Comment Archives: Stories: Arts and Culture: Last 30 Days
Re: “Local Filmmakers' A Measure of the Sin Tonight at Belcourt”
A Measure of the Sin: Prescient of the terrible Cleveland tragedy! The women bonded as a captive family and only one dared to attempt the escape from the childhood fears, to soaring joys and tenderful love!
Freedom from the tyrant! The healing begins. Dissimilar stories! ART imitating life again!
"A Measure of the Sin: Every childhood is normal...to the child that lives it. For Meridith that means an enchanted seclusion that is shattered when she is deprived of her mother. Desparate and alone, Meredith must join a household with other women and their children, a sinister man who controls every facet of her existence and a vicious bear that only she can see. As life in this world becomes increasingly strange and frightening, Meredith realizes
that she must flee, even though she fears she has not learned enough to survive on her own."
"Powerful end of the rope drama! A Measure of the Sin! You will love it!We did!"
"Childhood fears, soaring joys and tenderful love!"
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
Years ago I was invited to a party at a friend of a friend's. I heard that in the barn was a guy making gunpowder to load into rocket engines. I loved model rocketry and decided that I needed to meet this guy. We talked about black powder rockets and he supervised while I loaded one myself.
At some point I realized that I was talking with “The Don Evans,” an “amazing artist” who many friends of mine had told me I needed to meet. We had a good laugh about our serendipitous meeting and became great friends. I was fortunate to have participated in several of Don's events, including Burning Banjos and a performance at Vanderbilt in which I played a dancing star.
I will always appreciate the way Don inspired so many of us to do something meaningful and creative with our lives. He lived what he taught and what he believed. You can't ask for more than that.
—Landry Butler
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
What made Don so special is that when the rest of us talk about living life to the fullest, he was actually doing it. Each day presented another opportunity to do something new and exciting. The process of making art can be intimidating, especially for those of us who don’t see ourselves as particularly gifted. When you took a class with Don, or were around him, he had no patience for that kind of thinking. Worrying about whether something was “good” or not got in the way of the most important thing about art: the process of making it.
Don’s favorite type of art was the kind that brought people together to create it. He was an expert at creating a community by engaging others to participate in one of his many projects to build a tower of fireworks tower or a rocket ship. When you got to that final moment of lighting the fuse on the fireworks or the rocket, watching Don’s excitement experiencing it was just as fun as watching the art itself. His infectious laugh and pure joy was what made it all so special.
Don never lost the beautiful imagination that most of us leave behind in childhood. Just last Saturday, he was telling me and my friends, Jim and Angela, about his trip to Mars with his friend John Hadley. He said when they returned, Sheryl wouldn’t let him in the house with all of the moon dust on his socks, so he had to take them off to enter. Don said he had to store them in plexiglass and sent Jim into the next room to find them. When Jim emerged, he brought a framed piece of art comprised of those socks covered in moon dust, which were documentation of that journey.
I feel so blessed that I was able to see Don just before he embarked on his latest adventure. I bet he’s looking down from the bright star that he’s on and becoming frustrated with us spending so much time fussing over him. So before he gets more exasperated with us, make sure to work on something fun. You know he is.
-Lucia Folk
Re: “Local Filmmakers' A Measure of the Sin Tonight at Belcourt”
Only the Toreador dares stand eyeball to eyeball to his primitive opponent waiting for its furious charge to allow it's horns to be his safety guides as his ballet muscled body.Toro raises his head as to throw the puny human while toreador, raising up, has his sword drawn from his cape and with two hands forcefully drives his surgically honed weapon directly into the vital area, stopping the furiously charging beast by piercing the heart, Toro stops dead on the spot as has been demonstrated for the ages. Cheers and jeers scream from the crowds. Cries of nays or praise both echo but only the toreador risks life and limb by balancing between the horns and wielding the death blow.
Who in their right mind would try to please everyone. It is accomplished in all of the arts by gently massaging the Emotions, the emotions of the performers touching the viewer, or reader and turning them into participants. Apathy is failure. Emotional response is success!
The Arts are for the people! The people are for the Arts! Enjoy!
