Instagram is the latest, and obviously the hippest, photo-sharing app; it allows anyone with a smartphone to play amateur photographer, transforming regular old snapshots into filtered, fogged and color-tinted works of art at the touch of a finger. Search “Denver” on Statigram, one of the app’s web-based viewing platforms, and…
Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, effectively ending slavery for all Americans. But the news did not reach Texas until June of 1865, when Union General Gordon Granger stormed into Galveston with 2,000 troops to tell the people of Texas that, under General Order No. 3,…
Boulder-based filmmaker Hunter Weeks is bringing his new film, Where the Yellowstone Goes, to the Denver FilmCenter tonight at 7 p.m.; the screening will be followed by a Q&A session. Weeks and his crew — including his wife, Sarah Hall, and Denver-based filmmaker Mike Dion, a frequent collaborator — spent…
José Guadalupe Posada’s engravings adorned everything from National Enquirer-style stories of monsters and grisly crimes to devout religious pamphlets. Today, artist Jerry Vigil creates three-dimensional wood carvings that translate Posada’s style for a modern age, just as the Mexican engraver translated the day’s news into unforgettable illustrations. The two artists…
With “Fight for Your Right to Pride” as the official theme of Denver’s PrideFest 2012, the GLBTQ community is taking off its gloves — led by four grand marshals who are also happen to be “out” members of the Colorado Legislature: Senators Pat Steadman and Lucia Guzman, and Representatives Mark…
Steeped in local lore, Lakeside Amusement Park, at 4601 Sheridan Boulevard, is an art-deco wonderland. Framed by mature trees and blinking lights, the classic theme park is one of the oldest still in operation in the country…
Art and food have been an item for a long time, but some places do it better than others. City, O’ City is a case in point, where a partnership with the nonprofit Art-Plant, which curates shows by emerging artists for the eatery, keeps things interesting with work that isn’t…
For half a century, the art world’s chattering class — critics and curators, mostly — has been declaring abstraction dead and buried. In the ’60s, there was pop art, which was thought to be edging out abstraction. In the ’70s, it was neo-dada and postmodernism. The ’80s saw the development…
Set in the Norwegian boonies, Jannicke Systad Jacobsen’s first fiction feature (based on Olaug Nilssen’s 2005 novel) introduces its fifteen-year-old protagonist, Alma (Helene Bergsholm), with her hand down her pants, furiously coming as she listens to a phone-sex operator. Yet the opening scene’s promising boldness is soon undermined by cutaway…
Rock of Ages, a new star-clogged pop-musical diversion, is a cinematic event. It’s not every day, after all, that you get to see two great American traditions — guitar/bass/drums rock music and Tin Pan Alley musical theater — so thoroughly, mutually degraded. This mess originated as a stage production, first…
With her high cheekbones, feline brown eyes, and heart-shaped mouth, actress Aubrey Plaza is bombshell-hot. But in an unusual twist for a twentysomething performer at the beginning of her career, Plaza’s natural foxiness is a resource that has gone largely unexploited. Not exactly a character actress — she hasn’t yet…
With bicycles increasingly popular around town, the Whole Foods in Capitol Hill now features a one-stop shop for basic bike problems: a Dero Fixit bike stand. Did your cruiser get a flat tire on your way to the bar? Stop here and pump it up. Do you have a loose…
When Scared Stiff premiered last week night at The Bar, a small crowd of bizarro movie buffs gathered to see cult classic Plan 9 From Outer Space. But it wasn’t just the campy Ed Wood-directed flick that brought folks in — it was drag queen Alexus Vain’s commentary, which runs…
Some things — such as the growing trend of fried butter on a stick — are surreal in a terrible way, while others can be surreal in a fantastic way. Watching movies outdoors definitely qualifies in the latter category, but most drive-in movie theaters have gone the way of the…
Perhaps it was their shared propensity for posting weird ads on Craigslist that was fated to bring them, like so many missed connections, together. Or maybe they’re just two weird dudes. Whatever it is, there’s something approaching ironic about the fact that Daniel Nilsson — who had been looking via…
Film on the Rocks, which started rolling out its 2012 season last Monday night with Office Space, is back tonight with its next film, Iron Man, with music by The McRae and Force Publique, all at the stunning Red Rocks Amphitheatre. But some readers say they’re underwhelmed by this year’s…
You have one more chance to see Lisa Suarez’s I’ll Remember for You, which ends a short run at Su Teatro tonight. The play tells the story of Suarez’s relationship with her mother, who suffers from Alzeheimer’s. “There’s this bond and this sacrifice and this emotion,” says Su Teatro executive…
The Tour Divide is a harrowing bike race. And that’s true even if you don’t have diabetes. The 2,745 mile race follows the Continental Divide from Banff, Alberta to Antelope Wells, New Mexico and challenges racers to complete the distance unsupported by anyone else and living off the food and…
The most recent art toy collection from Task One, AKA Daniel Rowley, is the result of a lot of late nights. While he works, the graffiti and custom toy artist watches copious amounts of his favorite TV shows, so it was only a matter of time before inspiration caught up…
“If you could ride anywhere in the world, where would you go?” became a central question for Mike Dion after the success of the Denver-based filmmaker’s 2010 film, Ride the Divide. That question became the tagline for his next film, Reveal the Path, which took Dion and some of the…
Down to your last ten dollars? Don’t worry, there are plenty of things you can do this weekend that cost a Hamilton or less. Gawk at a performance artist living in a box, usher in summer at a dance party, or pretend you’re in Paris at a Francophile craft party…
Urban adventure races and downtown scavenger hunts have become old hat in adrenaline-conscious, wheel-happy Colorado. But when AIGA Colorado, the regional design association, decides to put on an outdoor event, you know it’s going to be of a very different type. To that end, letterpress typographer Rick Griffith of Matter…
