Cleveland Public Library will host the FREE and open to the public debut stage reading of the Karamu House production of The Fire inside: the Story and Poetry of Nikki Giovanni, on Saturday, February 17 at 3:00 p.m. in the Louis Stokes Wing Auditorium, of the Main Library, 325 Superior Avenue. Written by Susan Watson Turner and directed by Terrence Spivey, artistic director of Karamu, The Fire Inside presents an ensemble cast in a dramatization of the life and works of the African American poet, following Giovanni’s career from her early years in the Black Arts Movement through her writing and life today. The play will make its world debut in July at Cleveland’s annual Ingenuity Festival.

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    An exciting day it was for the steering committee of Great Lakes Bioneers Cleveland.
Most of the members were on hand for the initial planning retreat which took place at the CanalWay Center, near the banks of our river that burned.

    The planning retreat was facilitated by Gloria Rivera and Paula Cathcart, the organizers from the Great Lakes Bioneers Detroit site that has been up and running for 2 years. Cleveland's planning has been in gear since 3rd quarter 06 approximately when steering comm. members were funded to travel to other satellite sites in our reagion to learn more.

Great Lakes Bioneers Cleveland recently received approval to host a beaming site. CSU will host the event via live satellite uplink from the primary conference site in San Raphael, CA.

    What is Bioneers????

    Bioneers was conceived to conduct programs in the conservation of biological and cultural diversity, traditional farming practices, and environmental restoration.  Our vision of environment encompasses the natural landscape, cultivated landscape, biodiversity, cultural diversity, watersheds, community economics, and spirituality. Bioneers seeks to unite nature, culture and spirit in an Earth-honoring vision, and create economic models founded in social justice.

Bioneers are biological pioneers who are working with nature to heal nature and ourselves. They have peered deep into the heart of living systems to devise strategies for restoration based on nature's own operating instructions. They come from many cultures and perspectives, and all walks of life.

            Cleveland Public Library welcomes critically-acclaimed author Connie Briscoe to its Writers and Readers Series, Sunday, February 11 at 2 p.m. Free and open to the public, the event will take place at the Main Library, Louis Stokes Wing Auditorium, E. 6th Street and Superior Avenue.
            Born with a hereditary hearing loss, Briscoe never let her disability derail her from her life and career aspirations. Although she attempted to write a novel several times, it wasn’t until after pushing ahead in her career as an editor, traveling and pursuing other passions, that she attempted a second time to write a novel. What emerged in 1995 was the bestselling Sisters and Lovers. 

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Double-Edge Dance presents an exciting multi-media performance entitled Fault Lines in the big BOX series at Cleveland Public Theatre February 9-11.  

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• General admission $10
• 60+ Adults, Case Faculty and Staff $7
• Students $5

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This exciting exhibition showcasing emerging artists is a collaborative project of The Cleveland Foundation, Case Western Reserve University and The Cleveland Institute of Art. The Cleveland Foundation is providing the venue -- thier offices at The Hanna Building, 1422 Euclid Avenue, Suite 1300, the curator, Indra K. Lacis is a graduate student at Case Western Reserve University in the Department of Art and Art History, and the arts: Nick Adorni, Laura Bell, Nick Moenich, Ryan Pattison, Samantha Schartman, Kyle Erich Schulz, Tom Spoerndle and Leah Tacha are students at The Cleveland Institute of Art.

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Your opinions and feedback are important! Attend this Public Open House to Learn About the Next Steps for the Cleveland Innerbelt Plan. The Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) invites you to attend a Public Open House to review the Recommended Preferred Alternative. ODOT officials and their consultants will be available to answer questions.

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The Cleveland Institute of Art actually looks like the cool Bauhaus building it was intended to be.  We need more RED in this grey, windswept city!!!

I heard a fascinating, heartwarming and inspiring story on WCPN's Weekend America early this afternoon. It was about a fantastic sculptural building in Brooklyn called Broken Angel, the life's work of a unique romantic visionary, Arthur Woods. Outsider architecture might be a term used to describe his style. Woods is a self-trained architect and painter.

