Carrboro
Because We’re Still Here (and Moving): Mapping a World of Black History in Our Own Backyard — photography exhibit & interactive installation, Center Gallery. Acrylic paintings by DiGiulio, East Gallery. The ArtsCenter, 300-G E Main St. 929-2787, artscenterlive.org.

Mixed media by Chief — a tribute to the artists’ new daughter. The Beehive Salon, 102 E. Weaver St. 932-4483, thebeehive-salon.com.

More »

Carrboro

• Photography by Joanna Welborn & Mark Pettit. are we friends? — Jan 3-30. Public reception Fri, Jan 11, 6-9pm. Center Gallery, The ArtsCenter. 300-G E Main St, Carrboro. 929-2737, www.artscenterlive.org. More »

Carrboro

Paintings by Peg Bachenheimer and Catherine Carter – Through December at Provence Restaurant, 203 W Weaver St, Carrboro. www.pegbachenheimer.com

Chinese Red Glazed Pottery by Ben Owen III - Through Dec 31. NC Crafts Gallery, 212 W Main St, Carrboro, 942-4048, www.nccraftsgallery.com, Mon-Sat 10am-6pm, Sun 1-4pm.

Works on Paper by John Ensslin – Through Jan 12 at Acme Food & Beverage Co, 110 E Main St, Carrboro. 929-ACME, www.acmecarrboro.com

More »

Carrboro

Paintings by Stephanie Smith – Family rendering acrylic paintings. Through Dec 23, East End Gallery at The ArtsCenter. Artist’s reception: Fri, Dec 14, 6-9pm. 300-G E Main St, Carrboro. 929-2787, www.artscenterlive.org
Paintings by Peg Bachenheimer and Catherine Carter – Through December at Provence Restaurant, 203 W Weaver St, Carrboro. www.pegbachenheimer.com

Chinese Red Glazed Pottery by Ben Owen III - Through Dec 31. NC Crafts Gallery, 212 W Main St, Carrboro, 942-4048, www.nccraftsgallery.com, Mon-Sat 10am-6pm, Sun 1-4pm.

Super Awesome Holiday Family Show – Bright, starry, and really special! Through 14-Jan 7 at Wootini, 200 N Greensboro St, Carr Mill Mall, Carrboro. Opening reception: Fri, Dec 14, 7-11pm.

More »

On Friday and Saturday, September 7 and 8, the ArtsCenter will present The Coastal Cohorts (Don Dixon, Bland Simpson and Jim Wann) performing songs from their popular coastal show “King Mackeral and The Blues are Running” and from their sequel CD “Wild Ponies, More Songs from the Carolina Coast.”

The trio recently completed a successful four-show stand for the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and the North Carolina Coastal Federation, June 28th-30th, at the Crystal Coast Civic Center in Morehead City.

The shows start at 8:30 p.m.  Tickets are $16 General Admission and $14 for ArtsCenter Friends. For more information, call 929-2787.

— From Staff Reports

 
Joe Thompson near his house in Mebane. Photo by Lissa Gotwals

Been a long time coming.

One of the things people might not know about Joe Thompson is that he started playing as a very young man, which means that at age 89 his career as a fiddler runs close to eight decades.

Thompson and his cousin Odell were mainstays of the square dance circuit — both black and white dances — in the Piedmont during the string music heydays of the 1920s and ‘30s. They learned the style of black string bands from their fathers, and, like them, became highly sought-after players.

More »

PlayMaker’s producing artistic director Joseph Haj. Photo Courtesy of UNC News Services

UNC News Services

CHAPEL HILL – PlayMakers Repertory Company is seeking area residents with informed opinions on conflict in the Middle East to present their views in community discussions Sept. 12-16.

The professional theater company in residence at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will host the discussions nightly on those dates after its performances of “When the Bulbul Stopped Singing,” a play with a decidedly Palestinian point of view.

More »

Carrboro Film Festival  coming soon. Photo Illustration Courtesy of Jackie Helvey

Organizers for the second annual Carrboro Film Festival are putting out the call for submissions from local filmmakers.

