hope that turns out to be naive: too much faith a white stranger’s accreditations, not enough trust in their own practices and perceptions:

We should’ve let Grandpop

loose on him from the start

and he would’ve held him up

higheye to the sun

and looked straight through him

just like he held us up

and then he would have known first

like he always knew first

and brought to us

the very map of his heart

then we would have known

just what his intentions were

with our Carlene

It’s a hard-earned lesson, like much of what is contained in Rice, and Finney is determined to see that it isn’t forgotten. That poem and others in the book emphasize the combined knowledge of its characters, keenly aware of the role a community plays in sustaining its members. Establishing such a community is one function Finney finds for poetry in Rice, and this feature of the book goes hand in hand with her skill in crafting language that feels authentic and spoken.  Poetry must serve this function, Finney’s book suggests, because Hollywood is unwilling or unable to:

Why can’t a story sell

less somebody kill molest mutilate me

or make my BabyDarling buffoon fall through a roof

she asks in “Pluck,” a poem that takes aim at narratives that present Black characters either as one-dimensional buffoons, or that reduce the horrors of slavery to melodrama and tawdry romance:

Slavery was no opera

soaped or staged

was no historical moment

when African women conceived children

out of love for white men

The desire for representations of Blacks is strong, Finney acknowledges, but cautions against accepting portrayals that deny people their dignity, complexity, intelligence, or anger:

Sometimes when they know we are starving

they will throw stale bread

but don’t eat right then

hold out     turn away

refuse and reach for your heart   your liver   your lungs

This is the bad bread that Rice is offered as nourishing alternative to, the title crop coming to stand for the knowledge and skill of those that produced it. As a counter to popular media’s oversights, Rice offers accounts of real people, like FX Walker II, a mapmaker whose craft suggests a parallel to the poet’s, or Finney’s own grandfather, Ernest A. Finney Jr., first Black chief justice of the state of South Carolina, characterized in “He Never Had It Made” by his faith in hard work and the law:

He is the Justice Man

and from waiting tables as a young lawyer

for the white and the privileged

to this day here   he has always believed

back then as a boy with only a road

up here as a man who never looks back

The law works Girl

While Rice is a deeply personal book, as the family photographs accompanying the poems make clear, it also situates the personal within a larger history, reminding us that personal history is already social, and that history is personal. If no one will testify to the sufferings and triumphs of real people, then those experience and their lessons may be erased. “Daguerre of Negras” speaks explicitly to these concerns, noting that “They will ask for your evidence / Might you have a photo?”:

They will tell you it never happened

Cause proof must be in a tin plate

And where pray tell is yours

In these poems, bodies themselves are stamped with history. “Making Foots,” which documents the mutilation of Black feet by fire, blunt force, blades, and disregard, concludes:

If your Black foot

ever wakes you up

in the night

wanting to talk about something

aching there

under the cover

out loud

for no apparent

reason

There is reason

But while it’s a reminder of past injustices, and an acknowledgement that they continue in different forms, Rice is also a celebration of the community it evokes. What must be remembered are not only the indignities suffered in the past, but the dignity of those who suffered them. In his foreword, Kwame Dawes writes “What a poet like yourself does is to reinstate the concept of the poet as a griot—as priest, not void of subjectivity and a private self but able to contain the voices of the community—virtually empowered with the gift to develop a soul for the people” (x). Here, the many voices in Finney’s poems insist, I will tell my own story. And each voice is like the one in “A Woman with Keys”:

I am a woman with keys

Unlocking all the buildings

That now belong

To me

Finney has unlocked history for her speakers. Now they occupy history’s rooms, ready for their stories to be heard

-- Jonathan Butler

Who is wrong and who is wronged? Ed Madden reviews "Collected Stories" at Trustus Theatre

There was a moment during a dress rehearsal of Collected Stories earlier this week that simply crushed me.  The stage was dark, and a stagehand went around the set in the darkness, slowly and methodically making a mess of the place.  A plant toppled, papers strewn across furniture and floor, prescription bottles scattered on desk and table, a curtain undone, a shawl tossed in the floor.

Collected Stories, a play by Donald Margulies, opens at Trustus Theatre this Thursday, August 15, and closes on Sunday August 18.  It’s a short run for a powerful little play, directed by Milena Herring.  In a sequence of short scenes over the course of six years, we see Ruth Steiner, an older writer and teacher, take on as her student and later assistant the seemingly innocent Lisa Morrison, a 26-year-old would-be writer.  I say seemingly innocent, as it’s never clear how manipulative and shrewd she really is.  As the balance of power between the two shifts, we wonder at the end who the real innocent might be.

Ruth is played by the indomitable Elena Martinez-Vidal, confident and pitch-perfect throughout the play.  A couple of moments feel performed for the audience as much as they are for Lisa—stagey, theatrical, but that feels right.  Ruth’s little Greenwich Village apartment is her stage, Lisa her pupil and audience, and she is acting out what a famous writer is and says. I’m reminded of that scene in Douglas Sirk’s 1959 Imitation of Life, when Susie (Sandra Dee) tells her mother Lara (Lana Turner), “Oh stop acting mother!”  But she can’t: she is always onstage.  Martinez-Vidal is fascinating in this part, especially near the end, when Ruth’s life and health are ruined, and still some dark vitality—and anger—drives her speech and action.  She bristles stiffly in what seems to be a conciliatory hug from Lisa.

Elisabeth Gray Engle as Lisa was a puzzle, a chameleon.  Ingénue or ingenious, devious or devoted, we’re never really sure, though Engle, like Lisa, slowly but surely finds her voice.  The moment she tells Ruth about a story her father hated, something shifts in the play, and we start to realize that Lisa, as Engle deftly portrays her, has more to her than we imagined.

Either character could have been a type character if not a caricature—the old Jewish writer and professor, the gushing would-be writer—but both actresses brought a real depth to their portrayals.  The room itself, the set, is almost a character as well. Early in the play, Lisa rhapsodizes on how wonderful it would be to live in a place like that, a place perfect for a writer.  She reads the space through Ruth’s fiction, noting a Matisse from this story, the view of a playground from that one.  So when the stagehand comes through knocking over a plant and strewing paper and pill bottles, we realize that something has gone deeply wrong.

Two primary issues drive the play.  One is power.  When Ruth and Lisa argue over the guilt of Woody Allen after his affair with his 19-year-old step-daughter, we can’t help but wonder about the balance of power in this relationship.  Ruth admits her own affair with an older man, the poet Delmore Schwartz, but she also says that she has never written about the affair, even though it was the bright moment of her life.  “Some things you don’t touch,” she says, a command this daughter-figure is, we know, bound to disobey.

The second issue is the ownership of stories—and in an indirect way, lives.  Ruth admits to exaggerating elements of her own biography for political effect, and the two women agree that writers “rummage” through other people’s lives for stories.  “We’re all rummagers.  That’s what writers are.”  When one accuses the other, “You’ve stolen my stories,” the glib reply—“They stopped being your stories when you told them to me”— amplifies rather than answers the ethical questions.

In 1993, American novelist David Leavitt was sued by English poet Stephen Spender, who accused him of using a section of his memoir World Within World as fodder for his novel, While England Sleeps, a fictional portrayal of someone very like Spender.  I can’t help but think this literary larceny inflects Collected Stories, which premiered three years later in 1996.  (Leavitt’s next published work was The Term Paper Artist, a wicked novella from the point of view of an author accused of plagiarism, who starts to write term papers for college students.)