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
Don was my teacher and one of the most generous artists I have ever known. He was always focused outward, connecting with people - waking us up, spurring us to choreograph and make grand creations (The bigger the better!) - that was his art. I remember in the early nineties he was one of the early adopters of social media. He showed me how he was using the computer to connect with people he knew via their pictures, art and stories. This was really strange to me as I had only just been introduced to email (and had little interest in it), but it was very important to him and exciting. People were important to Don. In my artwork, he told me there were no mistakes and chastised me for taking my pen off the paper and working things over too much. The point was the process, and the richness of the experience caught in the thought and the effort of creating.
Re: “John Scarpati's photos from L.A.'s punk and glam heyday come to Bongo Java”
The depiction of crossroad of the worlds above is spot on!
Now picture me headed in with a box full of receipts to see Keith Clark
raise the anti with a stop by Smalls on the way home, and a lean over the bar to ask Keith Morris for a Negroni
Yup – that's Hollywood! \,,/ ( > < ) \,,/
Re: “Stephen King-John Mellencamp-T Bone Burnett Musical Coming to Ryman Oct. 16”
I hope the Ryman has enough mops for the stage blood.
Re: “John Scarpati's photos from L.A.'s punk and glam heyday come to Bongo Java”
it's an intriguing and accurate capture of the creative being that IS Scarpati...
one quibble: Crossroads of the World was a very retro office compound. for years, music managers, accountants and various "service" providers were based there
...and it literally looked like a ride rejected by Disney for being a little too shabby, a little too kitsch, which only made me love it more!
viva that iconic portrait of the Cramps & long live the Screaming Sirens --
Re: “Cahiers du Coco: Brief Encounter”
I just wanted to say that I love this feature and I look forward to each post. Thanks and keep up the good work.
Re: “Local Filmmakers' A Measure of the Sin Tonight at Belcourt”
Hannah's books are still sometimes available through the Amazon network at bargain prices: Eves Daughter, 1962 and Time.Wait 1984. These petite hardcover literary giants are growing harder to acquire as prices escalate on readers demand. Either of these gems will bring joy to your soul. We especially like Eves Daughter for her scope encompassing her most treasured expressions. Enjoy!
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
He wore white to our wedding... a white tuxedo with tails complete with white bow tie and sprayed painted white combat boots. The life moment captured forever on mental film. Uncle Don knew how to celebrate family.
He sat on the western Michigan lake shore with our children every summer and patiently exampled how to REALLY sculpture a sand castle. Our daughter was awestruck. Uncle Don knew how to inspire.
He shared his pyrotechnic knowledge with calculated trial and error lessons... and those heavenly rewarding displays. Our son was mesmerized. Uncle Don knew to launch a shooting star.
He took whatever life handed him and crafted something useful and beautiful. Everything had appreciative worth and a "do something" purpose in his eyes. Uncle Don knew how to create.
He recognized the rarity of pure joy and knew how to laugh... an honest from the heart and deep from within the soul, belly laugh. The man was generous with his happiness. Uncle Don knew how to breathe.
He accepted you for who...what, when, where, how, and why you were... no matter. Finding and acknowledging good was his utmost, revering talent. Uncle Don knew how to love... and be loved.
Uncle Don, you were a Blue Moon. And we loved you.
Dawn
Re: “My Balls and My Word: Al Pacino as Scarface This Weekend at Belcourt”
It's really fun to watch Scarface and pretend that Tony was the bastard son of Michael Corleone, conceived during his trip to Havana in 1958.
Re: “Local Filmmakers' A Measure of the Sin Tonight at Belcourt”
Hannah Kahn, fresh from college, was hired as the $100.00 per month poetry editor of the Miami Herald.
Some of her brilliant poems first appeared in: American Mercury, American Scholar, Children Limited, Experiment, Florida Magazine of Verse, Good Housekeeping, Harpers, Ladies Home Journal, Literary Review, Lyric, McCalls, New York Times, Patterns, Poetry Chapbook, Poetry Review (London), Poetry World, Prairie Schooner, Recurrence, Saturday Evening Post, Saturday Review, Southwest Review, Span, The Survey, Voices, and Yankee.
She made Grateful Acknowledgment to the Poetry Society of Georgia for: Grief Has No Voice (Jane Judge Memorial Award) 1951. Tenement House Mother (Conrad Aiken Award) 1960
Poetry Society of Virginia for The last Delay, (Norfolk Award) 1954
Poetry Society of Great Britain and America for Asylum which won the Howard Parsons Inter-national Sonnet in 1956.
