Best of 2014: Visual Art

"I stop,
gather wet wood,
cut dry shavings, and for her,
whose face I held in my hands
a few hours, whom I gave back
only to keep holding the space where she was,

I light
a small fire in the rain."
-Galway Kinnell, "Under the Maud Moon"

I fell down a little bit on the job here. I didn't hit nearly the galleries or museums I hit in previous years, and I didn't make it to any out of town spots except New York and Cleveland, but the high points were high. Of the 55 or so shows I saw this year, these 10 stunned me to tears or made me want to try, desperately, hungrily, to articulate what it did to me. This is a series of snapshots of me still trying and still coming up short.

As with the other three posts, everything is in Columbus except otherwise stated.

1. Chris Ofili, Night and Day (New Museum, NYC) – I knew the controversy, of course, growing up when I did. And I knew a few of the pieces. But I was wholly unprepared to walk into the New Museum on a frigid November afternoon and be confronted by who – in my unbeliever's eyes – might be the greatest Christian artist working today. Starting with the beautifully human and distorted sculpture of St. Sebastian in grey and browning metal, limbs trying to pull out two gleaming silver arrows and tapering out to almost tentacles while the entire body is bedecked with hastily hammered and bent nails, Ofili said things to me about the horrifying nature of transcendence and the dangers of belief that I can't quite put into words. Time stopped. From there, every few feet held another explosion, something else driving me deeper into myself but also showing me this perspective I had some historical context for but still at an angle to myself. Small character studies in the Afro Muses series, the famous large, sensual paintings like "The Holy Virgin Mary" using glittering, vibrating artificial colors in paint along with things connecting the sensation back to the Earth like elephant dung, but the material doesn't desecrate the subject; the reality elevates it back up and makes it greater. The Ofili Chapel paintings of images slow to reveal their horrors - lynchings, soldiers - in black in a dimly lit room that look like they're glowing like Rothko. Grotesqueries that rise above jokes like "Shithead" with the artist's own hair, human teeth and a lump of elephant dung like a holy artifact you could get out of an underground comic book. Ofili's a stunning religious artist because he cares so deeply – deeply enough to be outraged by, but you never feel like he hates – about the world. There's no story without a human voice. There's no image without the human brain and art to make sense out of it. There's no God without someone to believe, without someone who needs to believe. There's no sainthood without a horrible death.
2. Carrie Mae Weems, Three Decades of Photography and Video (Guggenheim, NYC) – There was an overwhelming temptation to just write "My God" three times talking about this. As you can see, I try to overcome that in the ensuing words, maybe to everybody's detriment. Weems' work has always made my blood run cold whenever I've encountered her, most recently (before this) in the Wexner Center's terrific Blues for Smoke, but seeing this retrospective of her career up to now is one of the great chronicles of the important work of playing witness I can possibly imagine. Her work goes deep into her family history (deceptively simple candid-seeming photographs with paragraphs of oral history). She looks at the arc of black history as it's told to outsiders and sometimes internalized, through portraits tinted with shocking monochromatic colors of models posed as stereotypes or once-accepted horrifyingly racist bric-a-brac. And then the full flowering of this, "From Here I Saw What Happened And I Cried," tinting and overlaying text on photographs originally used to illustrate a racist essay in a red you can't gloss over. I started crying myself somewhere in the middle, but was lifted up that someone did this, that this work expended to fight back the dragon of forgetting won't be forgotten itself. All of the formal beauty and the conceptual rigor were deployed in the holy service of this much-needed needle in your eyes. My God. My God. My God.
3. Robert Gober, The Heart is Not a Metaphor (Museum of Modern Art, NYC) – It sure seems like I cried a lot in galleries this year. Maybe that's good. Maybe I needed it.This huge retrospective of Gober's work, much of which dealt with the AIDS crisis, was bracing and vibrated with deep, meditative space. The early work, children's cribs and sinks subtly then more and more pointedly distorted, did the hard work of changing my perception of the world in a way not much art ever has. But that electricity was just acclimating me to Gober's vocabulary and scraping a layer of skin off for his more immersive work. Legs appearing to come out of the wall, whole bodies subsumed by walls, by the institution, by all institutions,  sometimes anointed by candles. Sinks buried in the ground like tombstones, a reminder that we can never get as clean as we want. And for me, maybe the most moving piece, his room-sized snapshot of 9/11, pews with empty clothes, a headless torso crucified with water flowing out of holes where its nipples would go and Times pages like windows – almost the after-image from a nuclear blast, but that blast was concentrated pain. There's so much to unpack in this I barely scratched the surface, but there were lessons about understanding yourself and how to engage with the world even as you know it will let you down that I grasped immediately, or they grasped me. And they wouldn't let me go. That's why, with all the great work I saw at MoMA this year – Jasper Johns' Regrets, Sigmar Polke's Alibis, Gauguin's Metamorphoses, Matisse's Cut Outs – this towers over them in my head and helped me face the day even as it preoccupied my thoughts for hours..
