Saturday, December 29, 2007
The DIGITAL GENIE is OUT of the BOTTLE!
Friends and Colleagues:
Please visit the blog-site Students 2.0 http://students2oh.org/ and witness the beginning of something extraordinary......the World of Education as WE knew it will never quite be the same. AND this is a GREAT THING!
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Detroit Film Festival & Flint ART Project
Surprise from the streets: Art!
Detroit is like a big canvas
December 18, 2007
CREATION OF COLOR: With an artistic storefront, the artist known as Dabl attracts customers to his store, Dabl's African Bead Gallery, at Vinewood and Grand River. He sells thousands of African beads, some more than 300 years old, he says. (ERIC SEALS/DFP)
BY BILL McGRAW
FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
Shards of glass arranged randomly on a wooden utility pole. A jaunty human body carved out of a dead tree, wearing a tire as a hat. Ceramic benches in a vacant lot. The face of an elf painted on the base of a streetlight. Elaborate graffiti in countless places across the city.
Art is one of the last things outsiders associate with Detroit. But drive the streets and you quickly realize the city possesses an energetic, grassroots creative class that not only spreads color, whimsy and provocation across the landscape, but also serves as an engine of redevelopment.
True, not everyone considers all of it art, especially when it comes to graffiti.
And the underground nature of some of the work helps keep it off the radar of many people, even art lovers.
But it's evident that the city's far-flung artistic community extends many levels beyond the Detroit Institute of Arts, which reopened in November after a $158-million renovation.
Last year, the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD) opened in an abandoned car dealership on Woodward Avenue and received praise from the New York Times for its "guerrilla architecture ... that accepts decay as fact."
This year, the Contemporary Art Institute of Detroit (CAID) expanded in a variety of directions from its 3-year-old home in an 1889 grocery store-turned-billiards-hall-turned auto-parts-outlet in a deserted area of Rosa Parks Boulevard.
While a number of local artists seek their fame by moving to the coasts or Chicago, those who have stayed say they are attracted to Detroit because of its ample workshop space, cheap rent, creative community and the city's laissez-faire attitude toward street art that allows a wider range of freedom of expression than would be tolerated in the more tightly regulated suburbs.
The artists
Mitch Cope, 34, is a Detroit artist and curator. He and wife Gina Reichert run a Hamtramck store, Design 99, that sells quirkily fabricated household items. Collaborating with two German artists, Cope has made benches out of Detroit's ubiquitous tree of heaven, also known as the ghetto palm and ailanthus tree.
"When we talk to artists from out-of-town, we mostly talk about opportunities that don't exist elsewhere," he said. "You can come to the city, take over land, do whatever you want."
Aaron Timlin, CAID's executive director, added: "There's a pioneering attitude. There are so many things artists can do in Detroit because it is so spread out. Throw up a sculpture on a vacant lot. Performance art. Detroit is a big empty canvas."
The spiritual godfather of the grassroots art scene is Tyree Guyton, whose internationally known installation around Heidelberg Street on the near East Side attracts visitors every day. Guyton's artwork deals with how abandonment affects a neighborhood -- and decay is central to the work of a number of artists.
In Detroit, there are people who draw attention to abandonment by painting gutted homes orange or attaching orange traffic cones to them. There is Larry Zelenski, who produces greeting cards with lovingly enhanced photos of abandoned houses. And there is Kevin Joy, who paints cartoons, Mayan-style hieroglyphics and other wacky images on abandoned houses and in the windows of vacant downtown buildings.
Flamboyant artwork was one aspect of the popular Theatre Bizarre, an annual underground Halloween carnival near the State Fairgrounds that this year featured goth, punk and rockabilly music, a burlesque show and a skin-piercing exhibition.
The graffiti was so interesting and extensive on bridge abutments in the below-grade rail line east of downtown, known as the Dequindre Cut, that city officials decided to preserve the images as they transform the area into a greenway and recreation path that will open next year.
In dozens of locations, countless anonymous metro Detroiters have fashioned artistic-looking street shrines of candles, stuffed animals, liquor bottles, photos and written tributes that memorialize the dead -- mostly the victims of gun violence.
Artists also contribute to the city's revival, though their improvements are usually small scale and rarely the subjects of news conferences.
In October, for instance, Zi Walls, a 29-year-old graphic artist and musician, and two partners, cleaned up an abandoned store on Michigan Avenue near Tiger Stadium and opened Communique, a space for video, film, music, poetry and other alternative media.
