Arts & Culture

Global warming will, sooner than later, fry the planet; free-for-all globalization will decimate our common concepts of commerce; unchecked overpopulation and its voracious demand for resources will burden the earth beyond its capacity to renew. And that’s the good news. The bad is that America’s addiction to foreign oil is…

You may not have a valentine this Valentine’s Day, but there’s a lot to love tonight. From 9 p.m.- 1 a.m., the Cherry Cricket, at 2641 E. Second Avenue, will offer its annual Anti-V Day Karaoke Party. “Pissed at your ex? Can’t afford a fancy dinner? Think Valentine’s is a…

It’s not every day that a group of all-female Tuvan throat singers and folk musicians stop in town, so consider yourself lucky to be able to hear Tyva Kyzy not once, but twice this week. “It’s pretty cool, because I think they’re the only all-female ensemble of throat singers in…

Eric Schmiedl’s Plainsong, an adaptation of Kent Haruf’s award-winning novel, was one of the high points of the Denver Center Theatre Company’s 2008 season. Now Schmiedl is back as one of five playwrights participating in the Colorado New Play Summit, which features a staged reading of his new play, Eventide,…

The Ill Affair and the illiterate Website Launch Party are back-to-back events exploring the boundaries of love and hate while raising money for RedLine art studio and illiterate magazine. “We’re looking at these words commonly viewed as oppositional terms and seeing how they interact,” says illiterate editor Adam Gildar. “How…

I don’t refer to myself as a chocoholic. My addiction is much more severe: I consider myself a connoisseur. As such, know that I am nail-bitingly excited about the Havana District’s Travel the World Through Chocolate, which will showcase chocolate imported from the around the globe for our tasting pleasure…

Love it or hate it, television is an inescapable force in our culture. In recognition of this fact — and of the impending end of analog broadcasts (originally scheduled for February 17, but postponed until June 12) — artist Eric Matelski put together Poor Reception, a television art show featuring…

Last year, Christoph Heinrich, the curator of the modern and contemporary department at the Denver Art Museum, 100 West 14th Avenue Parkway, decided to take on a complete reinstallation of the permanent-collection galleries on the third and fourth floors of the Hamilton wing. His selections were chosen according to how…

There are a few giants who stand at the forefront of downtempo electronic music: Portishead, Massive Attack, Zero 7, and Peter Kruder and Richard Dorfmeister — and, of course, DJ Mark Farina, who’s been steadily releasing house-style mixes and morphs of downtempo, hip-hop, jazz and soul with his Mushroom Jazz…

Next time you try to pull on one of those lightweight, modern-day wonder-fabric girdles over your bulges, just remember this: In Victorian times, women’s undergarments — at least those of self-respecting, well-appointed fine ladies — typically weighed seven to ten pounds, and women often wore up to thirteen layers under…

Kity Ironton of Pandora Jewelry loves her customers. In fact, like many independent retailers, she’s not complaining about hard times. “Even with the economy the way it is, Denver has supported us, so we want to show our support for them,” she says, and that’s why Ironton and her crew…

Not every artist’s work is musical-revue material, but there’s no question that songwriters Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller are more than up to the revue challenge. Their own personal revue, Smokey Joe’s Cafe: The Songs of Leiber and Stoller, won a Tony Award in 1995, and its soundtrack won a…

Denver’s long-lived Chicano theater ensemble, Su Teatro, will step up next week to receive the Mayor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. But the group is also moving closer each day toward the realization of a dream: a new facility taking shape on Santa Fe Drive. And if every step…

Amazingly enough, in 2004, Russ Gershon’s adventurous Either/Orchestra jazz ensemble became the first American big band to play Addis Ababa since Duke Ellington hit Ethiopia in 1973, spawning a cross-cultural collaboration with some of the East African nation’s top musicians that continues to this day. That includes a partnership with…

Not satisfied with being a sleepy little town, the burg of Lafayette, Colorado, seems to spend an inordinate amount of time looking for ways to distinguish itself by celebrating the ordinary and the unexpected. Oatmeal, peaches, itself: Lafayette’s got an annual paean to each, but nothing quite tops this month’s…

“One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star,” Friedrich Nietzsche wrote. It’s a quote that comes to mind when considering that nature, while chaotic, is also what makes life possible on this small rock. “Natural disasters are manifestations of the earth’s…

At least 25 percent of seasonal gift cards purchased in the United States each year are for Valentine’s Day, according to the Greeting Card Association, while more than 36 million heart-shaped boxes of chocolate will be sold on Cupid’s behalf, says the National Confectioners Association. Necco — manufacturer of Sweethearts…

Nothing But the Truth, the opening-night attraction for the Thursday, February 12, launch of the Boulder International Film Festival, is an old-fashioned Hollywood flick in the best sense of the term. The plot, about a reporter (Kate Beckinsale) who goes to jail à la New York Times lightning rod Judith…

Two years ago, Challenge Aspen ski instructor Chris Bove was in a freak ski accident the night before the annual Buttermilk Uphill Race and Walkathon. He spent seven hours in surgery and died at 1 a.m., just hours before the race was set to begin. So it’s only fitting that…