4. Various Artists, Cruzamentos: Contemporary Art in Brazil (Wexner Center for the Arts) – Most of the narrative about the Wexner Center this year will be about Transfigurations, and rightly so, with so many undisputed masterpieces in one place. But for me, Cruzamentos was the eye-opener. This survey of the Brazillian art scene was packed so full of surprises and delights that I should have seen this 10 times instead of 5 (blame the brutally cold winter). Lucia Koch’s installations were my favorites, glimpses into another world that reminded me a little of Anish Kapoor, and an astonishing installation/film loop by Jonathas de Andrade using a horse race as a metaphor, a calling back to prankster art and a cracking of nostalgia. Adrianas Varejao’s Polvo reminded me how different – but sadly, similar – conversations about race are in other countries, with newly crafted paints built around a ‘70s survey of how citizens identified their skin color used to paint classical portraits. There was so much that took my breath away with horror and delight – this was a great example of how grant money can really benefit an institution and an audience (and, I hope, the artists).
5. Diana Al-Hadid, s/t (Canzani Center at Columbus College of Art and Design) – Massive sculptures that don’t look unfinished so much as decaying, their essence melting off the frameworks, headless bodies climbing what looks like an old hillside development. Gaps shot through these stunning monuments to façade and falsehood, like the centerpiece Nolli’s Orders or the ropy dream logic of Head in the Clouds. This had a redemptive, purging quality like Richard Serra’s giant metal sculptures; there’s a gravity you can get lost in but you can also unburden yourself to. I must have seen this half a dozen times and wish I’d gone even more often.
6. Maria Lassnig, s/t (MoMA PS1, NYC) – Similar to Ofili, Lassnig was a name I’d heard but I’d never seen more than a couple of pieces. This Austrian artist presented some of the most beautiful depictions of the struggle for freedom and the effort to live up to – or free yourself from – your fantasy life. The weight of the world and the static and disjunction of memory and perception are hard to ignore here, things always fading and snapping into focus. Much like Chagall, she used the tools she wanted from the movements she touched over a long and varied career – surrealism, minimalism, abstract expressionism – but she used what she wanted and no more. She absorbed what she wanted from what she touched but she never, from the evidence of this amazing retrospective, lost sight of her own voice. 
7. Carla Klein, s/t (Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, NYC) – This was probably the most successful blending of photography and painting I’ve ever seen. Expansive landscapes implying motion, often views of careening around a turn or on a road looking over a flat expanse, with paint blurring the edges or creating the equivalent of photographic imperfections, sometimes dissolving into just an acid blur of color over the side or scratches on the “film.” There was something very arresting and meditative about these canvases; when I walked back out onto the Chelsea street, the air had a tint I didn’t expect and it felt like time was moving in a subtly different current. 
8. Will Eisner, 75 Years of Graphic Storytelling (Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum) – The renovated Billy Ireland has been a massive force for good in Columbus, both in having room to display more of the amazing collection and mount bigger exhibits, and also in the attention it’s brought to the art form. The Calvin and Hobbes retrospective got the most attention, but everything they mounted this year was worth seeing and worth recommending. I want to call specific attention to the Will Eisner show of this fall, an incredible influence on comic book storytelling over the decades of his career. This captured some of everything – his use of cinematic techniques no one had yet translated to a comics page, his work on educational and industrial comics, his plainspoken storytelling and that beautiful line work. A great introduction for new fans, but for people like me who’d been in awe of Eisner’s work for most of our lives, this was heaven. 
9. Korakit Arunanondchai, s/t (MoMA PS1, NYC) – This first US museum exhibition by this Thai artist dismantled any cynicism I had at least for a little while. Paintings and inkjet splashes on denim and video installations; a finger in the eye of your notions of authenticity but also a slashing attack at the way globalization has steamrolled work and created a sameness of culture. This deals with identity and the need to control your representation, but also how hard it is to separate this from your intake of media. The importance of being more than just a series of signifiers, but also an understanding of how signifiers can bring comfort to you. There was an edgy, earnest magic in this I don’t get enough of.
10. Lee Krasner and Norman Lewis, From the Margins ( Jewish Museum, NYC) – This was a delight, the parallel tracks of Lee Krasner, whose painting I’ve loved for many years, and Norm Lewis, whose work I didn't really know at all, in the wake of Abstract Expressionism and much later. Thick daubs of color and lines that snake and spiral that feel as much influenced by the night air in the city as by any tradition, but still informed and infused by a deep understanding of tradition. These were roadmaps back to places in my heart I hadn't seen in a while.
    