Where does theft stop and imagination begin?

Even though Ruth may think she’s granting voice to the voiceless, or Lisa may claim she is paying homage, there’s still a real sense here of ethical risk, one that carries, for me, beyond the play.  This would be a fascinating play to discuss in a creative writing class, where questions of writing about real people, people we know, inevitably lead to complex conversations.  What happens when our families read themselves in our stories (no matter how fictionalized)?  Or what happens when we alter details in a presumably nonfiction piece for aesthetic effect.  Yeah, we all know art is the lie that tells the truth (pace Oscar Wilde and Julian Barnes), but playful paradoxes rub raw when real people feel wronged.

Collected Stories closes out Trustus Theatre’s 28th season, and runs Thursday thru Sunday, August 15-18 (with a matinee on Sunday).   It’s a rich play—and as a meditation on plagiarism, intellectual property, and dishonesty, a great way to start the school year.  See it while you can.  Contact the box office at (803) 254-9732 for more information, or visit http://www.trustus.org .

~ Ed Madden

Why You Should Go To Shows Vol. 3: Valley Maker CD Release @ New Brookland Tavern 8/10/13

1) Valley Maker himself (itself?), of course. VM is the recent songwriting nom de plume of Austin Crane, who released a few quite-excellent records under his own name and the Valley Maker moniker before departing for graduate school in 2010. Crane only plays a few gigs a year, and all of them mostly here in Columbia on his brief returns. His last record (and first under the VM name) came out in 2010, and is still one of the most-downloaded South Carolina records on Bandcamp to date. All of which is to say that each show he performs becomes a near must-see. Plus, his new full-length Yes I Know I’ve Loved This World is pretty killer.

2) Opener Amy Godwin, who provides the haunting, mood-setting background vocals on Valley Maker records, started the show off my using extensive vocal loops to harmonize with herself on her traditional folk-meets-dream pop sound that is absolutely enchanting.

3) Let’s Go Coyote! frontman Pat Wall (Free Times music editor and Those Lavender Whales guitarslinger Pat Wall) takes a visceral joy in playing the electric guitar as oddly and brashly as he wants, and in the process demonstrates exactly what rock and roll played live should be about.

4) The stage banter bromance of Wall and drummer Aaron Graves, who fronts Those Lavender Whales, also gave LGC an appeal which really only comes through on stage.

5) Those Lavender Whales were co-headliners, and hearing them shoot through songs on their new EP, entitled Parts & Pieces/Goose and Geeses, was worth the ticket price alone. I called their last record my favorite local release of last year, and I’m pretty sure some of these songs are even better.

6) The gang vocals on Valley Maker’s final song (the new record's closing number, “Goodness”). While perhaps not strictly necessary, it was a striking reminder of how the camaraderie of local musicians and their uninhibited affection for each other’s songs is what makes a music scene in the first place. And, of course, just how good of a songwriter Crane is. Musical moments that combine the warm-and-fuzzy with goosebumps are rare, but they happen, as this loveable moment proved.

-K. Petersen

Why You Should Go to Shows is a projected blog series that describes the specific joys of certain live performances rather than providing a strict review of the show in question or speaking of the joy of patronage in the abstract. Kind of.

Collected Stories, opening at Trustus, poses tough questions by Jaquelyn Mohan

Who owns your memories?  It is a strange question, and one which opens conversation about intellectual property, personal experience, ownership, and the often blurred line between what is right and what is wrong.  In Collected Stories, playwright David Margulies raises these issues, and Milena Herring further explores these issues and more in her production of the controversial play opening at Trustus Theatre this August.

Collected Stories tells the tale of the changing relationship between two women over a span of six years.  Ruth Steiner, played by Elena Martinez, takes the role of teacher and mentor to the younger Lisa Morrison, played by E. G. Heard Engle.  Ruth is a respected professor and short story writer in her mid-fifties who takes on Lisa, graduate student and aspiring writer, as her assistant.  As the years pass, they become friends and eventually adversaries as one character makes a choice that forever changes both women’s lives, careers, and futures.

A USC graduate, director Milena Herring worked in New York in the theater business for thirty years before returning to Columbia in 2010.  Her love for Collected Stories originally sparked when she saw the play performed in New York in 1997 by Uta Hagen and Debra Messing.  Herring is thrilled to finally have the opportunity to direct Collected Stories.

“What appealed to me about the play originally was the veracity of who is wrong and who is right.  There’s a point in the play where the audience gives a collective gasp and realizes a truth about ones of the characters,” Herring says, recalling when she first saw the play years ago.  “The plays that I love, both as a director and as a member of the audience, are plays that move the audience from point A to point B or even point W—they move the audience intellectually or emotionally, and this play does both.”

Collected Stories deals with numerous highly charged ideas and themes ranging from betrayal, intellectual property, the creative process, aging, lost love, and literary appropriation.  “It’s a good thinking person’s play,” Herring says.  The play deals with these heavy issues with honesty and oftentimes humor.  “It’s just very real,” Herring adds.  “In the 1960s it would have been called kitchen sink realism.  It’s a slice of life.  You’re dropping in on a conversation between Lisa and Ruth over six years.”

In this unique two-person play, both actors are equally passionate about the issues the play raises and the story it tells.  “This is a story about two women and their friendship. Friendships change and shift over time as lives change, and I love that their relationship is the root of the play,” says Engle, who takes the roll of Lisa Morrison.  Elena Martinez Vidal, who plays Ruth Steiner, said “I like this kind of show because it can engender tons of discussion…The play does not guide the audience to any conclusions: they will have to make up their own minds.  And those conclusions will probably depend a lot on their experiences and backgrounds.”  Collected Stories will leave you wondering to what extent your life is your own and how one person’s experience can become another person’s story.

Collected Stories is the celebratory closing play for the 28^th season at Trustus Theatre.  “The first play of the season was Next to Normal, and it was a really fine local production you could hold up to any New York production,” Herring recalls.  “Collected Stories is a good counter production to Next to Normal…They’re good bookends to the season.”  Raising ideas pertinent to theater itself such as intellectual property and literary appropriation, Collected Stories is a brave production that is sure to keep the audience guessing until the end and, as they exit the theater, leave them with the haunting question, Who owns your memories?

Three leading ladies work together to run this play, two on-stage and one off-, and make it an experience no one will soon forget or, for that matter, be able to stop talking about.  Sponsored by Callison Tighe with consideration by Muddy Ford Press, Collected Stories will run on the Trustus main stage from August 15^th through the 18^th.  Trustus Theatre is located at 520 Lady Street.  For tickets and more information, visit www.trustus.org or call the box office Tuesdays through Saturdays 1-6 pm at 803-254-9732.

-- Jaquelyn Mohan, Jasper intern

2nd Annual Artists for Africa benefit performance this weekend at Columbia Music Festival Association Artspace

 

This Saturday and Sunday, August 10^th and 11^th, Artists for Africa, a newly formed non-profit organization with goals to provide arts education to impoverished children in Africa, presents the 2^nd annual benefit performance at the CMFA Artspace on Pulaski Street in the Vista.

Artists for Africa Founder, dancer and teacher Cooper Rust, has recently returned from her second stint in Nairobi, Kenya, teaching ballet to young children in the area. In 2012, Rust was able to coordinate an effort that raised nearly seven thousand dollars for the cause in one weekend of performances. Thanks to the work of Artists for Africa, an additional 300 underprivileged children in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya were able to enjoy after school arts classes, giving most of them their first opportunity of this kind.

