Isn't It All Art Anyway?

ART & MUSIC
Gallery Grooves Serves Up Art, Jazz, and Wine

Join us this evening for Gallery Grooves, The Rake’s monthly gathering around art, jazz, and wine. Tonight’s event is at the Goldstein Museum of Design, featuring art from its latest exhibit. Products of Our Time explores the interstices of design, art, and cultural commentary, highlighting consumer-inspired designed objects as a bellwether of our times. Enjoy the exhibit accompanied by a bellwether of another time, the stellar jazz selections of Terence Blanchard (“A Tale of God’s Will”), Dave Brubeck (“Indian Summer”), and Monk’s Music Trio (“Monk on Mondays”). Socialize and discuss the latest jazz with Kevin Barnes from KBEM, and tease the palate with complimentary libations from The Wine Company.

7 p.m., Goldstein Museum of Design, University of Minnesota, 364 McNeal Hall, Saint Paul; 612-624-7434; free.

ART & FILM
Super Night Shot

If you happen to be wandering near the Walker, do not be alarmed if you’re accosted by a young European wielding a video camera. This is merely part of the “War on Anonymity” waged by the Gob Squad, a performance art troupe whose members hail from the U.K. and Germany. One hour before each 9 p.m. performance, troupe members will take to the mean streets of Lowry Hill, where they will allow serendipity to take over as they incorporate unsuspecting passersby into their impromptu cinematic creation. Then they hustle back to the Walker to treat their audience to Super Night Shot, a one-hour, four-screen showing of their uncut footage. Who know what kind of material they can generate by provoking us supposedly modest Minnesotans? –Danielle Kurtzleben

9 p.m., Walker Art Center, 1750 Hennepin Ave., Minneapolis; 612-375-7600; $25 (members $21).

BOOKS & AUTHORS
Steven Pinker

You had your summer of trashy beach reading — now it’s time for the weighty tomes like The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature. Not that they can’t be entertaining, too. In the case of Stuff, author Steven Pinker is not only super-smart (he’s made Time’s 100-Most-Influential-People-in- the-World-Today list and is a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist), but he also has a gift for writing that makes heavy-duty science accessible and even, dare we say, popular. Most likely his public presentations, such as this “Talk of the Stacks” event at the Minneapolis Central Library, follow suit. We’ll be interested to see if he uses the material from the chapter in Stuff that delves into the differences between taboo and respectable terms for sex (motion, it turns out, is one factor). –Julie Caniglia

7 p.m., Minneapolis Central Library, Pohlad Hall, 300 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis, 612-630-6174.

Writing in Clip

A last-minute booking from the Amazon Bookstore Cooperative: With the release, earlier this month, of her new book Ani DiFranco: Verses, the eminent Ms. DiFranco joins the ranks of Jim Carroll and countless other rockers who’ve gone poet. Of course, to the throngs of not-pretty girls who count themselves as fans, the folk singer’s clever, not-so-soft lyrics sounded like poetry all along. (Verses is apparently decorated by DiFranco’s drawings, too.) The book is being released in conjunction with DiFranco’s career retrospective album, Canon; and in fact, the righteous babe will traverse her repertoire when she plays the State Theatre tomorrow (Friday) night. But who better to host this more intimate gathering than Minneapolis’s own (and only) feminist bookstore? –Christy DeSmith

5:30 p.m., Parkway Theater, 4814 Chicago Ave., Minneapolis; 612-821-9630; $7, $20 with book included.

SHOPPING
Definitely the Time for a Rug

A Stephanie Odegard-designed rug certainly won’t come cheap. But if you’ve been coveting a floor covering by the native Minnesotan turned New York City-based minimalist and business owner (with a conscience), now’s your chance to snag one at a discount — we’re talking up to eighty-percent off. Odegard at Michael Sydney, Ltd. hosts a rare Minneapolis surplus sale today through Sunday. Check out work samples on its website, and read The Rake’s February 2007 story on Odegard. –DeSmith

10 a.m. to 8 p.m., Odegard at Michael Sydney, Ltd., 210 N. Second St., Minneapolis; 612-455-6100.