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Announcement and She Kills Monsters Review moved (includes link)

Hello!

I'm going to be writing about theater for Columbus Underground (http://www.columbusunderground.com/) going forward and everything else still here (for now), including theatre stuff outside of the CU scope.

The first review is a general audience edit of the She Kills Monsters review so I've taken it down today after submitting it on to my editor there. You can find the new and improved review here: http://www.columbusunderground.com/theatre-review-available-lights-season-opener-she-kills-monsters-a-delightful-journey-into-fantasy-rs1

As always, thanks for reading and I hope you follow me over.

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Best of 2014: Theatre

"Live, you crazy mother

fucker!

Live!
& organize
yr shit
as rightly
burning!"
-Amiri Baraka, "AM/TRAK"

1. How We Got On by Idris Goodwin (Available Light Theatre) – I wrote about Goodwin’s phenomenal play at some length already. This knocked me around in the best way; the only other thing this year I can compare it to for sheer feel-good (but not dumb or uncomplicated) joy is She Kills Monsters a couple slots below. This story about taking your first steps into creative work and self-actualization against the backdrop of the early tendrils of hip-hop’s ascendance to primary art form DNA of the last quarter of the 20^th century was magic from beginning to end. The characters worked as poetic archetype, but they were so beautifully played they still felt like unpredictable, screwed-up (in a good way) kids - from David Glover’s trying to find his own way to Kayla Jackmon’s diamond-hard intensity leavened by a beautiful playfulness to Rudy Frias’s intense boasting and charisma belying a burning insecurity. And Wilma Hatton as The Selector, combination narrator, DJ, and every adult authority figure who wanders into frame, nearly steals the show. Drew Eberly’s direction is spot-on, keeping this moving like a close game or a raging party.
2. Father Comes Home From the Wars Part 1, 2, and 3 by Suzan Lori-Parks (Public Theatre, NYC) – This was everything Lori-Parks does, amplified and in glorious over-saturated color. The beginning of a cycle inspired by The Odyssey and built around the civil war, this tells a moving, mythopoetic story about a slave named Hero (played magnificently by Sterling K. Brown) and his circle including Homer (Jeremie Harris) and Penny (Jenny Jules), the Rebel army represented by a drunk, insecure colonel (a brilliant Ken Marks), and a prisoner (a heartbreaking Louis Cancelmi), as Hero goes to war, comes back, and tries to find some peace. All of the acting, with special attention to Jenny Jules and Peter Jay Fernandez, is perfect, and the direction by Jo Bonney couldn’t be bettered. It’s about America, how we got here, and how screwed up we all are. It’s about unwinnable battles and untenable situations and how much you compromise until you break – how you do damage to people you should love and care for and how you struggle to do right. It’s about the way the tale and the teller argue for primacy and truth but also refresh each other’s blood. It’s about the terror of the future but the greater terror of old patterns repeating ad nauseam.
3. Vidas Perfectas by Robert Ashley, translated by Javier Sainz de Robles (Whitney Museum, NYC) – I still remember the first time I heard Robert Ashley’s television opera, and it made the same impression on me as the first time I saw a Rauschenberg or the first time I heard Monk. Another peak in that kind of modernism I loved so much, ironic-hip slang and double talk spun around a deep empathy and a sense of magic that’s hard to sum up in words. I saw one of my favorite sections, The Bar (El Bar here), and one of my all-time heroes, Ned Sublette, appeared as the lounge singer R with the riveting pianist Elio Villafranca along with Raul de Nieves and Elisa Santiago, all brilliant. The Spanish translation spoke to America as it is now and also a mythic west, and the set/taping for television had a plastic feeling both comforting and very unsettling. This was amplified by Alex Waterman’s direction, which managed to be both tense and loose at the same time. “We don’t serve fine wine in half pints, buddy.”
4. Straight White Men by Young Jean Lee (Young Jean Lee Theater Group presented by the Wexner Center) – I think I said last year, when writing about We’re Gonna Die, that Young Jean Lee is one of those people who inevitably reminds me to work much, much harder. Possibly her most straightforward play finds her drifting toward Annie Baker territory, a deceptive naturalism that hides and shades a brilliantly weird depth. It delves into what privilege means and the additional complications that come from trying to acknowledge it and slip out of its grip, the soft, purring cat that will eat you that we call comfort (apologies to Jim Sallis). It performs a hard task, understanding and having compassion while not letting you off the hook. Sometimes it’s hard to look away from and sometimes the laughs rain down so easily that you don’t see the uppercut coming. Thank you to the Wexner Center for helping commission this and presenting its premiere.
5. We Are Proud to Present A Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as Southwest Africa, From the German Sudwestafrika, Between the Years 1884-1915 by Jackie Sibblies Drury (Available Light Theatre) – I wrote about this at some length here [LINK], comparing and contrasting it to How We Got On, and itmay have been the most difficult piece any local company put on this year. An unflinching look at race, at how we shape and process history, at how there’s always someone on the bottom of every joke, at how so very much art is built on the backs of people who didn’t get a say, that’s at turns jaw-droppingly funny and jaw-droppingly depressing, sometimes turning at a whiplash pace. Perfectly directed by Matt Slaybaugh and with a cast it would be impossible to better, including Ben Jones who was a revelation, Shanelle Marie whose work was new to me but blew me away, and actors whose work I already loved clearing the already high bar set for them: David Glover, Acacia Duncan, Jordan Fehr, and Matt Hermes. On a minimal set with characters not drawn very specifically and language that worked on so many (sometimes contrasting) levels at the same time it would make Harold Pinter blush, they made the kind of magic you only get in a room sharing each other’s breath, and made at least a few people sleep a little less easy that night.
6. She Kills Monsters by Qui Nguyen (Available Light Theatre) – I just wrote about this and it’s the only thing on my list still playing as I post this, so of course I encourage you to see it. A different facet of the light aspects of How We Got On, with less thematic rigor but a very similar sense of the childlike first steps to the joy of creation, and another exquisite cast, held down by Krista Lively Stauffer as Agnes Evans and Kimberly Martin as her sister Tilly, with a pitch-perfect rotating constellation of supporting characters around them including Whitney Thomas Eads, Mark Hale, Laura Crone, Jordan Fehr, Emma Lou Harris, Allison Brogan, and Adam Humphrey. Ian Short’s direction is the perfect blend of lighthearted and deeply sad, exciting but with a real gravity.
7. Operetta Burlesque by Emma Dante (Sud Costa Occidentale presented with the OSU Theatre Department) - Maybe the sexiest evening I spent at the theater and one of the funniest. One of Emma Dante's troupes earliest tours of the US brought us a frenetic, wild look at a 40 year old man, Pietro, still stuck living with his parents and spending what money he makes on weekend trips to the nearest big city for glittering women's clothing and love that's clearly going to end badly, with the flashpoint being the man he's finally found "true love" with telling him he's going to stay with his wife and threatening to kill him. But the meat of the piece is Pietro's self-image, a very beautiful woman, in righteous, electrifying dance sequences. As much as I loved this, I'd also like to admonish the OSU group that brought them to town for not listing the cast on the webpage. Make it easy for those of us who want to tell people but didn't save the program.
8. Brownsville Song (B-Side for Tray) by Kimber Lee (LCT3 at Lincoln Center Theatre, NYC) – This was a heartbreaking study in empathy telling an all-too-familiar story of a promising young man cut down in random violence. Sheldon Best as Tray is a star, giving a perfectly calibrated performance that hits every beat it needs to, and Lizan Mitchell as his grandmother Lena is a supernova, taking the “wise grandmother holding her family together” archetype into a three-dimensional relief that reminds you of every person who ever had an influence on you (and made me miss my grandmother a great deal). Sun Mee Chomet, Taliyah Whitaker, and especially Chris Myers all also made deep impressions without a lot of stage time. Patricia McGregor’s direction kept this taut play moving and tightly wound; the sequences where everything stopped for Tray and his sister to dance were some of the most beautiful things I saw in a theater all year. What this lacked in originality it made up for with a knowing eye and a throbbing heart.
9. Act One by James Lapine, adapted from the memoir by Moss Hart (Lincoln Center Theatre, NYC) –There were some issues with this – it really could have used an editor – but it scratched my itch for a traditional three-act structure and classic Broadway razzle-dazzle (its spell-binding turntable set turned me into a 9-year-old boy seeing Phantom of the Opera again) like nothing else I saw this year. A giant cast, all perfectly fine, especially Santino Fontana as young Moss Hart, was held together and made sing by Tony Shaloub as George Kaufman/older Moss Hart/Moss Hart’s father. Shaloub's might be the finest performance I’ve ever seen on a stage. It’s no exaggeration to say it’s in the top five; a case study in the way you can turn caricature into complexity with just a couple twists of the screws. This is the kind of big-canvas play almost no one does anymore but Lincoln Center keeps commissioning and pushing, and we’re all better for it.
10. The Room Nobody Knows by Kuro Tanino (Niwa Gekidan Penino presented by Wexner Center for the Arts) - I wrote about this at some length already and the images have stuck with me since. Tanino's heavily Freudian psychodrama used surreal elements and twisted figments of fantasy to pack a disturbing, hilarious punch.