Rust initially traveled to Kenya in 2012 to work with Anno’s Africa, an organization based out of the United Kingdom promoting education resources in Africa. Artists for Africa joins Anno’s Africa and One Fine Day, based out of Germany, in the global fight for arts exposure and education for these children. A year later, Rust has again just returned home from Kenya and says, “I have all the confidence in the world that Columbia will once again come together to support me and this beautiful cause.”

The concerts include performances by members of the Columbia City Ballet, Columbia Summer Repertory Company, Trustus Theatre’s upcoming production of “Ragtime,” and Milwaukee Ballet among others. Saturday evening’s show includes a silent auction and food and beverages donated by Villa Tronco, Rosso, Gervais and Vine, Tin Roof, Blue Marlin, and Cellar on Greene. Framing of the artwork donated by The Frame Shop, City Art, Haven's, Frames and Things, Framing Plus, House of Frames, Picture Perfect, and Just Susan's Framing.

The events, sponsored by Top Hat Sweepers and the Columbia Music Festival Association, begin at 7pm on the 10^th and 3pm on the 11^th. Tickets for the 10^th are $25 in advance and $30 at the door, and for the 11^th are $15 in advance and $20 at the door.

For more information, please visit www.artistsforafricausa.org or to purchase tickets, call (803) 467-9004.

-- Bonnie Boiter-Jolley

Be the first to see "The Velvet Weapon" (winner of the 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival) on Sat. Aug.10 at 2 PM!

Love live theatre, but stymied by steep ticket prices?  Trustus has got you covered.

Love live theatre, but have commitments like jobs and children that keep you from going out at night?  Trustus has got you covered.

Love live theatre, but wish there were some way to see new shows other than traveling to New York?  Ever wish there were some way for new works of theatre to get a shot at an audience without having to worry about either being a Broadway blockbuster?  Trustus has got you covered.

Ever wish you could give feedback directly to a playwright, before the play ever even opens?  Trustus has got you covered.

Are you so tired of the famously hot August heat - punctuated by the monsoon-like August thunderstorms - that you wish you could just sit down in the dark somewhere with a cold beer or refreshing glass of wine, and watch some live theatre you've never seen before? Trustus has got you covered.

Tomorrow afternoon at 2:00 PM - that's Saturday, August 10th - The Velvet Weapon, winner of the 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival, will have a one-time-only staged reading at Trustus Theatre, open and free to the public.  The Trustus bar will also be open (although not free.)  There are only some 135 seats, however, so make sure one of them is yours.

The playwright, Deborah Brevoort, was kind enough to talk with Jasper about her new work, and you can read that exclusive interview here.  The cast for this reading includes:  Paul Kaufmann (last fall's Next to Normal and  I Am My Own Wife, both at Trustus), Trey Hobbs (Albany in USC's recent King Lear, Greg in reasons to be pretty at Trustus in 2010), Mandy Applegate (The Last Five Years and Plan 9 from Outer Space, both at  Trustus, and The Producers at Workshop) Hunter Boyle (Peron in Evita at Trustus, Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at Workshop) Chelsea Nicole Crook, Eric Bultman, Cindy Durrett (numerous incarnations of Nunsense at Act One Theatre), Josiah Laubenstein (Edgar in King Lear, and Mike in Pine, the previous year's Festival winner  currently running at Trustus), Raia Jane Hirsch (The Motherf*@%er With the Hat at Trustus, Pride and Prejudice with SC Shakespeare Co.), and Kayla Cahill (The Shape of Things at  Workshop.)

Press material describes The Velvet Weapon as "a hilariously smart backstage farce that will leave you laughing while also engaging you long after you've left the theatre.  At the National Theatre of an unnamed country, in an unnamed city, a matinee audience rises up in protest over what is being performed on stage, and demands something new. They begin a performance of their own of The Velvet Weapon, a play by an unproduced playwright of questionable talent. Inspired by the Velvet Revolution in the former Czechoslovakia, The Velvet Weapon is a humorous exploration of populist democracy told through a battle between high-brow and low-brow art."

Director Chad Henderson shared a few thoughts with Jasper:

Jasper:   What has your involvement been in previous years with the Playwrights' Festival?

Henderson:  I directed Swing ’39 in 2011. I also acted in Copy Man under the direction of Jim Thigpen years ago.

Jasper:  Why is it important for an author to get feedback via a reading?

Henderson:  Probably the same reason I invite colleagues to come watch rehearsals of a show I’m directing before we open – its good to know what’s working and what’s not. In this particular case, Brevoort has written a farce – so pace and delivery is the name of the game it seems. The language on the page is the direct key to engaging an audience, so

Jasper:  How did you go about casting Velvet Weapon?

Henderson:  I was looking for people who are quick, humorous, and who have good timing.

Jasper:  For audience members who have never attended a reading before, what can they expect?

Henderson:  The actors (and it’s a great cast) will be reading without staging. Therefore, they will be acting while reading – but not walking around the stage. We would have loved to have staged this reading, however with farces there’s so much action that simplistic blocking would get in the way of the words being said. And since this is a celebration of a new work – we’re keeping it simple. But the script is certainly funny enough and endearing enough to entertain on a Saturday afternoon.

Jasper:  What sort of themes are addressed in this play?

Henderson:  “What is art?” is a question that strings through the narrative. Should art entertain? Should art explore the human condition? If it doesn’t explore the human condition – is it still art?

Be the first to see The Velvet Weapon, which will get a full production in the summer of 2014.  Curtain is at 2 PM tomorrow (Sat. Aug. 10) at Trustus Theatre, at 520 Lady Street in the heart of the Congaree Vista.  The Facebook "event" page for the reading is here.

~ August Krickel

Lee Malerich and Glenn Saborosch -- Artist Profiles

A barn turned workshop and toy box, a collection of gliders from the 1940s, a shower mosaic based on Matisse’s The Dance, a seventeen-year-old cat named Mouse. This is the home of South Carolina artists, Lee Malerich and Glenn Saborosch. The two have been together for four years, both of them having grown up in the Midwest before ending up in the Palmetto State. Malerich and Saborosch have an interesting back story since they both went to the same high school, dated temporarily in college, and then went on to live separate lives, marry other people, and have successful art careers before meeting again years later. They found each other through their art; Saborosch, widowed, found an online profile for Malerich, then divorced, and they began a letter correspondence. Months later, they met in person in an art show in Iowa. Both recount with amazement how – even later in life – a second chance at romance turned them into twenty-somethings in love. They got married in Rome in 2009, “and not Rome, Georgia,” Malerich clarifies, laughing. They now live in Neeses, with Saborosch’s son Garrett, their cat Mouse, and a collection of art as dynamic as the couple who created it. Though they share a love for the arts and sweet green tea, their styles, the mediums they use, and the stories behind their art are unique.  

For most of Malerich’s artistic career, she has been in textiles. She learned sewing out of necessity when she was young, but loved the process. When she discovered that she could use the beauty in fabrics and thread for more than just clothes – for art – Malerich was hooked. The Midwestern grown artist received two studio art degrees from Northern Illinois University before moving to South Carolina to teach. In NIU she met Renie Breskin Adams, who Malerich says inspired many of her views regarding textiles. Adams, a professor teaching in NIU, had graduated from Indiana University with a group Malerich describes as treating a “stitch as a brushstroke.” Their cloth and thread was their art, not merely their craft, a frustrating limitation often applied to textiles. Malerich also recalls that Adam’s work was “overwhelmingly personal,” a characteristic inherent in Malerich’s textiles as well.

