The house stands on a barren corner lot, across from a vacant, industrial patch of Northeast Minneapolis. Nearby, the tracks of the Burlington Northern cut a swath to the Mississippi. And in the other direction, just around the corner, there is a busy grocery and liquor mart called Sentyrz, which one neighbor calls “the store … Read more
It was still early in the game, but Mary Atwood was feeling confident. She had just stacked “NOVA” atop “VOX” to take a 177 to 62 lead over Jim Kramer, and the triple word was blocked. But Jim’s fortunes shifted when he ran “POETIZER” down the center of the board for 54 points. He then … Read more
The other day, my friend Carl sheepishly asked me a funny question while we were at the gym. I could tell he wanted a serious answer. “What would you say if your wife told you she wanted a boob job?” “Rachel wants to get a boob job?!” I almost yelled it. “What do you think … Read more
Wagner’s music, so they say, is not as bad as it sounds. I suppose the tunes aren’t too awful if you don’t mind being shouted at. But what makes me queasy is the overwhelming moral effect, the way it makes you limp and inert like a rabbit trapped in headlights. Other composers in the light … Read more
You thought ice fishing was harrowing. Grotesque, fascinating, hilarious, and apparently true: In Oklahoma, there are folks who obtain catfish by reaching deep into the muck of the river and yanking those bad boys out by the jaws. Let’s say that again: These Okies reach into a hole, under a rock, underwater, find themselves a … Read more
No, we’re not talking about those hunting-porn prints where big-chested mallards flash their downy underparts as they ascend from a dewy cornfield. This is more thoughtful, eclectic stuff—bird art for people who’d rather point binoculars than shotguns at our avian friends. Culled from a respected annual show at the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in … Read more
Swiss artist Niklaus Troxler knows exactly what jazz music looks like. It’s unembraceably big, it doesn’t hold still for a second, and it’s as colorful as an untended wildflower garden. The MIA recently acquired twenty-five of Troxler’s jazz posters, created for European jazz festivals during the sixties. How this two-dimensional medium can capture so much … Read more
There are so many photographs in the archives of the Minnesota Historical Society that you will never get to see even a fraction of them. There simply isn’t enough time in anyone’s life, and most are tucked away in storage, waiting only for someone on a research mission about fishing lore, or disappeared buildings, or … Read more
Colorado photographer Tom Quinn Kumpf is best known for documenting Ireland in black and white, as if the situation there were ever so simple. His poignant and sometimes funny book Children of Belfast captured the everyday concerns of children growing up in a very screwed-up world. This exhibit, “Dancing Down a Dream,” brings together diverse … Read more
Penned by the pixie-punk ex-Minnesotan Lisa D’Amour, Nita & Zita re-imagines the story of immigrant sisters turned “international dancers.” Settling into the New Orleans French Quarter at the height of the Jazz Age, Nita and Zita dazzled audiences with their productions that mixed burlesque with contortionist acrobatics. They performed in lavishly ornate flapper-cum-freak show costumes … Read more