Found this this am, C/O a link from Brewed Fresh Daily, and thought I would share, though it might be "old news"...
As older cities shrink, some reinvent themselves
Updated 12/27/2006 4:22 AM ET
   
By Haya El Nasser, USA TODAY
RICHMOND, Va. — A triangular island at the intersection of 23rd and Q streets is paved with bricks and landscaped with dogwood and liriope. The carefully designed patch of green replaced an abandoned house. As modest as it is, the tiny Q Street Park is a powerful symbol of change in the blighted Church Hill neighborhood.

It's not simply a physical transformation but a dramatic switch in mindset. Richmond's population has lost 56,000 since its peak in 1970, when it had 250,000 residents, and the city is finally coming to terms with it. Green space is replacing boarded-up houses. Small single-family homes are rising where crowded cinderblock apartment buildings once stood. Singles and couples are moving into rehabilitated homes that once housed families of eight.

Slowly, old American cities that have been in a downward population spiral for a half-century or more are reinventing themselves as, well, smaller cities. They're starting to adopt — many, like Richmond, do it unknowingly — tenets of the burgeoning, European-born "Shrinking Cities" movement. The idea: If cities can grow in a smart way, they can also shrink smartly.

"Everybody's talking about smart growth, but nobody is talking about smart decline," says Terry Schwarz, senior planner at Kent State University's Urban Design Center of Northeast Ohio. The center runs the Shrinking Cities Institute in Cleveland, a city that has lost more than half its population since 1950. "There's nothing that says that a city that has fewer people in it has to be a bad place."

It's a startling admission in a nation that has always equated growth with success. Cities are downsizing by returning abandoned neighborhoods to nature and pulling the plug on expensive services to unpopulated areas. Some have stopped pumping water, running sewer lines and repaving roads in depopulated neighborhoods. They're turning decimated areas into parks, wildlife refuges or bike trails. They're tearing down homes no one is living in and concentrating development where people want to move.

January 26-28 featuring “Major to Minor” and “The Music Room” by Artistic Director David Shimotakahara and “New Work Premiere” by Amy Miller.                                        

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Curated by:
Ofri Cnaani
Rotem Ruff

Artists:
Dan Acostioaei, Romania
Karina Aguilera Skvirsky, New York, NY
Francisca Benitez, New York, NY
Gautam Kansara, New York, NY

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Three articles in the Sunday, January 14, 2007, Cleveland Plain Dealer really caught my attention. 1. "Power shifts, and a fast-track bill is derailed"; 2. "Gloomy forecast" and 3. "Lost confidence in Bush? So has he"  - especially the last one, where Elizabeth Auster writes, about President Bush, that "he now seems shaken by the prospect that his vision of a free and stable Iraq may be fading along with his power to achieve much else." Because of this, despite "Gloomy forecast", I expect most important aspects of the Cleveland, Northeast Ohio, Ohio, US and global economy to improve dramatically over the next 2, 4 and 10 years. In fact, I can't think of an area where there won't be significant improvements. Think of the growth I expect like when an economy is freed from a dictatorship and people are allowed to be free and thrive - markets open up - that is America, now that Bush has been replaced by democracy.

presented by Cleveland Heights Historical Society, Cleveland Heights Landmark Commission, FutureHeights, and Heights Arts

Visit the past, present, and future of the Cedar-Lee commercial district in this exhibition of historic photos and drawings of planned developments, with examples of the major Cleveland Heights residential styles.

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curated by Salvador Gonzalez
works by
Ana Luis Sanchez painter (Mexico)
Angelica Pozo ceramist (Afro-Cuban)
Rafael Valdivieso painter (Ecuador)
Hector Castellanos Lara painter (Guatemala)
Gloria Ritter painter (Panama)
Salvador Gonzalez painter (Mexico)
Mario Kujawski sculptor (Argentina)

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University Circle Celebrates MLK Day - JANUARY 14 & JANUARY 15
Celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in University Circle. On Sunday, January 14, and Monday, January 15, many University Circle institutions will offer free or discounted admission and special programming for visitors. UCI will provide free shuttle buses on January 15.

