Ladies and Gentlemen, our very own Cindi Barthel!
Blog
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Kauai
I was on Poipu Beach in Kauai last week and made sure to have my current issue of the RAKE with me! Thanks!
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Hispaniola
Here’s a shot aboard the Royal Caribbean vessel, the Navigator of the Seas and from the beach of Labadee, Hispaniola (aka Haiti).
Thanks for the great issue- it made wonderful reading on the trip!
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Corrections
True, the erratic boundaries that mark “east,” “west,” “north,” and “south” St. Paul are forever confusing the Minneapolitan editors at this magazine. Mr. Frame and several others wrote and called to check us on this point—Jerabek’s New Bohemian, the neighborhood café featured in our August issue, is not on St. Paul’s East Side, as the story suggested; it’s on the West Side. And, of course, West St. Paul is its own city entirely … Anyway, we regret the error(s).
Also, our August issue’s Table of Contents page incorrectly listed the web address of that month’s cover illustrator, Kyle Webster. The correct URL is: www.kyletwebster.com.
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We Laughed
It’s not often that I read something that moves me to write in with praise. Peter Schilling’s article on Fits-Overs [Rake Appeal, July] was so damn funny I couldn’t see straight. His willingness to wear the huge sun-blockers brightened my day. Please pass this along to him, and keep up the good work.
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Glory, Glory, Hallelujah
During one of my semi-annual visits to the Twin Cities last spring, an old friend put me onto a copy of your fine magazine. As I leafed through it, I was instantly impressed. I retired from teaching six years ago to my old home state but still find myself missing the many cultural amenities afforded by the Twin Cities area. Your magazine afforded a cure for my occasional bouts of cultural withdrawal. I was impressed by its breadth of coverage and the fact that, unlike many city magazines of its type, there is more pure content than any other that I had read. It echoes in nice ways the structure and content of its ancient sister the New Yorker—a magazine I have subscribed to for thirty years. Even so, it is distinctly a pure product of the area and captures its ethos beautifully. Also, unlike most city magazines, it is not ruled by advertising and its articles are not thinly disguised promotions for local business and commercial ventures. Keep on printing fiction, the more markets there are for that the better.
After reading a second issue graciously sent to me by my friend after my return, I was compelled to subscribe. I look forward to more of your varied coverage and fine writing.
Ken Warner, Johnstown, PA -
Left Bank of the Mississippi
Whenever there’s an article purporting to describe the 80s art scene, in which I participated as both an artist and a critic, I brace myself for a “here we go again” reaction. I’ll admit I have low expectations. I anticipate someone interviewing a handful of the same, old players and treating their recollections as gospel truth, while skimming over the contributions of so many others. So I was pleasantly surprised at what a good job Cathy Madison did. It’s a nicely balanced summary. Sure, Aldo Moroni and Dick Brewer have pretty much become the official media spokespeople for that era, but since they do such a good job in their capacity as community historians, I’m happy to let them.
However, I’d like to throw out another perspective about the relative merits of that era. Here are some of the things I really miss: venues for good critical writing, and a close-knit community that lived and worked in proximity to one another—and that thrived on such criticism. What I’m referring to is two now-defunct regional art mags: Vinyl (which became New North Artscape) and Artpaper, both of which published critical essays, longer articles, and numerous reviews of local shows. And a good two pages of Letters to the Editor—probably the most important part of the periodical, from the perspective of its readership. For a period of time, the offices of these publications were located within a two-block radius of the New French, and served a large community of visual artists, theater companies, and musicians also living, working, and performing within several blocks of the New French. What was the result? A lively, stimulating dialogue that invigorated the community, as well as a place to meet and conduct business. After Artpaper hit the stands, you made sure you were at the New French to talk about it. (Don’t ever underestimate the power of a good magazine to build a community, or the power of escalating real-estate costs to fragment a once-thriving one … )
Here’s what I think is better now: exhibition opportunities for younger artists and the opportunities to see more innovative and experimental work that just wasn’t visible in the 80s era. Why? Well, if you own a so-called “for profit” gallery that is by nature both a business and a reflection of your aesthetic perspective, it’s certainly both your objective and prerogative to show work that you personally believe in and that might also stand a chance of being sold. Nothing wrong with that, it just sets certain parameters for who and what gets shown. Oddly, I think it placed a strange burden on gallery owners like Tom Barry, Dick Brewer, Todd Bockley, Jon Oulman, and Bob Thompson. Everybody wanted to show with them because they were the players who had the “It” galleries that were selling work to the collectors, but of course not everyone’s work fit with their individual visions. I think they were greatly relieved when other spaces emerged on the scene. Everyone benefited.