As this is the first of the wrap-up posts, I’m going to get a little vague and rambly. Try to suppress your shock.

In a year so fraught with pain around me and some echoing pain of my own, I found great solace looking back at a year that was full to the bursting with art. Art that put me in touch with things it’s easier to shut away and art that made me desperately want to articulate something. That made me bemoan crowds that weren’t there and fall in love a little bit with the few of us who were. That made me overjoyed to have to elbow through a packed house. That left me speechless, that left me slackjawed, that made me feel like a fraud, that made me believe in being human again. And when I revisited it, it still helped me find my way back from whatever nonsense I was preoccupied with. Art that cut through the noise, the omnipresent static and empty chatter of teeth, the whine of invisible wires, and I felt that shiver up my back or that knife at my throat. I felt it and I was glad to be there, to be here, to be alive in this moment and to have made the choice to keep going out in the world and glad to have made the choice to be sitting or standing there, soaking this in.

That’s what I’m here to proselytize for. I don’t expect people reading this to share most of my tastes (though if you didn’t share some of them, why would you bother?), but if we have points of intersection, talk about what you like and what you don’t, argue with your friends. Please go deeper into what you love, what makes you feel alive, what keeps your brain firing even as the minutiae grinds it into oatmeal every day. Some of your friends already don’t have this choice. Some of your friends are already gone. Use the time and energy you have as wisely as you can and don’t beat yourself up for what you’ve wasted. I want this blog to be better about that, in addition to the previews, in the next year. That’s my challenge to myself. To talk more about what’s going on as it happens.

In theater there was a long line of honorable mentions – starting with things that *just* missed the top ten: the taut direction of Ian Short and brilliant acting of Elena Perantoni, David Glover, and Drew Eberly in Cock; Matt Slaybaugh’s tricky adaptation of Ben Lerner’s Leaving the Atocha Station and the mesmerizing performances of Ian Short, David Tull, Rudy Frias, and especially the volcanic Eleni Papaleonardos; the incredibly moving collaboration Thicker than Water, co-written by its actors, Nick Lingnofski and Michael Garrett Herring, and its director, John Dranschak; the symbiosis of Adrian Lester’s performance and Lolita Chakhrabati's writing in Red Velvet at St Ann’s in Brooklyn.

And other things that had one or more parts I thought worked beautifully but the whole didn’t cohere for me: the acting, especially Rudy Frias and Whitney Thomas Eads, in Dirty Math 2016: Days of Future Math; the anarchic energy and Kaitlin Descutner’s performance in the reading of The Performers; Acacia Duncan’s luminous performance in Cymbeline; Reed Birney and Brooke Bloom in Claire Barron’s You Got Older, even as the play tripped over itself and choked on what felt like undigested chunks of other playwrights, I didn’t doubt either of them in their roles for even a second, and Barron’s is a voice I very much want to hear again; Anthony Braxton’s score for Trillium J and the masterful singing, though I stumbled over the libretto; the chances taken in the workshop I saw of Camille Bullock’s Southern Cross the Dog, I promise you that’s a voice to watch out for in coming months and years, and the performance therein by Cameron Williamson.

There’s a bounty of pleasures if you’re willing to put in a little time.

 .

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"Hey, Fred!" Nights Out 12/08-12/14/2014

A much lighter week than last but still some gems, and if you have a chance amidst whatever shopping, festivities, football, etc, I especially encourage my theatre pick.

Theatre
She Kills Monsters by Qui Nguyen; Available Light Theatre, Studio Two, Riffe Center, 77 S. High St.  I reviewed this earlier this week and I'm going to give a quick note to see this. Ian Short’s return to directing after his riveting production of Cock earlier this year is a damn masterpiece. She Kills Monsters is an antidote to the too-common narrative that women find their way to gaming through boyfriends and a look at how roleplaying games are sometimes a step on the way to self-actualization, not a way to escape and shut yourself off. It's hilarious, it's sweet without being cloying, and it's pulse-pounding.  Thursday through Saturday at 8pm except December 11; Sunday matinee December 14 at 2pm. Tickets available at Ticketmaster or pay what you want at the door.

Music

December 10, 2014

Chris Knight; Rumba Cafe, 2507 Summit St.  One of the finest Americana singer-songwriters of the last 15 years, with a few mainstream country radio hits on other people (perhaps most notably Montgomery Gentry's take on "She Couldn't Change Me"), Knight has been making great records since his pair on Dualtone (including maybe the finest underrated country record of the '00s, The Jealous Kind) and reached a new peak on 2012's Little Victories. In a supple leather voice, Knight gives struggling characters a dignity and empathy reminiscent of classic Guy Clark or Dave Alvin. Local Tal Lohr opens.  Doors at 8:00pm. $20 Tickets available at Ticketweb.

December 12, 2014

Jesse Marchant; Tree Bar, 887 Chambers Rd.  Marchant's self-titled most recent record uses a jarring juxtaposition of heavy synths and his honeyed country baritone, but there's something about it that's intoxicating and hard to ignore. If you're looking for a lower-key Friday, this show should be a winner.  Starts at 10:00pm. $5 cover.

