Within every living art, there will always be a conversation among the artists who create it. The conversation is what makes it vital: a back-and-forth of reaction, adaptation, innovation, and yes, rejection. I recently saw, …
February 4, 2015
News & Stories
San Diego Reader 2015 Guide to local art
Record-release roundup
This week, Dead Rock West’s 2011 album Bright Morning Stars is being re-released on 180-gram vinyl, which will be available at their Pappy and Harriet’s show on February 7, and Sledding with Tigers is reissuing …
February 4, 2015
Last of the red hat ladies
Ex-UCSD chancellor Marye Anne Fox has resigned from the board of directors of Red Hat, Inc., an open-source software outfit based in Raleigh, North Carolina. A member of Red Hat’s compensation committee and nominating and …
February 4, 2015
Appellate court rebuffs wild-goose Chase
On January 30, the Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District, gave a pretty good spanking to a Poway couple who appealed when a Superior Court judge ruled in favor of the big J.P. Morgan Chase …
February 4, 2015
The case of the rotten gym rat
Deputies arrested a repeat felon who broke into lockers at a series of LA Fitness gyms around North County San Diego last spring, it was alleged in court on February 3. A woman named Meggan …
February 4, 2015
Saxy Sammy
Rain or shine, summer or winter, Sam Schildkraut, or “Saxy Sammy,” as he likes to call himself, goes to work each night, busking on the sidewalk outside of the Skechers Shoe Store on Mission Boulevard …
February 4, 2015
Kate Voegele, like a female Bon Jovi
Let us count the many ways that “Hallelujah” has been covered over the years. A throng of dissimilar artists have taken a shot at that magnum opus, including Tim Buckley, Il Divo, John Bon Jovi, …
February 4, 2015
Fifteen seconds of politics
County supervisor Greg Cox, preparing for his 2016 reelection bid, has hired a familiar name to help out. Tom Shepard, one-time political wonder boy for former Republican supervisors Roger Hedgecock and Susan Golding, and later …
February 4, 2015
Captain Beyond DNA
A critical mass of local bands is thriving, owing to the loud, expansive psych-metal of Earthless. “It’s all based around an underground, heavy psychedelic vibe,” says Earthless drummer Mario Rubalcaba, a former pro skater and …
February 4, 2015
Swami’s new trip
“I think people make up their mind whether they’re going to like something before they even hear it.”
February 4, 2015
Upscale harem
“Hookahs are definitely cheaper there,” she says. “But you get less of a head-rush from them.”
February 4, 2015
MLB: How they got there
Okay, it’s over. New England won. Padres pitchers and catchers report to spring training in two weeks. A year ago I wrote a column about NFL team owners and how they got their money. There …
February 4, 2015
Two old Jews sitting around talking boogaloo and ninja
Across the room at Cinema Society gansamacher Andy Friedenberg’s 60th birthday party stood Saundra Saperstein, Chair of the San Diego Jewish Film Festival. When asked what celebrities would be attending SDJFF 23, she mentioned Theodore …
February 4, 2015
Lightweight, miniature musical
Murder for Two, a musical/detective story, would be a lot more fun in an intimate, cabaret setting: clinking glasses, lubricated laughter, face-to-face interaction. But on the Old Globe’s Donald and Darlene Shiley mainstage, the two-hander …
February 4, 2015
Change your mind
Post Title: Change your thoughts; change your life Post Date: September 5, 2014 Attitude and behaviors are two things that can determine success or failure, both are influenced by memories. According to Dr. Norman Doidge, …
February 4, 2015
I think Garrison Keillor is a genius
Well, a secret genius, anyway. That might seem a funny sort of title for someone who’s written for The New Yorker, penned the screenplay for a Robert Altman film, published a slew of novels and …
February 4, 2015
Meet Kleptomom
"They never look at the bottom of my cart. But if they do, I'll just say, 'Oh my gosh. Sorry. Totally forgot."
February 4, 2015
Splash in the Devil's Punchbowl
Be prepared for this challenging but rewarding hike to one of San Diego County’s most spectacular waterfalls.
February 4, 2015
Interview with National Gallery director (and master documentarian) Frederick Wiseman
Frederick Wiseman’s documentaries have titles such as High School, Hospital, Juvenile Court, Meat, Model, Racetrack, Deaf, Missile, Zoo, Domestic Violence, and Boxing Gym. That last, from 2010, was my first exposure, and I was immediately …
February 4, 2015
Swallow what you mind
Some background: Alice Childress’s Trouble in Mind won an Obie Award for best off-Broadway show in 1955. It was scheduled to move to Broadway, which would make Childress the first African-American to have a play …
February 4, 2015
Farm to drive-thru
Does the end of Modern Farmer signal the final stage of hipster-foodie culture?
