Weekly Heads Up on the Arts Scene - 2

Okay kids, I am off to the tropics here, so you won't see anything from me for the next two weeks. So by way of a weekly arts preview here, this is a list of things I'm going to miss that I think you should go to. How does that sound? Listen up, there'll be a test when I get back.

1- Word on the Street:
Sunday, Sept. 25, from 11 AM to 6 PM at Library Square
Now that school's back in, the city's literary events are ramping up. Word on the Street is one of my favorite bookish events with Magazine samples, book sales from local publishers, author readings and scavenger hunt for the kids, all in the name of celebrating reading. Yay! Also, tickets for October's Writer's Festival go on sale Sept. 19th. Lots of good stuff coming up there.

2 - In the same literary vein, Salman Rushdie is at the Ridge on Sat. Sept. 24th, 7PM

3- On the visual arts front, following the success of SWARM6, is The Drift: Art on Main Street, which will be happening on Oct. 1st and 2nd. It's a celebration of all the great art on Main Street with 100 artists in 33 studios! I am sorely pissed about missing this one, it looks like it will be fabulous. The Opening Gala will be Friday Sept. 30th from 7-11 PM at the Polish Community Hall, 4015 Fraser Street and if you can't make it to that, just download a map from the website and make your own way.

4- A little left of the mainstream is Love Bomb/Ai No Bakudan. Transgendered artist and activist Terre Thaemlitz's electro-acoustic audio-video collage shatters conservative views on love. From the website: Lovebomb/Ai No Bakudan is an analysis of love as a cultural mechanism which enables otherwise unacceptable acts of violence, as demonstrated by domestic violence, a terrorist's love for his or her cause and America's vengeful love of freedom. Digitally processed spoken word samples narrate various scenerios of global violence. From a posthumous association between the roots of Italian Futurism and the 1906 lynching of three black men in Terre's home town, to the social abuses and neglect emburdened on the last lingering survivors of atomic blasts in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to Terre's personal post-queer-bashing traumas.
Normally I steer clear of performance art, but this just looks too intriguing! The show is $15 and happens on Sept. 24th at 8 PM at the Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie Street. There is also a free panel discussion on art and gender earlier in the day at 2 PM, called "Performing Gender: A Discussion on Art and Gender", which sounds like it could be really interesting.

Image courtesy of Francine Renaud whose art is a part of The Drift.