Funkdefy's James Brown Tribute; Bossy Grrl's Pinup Joint, 2598 N. High St.  Possibly my favorite dance night in Columbus. I haven't been a strong attendee of Funkdefy in its more erratic last couple years since moving over to Bossy Grrl's Pinup Joint, but there's no way I'm missing this. Begun almost impromptu a week or so after James Brown passed away, this mix of JB-related tracks and Christmas-themed soul will keep you warm for months.  Starts at 10:00pm. No cover.

December 13, 2014

Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue with Soul Rebels Brass Band; Newport Music Hall, 1722 N. High St.  A killing New Orleans funk double bill that might be the last great touring show of the year. Trombone Shorty's found a way to make his music more streamlined and palatable for a wide audience, but never abandoned that raw second-line swing or forgot his improvisational chops. Unlike so many jam bands, Trombone Shorty and company are oozing dynamics, knowing exactly how to whip a crowd into a frenzy and bring them down to a slow burn. And openers Soul Rebels are one of the finest torch-bearers of the brass band in this contemporary age. It doesn't matter how cold it's going to be outside, this show is going to be hot.  Doors at 7:00pm. $25 tickets available at Ticketmaster.

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"Hey, Fred!" Nights Out 12/01-12/06/2014

I apologize for the delay, my NYC trip killed two weeks and I decided to take the Thanksgiving week off. I hope you have been getting out and taking advantage of the dwindling lights (in all senses) of fall, and are girding your loins and battening down the hatches (again, in all senses) for the winter that will soon be upon us. But the calendar isn’t slowing down; this is one of the most packed weeks in recent memory.

Theatre

She Kills Monsters by Qui Nguyen; Available Light Theatre, Studio Two, Riffe Center, 77 S. High St.  I’m extremely excited for this – this play seems like a return to AVL’s sweet spot,

 and I can’t wait for Ian Short’s return to directing after his riveting production of Cock earlier this year. She Kills Monsters is an antidote to the too-common narrative that women find their way to gaming through boyfriends and a look at how roleplaying games are sometimes a step on the way to self-actualization, not a way to escape and shut yourself off. With a phenomenal cast including AVL mainstays Whitney Thomas Eads (one of the best things in Dirty Math 2016), Jordan Fehr (on a terrific hot streak this year), and Adam Humphrey (blew my mind in bobrauschenbergamerica and 33 Variations), and augmented by fresh faces who I’ve really enjoyed in other work like Actor’s Theatre’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Allison Brogan) or Short North Stage’s Sunday in the Park With George (Krista Lively Stauffer), and newcomers just out of school like Kimberly Martin and Emma Lou Andrews.  Opens December 4. Runs Thursday through Saturday at 8pm except December 11; Sunday matinee December 14 at 2pm. Tickets available at Ticketmaster or pay what you want at the door.

Music

December 1, 2014

Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas; The Basement, 391 Neil Ave.  One of the brightest lights in Detroit’s current garage rock scene, Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas have been laying waste to stages for a few years and have seen a justified uptick in their profile with their first album, Secret Evil, out earlier this year. Raucous howling and slashing guitars never sacrifice the “roll” part of the equation with a series of dancefloor stomps. Locals Van Dale and Toledo native Dean Tartaglia open.  Doors at 7:00pm. $10 tickets at TicketMaster..

Ishmael Ali’s Zebec; Dick’s Den, 2417 N. High St.  Columbus expat Ali is back in town for the weekend and he’s playing a rare Monday show at Dick’s. One of my favorite composers here who didn’t hit my radar until not long before he left town, this should be a treat. Accompanied by a slew of great players including Billy Wolfe on reeds, Mike Humpherys on bass, Thom Caminito on tenor sax, and Matthiesesn Nisch Quan on drums. Bigger and better writeup by Andrew Patton at JazzColumbus.  Starts at 9:30pm. $4 cover.

Puce Mary with Ligature, Liebestod, Unholy Two, and Melted Men; The Summit, 2210 Summit St.  Maybe the most exciting show of the week. Denmark's Frederikke Hoffmeier's Puce Mary project brings its throbbing beats and taste for surreal detail with Ligature (featuring members of The Men, from the Ascetic House collective) and Liebestod (a solo project of Jesse Sanes from Hoax) and two of Columbus's finest, Unholy Two and Melted Men.  Doors at 9pm. $5 cover.

December 2, 2014

Todd May; Natalie’s Coal-Fired Pizza, 5601 N. High St.  The finest singer-songwriter in town (“And I’ll stand on Ron House’s coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that” – A. (after Steve Earle)) is hitting a new stride and getting a lot of long-overdue attention with his co-writes and indispensible lead guitar on Lydia Loveless’s record Somewhere Else and opening slots on many of those dates, and still riding his classic record Rickenbacker Girls (one of my top 5 records last year and a record I still play weekly). One of his solo sets should go over beautifully in one of my favorite rooms in town. The double bill is filled out by Jeff German of the Cur Dogs (and long ago Th’ Flyin’ Saucers) whose solo record 12 Rounds has gotten a lot of heat this year.  Starts at 8:00pm. $8 tickets at Vendini..

 Martin Savage Gang; Ace of Cups, 2619 N. High St.  Sweden's Martin Savage Gang played an outdoor Buccaneer show at Gonerfest a couple of years ago and split my wig. A thick layer of powerpop hooks and grooves laid over a prodigious bedrock of sleaze and grime. They're perfectly complimented by Raw Pony, one of Columbus's best bands who I think have come into their own this year, and other locals Nuclear Moms.  Doors at 9pm. $5 cover.