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CLEVELAND, OH—Bruce S. Gordon, president and CEO of the NAACP, will discuss economic issues in the African American community at noon on Friday, January 26, 2007, at The City Club of Cleveland.  After a 35-year career in the telecommunications industry, Gordon became head of the NAACP in August 2005. Before retiring in December 2003, he was president of the Retail Markets Group for Verizon Communications, where he managed a 35,000-person work force and was accountable for $23 billion in revenue.

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Cleveland Public Library will present The Most Rev. Richard Gerard Lennon, Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland as its keynote speaker for the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day commemorative celebration. The FREE and open to the public program will be held Monday, January 15, 1:00 p.m. at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Branch, 1962 Stokes Boulevard. The CPL Staff Chorus will perform. Freedom, A Visual Arts Exhibition, sponsored by The Arts League of Michigan, the First Congregational Church of Detroit, Michigan, and from a generous grant from The Ford Motor Company Fund, will be available to patrons. A reception will immediately follow the program.  The Branch will be open from 12:00 Noon to 4:00 p.m.

The Most Rev. Richard Gerard Lennon was installed as the 10th Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland, Ohio on May 15, 2006. His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI named Bishop Lennon to the leadership position over nearly 800,000 Catholics in eight counties of Northeast Ohio on April 4, 2006. A native of the Boston area, the 59-year-old Bishop Lennon was born in Arlington, Massachusetts, graduated from Catholic High School, and then attended Boston College before entering St. John’s Seminary in Brighton, Massachusetts, where he received an M.A. in Church History and a M.TH in Sacramental Theology.

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I came across this at Steve Goldberg's "What's in the Bag" blog and it sounds excellent. Quote: "The new year has finally arrived, but the Literary Café Poetry Academy is already well 2 months into their new year, and we have lined up yet another amazing evening of poetry and party. This Thursday, January 11 at 9:30pm (very sharp, pleeeze) the veterans, Daniel Gray-Kontar and RA Washington will be the features. These two have worked together before for delicious displays of verbal prowess and promise to give a show of extraordinary magnitude. Come to the Lit at 1031 Literary Road to witness the excitement."

RA Washington is a writer, musician, a teacher, a publisher, an artist, an independent film actor, and member of The Progressive Arts Alliance. Washington authored a number of books of poetry and novellas, published the literary magazine, Fair Trade, and his short films and paintings have been shown in independent galleries across the east coast, as well as, London, England, and Toronto, Canada. He was the Cleveland Museum of Art’s first ever Poet-in-Residence and is now MOCA’s director of community outreach. Sometimes known as King Freeqy, he can be seen holding court at Civilization coffee shop in Tremont.

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My hero, the man whose ideas expanded my own is interviewed here about his life and work. I had the opportunity to work with one of his very first dancers, Albert Reid when I was a 15 year old bunhead at a summer ballet school in Saratoga, NY. Needless to say, it changed my life and the course of my life’s work and world view.  So now that I have ended my career as artistic director of a modern dance repertory company here in Northeast Ohio, I, like Merce, am still dancing and still seeing dance even though I may not be entering theaters to do so as often as before. Now for example I head out for the dance of dog walking. Today, the lighting design is especially brilliant.

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This is too cool! I was exploring a site linked to realneo called Left Luggage, and came across a project created by Simon Fildes and Katrina McPherson as part of their hyperchoreography initiatives, described as "An interactive moving mosaic for the web." I can't recall any so engaging places on the web, where an individual creates a new art form - a dancing mosaic. I'll let words from the Ardnamurchan Zillij website describe this further, below, and strongly suggest you check it out - my first effort is shown in a screenshot above, but what I created was actually a living, moving work of art... each of the images that make up the mosaic are short video loops, so each of the images and the overall composition are constantly moving and changing - as a Flash file, I didn't know how to save it, so it was temporary and so personal... give it a try here.