Film: Independent Lens Series

KAKM and Out North present

Community Cinema

Free livescreenings from the upcoming season of the acclaimed PBS series Independent Lens

Every 3rd Tuesday through the season.

Find out more about the program and upcoming screenings here.

The series starts at 7 p.m. tonight, September 20, with a screening of

Pray the Devil Back to Hell

The story of how the women of Liberia stopped the country's civil war.

See a clip and come see the film.

Film: Three Veils

Out North could not be more excited to host a groundbreaking film that details the lives of 3 Arab-American women. The film, "Three Veils" is in its very first run on the festival circuit, and is sure to make big waves going forward.

Filmmaker Rolla Selbak and actress Sheetal Sheth traveled to Alaska last October for the screening of their films "The World Unseen" and "I Can't Think Straight." (The lesbian content in these films was mentioned as one reason a funder pulled $80,000 from Out North shortly thereafter.) The pair, impressed by the sold out houses and warm welcome they received, return again to show us their newest work.

June 10 and 11, Come mingle with these independent artists and watch the film "Three Veils" during a weekend of film-related events Sponsored by the Pride Foundation, and in support of Out North's Intersections film series.

Expect a good time, because we'll be grilling Alaska meat, dishing out vegan food, pouring wine, and showing a great film.

"Three Veils" centers on three Middle Eastern women living in the U.S., each with her own story about culture, family, love, faith, sexuality and more. It aims to portray the characters as human beings first, women second, and their cultural surroundings as veils that dictate how much of their inner selves are revealed. Watch a clip here: http://www.youtube.com/threeveils

Performance: Bridgman/Packer Dance

Because you loved them so much in 2008, Out North commissioned a new dance piece by Bridgman/Packer Dance. On an artistic high from becoming the first duet to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship, the two return to Anchorage with what Artistic Director Scott Schofield promises will be "the single coolest show you will see all year."

Choreographer/performers Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer, along with a multitude of their video counterparts, blend live camera, animation, and prerecorded urban settings to create multi-layered perspectives and surreal mindscapes amid a highly-charged alchemy of the live and the virtual. "Double Expose" is a fantastical, raucous, sensual exploration of identity, relationship, and the human psyche. In “Under the Skin,” the performers' bodies and costumes become projection screens creating a morphing and redefining of identities and the revealing of hidden psychological depths. Bridgman/Packer are Guggenheim Fellows, and Out North Contemporary Art House commissioned "Double Expose."

"The most thrilling dance work this reviewer has seen in recent memory...flat-out exhilarating."
- The Boston Globe

"in an age overrun with virtual dancing, the team of Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer stands out...by turns, witty, sexy, and surreal." - The New Yorker

Watch a clip: http://bit.ly/BPdiscovery

Performance: Jack Dalton and Allison Warden

Out North is proud to partner with two important community artists to present 

TIME IMMEMORIAL at the Sydney Lawrence Theatre

Join Alaskan Native Artists Jack Dalton and Allison Warden as they perform a journey of two souls, Miti and Tulu, who are born into different relationships through many lifetimes, weaving their way through important events in Alaskan Native history. In one lifetime they are sisters, in another, elder and child, in another, husband and wife and so on... Together, they weave a beautiful and moving story of Alaska Native people moving forward through time, through change, retaining their strength, culture and identity.

Technical Theater Training Workshop

April 18-21, 6-9pm at Out North
$15 each class or $50 for 4 classes

Matt Lawrence is the Technical Director of the Evergreen State College theater. He is also a freelance light designer, IATSE grip, and longtime tour manager/production designer. He has tech directed and designed Out North Artistic & Executive Director Scott Turner Schofield's solo work in spaces from Out North to the National Theater of Belgium, and has lit dance works in spaces as varied as the Capitol Playhouse in Olympia to Lincoln Center - among a long career of making live art work well and look pretty in tiny blackboxes and state-of-the- art facilities. He's an excellent tech and a great teacher.

Thanks to support from the Alaska State Council on the Arts, Matt will be in residence at Out North April 18-21st, offering four 3-hour classes in the basics of technical theater on the scale - and equipment availablity - of venues like Out North. Lighting, rigging, safety, and basic stagecraft will be covered. The plan is to create a basic skill-set that can then be refined and built upon at a particular venue in town.

We can take 10 participants and maybe more if there is desire. There are no limits or expectations as to background knowledge or age of the participants. It's affordable, and it'll be a lot of fun too.

UPDATE: This workshop served six participants , three of whom went on to occupy positions at local theaters.

Performance: Rhodessa Jones and Idris Ackamoor

THE LOVE PROJECT
CONCEIVED & PERFORMED BY RHODESSA JONES AND IDRIS ACKAMOOR
WRITTEN BY PEARL CLEAGE, ZARON W. BURNETT, RHODESSA JONES AND
IDRIS ACKAMOOR | DIRECTED BY HARRIET SCHIFFER-SCOTT
"Cultural Odyssey's Idris Ackamoor and Rhodessa Jones stole my heart with their delectable performances. . . . There's a message of everlasting love in 'The Love Project'." - Monica Hill, examiner.com
Part house party, part TV talk show, and part cabaret, THE LOVE PROJECT is an interactive experience that testifies to the network of human relations that define our times. 

Currently on tour performing at
La MaMa E.T.C. in New York City, The Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center in Tampa, Florida, 7 Stages Theater in Atlanta, Georgia and The University of the West Indies in Trindad, W.I. 
Don't miss it at Out North April 14-16

Visual Art: Ted Herlinger

I Love Ted Herlinger's Guts

It was pretty amazing to walk into the gallery with all these spheres floating in the air.  And then I started looking at individual spheres and it was even more amazing.  I know, some people think it doesn't take much to get me excited.  But these are special, especially the whole collection hanging in this lighting.

 

The exhibit is called Phase II.  The artist is Ted Herlinger.

They're made of reed, pork gut, and elk sinew.

Here's what the description said.

One more.

This post originally posted on What Do I Know?