December 4, 2014

New Pollution with John Turck Trio and the Tony Monaco Trio; Woodlands Tavern, 1200 W. 3rd Ave.  An odd bill that speaks to the fascinating crosscurrents through genre in Columbus bands. One of our finest B-3 trios, Tony Monaco Trio, featuring guitar master Derek DiCenzo and terrific drummer Louis Tsamous, will lay down a bed of ferocious grooves and infectious, funky swing. Monaco is not to be missed when he plays in town between his jaunts to Europe or Japan. Following is the John Turck Trio, which features Turck, a strong tenor voice and one of the finest keyboard players in town in more pop context, augmented by Danny Cashin on bass and backing vocals and AJ Barnes on drums, who brings a sharper avant-garde edge to the proceedings but can lay down a pocket with the best of them. I saw the JT3 at Comfest and was blown away at how much tighter their songs have gotten. I'm not familiar with New Pollution, the headliners, but they're listed as a "soul/funk machine" and so should go over gangbusters with the crowd at Woodlands.  Doors at 7:30pm. $10 cover.

The Human Experience with SaQi and Scotty Boombox; Rumba Cafe, 2507 Summit St.  It's a pleasure seeing Scotty Boombox back making solo music with his new record, A Mime and a Thief, after several years with Ocean Ghost, the joyous joke-belying-real-darkness collaborative band with J. Rhodes .His return to downtempo, sensual electronics threaded by his voice is full of great songs with sticky hooks. Headlining are touring acts SaQi (whose work mines a similar seam) and The Human Experience.  Starts at 9pm. $10 cover.

 December 5, 2014

Lee Konitz Quartet; Wexner Center for the Arts, 1871 N. High St.  Legends don't loom much larger in American music than Lee Konitz and the fact that he's still touring at 87 is a marvel, much less that he's still working so close to the top of his game. From his work in the early '50s with Gerry Mulligan, Miles Davis, and Lennie Tristano, through one of my favorite records, Some New Stuff, with the rhythm section of Greg Cohen and Joey Baron in 2001, and up to his terrific quartet with Brad Mehldau, Charlie Haden, and Paul Motian, Live in Birdland, of just a couple years ago, he's still making beguiling, intoxicating music. His world-beating quartet of Dan Tepfer on piano, George Schuler on drums, and Jeremy Stratton on bass are more than up for the challenge. If you have any interest at all in jazz or I'd hazard to say in modern art, do not miss this.  Starts at 8pm. $18 tickets available at the Wexner Center website.

Elephant Wrecking Ball; Scarlet and Grey Cafe, 2203 N. High St.  This funky trio of trombone, bass, and drums features Scott Flynn from Pretty Lights and John Brown's Body on brass, Neal Evans from Dopeapod on drums, and Dan Africano whose long resume includes Zongo Junction (their appearance a couple of years ago at Woodlands is one of my favorite shows ever in that venue), Nicky Egan and NYC's well-loved cover act The Bayside Tigers on bass. It's an infectious, joyful mix and something people not immediately allergic to things jammy should make a point of checking out. Locals ALCON open.  Doors at 9:00pm. $5 cover.

Andyman-a-thon 2014 Benefit Concert; King Avenue 5, 945 King Ave.  The Andyman-a-thon benefit for children is one of the best traditions in Columbus and it's fantastic that Andy's friends (principally Quinn Fallon) and CD1025 keep that flame alive since his tragic loss, including with an annual show that includes people Andy personally championed and up-and-coming bands. This year, the former category includes Colin Gawel and the Lonely Bones, who are as satisfying a straight-forward roots-rock outfit as you'll find in this town when they're firing on all cylinders, and a reunion of the original lineup of the X-Rated Cowboys, who drew rabid fans in their day with their brand of wry honky-tonk songs and an energetic stage show. The newcomers include Damn the Witch Siren, whose synthpop gets stronger and tighter around their hooky songs every time I see them, and Comrade Question, whose middle ground of the Ventures and the Velvets makes them one of my favorite bands working in town right now. If you want to take the temperature of a slice of Columbus music past and present, this show will be very rewarding, and in a great room for a great cause. Starts at 7:30pm. $10 cover.

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"Hey, Fred!" Nights Out 11/03-11/09/2014

This week had me feeling a little under the weather and a little low, but back on the horse. Onward and upward, whoever checks this.

Visual Art

November 3, 2014

Lambert Family Lecture: Robert Storr and Carroll Dunham in Conversation; Wexner Center for the Arts, 1871 N, High St.  The lectures supported by the Lambert family endowment are always eye-opening and this meeting of Storr, dean of Yale University School of Art and the curator of the current treasure trove exhibition Transfigurations, and Dunham, whose work recalling both Cezanne and underground comics was seen in the fantastic Spring show Comic Future, discussing the still-pervasive influence by the masters on display at the Wexner Center is not to be missed.  Starts at 7pm. Free.

November 6, 2014

Heather McGill: The Color of Everything; CCAD Canzani Center, 60 Cleveland Ave.  This opening reception of Detroit sculptor Heather McGill’s current exhibition at the Canzani Center looks to extend the winning streak CCAD’s exhibition department has been on. There’s a deep love of ordinary materials, finding patterns and a sensual appreciation of color that opens other worlds of perception.  Starts at 6:30pm. Free.

November 7, 2014

Kerry James Marshall; Wexner Center for the Arts, 1871 N. High St.  Marshall’s work is always provocative and incredibly humane. His solo exhibition Every Beat of My Heart is one of my favorite things ever on display at the Wex, with its juxtaposition of bunraku puppetry and comic book storytelling, and he also had pieces in the recent Blues For Smoke. His talk touching on the influence of Giacometti, Dubuffet, and Picasso should be a fascinating bookend for the Lambert Family Lecture on Monday.  Starts at 7:30pm. Free.

Theatre

November 8, 2014

24 Hour Theatre; Riffe Center Studio One, 77 S. High St.  Available Light Theatre’s only November show is a doozy – much of the cream of the Columbus theater scene (technicians, actors, writers, directors) broken up into smaller groups on Friday evening to create wholly new short plays to premier the next night. An energy not likely to be duplicated, and knowing the work of more than half the people involved as well as I’d do I’d bet on some moments of sublime beauty forged in the crucible of that risk and adrenaline. The Aoife O’Donovan show (see below under Music) at the same time means I won’t be in attendance for this, but I’m heartsick to miss it.  Starts at 8:00pm. Pay what you want tickets at the door.