Artists also have taken their galleries and work spaces to a variety of old buildings that might otherwise sit empty.
Among those outposts are the Pioneer Building, a former factory on East Grand Boulevard; the 4731 Gallery, a four-story brick building on Grand River and 15th, and, perhaps most notably, the Russell Industrial Center, an immense complex of seven buildings at Russell and Clay.
FROM FACTORY TO ART HOUSE: Christian Unverzagt, 36, a designer from Detroit, shows off a party space in November at the Russell Industrial Center, where he has a studio. The complex, at 1604 Clay St. in Detroit, is one of several old industrial buildings that artists have taken over to use as their galleries and work spaces. (SUSAN TUSA/DFP)
The art factory
With its dingy brick, uneven windows, bulky water tower and the rambling vastness, the six- and seven-story Russell Industrial Center looks like a throwback to Detroit's smokestack past. Passing it on the Chrysler Freeway north of East Grand Boulevard, you might not even be sure whether it's occupied.
But when you pull into its inner parking lot, you realize this is no ordinary old factory.
First indication: There are a lot of people walking around and considerable vehicle traffic.
Second indication: Walking through the hallways, you see bright lights and fat red elephant sculptures amid the sawing, hammering and eclectic music.
Third indication: The "no parking" signs are fastened to metal that is bent into whimsical humanlike shapes.
Chris Bell made the figurines.
By day, he is a mechanic for the Detroit Department of Transportation. After hours, Bell calls himself the "man of steel," and works on the third floor of Building No. 2, soldering and welding spare parts and sheet metal into the shapes of animals, people and things.
He's an artist, and the Russell is his home.
"This place is like a sanctuary," he said. "This is my family. I'm among like-minded people. There is nothing but positiveness."
The Russell is home to 120 tenants, about 80 of whom are artists, said Eric Novack, the center's leasing agent who writes novels in his spare time.
The tenants are attracted by an authentic industrial design of thick concrete and mammoth elevators, plus rents that run about $550 a month for 1,000 square feet -- considerably cheaper than in much of suburbia. The artists and others occupy about 650,000 of the Russell's 2.2 million square feet.
"You can do whatever you want as long as it's legal," Novack said. "We have two rules: Respect the community and respect the building."
The tenants are a diverse group with specialties like photography, music, painting, interior design, architecture, metal work, glassblowing, graphic design, cabinetry, clothes manufacturing, candle-making, posters and a company -- Sensitile Systems -- that makes acrylic material that reconfigures shadows and light.
The Salt-Mine Studio offers what it says is the only fine-arts foundry in the city. The Detroit Industrial Projects is a modest-size gallery that undergoes a total transformation for each show.
Designed by renowned architect Albert Kahn in the World War I era, the Russell was a busy manufacturing center of auto parts and bomber wings during Detroit's heyday. Home to some 130 print companies in the 1970s, it experienced financial problems in the 1990s, and Dennis Kefallinos, who owns Nikki's Pizza and other ventures, bought the complex in 2003.
Spreading the word
In September, the Russell held a one-day People's Art Festival that attracted more than 150 visual artists, performance artists, filmmakers and musicians from inside the building and beyond.
Novack said the fair was so successful plans are in the works for next year's event. He says the complex also will add a year-round screening area for videos and films.
The Russell event joins two other summer festivals in central Detroit -- Dally in the Alley south of Wayne State University and the Fourth Street Fair north of campus -- that are offbeat and focused on music and art.
"People from out of state say, 'There's nothing going on in Detroit,' " said Mark Arminski, who rents space in the Russell and is a well-known designer of posters for rock bands. "I tell them, 'Come here for a summer. Go to galleries and festivals. Even clubs. A lot of clubs are hanging art these days.' "
Said Jeannette Strezinski of the Detroit Industrial Projects: "If you're in the suburbs and you're only paying attention to the big galleries, you're kind of going to miss a lot."
Contact BILL McGRAW at 313-223-4781 or bmcgraw@freepress.com.
Monday, December 10, 2007
IDEAS 2007
The 7th Annual Year in Ideas
For the seventh consecutive December, the magazine looks back on the passing year through a special lens: ideas. Editors and writers trawl the oceans of ingenuity, hoping to snag in our nets the many curious, inspired, perplexing and sometimes outright illegal innovations of the past 12 months. Then we lay them out on the dock, flipping and flopping and gasping for air, and toss back all but those that are fresh enough for our particular cut of intellectual sushi. For better or worse, these are 70 of the ideas that helped make 2007 what it was. Enjoy.
