ARTS COVERAGE TO END ALL ARTS COVERAGE >>>
At this point it goes without saying. If you're looking for coverage of local arts in Tacoma, Olympia, and all points in between, the Weekly Volcano is THE place to find it. Our goal is to consistently provide the best local arts coverage possible to our fantastic readers. We're always on the lookout for ways to shine a light on all the awesome creativity we see around us.
This week's Volcano arts section includes "Gathering Together" at TESC, "Much Ado About Nothing," at Olympia Little Theatre, 100 Voices at SPSCC and more.
Here's a look at the Volcano arts coverage waiting for you this week in print and online.
VISUAL EDGE: GATHERING TOGETHER AT TESC
The art of Danielle Bodine, Adriene Cruz and Alonzo Davis at The Evergreen State College - exhibited under the name Gathering Together - is a montage of many different styles and materials that contrast and complement one another.
I could almost hear rattles and drums and the chirping of birds upon stepping into the gallery, and I immediately gravitated toward a powerful little sculpture called "Hybred Podacus" that I wish I could have in my home. More on that later.
All three artists enjoy national prominence, but I was unaware of them until TESC brought them to Olympia.
Bodine is a fiber artist originally from Seattle and now living on Whidbey Island. Cruz is a native of Harlem in New York City, now living in Portland. Davis, is a Southern Californian who attributes his art to influences from world travel. "The magic of the Southwest United States, Brazil, Haiti and West Africa has penetrated my work. ... and the colors and rhythms of the Pacific Rim continue to infiltrate."
The three artists combine varied materials and techniques including weaving, stitching, tying, painting, collaging, sculpting and more, with natural and manufactured materials to create artworks both traditional and innovative with a strong sense of connection to the earth and to peoples of many cultures. ... -- Alec Clayton
THEATER: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
The bitch of directing Shakespeare is the number of plates that must be kept spinning: a text packed with outdated language, a chorus of actors running on and off stage for dozens of scenes, and probably a concept Shakespeare never intended. If this daunting effort fails, the director gets most of the blame; we surely can't fault the author. If it works, each cast and crew member deserves credit. Material that seems as dense as theatrical calculus in Act I must feel breezy and offhand by Act V. And when the timeless magic of Shakespeare truly sings, we get the sense of all gears meshing in a glorious machine.
Much Ado About Nothing at Olympia Little Theatre is just such a production, and while its roster is impressively deep, it earns praise for its director, Terence Artz, most of all. ... -- Christian Carvajal
LOCAL FILM: KARI BAUMANN'S DECORATE YOUR FACE
Tacoma's freelance makeup artist Kari Baumann has her own business, and she calls it Decorate Your Face. I hear that name and immediately a mental movie begins playing of Baumann gleefully chucking handfuls of foundation and glitter (glitter?) at her clients' cheeks, with all the expressionistic exuberance of Jackson Pollock. Don't ask me why.
But Baumann's real-life work, though more subtle than this fantasy, functions equally effective. Since establishing her trade in 2005, local movie productions have mainly called upon Baumann's talents in decorating actors' faces in more naturalistic ways. Yet sometimes the end product can still shock, as it does in director Ron Lagman's short Tapat Sa Pangako (Committed) (which premiered in Tacoma last month and played this past weekend at Seattle's Post Alley Film Festival). Viewers won't easily shake off one of the movie's most striking images: the near-black bruises running across an abused woman's back, which Baumann created. ... -- Christopher Wood
How many voices does one concert need? One? Several? Maybe 50? Saturday in Olympia the sixth annual 100 Voices Concert will offer more amazing voices in one place than you could ever desire, combining the talents of the Saint Martin's University Chorale, the Opera Pacifica Chorus, the South Puget Sound Community College Choirs and the Olympia Chamber Orchestra for an evening sure to be highlighted by the planned in-English performance of A German Requiem by Johannes Brahms. ... - Weekly Volcano
PLUS: COMPREHENSIVE ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT LISTINGS
PLUS: EVEN MORE LOCAL THEATER COVERAGE
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