Music

November 3, 2014

The Maxies and The Girls!; Café Bourbon Street, 2216 Summit St.  The Maxies, a California-by-way-of-Greenland pop punk band, are known for a riotous stage show with the band wearing masks and making fun of whoever else is on the bill, so the similarly light-hearted-but-belying-a-deeper-heartbreak The Girls! should be a perfect fit for this Monday night dive duel at Bourbon Street.  Doors at 8:00pm. $5 cover.

November 4, 2014

Timeghost and Bernard Herman; Cafe Bourbon Street, 2216 Summit St.  A little bummer noise (in the best way) to twist your week up. Providence's Timeghost is a pulsing, twitching wave of synth and I can't wait for their new record, Cellular, coming out on Load Records. They're out on tour with Bernard Herman, who are so audaciously named that I really want to check them out. Local openers are Schweppes and Bobb Hatt.  Doors at 9:00pm. $5 cover.

November 5, 2014

[EDIT - THE COREY WILCOX SHOW IS CANCELED] Corey Wilcox; Rambling House, 310 E. Hudson St.  Rambling House, beautifully renovated in the shell of beloved honky-tonk Mac’s, has been doing great things for its sleepy corner of Old North Columbus, with terrific house-made soda and nicely balanced cocktails using these sodas as the cornerstone of a great bar program highlighting all things Ohio. And they’ve been doing great things for a subset of the roots music community in town, booking the current crop of bluegrass, jamgrass, and other stripes of good-time acoustic music. I’m heartened to see them expanding to include some jazz because it's a great, intimate room. Corey Wilcox is a trombone player and Oberlin graduate who has been getting some heat as part of pianist Marcus Roberts band. He's in town playing with a simpatico crew of locals including Derek Dicenzo on guitar, Nate Smith on bass, and Max Button on drums.  Starts at 9:00pm. $5 cover.

November 6, 2014

Letha Melchior Benefit; Ace of Cups, 2619 N. High St.  Letha Melchior and her husband Dan made some of the finest underground music of the last quarter century, and were great friends to a number of Columbus musicians. Sadly, this show has turned into a celebration of her life, as she passed away recently, but proceeds still go to her remaining medical bills and it's one of the best bills playing all week. Lou Poster, of Grafton and Ferals fame and currently killing it with Drift Mouth, plays a rare solo set. The Ipps, on a white-hot streak, and Day Creeper, who are destroying in their new four piece lineup, also play, along with Adam Elliott (Times New Viking, Connections) DJing.  Starts at 9:00pm. $7 strongly suggested donation.

Us, Today; Brothers Drake, 26 E. 5th St.  Cincinnati's Us, Today are one of the most buzzed-about modern jazz bands to come out of that town in a while. They find the sweetspot in the timbre of vibes between the late-'90s post-rock of Tortoise and the jazz structures of Milt Hinton, with the rest of the trio filled out by guitar and drums. Locals Radarhill open.  Starts at 9:00pm. Free.

November 7, 2014

Voices to End Ebola; Ohio Union, 1739 N. High St.  Some fantastic music that doesn't often get play in town for a fantastic cause, raising money for Doctors Without Borders to fight the Ebola crisis. Performances include the Columbus Highlife Ensemble featuring David Aina and the kora player Ryan Skinner.  Starts at 7:00pm. Donations strongly recommended.

Japanese B-Sides and New Gentle Soul; Ace of Cups, 2619 N. High St.  There's always been a trend toward cover bands not doing the Top 40 that would get them the big money gigs, but instead having fun with songs they love as a release valve and a recharging for their original work - most prominently The Randys, Hoodoo Soul Band, and Good Company. One of the best up and coming bands in this category is Japanese B-Sides, a project of Dan Bandman (Kyle Sowashes, Bookmobile), Ryan Horns (Paper Airplane), James Allison, Mark Sims (Tough and Lovely, Southern Diplomats), and Matt Whistler. They're doing two sets for a good-time dance party on Friday, including The Who, Badfinger, and 13th Floor Elevators. The sweet nougat in the middle is New Gentle Soul, whose set includes a good number of covers including The Everly Brothers, Echo and the Bunnymen, and one of the finest versions of "Hold Tight" you're likely to hear anywhere, played with an abstracted freshness and conceptual rigor that never veers into pretension.  Starts at 10:00pm. $5 cover.

November 8, 2014

Aoife O'Donovan and Noam Pikelny; Lincoln Theater, 769 E. Long St.  Hands down one of the shows I'm most looking forward to all year. Aoife's first solo record, Fossils, was my top record last year and I still play it very regularly - there are bars I won't name that might be a little tired of hearing it on the jukebox over a year later. She's one of the finest songwriters working today, with a voice that fuses the ethereal breathy beauty of an Alison Krauss or an Emmylou Harris with a sharp wit and a ferocious earthiness. She's the lightning limning the hurricane and the burn after a beautiful sunset. Which is not to discount the other half of this roots supergroup's leaders, Noam Pikelny. Pikleny is one of the most interesting banjo players working right now, with an approach that combines every great banjo innovation of the last 40 years and plays them with a fluid ease that belies a fiery intensity, as seen on his record from last year Noam Pikelny Plays Kenny Baker Plays Bill Monroe and his work in Punch Brothers. Their shared quartet is filled out by Shad Cobb on fiddle, who has added color to John Cowan, Jim Lauderdale, and Steve Earle, and Barry Bales on bass, who's played with Alison Krauss, Kenny Chesney, and Dolly Parton.  Starts at 8:00pm. $23 tickets available at Ticketmaster.