Like Medium West—the brainchild of Jon Marc Edwards and Paige Mankin, and the first gallery specifically established to provide visibility to artists using what they considered to be cutting-edge interdisciplinary approaches in film and video, as well as painting and performance, frequently with an emphasis on the then-de rigueur familiarity with Roland Barthes, Baudrillard, and semiotic/deconstructivist theory. Basically, if you weren’t familiar with the concept of The Other, you’d best be showing your slides to an “other” gallery. That’s why public reception of the Rifle Sport Gallery was so enthusiastic.
I think the Golden Age of Minneapolis Art is happening now, and that it started many years ago with the rise of spaces that took on interesting and innovative work that was often experimental, media-based, installation-oriented, and not necessarily easily consumable. Work that made you think, often made by artists just a year or two out of school; work by artists that never went to school; and work by artists relegated to the periphery of society. Spaces begun by artists who took the reins and created venues that reflected the perspectives of their peers. And now we’ve got some pretty darn nice professionally managed spaces, staffed almost entirely by volunteers, where you can always count on seeing thought-provoking shows: spaces like the Soap Factory, SooVac, Franklin Art Works, Midway, Intermedia Arts, Rosalux, Rogue Buddha, the list goes on. (Forgive me, as I know I’ve failed to mention so many … ) The word “alternative space” seems hardly relevant anymore, as alternative is the norm.
So what do we need now? An art magazine that publishes four to eight reviews monthly with a couple of longer topical articles. Also, somebody to fund it, and a sufficiently masochistic individual with no need for personal time or disposable income crazy enough to be the managing editor. (Any takers?)
Oh yeah, and a bar to hang out in where we can all bitch about the articles.
Melissa Stang, Minneapolis
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Sweden
Rich Feely of Eden Prairie writes: My son Jack and I vacationed on the southwestern coast of Sweden in June. The granite island of Smogen maintains its fishing-village culture while hosting weekend vacationers from throughout Sweden. The Rake’s cover matches the brilliant sky over the West Sea.
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Fighting Over North
If you were watching the news August 11, you probably saw Rev. Jerry McAfee hijack Mayor R.T. Rybak’s press conference on fighting crime. Rybak and Council Member Don Samuels were standing on West Broadway Avenue when, the cameras showed, McAfee got into Rybak’s face. The next images were of Rybak scurrying to his waiting car.
This was another skirmish in the ongoing battle for the hearts and minds of North Minneapolis residents between Rybak-ally Samuels and activists such as McAfee, pastor of the New Salem Baptist Church. This tension between those African-Americans “workin’ with The Man” and those down in the trenches “struggling against The Man” has deep roots, going back to the “house Negroes”-versus-“field hands” days.
Since both McAfee and Samuels want (in McAfee’s words) to have the police “target those that need to be targeted,” why can’t they “just get along” and focus on getting things done? Because each man has a different view of how to interact with the majority culture and establish political legitimacy. McAfee, who calls Samuels “Rybak’s house Negro,” claims that Samuels has let scarce city resources, such as video-surveillance cameras, go to more affluent parts of the city. Samuels counters by saying that McAfee is a “wannabe power broker and professional hell-raiser,” who “makes a living off the suffering in North Minneapolis” while he retreats nightly to the relative safety of Brooklyn Park.
McAfee, whose two-thousand-member church is one of the largest black congregations in the city, boasted to me about how his organization is working. “We have a crack-fighting team, a mentoring team, and a team that works with people in prison. We are on the streets daily. We respect the members of our community and we demand respect from people outside our community.”
Were his actions that day motivated by his fears of racial profiling, along with pique at not being invited to participate in the press conference? “Absolutely not,” McAfee said. “The mayor came up here with an attitude. Me getting in the mayor’s face only happened after he repeatedly ignored my questions about why it took him so long to focus on crime in North Minneapolis. I wanted to know—why did South Minneapolis get surveillance cameras before we did, even though twenty-six of the forty-one murders so far this year have been in this community?”
Samuels denies that Rybak disrespected McAfee. “It is Lord of the Flies time up here, and McAfee is crying about getting ‘respect.’ Well, the grown-ups are coming and we are prepared to face the thugs and guns that McAfee, who does not live in this community, apparently cannot deal with. What happened at the press conference tells these immature, morally deprived kids that it is OK to be violent and stay stupid.”