Alzheimer’s Telephone Screening
Best Way to Deflect an Asteroid, The
Hope Can Be Worse Than Hopelessness
Iconic-Performance-Network Player, The
Office-Chair Exercise (for Men and Women)
Right to Medical Self-Defense, The
Rock-Paper-Scissors Is Universal
Two-Birds-With-One-Stone Resistance
Unadapted Theatrical Adaptation, The
International Film Festival
MITCH ALBOM
If we rebate it, movies will come
December 9, 2007
BY MITCH ALBOM
FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
By now, some of you know that tonight, a movie of my book "For One More Day," produced by Oprah Winfrey, will air on ABC. People this past week have been saying congratulations. And this is indeed a lucky, wonderful feeling. But I have one regret.
I wish it had been made in Michigan.
It wasn't, as many films are not, largely because of money. The film is set in a small town, with modest houses and baseball fields, and we certainly have those in Michigan. The producers were not against the idea.
But in the end, the film was shot in Connecticut. That state offers a big tax rebate to filmmakers, about 30%. As a result, one report estimated Connecticut's film and TV business grew from $1 million in the first six months of 2006 to more than $300 million since.
Similar acts have been passed in states such as Louisiana and New Mexico, and you'd not believe how many movies are shooting there.
Meanwhile, Michigan sits largely untapped. Mike Binder, the wonderful filmmaker behind such movies as "Reign Over Me" and "The Upside of Anger," is from Michigan. He loves Michigan. He has an upcoming movie called "The Emperor of Michigan."
He may have to shoot it in Connecticut.
The war of the states
A few weeks ago, Binder and I spoke before the Legislature about our frustrations in trying to bring film work home. Many were shocked to learn how movie producers work. The conversation goes like this:
"What kind of rebate does Michigan offer?"
"Well, it's not as good as (xxxxxxx)."
"Sorry. We're going to (xxxxxxx)."
Now, I can think of a dozen reasons why films should be interested in Michigan, including our varied landscape -- from hot urban to frozen wilderness -- and low cost of housing.
But I can think of 100 reasons why Michigan should be interested in films. One, money. Two, it's a clean business -- no smokestacks. Three, it's a huge growth industry, with digital and Web-based production increasing. Four, it needs young, creative minds, the kind leaving our state every day. Five, movies can be good for image -- and business. Look at Mackinac Island and "Somewhere in Time."
A few years ago, New Mexico, when it came to films, was as barren as its landscape. Then its new governor got aggressive, a 25% rebate was passed, and, according to Variety, not only did the state see film revenue jump from almost nothing to $428 million in 2006, but a 26-acre soundstage has been built. Support businesses are opening there. Money. Jobs.
If New Mexico, why not us?
And roll the credits ...
If Michigan could pass an aggressive rebate program -- one that would lead the nation -- movies and TV would flock here overnight. We thought we passed a decent rebate early this year. But it wasn't competitive with top states (ours is a max of 20%). As a result, only two major movies partly shot here this year, "that brought in about $4 million," said Janet Lockwood, director of the Michigan Film Office.
That's nowhere near what it could be. You can argue that we shouldn't give breaks to moviemakers if we don't give them to everyone. You may be right. But they're going to get them somewhere. And they'll go where that is. And a portion of something is better than a whole bucket of nothing, right?
Until recently, many movies were shot in Canada because of rebates and the exchange rate. My previous book/movie, "The Five People You Meet in Heaven," was shot in Vancouver, and many crewmembers told me they'd moved there "to get into the film business."
Well, if they can move there, they can move here -- where the exchange rate now favors us.
Understand, this does not financially benefit people like Binder, Jeff Daniels or myself. We're paid the same either way. But with so many film-related Michiganders who prefer to bring the work back home, doesn't it make sense to capitalize on that?
Our lawmakers are considering action. If it had been in place, the movie tonight on ABC -- and the names in the credits -- might have looked more familiar. Meanwhile, I am scheduled to have a movie shot next year. It's about a homeless man, a casino and the Detroit River.
I hope we don't make it in Albuquerque.
Contact MITCH ALBOM at 313-223-4581 or malbom@freepress.com. He will sign books at 7:30 p.m. Monday at Barnes & Noble in Rochester Hill and 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Borders in Farmington Hills. .
Monday, December 3, 2007
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