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"Hey, Fred!" Nights Out 10/27-11/02/2014

The week after CMJ in NYC frequently coincides with Halloween, and the combination of bedraggled middle America bands making their way back home from selling themselves and local bands doing cover sets of varying intensity and joy often makes for one of the more exciting weeks all year in a crossroads town like this. And while this year seems a little light, there’s still more stuff I’m excited about than I’ll be able to make it to - my favorite problem to have.

 Literary

October 30, 2014

Will Eisner: Life and Legacy presented by Jeff Smith; Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum, 1871 N. High St.  Will Eisner revolutionized comics storytelling over and over again. It's hard for me to think of someone who had a bigger impact on popular art I grew up loving, and getting to see Eisner speak when I was in high school is one of my favorite memories even all these years later. Jeff Smith, hometown hero and creator of Bone, Rasl, and other work, is presenting a lecture to tie in with the Billy Ireland's jaw-dropping exhibition, Will Eisner: 75 Years of Graphic Storytelling. Don't miss this.  Reception at 6:00pm; lecture at 7:30pm. Free.

November 1, 2014

The Ohio Meatgrinder Poetry Slam; Park Street Tavern, 501 Park St.  Scott Woods and Louise Robertson, beyond being two of my favorite poets in town (or anywhere), have done immeasurable good for this city's poetry scene through their education and organization efforts. Over the last 17 or 18 years, Woods' Writer's Block Poetry night (with Vernell Bristow) has spawned the reading scene as we know it, which has flowered into competing nights and a state so healthy Columbus has sent three very competitive teams some years to the National Poetry Slam. So if those two are running a slam - especially a slam that promises to tweak the orthodoxies that have grown up in the major slam rules (no props, etc.), but keep the core quality that made it so exciting in the first place (brevity and the sense of everyone trying to outdo one another), I sit up and take notice. There are also side events like workshops; see http://meatgrinder.rewritingovid.net/schedule.php for the full schedule. Preliminary Bouts start at 3:00pm and are $5. Finals start at 8:00pm and are $10.

Music

October 29, 2014

New Bomb Turks and Spider Bags; Ace of Cups, 2617 N. High St.  Like the buzzards returning to Hinckley, every year seems to bring at least one homecoming of the New Bomb Turks, and even in a period of mostly inactivity (aside from an offer they can’t refuse usually paired with a hometown show), it’s still something to be celebrated. They still sound fresher and move a crowd harder than bands half their age who practice ten times as often, and the catalog of some of the best rock and roll songs anyone’s ever written in this town is a can’t-miss proposition. Get there early enough for Chapel Hill’s Spider Bags opening; their blend of fuzzy roots-stumble reminiscent a little of Grandaddy or Ass Ponys should be a properly loopy appetizer.  Starts at 7pm. $8 tickets available at the bar.

Mary Lambert and Jillette Johnson; A&R Bar, 391 Neil Ave.  I’m the farthest thing from a Macklemore fan – current proof that you can root for someone socio-politically but have no aesthetic connection to their music at all – but a big part of the reason his very earnest anthem “Same Love” connected like it did and sounds so great on the jukebox at a bar (I just heard it a week ago across the street before the OBN IIIs show) was Mary Lambert’s hook. Her first solo album is out and from a couple listens it’s the kind of Elton John/Sade-ish pop-soul I used to hear a lot of as a kid and I don’t hear much on the radio these days and didn’t even realize I missed it until this hit my radar. It’s quirky, it’s beautiful, and to say the hooks are ingratiating would be an understatement. Jillette Johnson from NYC, who made a terrific piano based record, Water in a Whale, last year, seems like she’ll be the perfect opener for this.  Doors at 7pm. $17 tickets available on Ticketmaster..

Ora Iso; Café Bourbon Street, 2216 Summit St.  I’m very glad this show is happening late enough I can see it after the NBT appearance at Ace because, after doing some digging when I heard about the show, this hits all my buttons. A duo, Kathleen Malay and Jason Kudo make jagged and swirling soundscapes in which big rhythms suddenly rise up like just-cooled steel - they remind me most of Throbbing Gristle, but also veer into the more meditative terrain of Coil, with splashes of Prurient. Mark Van Fleet of the great and much-missed Sword Heaven and other locals, Band, and Of Verandas open.  Starts at 10pm. $5 cover.

October 30, 2014

Sinkane and Helado Negro; Wexner Center for the Arts, 1871 N. High St.  Ahmed Gallab’s Sinkane project should be the source of the most hometown pride from this music scene since RJD2. His new record on DFA Records, Mean Love, is easily one of my favorites of the year, a masterpiece of slow burn sinewy texture and hooks as sticky as tar. And a great double bill with Roberto Lange’s Helado Negro opening, who also made what I think is the best record of their career this year.  Starts at 8pm. $16 tickets at the Wexner website.

October 31, 2014

The Gizmos; The Summit, 2210 Summit St.  Legendary Indianapolis first wave punk band The Gizmos reunited an early lineup this year and reports from the shows have been astounding, especially friends of mine saying Bim Thomas (Bassholes, This Moment in Black History, Obnox) and Craig Bell (Rocket from the Tombs) sat in with them at Gonerfest, a show we missed because we knew they'd be coming here. The bill is filled out by Columbus all-stars, including the legendary Mike Rep with his new trio Last Call featuring one of my favorite rock drummers in town, Chris Pierce; raw punk band The Sick Thrills; and The Hexers, about whom I've written in this space many times.  Doors at 10pm. $10 cover.

Lyle Lovett and His Acoustic Group; McCoy Center for the Arts, 100 W. Dublin Granville Rd, New Albany, OH.  One of the finest songwriters and bandleaders of the last 30 years is making a second trip to the area in a six-month period, this time with his acoustic group. Lovett's easy charm and low-key intensity translate just as well with the sparser arrangements and often with a wider range of song choices. Anchored by bassist Viktor Krauss, of many of Bill Frisell's best groups, he's bringing a crack band including violin player  Luke Bulla and mandolinist Keith Sewell.  Starts at 8pm. $42 tickets available at Ticketmaster. 

 

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