February 4, 2015
Buy this mansion from Jenny Craig
Current Owner: Genevieve (Jenny) Craig Bedrooms: 5 Baths: 6.5 Price: $39,500,000 This week we visit an 8925-square-foot mansion sitting on a nearly three-quarter-acre lot on a small spit of sand lying just across the San …
February 4, 2015
Midnight on the Coronado pier
A bucket — blood-stained rag hanging out — was making a racket as a ten-inch mackerel whacked the sides. It would be back in the water as soon as Cesar (not his real name) pinned …
February 4, 2015
Cell-phone companies are stealing San Diego parkland
“In our city parks, the law says you’re not allowed to solicit funds,” says La Jolla resident Marc Kuritz. “You can’t sell merchandise. You can’t pass out advertising flyers. You’re not even allowed to pick flowers. But our mayor and city council hand over chunks of our park land to private corporations for cell phone towers. It’s not legal, it’s not right, and it makes no sense, unless you are the politician getting the revenue or the telecommunications giant making the profit.”
February 4, 2015
Extra, extra
A Viking with No Family I’ve been a frequent supporter of the Reader for many years, and just wanted to express my concern on the January 22 cover story, “One in the Gut. One in …
February 4, 2015
Jet set ethics
Another aide to Republican House member Darrell Issa has jetted off for a quick junket to Las Vegas, thanks to special-interest money. Last year it was Veronica Wong, Issa’s deputy chief of staff in charge …
February 4, 2015
February 3 dock totals
The Premier 1/2 Day AM run with 22 Anglers aboard pinned up and boated 218 Rockfish and 2 Lingcod for the freezer 48 Anglers aboard the New Seaforth 1/2 Day AM run found 11 Yellowtail …
February 4, 2015
And the arts cover contest winner is ... Sarah Stieber!
Sarah Stieber paints in what she calls “Electric Realism,” a style that projects the “amplification of real life,” and uses bright, vivid colors that suggest “wishful seeing.” Stieber created “Fierce” in 2014, originally intending the …
February 4, 2015
My favorite San Diego theater
It’s just a room upstairs, in an old two-story house. They say when it opened, on December 1, 1868, 150 watched the Tanner Troupe perform a song and dance revue at the “Brick Building.” A …
February 4, 2015
Dancing machines
San Diego hosts a network of dance companies and studios filled with nationally and internationally acclaimed dancers and choreographers adept in styles from tap to jazz, modern to contemporary, ballroom to ballet, hip-hop to Irish …
February 4, 2015
The blood of a lamb
Walter Sutin grew up in Pennsylvania and studied at Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore before moving to San Diego in 2008 and, three years later, enrolling in the master’s program at UCSD. He …
February 4, 2015
Photography unique to the Casbah
Sean McMullen never intended to become a photographer. After testing out of high school in the mid-’80s to pursue a future in filmmaking, the Chula Vista native took a course in photography under the technical …
February 4, 2015
Movement, memory, and sound
It’s only been about five months since Mexico City multimedia artist and musician Francisco Eme moved to San Diego, but he’s already integrated his work into multiple shows in California and Baja. Many of the …
February 4, 2015
Theater, out of the theater
Picture this: you spend the evening climbing in and out of cars where you experience a series of five-to-ten-minute plays that take place inside the cars (The Car Plays, La Jolla Playhouse, 2013–2014). Or you …
February 4, 2015
Art seen
In a bid to rid themselves of the “starving artist” label, veteran San Diego artists came together to create the Studio Door, which is a business that allows them to produce their own work but …
February 4, 2015
Exhibitionists
“No reading, no memorizing. It’s all oral,” described Storytellers of San Diego president Marilyn McPhie of the yarns these spinners create live for audiences. Join the performers for the Storytelling Festival on March 21 at …
February 4, 2015
San Diego theater icons
MVP: Becky Biegelsen Every year the San Diego Performing Arts League honors volunteers for special recognition with a STAR award. These are the workers who devote hours and hours to keep an organization going. There …
February 4, 2015
Tijuana to China and back
“No one is going to shut me up here.” That’s what artist Daniel Ruanova told Newsweek in a 2002 article that arrived at the zenith of media captivation with Tijuana art and music. The publication …
February 4, 2015
What didn’t he do last year?
Eddie Yaroch earned a Craig Noel Award nomination — Outstanding Featured Performance in a Play, Male — for his raptor-loving Andy Fastow in Moxie Theatre’s Enron. But that’s not all. In 2014 he also: — …
February 4, 2015
Parks and art and recreation
Among the barrel cactus and desert agave of Borrego Springs you’ll find a peculiar site: a herd of Gomphotheres and a 350-foot sea serpent slithering out of the sand. These, and 138 other larger than …
February 4, 2015
Art of Élan
“Have you been to an Art of Élan concert?” Whenever I get this question it is asked at a hundred miles an hour with the enthusiasm of true belief. What is Art of Élan? On …
February 4, 2015