Suddenly she became a widow, Frank the love of her life was gone. Now it was just Hannah and Vivian.
VIVIAN by Hannah
All things inanimate
because of her
are brought to bloom
By her own light
she brings a star
into a room
As though a match
were held against
a shadowed wall
she, by her touch,
can make full-blown
what had been small.
Like any Great Woman and Mother, Hannah took a job in a North Miami family furniture store. She stayed in the Arts by volunteering as our part time assistant poetry editor for our Florida Arts Gazette.
This beautiful soul left a void in our earthly domain when she joined the angels in 1989. I Thank you Hannah Kahn for bringing your luminosity into our lives. I think of you often.
You live in my heart. Love!
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
The last time I did stuff with Don was in 2010. I drove up from Atlanta to be part of "Burning Banjos 3". Here's an excerpt from my blog post about the event, and Don -
"...But perhaps the one person who catalyzed me artistically in those days was Don Evans. Don was an art professor at Vanderbilt, and would do eclectic and quirky art projects under the auspices of Little Marrowbone Repair Corporation ("a bunch of friends that get together and do stuff"). I knew of Don by reputation, but had never really met him until (The Mind's Eye Group made our public debut with) Fringe Dances (1986). He was in the audience, and afterwards came up and shook mine & Jason's hands with such energy and genuine effusiveness that we knew we had obviously made a connection. Don invited us to come visit him at the university, and offered up his resources to help us develop our work. One of our subsequent productions took place in the beautiful marbled lobby of the art building at Vanderbilt. Don taught us about slides, video, darkroom techniques, performance art history. We "did stuff" at Little Marrowbone happenings out at his farm just outside of Nashville. He loaned us projection equipment until we could get our own. Most of all he just simply provided inspiration and support...
He's a quirky, gentle and eclectic soul and I'm a bigger person for having known him, and when I heard about his "Burning Banjos" event (the first Little Marrowbone event in almost ten years!), well I simply had to make a pilgrimage and pay homage to those that got me where I am today. And pay homage I did - making glorious improvised noise to accompany a range of pyrotechnics and dance (thanks to LeeAnne's Blue Moves dance company). I hope this isn't the last time I get to "do stuff" with Don & Little Marrowbone."
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
Don always made you feel he was genuinely glad to see you. He inspired you to "do something!" Don was a gentle glowing example of a real man, one that LIVED life. Thank you Don for the dazzling explosion you were, you lit up our eyes then gently drifted off like smoke on the breeze. One of a kind, you will be missed.
Michael Parrish
Re: “Nashville Community Darkroom, Film Photography Revivalists, Launches Kickstarter”
God, quit trying to be Wes Anderson. We already have one of those.
Re: “Local Filmmakers' A Measure of the Sin Tonight at Belcourt”
A woman who was held in awe by male English speaking poets, my friend Hannah Kahn.
Signature
by Hannah Kahn C1954
If I sing because I must
being made of singing dust,
and I cry because of need
being born of watered seed,
and I grow like twisted tree
having neither symmetry
nor the structure to avert
the falling axe, the minor hurt,
yet of one thing I am sure
that this bears my signature,
that I knew love when it came
and I called by its name.
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
I met Don at UT Knoxville in 1960 when I was 19, two years into an electrical engineering program. We became roommates and lifelong friends. He never lost patience with me as I struggled over the years to understand art, and in particular, his art. I was fortunate to have witnessed his creation of countless doodles in real time. We were two-thirds of The Cripple Creek Boys bluegrass band at UT.........and of course Don’s old time banjo style was his and his alone...............
Fred Applegate
Re: “Don Evans, 1939-2013”
I was a little girl daydreaming in the back seat one day, when I saw the most magnificent vision through the window. A car . . . a wonderful car, shaped like a silly yet majestic head with flowing beard and curls. Inside was a man who smiled and waved at my awestruck face.
Many years later I was one of Don's students, only making the connection between him and that childhood memory when I SAW it -- the same wonderful car, now resting peaceably in his backyard. I will never forget him.
Re: “Inside This Week's Art Story: Outtakes and Inspiration From John Scarpati”
Hello author, I actually took the cover photo for Redd Kross' Researching The Blues - but John Scarpati did the color correction and noise reduction on it :)