Holding one of her older pieces, Malerich points to one image – a person with cancer scars curled up in a circle – created by the stitching over a background of fabric, saying, “Well, it’s me.” The majority of the images in her textile works are beautiful, intricate representations of herself. However, Malerich says she is moving away from this vulnerability in her art. In fact, she is moving away from her previous style in many ways. Her newer work is not only less vulnerable; it is also fabric-less. Malerich has branched into three-dimensional art alongside Saborosch; her medium, window frames.

Her first ventures into windows are tile mosaics in simple wooden frames, with an amount of detail similar to her textiles. She explains that her prior motto had been to “build in as much detail as possible” before the piece “falls apart,” but now she is more interested in “thinly orchestrated” and simple patterns. Her most recent window frames have empty spaces, pieces of the glass panes leftover without obstructing the view of what’s through the window. The frames are often stacked on top of each other, giving a surprising depth to the thin wooden beams. Attached objects range from metal coils to seashells to painted faces, all materials that incorporate her love of the flea market into her art. Beyond living frugally, her chosen materials help convey meaning in her work; Malerich believes her art should always hold meaning or express an emotion. Ceramic figurines of red cardinals, the Illinois state bird, rest on a window frame piece she is working on now, a tribute to the place where both Malerich and Saborosch were raised.

Like Malerich, Saborosch also discovered his medium at a young age, learning to weld in a high school sculpture class and loving it. He studied for two years at Lindenwood University in St. Charles Missouri, though he says he struggled in school while he excelled in art. After receiving a critique in a show that he focus on one genre, he decided to dedicate his time to sculpture, specifically metal work. Saborosch ended up taking a twenty-year hiatus from sculpting due to family and his work; Saborosch was a truck driver. However, he would not be kept away forever, and had started entering shows again before he and Malerich reunited.

Malerich calls Saborosch’s style “describing masses out of lines.” Steel strips and wire form animals, people, scenes frozen in time. In one sculpture, a ballerina bends her head back, leg lifted, hands crossed in front of her. Saborosch notes how expressive hands are in a sculpture that lacks a face. Another sculpture, a leaping runner, is harder to identify at first glance, but the motion created by a few simple lines of metal is easily apparent.

(above by Glenn Saborosch -- currently on display at Tokyo Disney)

Recently, though, Saborosch has also found his style changing. His newer pieces are abstract, and his materials now include spare agricultural tools. Rather than plan ahead what shape the pieces will take, as he did with his representative work, Saborosch says he “plays” with the newer pieces, letting them take on a form of their own. He stops “if it starts to look like an animal,” he asserts. He wants the pieces to be abstract. Unlike Malerich, Glen doesn’t set out with a message or emotion in mind. He creates art for the aesthetic of the shape, whether in a steel representation of a leaping horse or an abstract sculpture made from tractor parts.

Both Malerich and Saborosch are quick to add that the materials chosen his more recent works do not have any bearing on the interpretation of the pieces. The repurposed tractor parts aren’t meant to be recognized as repurposed tractor parts; the positive and negative spaces they create are what speak for the piece. His use of thrown out agricultural equipment is perhaps just another way that Malerich’s love of reusing waste has rubbed off on him.

The couple agrees that both their work changed after they got married. Through the changes in their styles, mediums, and personal views on art, Malerich says living together is a of “moving toward the middle.” They celebrate the different art styles and skills each brings to the table. Malerich proudly calls Glen “the real deal” when it comes to artistic talent, while she is the one with more experience and formal training. They help each other through these strengths; Malerich writes Saborosch’s bios and Saborosch helps Malerich if one of her newer projects requires a special tool or heavy lifting. While Malerich does exclaim, “It’s not fair!” regarding needing Saborosch’s help with her own pieces, both artists appreciate living with another artistic mind. Saborosch says it’s nice having someone there to critique one’s work and provide ideas.

When asked if they ever collaborate on projects, there is some minor discussion and laughter. In short, no, they work separately. Saborosch says, “We’re in our own little worlds together,” Malerich adding that their work is like “parallel play.” They feed off of each other – inspiring, advising, learning – without crossing the line into the other’s art pieces. Both of them, however, seem happiest when discussing their significant other’s work. They are quick to praise, describe, and enthuse over the other’s art. Malerich encourages Saborosch to talk about his Cinderella sculpture, a success he takes much pride in. This piece was commissioned by Disney and is currently on display in Disney World in Tokyo, part of a series of “story beats” telling the Cinderella story though different art genres.

However, both artists are finding it difficult to show and sell their newer work. They sell from their home rather than any one established place, and have had some of their newer pieces rejected from art shows. Saborosch says that he may return to figure work to see if that sells better, but both Malerich and Saborosch are not worried about the situation. The couple is retired and don’t need to work to live comfortably. Malerich says coming to a place where you no longer need money is an interesting experience, leading her to question her motives for her art. She wants to continue to create art that makes her happy, regardless of how it is accepted.

Malerich is a part of the group, Cats on a Leash, artists who have been together for over thirty years and show periodically. Beyond that, Malerich and Saborosch will be selling and doing commissions from their Neeses home. She discusses and displays both of their artworks, as well as her love of living “on the cheap,” in her blog “Waste as a Way of Life.”

Malerich may also be showing this fall, though nothing is set in stone yet, in the Pickens County Museum exhibit “Fiber Art: Connecting Concept and Medium,” which will run from September 7 through November 14.

 -- Joanna Savold, Jasper intern

"Pine" at Trustus Explores Emotions, Loss, and Family Dynamics

Pine, the winner of the Trustus Playwrights' Festival which runs through this coming Saturday, August 10th, has a double meaning in its title:  the aroma of the trees that dominate stage right, and the prevailing cloud of mourning that has surrounded an upstate New York family since the death of middle son Colin five years previously.  Never entirely a comedy nor a sentimental drama, this new play from Eugenie Carabatsos successfully explores the complex nuances of how ordinary people interact in situations we all face: loss of a loved one, inclusion of newcomers to the family, and changing dynamics when children become adults. The twist: Colin is still around.  His spirit lingers in his family's home, and comments on all the action as it unfolds on stage.

That twist is certainly nothing new, from literature (The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, Topper, Wilde's Canterville Ghost) to stage (I Hate Hamlet, Coward's Blithe Spirit) to film (the Patrick Swayze-Demi Moore movie Ghost, and big-screen versions of most of the preceding.)  Following the conventions of the genre, it's therefore no plot spoiler to assume that one or more characters have unfinished business, but as in life, nothing is clearly spelled out. Are some characters still grieving, or did they never have a chance to?   Is Colin trapped in limbo as a result, or is the unfinished business his?

Advance publicity and opening scenes where Colin speaks to the audience make it clear that Colin really is a ghost, i.e. this isn't Next to Normal, and he's not the product of anyone's delusion.  As Colin, Hunter Bolton is up to the challenge of reacting to everyone's dialogue and movement without ever being acknowledged by the other characters.  He's terribly under-used in the first act, simply because there's no one with whom to interact. Still, a number of audience members commented on how skillfully his body language and facial expressions convey his presence and feelings, even when he's a passive observer.  The pace picks up significantly in the second act, when plot twists allow Colin to participate more, and the opening night audience gave the first scene of Act 2 a round of applause as a result.  Bolton takes his time with every line, and is both sympathetic and believable as a decent, ordinary guy who has found no answer to his question:  "If I'm gone, why am I still here?"