The major difference between McAfee and Samuels revolves around their relationships with Rybak. McAfee dislikes Rybak and sees him as someone who only comes to North Minneapolis to record sound bites. Samuels makes no apologies for his relationship with Rybak. “The mayor is advocating a targeted precision strike for a limited period of time by forty cops. This is a good thing! My relationship with the mayor is an asset for this community. McAfee’s attempt to publicly humiliate and excoriate me because I can work with him is wrong.”
The harsh political reality is that North Minneapolis desperately needs the juice that both men bring to the table. Samuels is North Minneapolis’ voice on the council. Suggesting that he is an Uncle Tom for creating a political alliance with the mayor only makes it less likely that Northsiders will get city resources. Nevertheless, Rybak and Samuels have got to forge a working relationship with people like McAfee. He has credibility with factions of the community that distrust Rybak—and by association, any politician who is at his side whenever he comes to the hood. Neither man can claim political legitimacy without maintaining an effective bond with the other. And both should realize that claims of political legitimacy do not mean much in comparison with the twenty-six people who have been blown away in less than eight months.
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Looking, but Not Seeing
Lance Bass is gay? You’re kidding. Does this mean he’s not going to be an astronaut? Because I really, really wanted him to go to outer space. Joan Collins has a paid-in-full ticket to go on the Virgin 2010 flight, but she’s kind of old, and though I love her, I think Lance Bass is probably more suited for the rigors of space travel. Joan’s eyelashes seem as if they might ignite upon re-entry.
I don’t care if Lance Bass is gay. It’s just that I’m always the last to know these things. As a young girl, I managed to harbor crushes on both Paul Lynde and the lead singer of Judas Priest. I’m into guys with a wild sense of humor who aren’t afraid to laugh at themselves. And who doesn’t prefer her rock stars swathed in studded black leather?
When I was a teen, my “gaydar” antennae could only pick up the strongest of signals. In the early eighties, I thought that maybe Boy George might be gay, but I wasn’t totally sure. Wearing muumuus and eyeliner could just be his look. Maybe under that stringy weave he was simply a Hawaiian with a Maybelline fetish.
As the eighties progressed, I was better able to discern the sexual orientation of celebrities by carefully examining the photo captions in People magazine. Any matinee idol who was a “confirmed bachelor” or starlet who had a “gal pal” could be batting for the other team, as it were. I had to keep up on these things because I didn’t want my romantic hopes to be dashed again, like they were with Paul Lynde.
Think of it this way: You don’t nurture the crush on the married Beatle. You go for the eligible one—the one you actually have a shot at a date with—in Pretend Town. (By the way, can you imagine, if on the Beatles’ historic Ed Sullivan appearance, under John Lennon’s camera shot the caption read, “Don’t bother girls—HE’S GAY!”)
When I was a young adult, k.d. lang’s refreshing lack of ambiguity drew these sorts of things into sharper focus. (It only took me a moment to discard the possibility that k.d. might be e.e. cummings’ soul mate.) Melissa Etheridge never tried to hide which chromosome she craved. The album titled Yes I Am, and the accompanying videos which featured luscious women as the objects of her desire, were obvious enough, even for me. But some fans missed the signals. I remember reading in an interview with Etheridge in Rolling Stone magazine that she had to keep dodging calls from country western star Billy Ray Cyrus—he of the “Achy Breaky Heart” and the magnificent man mullet. Apparently, Billy Ray just didn’t get it. He kept asking her out. She finally said that she had to tell him point-blank. The interview never got into specifics on what his reaction was. Judging from his public persona, I imagine it could have gone like this:
(Melissa picks up the phone.) “Hello? Oh. Hi, Billy Ray. Uh, no, I really can’t go out to dinner with you. I’ve got a girlfriend and we’re going out that night. What? No, I don’t want to bring her along. I know the more the merrier, but see, uh … My girlfriend and I are going out to dinner that night. On a date. Just the two of us. No men. No, you don’t understand. It’s not so we can have a heart-to-heart girl talk. I’m gay. She’s gay. I date women. Not men. You are a man, Billy. I don’t date men. No, that is not kinky! Cut it out, will you! I AM NOT JUST SAYING THAT SO YOU’LL GET TURNED ON! DON’T CALL HERE ANYMORE!” (Hangs up.)
Hands down, the woman with the worst gaydar in the world is, of course, Liza Minnelli. She’s the Wrongway Peachfuzz of sexual orientation. Her husband Peter Allen was a protégé of her mom and a Broadway dancer, for heaven’s sake. This may come to you as awful news—(or a relief, depending on your inclinations) but her fourth husband-for-a-minute—the eyebrow-plucking, Lalique Crystal-collecting producer David Gest—insists he’s not “that way,” as the worldwide homosexual community breathes a giant sigh of relief.