Cultural preview
No crying: "Tears" exhibit is all wet
Published on Oct 31st, 2002
0 comments Michele Leavitt’s new environmentally-themed installation, “Tears,” purports to have something to do with the Virginia Film Festival’s wet theme this year, though the association is peripheral at...
Spooky doings: Delights for goblins abound
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments Halloween at our house is the major holiday of the year, and the kids in our neighborhood have been working feverishly for weeks creating tricks for unsuspecting treat-seekers. Other folks around...
Perfect harmony: Marriage in black and white
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments If– as is asserted in the forward to Mary Motley Kalergis’ moving new book, Love in Black and White– 99.9 percent of the DNA of every person on earth is identical, then here is a...
Catchy CD: Tin Heart has a hook
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments Jan Smith’s amalgamation of folk, country, bluegrass, and pop is on prominent display on her new debut CD, Tin Heart, has something that many (I’d say most) multi-genre forays seem to be lacking....
Dangerous liaison: Slave story mimics Oedipus
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments We all know the story of Oedipus, the flawed protagonist of Sophocles' monumental Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex, who– just as it was prophesied he would– killed his own father and married his...
Good cause: Law students host benefit
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments “Rape is a crime of power, and can leave its victim feeling helpless and out-of-control,” says first-year law student Nick Lewin, founder of the Rape Crisis Advocacy Project. Now run entirely by law...
On point: Halloween drawings timely and fun
Published on Oct 24th, 2002
0 comments It’s more than a little refreshing to find at least one artist in this town with Halloween in his heart. Granted, the holiday is mostly considered a kid’s thing, but it’s also one of the few holidays...
No secret: Discover Egypt's treasures downtown
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments It’s a long way back to the latest rotating exhibit at the Virginia Discovery Museum. Visitors may enter the museum in modern times, but as they make their way to the Back Gallery past Discovery...
Games people play: Keeping busy in the parlor
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments The roaring ‘20s– jazz, Broadway, Hollywood, and the comic strips. The bobo ‘90s-– Pictionary, Sega, Scrabble, and on-line chess. A fair analogy? These are the things they’re pondering up in...
Shhhh
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments A certain small subset of Charlottesvillians are bound to droll uncontrollably when they hear about the Richmond indie rock group Zetamale, and most of their increased saliva production will no doubt...
Life in hell: No Exit in Red Shed
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments Offstage Theater, known around town for putting up shows  in quite unlikely places, has a new "home" of sorts. They affectionately call it The Red Shed. You may have seen it if you've been to...
Martha's back: Market has double mission
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments As the leading cause of death among women ages 35-55, breast cancer is bound to affect a wide swath of our population.  An indiscriminate disease that affects a demographic most likely to be in...
Martha's back: Market has double mission
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments As the leading cause of death among women ages 35-55, breast cancer is bound to affect a wide swath of our population.  An indiscriminate disease that affects a demographic most likely to be in...
Goin' up country: Richards' art becomes cheery
Published on Oct 17th, 2002
0 comments Russell Richards’ new stuff is, in many ways, not much of a departure from his black and wicked City Series. The basic aesthetic is still in place– rubbery, twisted bodies with sharp elbows and...
Southern living
Published on Oct 10th, 2002
0 comments I don't usually review just opening acts, but this week, after hearing Caroline Herring's debut CD, Twilight, I thought I'd make an exception– maybe I could provide a little brick in the path...
Spooks galore! Anything can happen in the woods
Published on Oct 10th, 2002
0 comments Weird things start happening at this time of year. Carved pumpkins with votive candles illuminating gruesome faces are already springing up on front porches in our neighborhood. Effigies will soon be...
Keeping it clean: To the very last drop
Published on Oct 10th, 2002
0 comments With mandatory water restrictions in place for  both the city and county, residents everywhere scan the skies for dark clouds. The less optimistic eye the reservoirs with an ever-increasing...
Lend a hand: Lighten up at Live Arts
Published on Oct 10th, 2002
0 comments My grandmother used to say, "Many hands make light work." She was the youngest of 10 children and spent her entire life on a farm, where every day was filled with chores that proved easier when...
Jarring history: Virginia's past a la Krueger
Published on Oct 10th, 2002
0 comments I don’t want to go back to high school. No one I know wants to go back to high school. However, this isn’t the case with a few new Peggy Sue Got Married-style shows on the big networks, and also for...
Free labor: Where's mom's signing bonus?
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments Back in the days when technology jobs appeared limitless and hot-shot new enterprises challenged the gospel of conventional business practices, there was an enthusiastic notion that soon the nation...
Stow the shanties
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments “Arr. Methinks the Pirate Mark does not like these sea shanties, laddy.”That was basically all I had to say after seeing Elf Power for the first time, when they opened for Wilco last year. I had no...
Cut and piece: Quilts come out of the closet
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments Circles of 19th century women with nimble fingers gathered around sitting room fires crafting masterpieces fine enough to display as art. Because this was utilitarian “women’s work,” however, these...
The great grape: Boar's Head festival honors vintners
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments Who knew that Virginia would become such a boon to the viticulture industry? For the last 20 years or so, vineyards have sprouted (so to speak) exponentially across the state, producing on a regular...
Grand scale: Dance combines many arts
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments Grab your dancing shoes and head over to the McGuffey Art Center on Friday afternoon in time to join the “Dance Technique Class” which is a prelude to a performance by the Arlington-based Jane...
New paths
Published on Oct 3rd, 2002
0 comments Two years ago, Meg West’s focus shifted from graphic design to oil painting, and the inspiration for that change is obvious in every one of her paintings. A resident of Crozet, West paints what she...
Fish 'n chimps: Forty-Five's hapless fools
Published on Sep 26th, 2002
0 comments I’m trying to decide what I like best about George Singleton’s new collection of short stories. It might be the title, The Half-Mammals of Dixie, or it might be the jacket cover– a portrait of...
New standards: Ostinato redefines the norm
Published on Sep 26th, 2002
0 comments I was raised on the Beatles, and their lite-punk pop cousins Nirvana, and for a large part of my early life, these were the groups by which I would measure all other popular music. In other words, I...
Alive and well: Soccer is king in these parts
Published on Sep 26th, 2002
0 comments “Americans don’t like soccer,” NPR sports commentator Frank Deford said the other day on Morning Edition. “We know that,” he repeated emphatically. “Americans do not like soccer.”Well, I don’t know...
Pigs out: Vegetarians stage healthful bash
Published on Sep 26th, 2002
0 comments Vegetarianism has hit the mainstream. Once associated only with the counterculture or other countries, being vegetarian now ceases to raise eyebrows, And like most good movements, it has spawned as...
Step up! Curtains open for new acting school
Published on Sep 26th, 2002
0 comments There’s a new drama school in town, and it's getting good reviews. Barely a year old, Charlottesville School for the Dramatic Arts (CSDA) already offers a full slate of classes and productions and...