Indeed, all the characters are quite ordinary; one might almost say under-developed,except part of the point of the script is that this is a regular family, with no dysfunction beyond what would be expected.  Becky Hunter as sharp-tongued mother Rita, Rachel Kuhnle as independent sister Julie, and Cory Alpert as troubled younger brother Teddy all look like they and Bolton could be related.   Jennifer Moody Sanchez plays Rachel, Colin's fiancée (not his ex- fiancée, Colin is quick to assert, since they never broke up) who is still considered part of the family, but also is finally ready to move on with her life.  Josiah Laubenstein as in-law Mike has some nice moments of comedy with Kuhnle; I enjoyed his portrayal of Edgar in USC's King Lear a few months back, but the manic tone that worked for Edgar's feigned madness is a little distracting here, and there's no line that couldn't benefit from being delivered an octave lower.  He gets some of the show's biggest laughs, however, rejoicing when Rachel's new boyfriend supplants him as the barely-accepted outsider.  In one of the show's many relatable and accessible themes, boyfriend Miles (Harrison Saunders) has to compete with the persisting presence of Colin, and how many of us have had to compete with the metaphoric ghost of a significant other's ex?  Which is especially ironic, given that Bolton and Saunders fought for the hand of Juliet as Romeo and Paris in a memorable production in Finlay Park a few years ago.

I was prepared to say that Alpert's maturity makes him a little old for his role, but program notes reveal he is exactly the same age as his character, the teen who survived the car crash that killed Colin, and who states what I'm told is sadly all too common in such scenarios: "it should have been me."  His scenes with Bolton are genuinely moving, as each wrestles their circumstances, the former pleading "I'd rather have this than nothing," while the latter despairs "I'd rather have nothing than this."   Alpert and Bolton do nice work together as they reveal how family conflict can persist long after one of them is gone.  Carabatsos excels in natural dialogue that captures the quirks of everyday life, as when wine is spilled on Rita's best pair of slacks, and she gripes that even a new pair won't be that same "best" pair.  A culminating and cathartic scene allows each character to grieve in a different way, and to explain differing but understandable rationales.

Guest designer Chet Longley's set is more detailed than we have seen recently at Trustus, and includes a very believable patch of forest, and a simple recreation of the wooden-siding-covered exterior and interior of a home in the Catskills. I might have enjoyed a little more set decoration - mirrors or pictures on the wall, the occasional lamp or dresser - but as much space for movement needs to be opened up, in order for the cast to be able to move about freely with ever bumping into the invisible Colin. A nice touch is the way an upstairs bedroom is located directly above the kitchen, allowing Bolton to move easily from one to the other, perching on top of a refrigerator as a ghost might.

Director Dewey Scott-Wiley handles the challenges of blocking around an unseen and non-corporeal main character well, and takes full advantage of her cast's ability to wring emotion and meaning from pauses and silences as well as from lines.  Her sound design might need a little tweaking, however, as audibility and clarity decreases the farther a character goes toward stage right.  There is also a whooshing sound effect hat signifies Colin's presence that I never entirely "bought," although at the same time I can't think what, if anything, might work better.

Playwright Carabatsos graduated from college only three years ago, and is to be commended for her mastery of realistic dialogue and the ability to focus on and portray idiosyncratic character traits that we all possess.  Her skill not only derives from what must surely have been an excellent education at Wesleyan University, but also, I suspect, from good genes:  I discovered at opening night that her father, James Carabatsos, is the screenwriter of such films as Hamburger Hill, Sally Field's Heroes, and Clint Eastwood's Heartbreak Ridge. While completely unrelated to Pine, I must note that as recently as three weeks ago a group of baby boomers in a 5 Points bar paused while channel-surfing to chant "Swede, Swede, Swede!" along with Clint's platoon, that at least once a month for the last couple of decades I have quoted the "permission to speak freely?" line, and that also within this past month I quoted the immigrant soldier from Lost Battalion who proudly asserted that he was indeed an American: "I took the test!"

Pine is not the greatest play ever written, but it's certainly a good one.  It could probably stand another re-write or two, to tighten up the story and perhaps drop about 30 minutes of chit-chat.   The characters too could be more fully developed - we could see Teddy as more fragile, more lost, and more at risk, and Rita could be meaner and feistier, a la Shirley MacLaine in Terms of Endearment (and everything she's done since.) Pine's tone is very much like that film, or the play and film Steel Magnolias, both full of memorable laugh lines but ultimately dealing with death.  It would be very easy to say the ending is all too predictable, but in the last half hour, I found myself desperately wanting just that ending and no other.  Which makes me think that the characters became people that I cared about. A friend and colleague noted that he felt his emotions were a little manipulated, and I can certainly see that.  My reaction, however, is excitement and joy that such a young writer has mastered the skill of manipulating emotions!   Either way, I don't think there was a dry eye in the sold-out opening night house by the show's end, and I rarely cry at live theatre.

Pine may not go on to win any Tony Awards - although it would be extremely cool if it did - but could certainly make for a decent Hallmark Hall of Fame movie.  What's much more important is this chance to nurture and encourage the growth of a new, talented author, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if one day Pine is seen as a promising early work from an acclaimed playwright.  But make those reservations now - there are only three more chances to be part of theatre history, with shows this coming Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights at 8 PM.  Contact the Trustus box office at (803) 254-9732 or visit www.trustus.org for more information.

~ August Krickel

Deborah Brevoort's "The Velvet Weapon" Wins 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival - Chad Henderson Directs Staged Reading Saturday, August 10th

The Velvet Weapon, by Deborah Brevoort, is the winner of the 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival, and will receive a full production in the summer of 2014, preceded by a staged reading  this coming Saturday, August 10th, at 2 PM on the Thigpen Main Stage at 520 Lady Street in the Vista.  As sponsor of one of the nation's longest-running play festivals, Trustus has nurtured and fostered the growth of new playwrights such as David Lindsay-Abaire, who later went on to win the Pulitzer Prize.

Over the following year, each winning playwright has the chance to develop the script for production, with the opportunity for input from and consultation with members of the Trustus staff and company, based on feedback at the initial staged reading.  This year's reading will be directed by Chad Henderson, chosen by Jasper readers as the 2012 Theatre Artist of the Year.  Included in the cast are Paul Kaufmann (Next to Normal and I Am My Own Wife at Trustus) Raia Jane Hirsch (The Motherf*@%er With the Hat at Trustus, Pride and Prejudice with SC Shakespeare Co.) Kayla Cayhill (The Shape of Things at Workshop) Trustus Managing Director Larry Hembree, Eric Bultman, and Chelsea Crook.

The reading is free and open to the public, but seating is limited; the bar will be open, with liquid refreshments for sale.

Deborah Brevoort holds an MFA in Playwriting from Brown University and an MFA in Musical Theatre writing from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she currently teaches. She also teaches in the MFA playwriting programs at Columbia University and Goddard College. Her web site is www.DeborahBrevoort.com.  She is perhaps best known for her work The Women of Lockerbie, which won the Kennedy Center’s Fund for New American Plays Award, and the silver medal in the Onassis International Playwriting Competition. It has been produced across the U.S., as well as in Scotland, Japan, Greece, Spain, Belarus, Poland, Australia and England, and has been translated into seven languages.