The festival will be held November 18 and will feature films no longer than 20 minutes.

According to the festival requirements, filmmakers must have “at one time in life had a brush with Orange County.”
More »

 
The ten-minute theater short Back Roads, written by Stephanie Walker and directed by Jill Greeson, tells a story of a car trip gone wrong.

The ArtsCenter will present the sixth annual 10 by 10 theater festival, July 12-22. The festival features ten theatrical shorts each ten minutes long. Ten actors from Triangle companies will perform. Admission is $10. The shows begin at 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 3 p.m. on Sundays.

The shorts were chosen from over 400 submitted scripts. Several of the selected playwrights have been featured in past 10 by 10 shows.  Eight guest directors directed the plays.

On Saturday, July 14, the ArtsCenter will host a Playwright’s Gala, where audiences may meet the playwrights after the show. And on the 21st, audiences will be able to meet with the casts and crews.

By Taylor Sisk
Staff Writer

“I really think that as a culture, we’re ready for a major overhaul,” says Carrboro’s Tim Peck.

Peck is the subject of a new short video produced by Linda DiLorenzo of DiLorenzo Studios, titled “Peck and Artisans.” The video focuses on Peck’s work as a general contractor and the philosophy of that work. The need for overhaul he’s referring to above is in the nature of the latter — the philosophy of work, and what

Peck sees as an ongoing cultural trend away from regard for true craft.

Peck’s concern is that the default approach to work these days is “hurry up, hurry up — and it’s hard for people to put care into their work.”

“A lot of people feel trapped in a situation where they’re just knockin’ it out,” he says, “and it’s not that much fun.”

In the video, Peck puts it this way: “People don’t get the kinds of rewards that they need internally that I think people used to get … [when] you made something and you felt good about what you made.”
“People feeling pride in their work is so important,” Peck says. “And the way things are set up, we’re just destroying that every day. We tell people that they’re not going fast enough, it costs too much … How do we be craftsmen, how do we feel good about ourselves in this day and time, when we’re just pulled on in so many ways?”

A central theme of the video is the collaborative creative process Peck assumes with his clients. Among those featured in the show are Moshi Moshi hair studio, Lantern Restaurant, 3 Cups, SandwHich, the Greenbridge project and a private residence in Carrboro. Several among these clients-cum-collaborators talk about the difficulty of a process in which appropriate attention is given to every consideration of every material, to exactingly precise craftsmanship and, bottom line, to no-compromising quality. Moreover, and apparently of equal importance to Peck, these same folks point out that, through it all, their friendship with the craftsman endured.

As subtext to the video is the unfolding of a similarly collaborative process between Peck and the filmmaker DiLorenzo. Providing voiceover, DiLorenzo says that in producing this piece she sought to “honor the craftsmanship, the knowledge of space, appreciation of beauty and attention to detail” found in work of the caliber of Peck’s, adding, “these are the tools of my craft as well.” More »

By Erica Eisdorfer
Columnist

A happy childhood does not a good memoir make. This isn’t an original thought, and it’s probably true. It may also be a fact that the worse your childhood, the better the book. Someone else’s trauma often makes for zesty reading.

Meredith Hall’s Without a Map is, as writer Ivan Doig says, “bone-honest.” I’ll say. Bony seems like exactly the right word for this book. More »

Tiles from Ali Sobel-Read at N.C. Crafts Gallery 

The 2nd Friday ArtWalk is this week, and there’s a special push on to walk Carrboro — and not just on Friday.

The ArtWalk is a traditional time to take to the streets and view displays through the downtowns of Chapel Hill and Carrboro.

Now a group of Carrboro residents wants to take it to a higher level.

More »

Joshua Bell

UNC News Services

Aretha Franklin, Yo-Yo Ma, k.d. lang and Brazilian vocalist Caetano Veloso will be among artists presented in the 2007-2008 Carolina Performing Arts season at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Three major international orchestras also will perform during the organization’s third season in Memorial Hall – including the legendary Saint Petersburg Philharmonic with chief conductor Yuri Temirkanov in a rare North Carolina appearance for both.

More »