Field Guide: Community Arts Initiatives Galore

Hi! Happy weekend.

I’m sitting in my house listening to the cicadas. Have you heard them? It’s an unreal white-noise sound—fervid, incantatory, and also slightly mechanical-sounding—that’s been droning all day. Here’s a video of the sounds that our particular patron saint, the 17-year-old cicada, makes individually and as a group. And, from a few weeks ago, here’s an interview with a local entomologist about the brood’s “ascent of a lifetime.”

This week I learned of a new arts journalism initiative from the Durham Arts Guild. This is great news—while there is no shortage of arts happenings in the Triangle, there is a profound shortage of enough outlets and resources to cover them. Funded by a Scripps Howard Fund grant, the program has hired three interns to write features in both English and Spanish on historically underrepresented local artists for the duration of 2024. Here are the first three stories. I’m stoked to follow along!

OK! Below, we’ve got links to new music reviews, film roundups, and features on community art projects in Chapel Hill and Durham. Thank you for reading.

elsewhere in the culture section

This weekend, UNC-Chapel Hill will see a dynamic range of performances at The Commons: Southern Futures, a three-day festival connecting the university and surrounding community. Byron Woods writes that “a cohort of local Black artists, including poets Cortland Gilliam and CJ Suitt, spoken word artist and musician Johnny Lee Chapman III, choreographers Jasmine Powell and Anthony “Otto” Nelson Jr., and playwright and composer Sylvester Allen Jr., have collaborated to curate and present new works.” I found this quote from Gilliam particularly interesting:

“Coming to the festival, I was thinking I know all these people in these different silos of work around Chapel Hill and the South,” he says. But the politics in bridging what he terms long-term “relational fissures” between the university and the town are tricky. “I wanted to invite very particular people who don’t often speak to one another, often for good reason. I think there’s a power in invitation.”

Meanwhile in Durham, the fruit of dedicated public art initiatives—including a glittering, mosaic-covered bench by the bus station—are appearing downtown. Muralist Dare Coulter, who was selected to create designs for the newly refurbished Wheels Roller Skating Rink, will put finishing touches on rink artwork this summer. The rink itself is slated to open this fall.

Glenn McDonald’s latest column has a rundown of film picks screenings locally and Brian Howe and Jordan Lawrence have reviews of the new Emma Geiger and Matt Southern albums, respectively. (Geiger’s music video for “Invite You” is quite sweet.)

Finally, local Durham bar owners say that their businesses have taken a hit from ongoing downtown condo construction. Justin Laidlaw reports on those concerns.

out and about in the triangle

Lots of Raleigh food-world updates: La Terrazza, the upscale restaurant atop the Dillon, opened this week. If you like to eat Mexican Food and chase balls simultaneously, Jaguar Bolera, an “eatertainment” (not my phrase) spot decked out with millennial pink walls and pickleball courts, opens at Raleigh Iron Works in May.

Per Raleigh Mag, Katsuji Tanabe has quite a few upcoming projects. The Syracuse-based deli Brooklyn Pickle (confusing, I know) is opening its first location in the Triangle. Locals Seafood is opening a 10,000-square-foot (!) fish market in Raleigh. In Durham, Nashville-based pizza chain Emmy Squared is opening in Brightleaf Square on May 9, and in Chapel Hill, neighborhood bar Sidetrack Lounge is opening at the homey former site of Allen & Son.

Slim’s has new owners; from 2o19, here is the INDY‘s celebration of the iconic dive’s 20th birthday. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Sylvan Esso’s first release, Psychic Hotline is having a pop-up shop on May 10. Hopscotch has released its venue lineup. The Eno River Festival has announced its band lineup, as has the Saturdays in Saxapahaw series.

The James Beard Foundation media award nominees include Durham’s Kate Medley, who published a book on Southern gas station food earlier this year. From earlier this year, here’s our interview with Medley. Finally, closing with some more public art, this Renzo Ortega mural on a Chapel Hill basketball court is lively and artful.

out and about in the world

A meditation on protests and Passover, the revenge of the homepage, research on ye age-old question of plant consciousness, and a nice poem about the end of April,

— Sarah Edwards —
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