The Velvet Weapon was inspired by the Velvet Revolution in the former Czechoslovakia, and is described as "a hilariously smart backstage farce that will leave you laughing while also engaging you long after you've left the theatre," and "a humorous exploration of populist democracy told through a battle between high-brow and low-brow art.  At the National Theatre of an unnamed country, a matinee audience rises up in protest over what is being performed on stage, and demands something new. They begin a performance of their own of The Velvet Weapon, a play by an unproduced playwright of questionable talent."

 The author kindly agreed to share some thoughts with Jasper via e-mail in this exclusive interview!

Jasper:  You have written drama, comedy, and the books for musicals.  Is The Velvet Weapon your first venture into farce?

Brevoort:   Velvet Weapon is my first farce, although one of my previous plays, The Poetry of Pizza, an Arab/American comedy about love, used elements of farce here and there. Albert Bermel, who wrote the definitive critical study on farce, said that it was “an older dramatist’s medium, because the techniques involved are so formidable.”   That surprised me; farces tend to feel so slight. They are like meringues that melt the minute they hit your mouth.   So, I wanted to try my hand at the form to see what was so difficult.  I was greatly humbled by it, I have to say.   These “slight” little plays are built like Swiss watches!

Jasper:  Do you find it challenging or difficult to move from one form to another, or does that give you a sort of freedom, to work in whatever form suits the material?

Brevoort:  I love writing in multiple forms.  I always find it difficult to move back and forth between them, but that is also the pleasure of it. As a writer, I have a couple of rules for myself. One is that I don’t ever repeat myself.  Another is that in every project I do, there must be something that I don’t know how to do. These rules help to ensure that I am always stretching myself as an artist, and that I don’t stagnate, or get too comfy.

Jasper:   Your theatrical career began at Alaska's Perseverance Theatre, and from there you moved into writing - how did that transition take place?

Brevoort:  I was the Producing Director of Perseverance Theatre, which means I was the person who raised all the money, and was the public administrative face of the theatre.  But Perseverance was an unusual company, because we were basically a group of artists who administered ourselves and the company. I started out as an actor, and worked in the acting company for the better part of 13 years.  I had always wanted to be a writer, so when we started offering playwriting classes at the theatre, led by Paula Vogel and Darrah Cloud, I took them. Paula snatched me out of the class, told me I was writer, and gave me a fellowship to come to Brown University to make the switch from theatre producing and acting to writing. I accepted the fellowship, and moved to NYC, where I’ve been ever since, working as a playwright, lyricist and librettist.

Jasper: I gather that contemporary themes, especially relating to political and social topics, recur in your work, although perhaps sometimes not overtly. Do you have a particular goal in your work?

Brevoort:  I am not aware that I have a political agenda or even that I have political themes - I just write what interests me.  And I am committed to writing each project truthfully, whatever that may entail.

Jasper:  How easy or difficult is it to make the audience think while still entertaining them?

Brevoort:  There are plenty of techniques you can use as a playwright to make an audience think or feel.  To me it’s simply a matter of craft.  It’s no harder to make an audience think than feel—it just requires different tools.  I do have to say, however, that the hardest thing to do is to make an audience laugh. That is 100 times harder than to make them cry.

Jasper:  Why did the "velvet revolution" in Czechoslovakia appeal to you as source material?

Brevoort:  I was very good friends with Pavel Dobrusky, a Czech scenographer who defected from the former Czechoslovakia and came to work with us at Perseverance Theatre in the mid-1980’s.  When the Velvet Revolution happened in 1989, Pavel worked with us on production called Wonderland, a sort of Alice-in-Wonderland take on the events taking place in Eastern Europe.  It was one of my favorite productions at Perseverance Theatre.

Fast forward 15 years:  Pavel and I both now live in NYC and got to talking one night about The Velvet Revolution and how we’d love to make a theatre piece about it.  Pavel knew all the theatre artists who had been involved—they were his old friends.  We put together a grant request to CEC Arts Link, which gave money to theatre artists to do projects in Eastern Europe.  We got the grant, which enabled the two of us to go to both the Czech and Slovak Republics and to interview all the artists who collaborated with Vaclav Havel to bring down the Soviet regime.  We spent about a month conducting intense, in-depth interviews with 43 of the ringleaders.

After the interviews, I remarked to Pavel that the Velvet Revolution was like one, great big back stage farce. Literally.   So, I wrote the play as a farce.

The goal was for Pavel to eventually direct the play.  But unfortunately, Pavel passed away.

Jasper:   Once you finished the play, you had readings at La Mama and the NJ Playwright’s Theatre?  How did that process work?   

Brevoort:  In addition to getting a CEC Arts Link grant to do the interviews, I got a playwriting fellowship from the NJ Council on the Arts, to write the play. The reading at the NJ Playwright’s Theatre was part of that fellowship.  Pavel directed the reading, which was done for about 30 NJ senior citizens, all of whom thought I was writing a satire about Obama.

The La Mama reading was part of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts “Performing Revolution in Central and Eastern Europe” festival, a citywide, 5-month event to commemorate the 20^th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution.  Pavel was no longer in NYC at that point, so he didn’t direct the reading. Many audience members at the reading were from Eastern Europe, so they got all the references in the play and recognized it as the story about Vaclav Havel.  The other half knew nothing about the Velvet Revolution and thought I was parodying populist democratic movements taking place around the world.

In February of this year I had a reading of the play at William Patterson University in NJ, and this time the audience thought I was writing about Occupy Wall Street.

This of course tickles me to no end; it was my goal that this play be about populist democracy not about the Velvet Revolution—and it appears to be working on that level because people are seeing references to American politics or world politics in it.  But I have also loaded the play with lots of inside jokes and references that only Eastern Europeans would “get”—and they seem to be “getting” them.

Each reading helped me to CUT the script. Speed of delivery is necessary for farce. If you have one syllable too many in a line, you won’t get a laugh.  So these readings have helped me to pare each line down so they work like darts.

Jasper:  How did you discover Trustus and the Playwrights' Festival?

Brevoort: I have heard about Trustus for many years,  most recently when I was the playwright-in-residence at Center Stage in Greenville, SC.  I’m delighted to get a chance to work with them!  I’ve never been to Columbia, so I don’t know anything about the community, and am looking forward to coming down and being there next year for rehearsals.

~ August Krickel

Tapp’s Art Center and Hidden Wounds Present “The Art of Healing” -- byKarla Turner, Jasper intern

“Not everything around me can hurt me now,” says Jim Dukes.

He has a powerful weapon.

A survivor of 12 concussions and two suicide attempts who is living with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and depression, he learned to “turn the world around and see it through the lens of [his] camera,” and then he began to heal.

He is sharing his healing journey with the community in collaboration with Tapp's Art Center and Hidden Wounds, a non-profit dedicated to providing creative and artistic healing therapy for military personnel battling postwar challenges.

“The Art of Healing,” at Tapp’s Art Center is a unique exhibit which will feature Dukes’ work and include art by Columbia artists Heidi Darr-Hope, Lyssa Harvey, Sandra Carr, Mary How and others who have “found the benefit in using art to heal in their lives,” says Dukes.

As Tapp’s artist-in-residence from July through September, Dukes will assist ongoing efforts to promote healing arts programs by working with local organizations and individuals who utilize art-healing techniques.

Steven Diaz, a USMC veteran, and the Director of Strategic Partnership for Hidden Wounds explains, “Not everyone responds to psychotherapy. Everyone is different with their healing process.”

