When I first stumbled across the TEDxRino website, I was confused — or maybe annoyed is a more realistic way to describe it. A friend had posted a video on Facebook that was essentially a slick commercial for the RiNo area in north Denver, starring a bunch of artists and…
Denver’s cityscape is always changing, but lately this boomtown has been exploding. Fortunately, this city is home to many devoted souls working to preserve images of what the Mile High City — and other places around the state — once looked like. While The Denver Eye took the prize as…
As one of the largest user-generated information sites on the Internet, Wikipedia is a powerful machine. The information shared on Wikipedia can be added and edited by anyone, yet just a fraction of its contributors are women. This Saturday, as part of its Feminism & Co. series, the Museum of…
Andrew Novick is a fixture in many of this city’s creative scenes, and tomorrow his worlds will collide with a food-as-art extravaganza. For one night only, he will open Andrew Novick’s Ramen Yatai inside of the 100 on 100 group art show at Love Gallery. The pop-up noodle house is an actual mini-restaurant…
For Billie Holiday’s 100th birthday celebration, local jazz vocalist Venus Cruz saw an opportunity to honor both the icon’s role in American history and jazz’s place in Denver’s story. This Saturday, April 11, Cruz and a group of fellow musicians will pay tribute to Holiday inside the Great Hall at…
It began with a book: Girls to the Front, by Sara Marcus. After a fellow musician gave David Castillo the book, which chronicles the rise and influence of the riot grrrl movement, he was inspired to make a zine. The zine never happened, but the idea became a band called…
Around this time last year, some residents of the Whittier neighborhood started receiving copies of an anonymous racist letter. Though it contained only two simple lines, expressing who wasn’t “welcome” in one of Denver’s oldest ’hoods, the community united to fight back against the hateful message. This determination — along…
The word “weird” doesn’t really mean much anymore. It’s been diluted by overuse and too many applications — a food can taste “weird”; a person can act “weird”; even a place can make you feel “weird.” But when I think about the kind of art I like and the moments…
In 2012, in an act of civil disobedience, dozens of urban farmers gathered and took over a piece of land called the Gill Tract, an area once dedicated to agricultural studies and owned by the University of California, Berkeley. Occupy the Farm, which screens Tuesday, April 7 at the Sie…
One day about six years ago, Peter Isakovic’s then-nine-year-old daughter expressed an interest in playing drums, and he wanted to make that happen for her. But Isakovic’s life wasn’t in the best shape at the time: He was a recently divorced dad crashing on a friend’s couch while working through…
This past weekend, I traveled to Boise, Idaho to perform at Treefort Music Fest, a four-day event that takes over downtown Boise featuring live music, art, food, film, theater and interactive activities. I was part of the activities portion, DJing a live amateur dance battle hosted by my roommate Piper’s…
A seminal figure in the world of cartoons and illustration, Lynda Barry has been creating award-winning comic strips, books and graphic novels for the better part of four decades. Along making those contributions to popular culture, Barry is also a teacher; she’s currently an associate professor in interdisciplinary creativity at…
Between his tireless work on the comedy scene and as co-host of pop-culture podcast These Things Matter, Kevin O’Brien has collaborated with a lot of creative folks in the city. For his latest live show endeavor, Service Stories, O’Brien wanted to tap into this collection of interesting people and curate…
Since the late ’70s, the work of Gary Panter — painter, comic artist and designer — has been a fixture of the counterculture. From creating the iconic logo for punk band The Screamers and illustrating album covers for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Germs and Frank Zappa to designing…
It’s 2015 and it seems we should be long past having an opinion on selfies — taking pictures of ourselves has existed as long as the technology has been available. Really, this is nothing new. But because our behavior has been under the microscope of the Internet via social networks…
On March 20, Casa Bonita was recognized as an official landmark by the Lakewood Historical Society. The pink-and-white eatertainment palace opened on West Colfax Avenue in 1974 (it was constructed a year earlier, hence the plaque’s reference to 1973), and has been the anchor business of the shopping strip it…
The first-ever Denver Youth Poet Laureate will be chosen tonight, and along with confirmation that the winner has mastered the spoken word, the title comes with an official platform for the young artist to speak for the community. Five finalists have been chosen from several dozen who’d applied, submitting poetry…
Ariann Black has worked as a professional magician since 1990, and she’s a master of her enchanting art form. The Canada-born magician began practicing the art of illusion when she was just four years old, working her way through magic school and onto the world’s stage. She’s performed on television…
History is the best when you can make it up. Rock n’ roll history in particular is even better when it’s fictionalized (a lot of rock history is just bloated tropes about straight dudes and sex and drug use anyway, so there’s a lot to work with.) When Garth Brooks…
The pink-and-white stucco tower of Casa Bonita has been beckoning families, tourists and gaggles of curious humans off the busy Colfax strip and through its big brown doors for more than four decades. Colorado’s most confounding and simultaneously beloved piece of pop culture has been a constant force, an unwavering…
There is an expected magic that comes along with seeing a performer like Stevie Wonder live — he’s a seminal pop star, a genre-less marvel. And most of all, he’s a musician’s musician, able to play a multitude of instruments alongside anyone brave enough for the challenge. There were plenty…
A few weeks ago, a friend and I started talking about planning a summer road trip to Los Angeles. We’re both working on large creative projects — he’s got a documentary in progress and I’ve been sitting on a book idea for years — and a long ride in the…
