I heard it all, musically, as a ‘tween in the Sixties, in the inner sanctum of my brother’s room. And while Mark allowed me my own forays into weirdness — I was obsessed with the Who’s “Happy Jack” — I allowed him some, too, including his fixation on that most…
Jason Bosch, sole dynamo behind the weekly ArgusFest human-rights film series, originally planned to screen the Errol Morris documentary, Standard Operating Procedure, a stark look at the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, tonight at the Mercury Cafe. But he changed his mind when he decided to also host the fest’s annual…
Mid-June is the time for fresh cherries and strawberries (and rosy stalks of rhubarb for those ephemeral strawberry-rhubarb pies); July and August bring apricots and sweet corn, Colorado peaches and heirloom tomatoes by the bushel. As the good stuff from in-state earth begins to ripen, farmers’ markets all over Colorado…
Nobody does underbelly, let alone Bangkok underbelly, better than John Burdett, whose detective thriller Bangkok Haunts is set into motion by the unsolved mystery surrounding the victim of a snuff film. This is the third installment in Burdett’s series, which stars Thai cop Sonchai Jitpleecheep and a corrupt cast of…
Did you ever wonder where that strange glint in your dog’s eye comes from? In every dog, after all, there are ancient roots, instinctual necessities harking back to ancestral wolves and sifted through time into something more manageable and useful to humans. That’s the story that evolves in Wolf to…
What do we love about house tours? Snooping. Sticking our noses where they don’t belong, because for one day a year, we can. And dreaming: rampaging have-nots treading where only the haves have gone before. Kitchens That Cook!, the annual kitchen tour hosted by the Junior League of Denver, fulfills…
Just blink, and you’ll miss another change to the landscape in the Central Platte Valley. It’s really happening that fast in a now-populated land that just a few years ago was home only to railroad tracks and industry. Like any sign of progress, the burgeoning valley’s got its pros and…
We all want to be something we’re not, and as the legions of Paris Hilton wannabes running rampant across the continent indicate, it’s not a passing fad. A lot of people must figure that if you just brush elbows with someone gorgeous, it might rub off a little. If that’s…
Denver newbie Patricia Branstead is a master printer, papermaker, book artist and teacher of all of the above, a globe-trotting treasure who decided to roost here. Raised near Washington, D.C., and schooled in the Bay Area, she founded and ran the Aeropress intaglio studio in New York City for seventeen…
The entire River North arts district will be hosting First Friday special events and open houses during tonight’s Evening in RiNo event. But the jewel in that crown will surely be the opening reception for Retroville — a pure-fun group kitsch show — taking place from 6 to 9 p.m…
Although his Tennyson Street gallery space is tiny, artist and artists’ friend Jimmy Sellars tends to do things big. So what the heck, he decided, why not take the art outside and put it on the wall? Because there seemed to be so many artists and so little room, the…
The 21st City Park Jazz season will go on as planned this year despite the major construction that makes the bandstand by Ferril Lake, where the free outdoor concerts have always traditionally been staged, look like an iffy place to spread a picnic blanket. Instead, the first three concerts, beginning…
Local aficionados of the corner used-furniture store might fondly remember the Cluttered Closet in Congress Park, which sadly shut its doors last fall. It was one of those places where you’d find a new/old sofa by serendipity as you walked through your neighborhood; the treasures were always plentiful and the…
Don’t utter the word “downsized” around Jim DeLutes: The new director of the troubled Downtown Denver Arts Festival has been working his tail off to rebuild the fest, which returned Friday to the Denver Pavilions in a fresh incarnation for its ninth Memorial Day Weekend run. “There’s not a lot…
Memorial Day Weekend is when Front Rangers truly test the waters of summer. A lot of us take the first camping trip of the year or the first dive into the pool; still others haunt favorite watering holes of another kind or go out to dig in the garden. Whatever…
Naturally, an experiential artist like Denver live art maverick Eric Matelski would be fascinated by the city’s bountiful network of community gardens. Gardening is a little like being an artist, after all, and galleries are like gardens. But how could Matelski blend the two separate communities? “I really wanted to…
Ah, the joys of bargain hunting! Two of the most avid collector communities in the universe — bookworms and music lovers — come out of their lairs and collide this weekend at the Twisted and Tattered Tent Sale. But there should be plenty of room for everyone when the Tattered…
“Brian Vogt had a dream,” says Denver Botanic Gardens spokesman Will Jones. “He was thinking about how our gardens are so unique because of the way they’re situated right in the middle of the city. There’s all this greenery at the center of so much concrete and steel.” So Gardens…
Local poetry mover and shaker Day Acoli named her weekly open-mike series Black Star Dog for two reasons: in memory of her late dog; and as a reference to Sirius, the Dog Star — the brightest star in the galaxy — and its dense, dark cousin, Sirius B. “I thought…
You’ve been to the chi-chi weekend fleas, and they’re a blast. But face it: In terms of looking true, salt-of-the-earth flea-market culture squarely in the eye, you’re only getting your toes wet. At the Old North Denver Flea Market — hosted monthly from May through October by alterNative Voices and…
Depending on what part of the world you’re from, Tropicália — a multi-disciplinary Brazilian counterculture movement of the ’60s — might have spawned the greatest pop music of the twentieth century or not even have left a blip on your cultural radar. But in more recent years, familiar artists such…
WWII-era refugees-turned-textile-designers Zika and Lida Ascher took London by storm in the ’40s, creating screen-printed fabrics, Day-Glo mohairs and other mod innovations that remained popular in the world of couture through the early ’70s. But perhaps their most famous contribution came in the form of limited-edition scarves — they called…