The exhibit is not limited to individuals with PTSD or TBI. “People use art to heal from a variety of things. There is a wide range of people who are actually putting work in the exhibit,” says Diaz.  They are living with cancer, depression and other life-changing conditions. Work will represent a variety of mediums; including photography, mixed media, drawing, writing, and painting.

The exhibit opens Thursday, August 1st as part of First Thursdays on Main. It runs through the 31st.

Selected artwork from the exhibit will be complied into a book of photos to be released and sold at a fundraiser that closes the show on August 30 at 7 p.m.  The photo book will include the participants’ experiences, as told by area writers.

Proceeds from admissions and artwork sales will benefit both Hidden Wounds and the Friends of the Tapp’s Arts Center, to advance healing through art.

“We see Tapp’s as a community center and we’re excited about the possibility to serve those individuals who seek and lead recovery through art and share examples of these proven technique with our community,” says Brenda Schwarz, executive director of Tapp’s Arts Center.

Those interested in healing through art and participating in the program should contact Steven Diaz at Hidden Wounds at (803) 873-6540 or steven@hiddenwounds.org or Jim Dukes at (704) 840-9008.

-- Karla Turner, Jasper intern

Eugenie Carabatsos discusses her play "Pine," premiering at Trustus Friday August 2nd

Pine, the new play by Eugenie Carabatsos and winner of the  Trustus Playwrights’ Festival will open on the Thigpen Main Stage at Trustus Theatre this Friday, August 2, at 8 PM, and will run through the following Saturday, August 10.  The author graciously agreed to share a few thoughts with Jasper, prior to her first visit to Columbia this weekend to see the world professional premiere of her new play.

Jasper:   What inspired you to become involved in theatre?  Is that your main focus as a writer?

Carabatsos:   My primary interest and passion is drama, though I would love to also be a novelist and perhaps create my own television show someday. As far back as I can remember, I have loved theater. My parents are theater-lovers, so they would take me to see plays and musicals frequently as a child. I remember I made my parents take me to see a community theater production of Annie Get Your Gun three times in one weekend. I always loved going to plays and telling stories, but it wasn't until my senior year of high school when I combined my love of storytelling and my love of plays and wrote my first play for my senior project. After seeing my play read aloud by actors, I was hooked.  I have not done any acting, but I have self-produced a few of my plays in festivals, which is a fun, challenging experience that I like very much.

Jasper:  Where did you grow up? 

Carabatsos:   I am from Bridgehampton, NY, which is a small town on the eastern end of Long Island. The area I live in is not unlike New England, so it was a very nice, easy transition to living in Middletown, CT for college.

Jasper:   Your alma mater, Wesleyan, is a very distinguished liberal arts college.  Did you study theatre or writing there?     

Carabatsos:  Wesleyan does have a wonderful theater and film program, but I actually was an English major, so I didn't get involved in the theater scene at all in college. For me, the best way to learn how to write well is to read well-written books, plays, and essays, so I definitely feel as though I gleaned a lot from my education creatively, even though I wasn't involved in the theater program there.

Jasper:  You wrote the first draft of Pine while attending an artist-in-residence program in the Catskills.   Was there anything in particular that inspired this story?

Carabatsos:   The play isn't based on personal experience. I was thinking about what it would be like for a young widow, and what her relationship would be with her "ex's" family.   I thought that relationship might be an interesting idea for a play. Then I thought, well what if the dead spouse was still around, but no one knew it? And that was the jumping off point. Then when I was in the Catskills, I thought that would be a perfect setting for the play.

Jasper:  Is there a significance to the title?

Carabatsos:   The title refers both to the idea of longing, and also to the smell that connects the family to each other and especially to the father.

Jasper: Is comedy a new medium for you?  And do you like to work with any recurring themes in your work?

Carabatsos:   Yes - when I wrote Pine, I hadn't dabbled in comedy at all.   I think the most recurring themes in my work are death, memory, and love. In terms of writing style, I am very interested in trying out different structures. Pine has a pretty straightforward structure, but most of my other work plays a lot with structure.

Jasper: Are you a full-time author? 

Carabatsos:  Making a living off of writing has been a goal since I decided I wanted to be a writer. I hope to one day reach it!  I work both as a private tutor and academic tutor for a tutoring company that specializes in clinically informed tutoring. I have also previously worked for an online university as an adjunct teacher. I actually really enjoy my tutoring work, and I am passionate about education, but being a writer full-time is definitely the end goal.

Jasper:   Part of the Trustus Playwrights' Festival includes a staged reading the year before the actual premiere, allowing for feedback.  What was that process like?

Carabatsos:  I did not attend the reading, but I had a wonderful conversation with the director afterwards, and we discussed the feedback the play received. It was a really helpful conversation. The play has been revised since that first reading. The core of the play is the same, but there are some things that I expanded upon or made stronger connections to. For example, I gave a lot more information about the father, so that the ending had more weight. I also included a scene with Rita in the trees and allowed her to have a moment with her daughter, Julie.

Jasper: How did you discover Trustus, and are you familiar with the Midlands area?

Carabatsos:   I learned about Trustus through a posting on pwcenter.org, which is the website I use to find all of my play submission opportunities. I have driven through South Carolina on a roadtrip, but haven't spent any significant time there (or in the South in general). I am really looking forward to it!

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From press material:

Eugenie Carabatsos has written eight plays, all of which have been produced in professional or festival settings.  After Eternity (Winner of the Venus Theatre Festival), The Brink, and Stalled have been produced in festivals including the Alumnae Theatre New Ideas Festival (Toronto, ON), the Midwinter Madness Festival (New York, NY), the Venus Theatre Festival (New York, NY), and Manhattan Repertory Theatre Festival (New York, NY). Her ten-minute plays have been produced by the Playwrights' Round Table (Orlando, FL), the Short + Sweet Festival (Sydney, Australia), the Edward Hopper House (Nyack, NY), Manhattan Repertory Theatre, The Secret Theatre (Queens, NY), Silver Spring Stage (Silver Spring, MD), the Pan Theater (Oakland, CA), the Complete Theatre (New York, NY), and Love Creek Productions (New York, NY). In Their Glory has received staged readings as part of Alumnae Theatre’s New Ideas Festival in Toronto, and, by the Truffle Theatre Company in Brooklyn. A one-act version of the play won the Scholastic Arts and Writing Award for Best Play in 2006. She graduated from Wesleyan University in 2010 with a BA in English.

The Trustus Playwrights’ Festival is considered by various publications to be one of the best in the nation. Not only do winning scripts garner a professional reading, but they also receive a full production on the Trustus Thigpen Main Stage. Past winners of this festival including  Jon Tuttle, Stephen Belber, and Andrea Lepico have gone on to have their scripts published and performed all over the nation. Past winner David Lindsay-Abaire was even awarded the coveted Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award later in his career. Now NYC playwright Eugenie Carabatsos joins the fine company of Playwrights’ Festival winners as her play Pine makes its professional debut right here in the Capital City.

Pine, under the direction of Trustus Artistic Director Dewey Scott-Wiley, is a ghost story – with humor and a tremendous amount of heart. As the lights come up, audiences are introduced to the White family. Gathering for the Christmas holidays, we realize that older son Colin White seems to go throughout the house unnoticed. Further exposition reveals that Colin is actually a ghost following a fatal car accident years earlier. Colin constantly tries to avoid his overbearing mother and to communicate with his younger brother Teddy, but Teddy can’t see him…or can he? The plot thickens as Colin’s ex-girlfriend shows up to the White home for a holiday visit with her new boyfriend. The Whites' Christmas takes many turns as Colin’s memory and spectral presence make us wonder if Colin’s family is beyond his reach.

Sarah Hammond, a Columbia native who is now a successful playwright in NYC, is the Trustus Literary Manager and oversees the festival submissions. “We went electronic with our competition last year,” said Hammond. “This year, for the first time ever, we also eliminated the submission fee for playwrights, which increased the number of submissions substantially. We got 400 submissions this year from all over the country.” Submissions consist of playwright bios, a play synopsis, and a 10-page script sample  which Hammond has to peruse thoroughly. She then asks for full plays from 25-40 of the playwrights submitting. “When asking for those full scripts, we look first for voices that leap off the page,” says Hammond “Is it theater? Does it feel live? Some dialogue just sings, and that's apparent in a ten-page sample. There's a rhythm - an energy - that comes from a playwright's gut. While we don't have one aesthetic for the new work at Trustus, we do tend to favor scripts with a very strong current of personal truth.” After the full scripts have been read, the top five make their way to Columbia, SC where the Trustus Artistic Director chooses the winner. Obviously, Ms. Carabatsos’ Pine found itself in the winner’s circle in 2012.

Director Dewey Scott-Wiley has assembled a talented cast to bring Carabatsos’ characters to life for the first time. Long-time Trustus Company member Becky Hunter (Palace of the Moorish Kings) takes the stage as Rita, the matriarch of the White family. Hunter Bolton (Love! Valour! Compassion!) makes his Trustus debut as Colin, the ghost. Playing Teddy and Julie, Colin’s siblings, are Cory Alpert and Rachel Kuhnle respectively. Playing Julie’s husband is USC MFA in Acting candidate Josiah Lauberstein (Boeing Boeing). Portraying Colin’s ex-girlfriend Rachel is Jennifer Moody Sanchez (My First Time), and with her is Harrison Saunders (Red) as Rachel’s new boyfriend and soon-to-be fiancé.

Pine makes its premiere on the Trustus Thigpen Main Stage on Friday, August 2nd at 8:00pm and runs through August 10th, 2013. Main Stage shows start at 8:00 pm Thursdays through Saturdays, and Sunday matinees are at 3:00pm. Tickets are $22.00 for adults, $20.00 for military and seniors, and $15.00 for students. Half-price Student Rush-Tickets are available 15 minutes prior to curtain.

Trustus Theatre is located at 520 Lady Street, behind the Gervais St. Publix. Parking isavailable on Lady St. and on Pulaski St. The Main Stage entrance is located on the Publix side of the building.   For more information or reservations call the box office Tuesdays through Saturdays 1-6 PM at 803-254-9732, visit www.trustus.org .

~ August Krickel

Calling all local artists!

Calling all local artists!

The Devine Street Association is holding its annual Art Stroll and Sidewalk Sale on Saturday August 3^rd from 10am – 6pm. The cost is $25 per art vendor, and table and tent must be provided by the artist.

Be sure to bring proper paper work approved by the City of Columbia allowing you to sell your merchandise and be prepared for exposure to thousands of people!

This opportunity is especially lucrative for local artists as the retailers along Devine Street will be having sales and bringing in a large amount of foot traffic and interested buyers.

Registration must be completed before August 1^st. Contact Jennifer Suber at Jennifer@youreventstaff.com or 803-608-6161 for details and registration information.

-- Sarah McNabb, Jasper Intern

Book Review -- Hating the Goddamn Peas: Angela Kelly’s Voodoo for the Other Woman by Jonathan Butler

 

There are no happily-ever-after endings in Angela Kelly’s Voodoo for the Other Woman (Hub City Press, 2013). This is a book of bad women, bad accidents, and bad news. Kelly has a gift for understatement and a voice that can speak unpleasant truths convincingly, in part because she lets the images speak for themselves:

A week later, Mother was white blonde again,

she came home with somebody named Pastor Arthur Ray,

he’d prayed with her, she said, though they smelled

of whiskey, his auburn toupee, crooked, tilted left.

And while its poems deal with such personal matters as heartbreak, infidelity, disease, childhood trauma, and substance abuse, Voodoo for the Other Woman doesn’t seem confessional, in part because Kelly spreads the book’s meditations on disillusion and desire across decades and personae, and in part because these poems maintain a cutting sense of humor. Kelly has a skill for sketching characters in a few details, as in “The Swannanoa Juvenile Detention Center for Girls”:

Next week, the Home Economics class will turn to cooking.

They are going to make chicken pot pie

with a fine golden crust. Jayne Ann says no green peas

are going in her pot pie. She hates goddamn peas.

In spite of the pain stitched through this book, the characters are handled with compassion, rather than venom, and the few moments of tenderness the book offers are more poignant for the destruction around them, gleaming like the broken glass at the conclusion of “Char’s Crossing”:

In the rearview mirror, the three-legged dog

wagged his entire body in farewell.

The acres of broken bottles winked out.

These poems are a requiem for the reckless passions of youth as well as an acknowledgement that childhood’s terrors and injustices persist into adulthood, as in “Dear Boys & Girls of the Playground,” where

Touching your thigh, you look around

for the rubber dodge ball, red and bouncy;

it could tear down the hall at any time.

Destruction often follows in desire’s wake in this poems. After the ecstatic groping there is always a vicious comedown, a severe hangover, sometimes paired with a literal hangover, as in “To Take a Vacation Alone”:

The hung-over mornings, when I wake at dawn,

panicked at the anonymous room, finally recognizing

the roll of surf, the open balcony doors, how the sea air

has seduced my sheets, reducing them to damp rags.

Gauze, perhaps, for a wound I have not even felt.

Cancer and life-threatening pregnancy loom in poems like “How to Prepare for Invasive Surgery” (“I would like to slip inside your jacket and be / the extra button stitched in the silk lining”). Kelly has a gift for striking juxtapositions, as in “Fear Comes Like  a Whistle, a Depot, the Train Itself”:

In the waiting room, I had thumbed through Cosmo-

“The Secret Parts of Your Body Which He Really Wants.”

Womb full of baseball tumors was not on the list.

The inanity of commercial culture in the face of profound personal suffering and loss is a recurring theme. Many of the topics covered are not the kind of thing advertisers want potential customers reading about next to their sales pitches, and Kelly’s book makes an argument for poetry as a place where they can be discussed honestly, with no concern for the sensibilities of advertisers. Like the “The Swannanoa Juvenile Detention Center for Girls,” poetry is a place where you can admit to hating “the goddamn peas.”And since many of the book’s topics, like uterine cancer and ectopic pregnancy, are “women’s issues,” Kelly could be said to be carving out a space for frank discussion of these topics ignored by the media at large. But Kelly’s book isn’t a feel-good celebration of mutual womanhood, either: when we meet the persona of the title poem, she’s putting a hex on a romantic rival, so that

When she steps off the curb,

her ankle may snap, or better yet,

the city bus rounding the curve …

The wisdom of Voodoo for the Other Woman seems hard won. These poems remind us of the uncertainty of our destinations and the unquantifiable value of tenderness in the midst of a collapsing world. In simple language, Kelly has achieved a complex tone that mixes humor, sadness, hope, rage, and resignation. It is a potent brew.

-- Jonathan Butler