Siah Armajani: Dialogue With Democracy One of this nation’s most important public-art figures, Siah Armajani was born in Iran in 1939 but is now a naturalized U.S. citizen. In commissioned work all over the country, he typically suggests the ideals of a society that encourage open dialogue among its citizenry. His sculptures emerge from a love for the language of…
You’ve got to hand it to Peter, Bjorn and John. After gaining a global audience with their commercial-friendly whistler, “Young Folks,” the Stockholm trio isn’t afraid to throw caution to the wind and ditch the singing. Seaside Rock sets sail on September 23 on Almost Gold Records and will be instrumental save for monologues in each member’s native Swedish. But…
Fred Wickham has two types of friends: the ones who thought he was crazy around this time last year — and the ones who thought what he did was the coolest thing ever. What Wickham did was rescue a large, diesel-fueled heap of Americana that weaved across the yellow line between country and rock, between heartbreaker and heartbroken, between mothers…
Six or seven years ago, Scott Lin was visiting a friend who owned a small Chinese restaurant. The friend was packing up a large carryout order with popular dishes such as sesame chicken and General Tso’s chicken. Lin commented on the size of the order, and his friend shook his head and said, “We wouldn’t feed this stuff to the…
Tim Scott has the kind of face caricaturists wish for. Long and lean, with a jutting chin and a forehead as wide as a tire tread, it has more real estate than features to fill it. What’s there, though, is sharp and distinctive, the eyebrows like slashes of permanent marker and the eyes lit with intense comedy. Friendly when he…
It’s still spring, and tickets are selling strong for the Bodies Revealed exhibit in the bowels of Union Station. On this late-April Saturday, the parents of two children — one boy and one girl — are picking up their exhibit tickets at the box office. Next to them, a woman paces in front of the ticket windows; some in her…
Yeah, looking back, it was too much to expect that this election year would be different. It was naïve to fall for the promise of a vigorous debate on important issues. Or to hope at least for a little less bullshit. Just a little less bullshit didn’t seem such an unreasonable hope once it became clear that the Bush-Clinton era…
Dear Mexican: Why do Mexicans paint stripes on their donkeys in Tijuana? Avenida Revolución Reveller Dear Gabacho: Same reason we put worms in tequila bottles, celebrate Cinco de Mayo and star in Beverly Hills Chihuahua: to cheat gabachos out of cash. To paraphrase the classic dictum: A gabacho and his money in front of a Mexican tourist trap is a…
You don’t hear much about the art of bobblehead transmogrification. There’s no course work available at the Kansas City Art Institute. There are no exhibitions at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Don’t bother looking for a First Friday retrospective on the early days of the form. That may be because it doesn’t exist yet. But when we at the Department…
Letters, August 14 Bannister Banter In reference to Keith Williams’ comments on your August 14 Letters page: You can’t single out Bannister Mall as the only example of the decline of business and a community in general. Let’s explain the whole downward spiral of, shall we say, “urban sprawl.” What killed the 63rd Street Drive-In while the I-70 and the…
Used to be that Sluggerrr had the only raging mullet in Kauffman Stadium’s home dugout. But there’s a new man in town with business in the front and party in the back. Manager Trey Hillman brings his bi-level to Kansas City, along with a whole lot of optimism for the youngsters that dominate his lineup. Names like Gordon, Butler and…
The main challenge confronting the parents and teachers of freshly-minted children is filling up their empty little noggins with actual knowledge, before their skull bones knit together over their fontanels, forever locking away everything they will ever know. Science City at Union Station offers Half-Pint Science, a fun weekly program that will fill your child’s head with hard, empirical science…
Perhaps the lightest, friskiest and most underrated classic of the Broadway musical’s golden age, Adler and Ross’ workers-versus-management comedy follows labor troubles from the factory floor to the union hall to -� in its allusive ’50s way -� the bedroom. This concert-style Musical Theatre Heritage production emphasizes the memorable songs “Steam Heat,” “Hernando’s Hideaway” and the knock-’em-dead “I’ll Never Be…
It’s rainin’ men tonight at the Voodoo Lounge as the Chippendales dancers, shirtless men who nonetheless wear bow ties in order to make the best possible first impression, strut their man-stuff for screaming throngs of women and men driven to paroxysms of sexual excitement at the sight of really well-groomed dudes ripping off their breakaway pants. Founded in the early…
Adopting its name from the smallest amount of fissile material needed to create a nuclear chain reaction, Critical Mass is a culture-jamming cycling event held in cities across the US on the last Friday of the month, framed as a protest, an alternative to both internal combustion and traffic laws, and a celebration. Of cycling! Numbering over a hundred riders…
If you thought Downtown Kansas City’s Power & Light district was just for late-night douche-clubbers, mechanical bull-riding aficionados and inexperienced twenty-one-year-olds who haven’t yet learned that drinking can be a harsh, barfy mistress, then fasten your seatbelt, strap on your helmet and make sure your oxygen mask is fitted securely over your mouth and nose, because today’s Sprint Family Fun…
Remember back when pompadours were piled as high as an elephant’s eye, poodle skirts were a national birthright and if you wanted a two-tone gab jacket, you just reached up and plucked it straight off the vine? That was in the 1950s. None of us were alive then, either, but if there’s one thing we get nostalgic for, it’s eras…
Hilary Brown opened this organic fast-food shack in 2005, serving burgers made with grass-fed beef (free from hormones and pesticides), buffalo, elk or natural turkey as well as chili and a tasty veggie burger. In addition to an array of health-conscious side dishes (cole slaw, a seaweed salad and french fries cooked in trans-fat-free coconut oil), Brown also sells unusual…
This hip and stylish dumpling-and-noodle shop started a culinary Chinese revolution on Kansas City’s Restaurant Row by presenting unexpected dishes — Ants on a Tree (cellophane noodles with minced pork), Chinese pot roast, flavored bubble teas — in an unabashedly California Cool setting. There are lots of vegetarian choices (the vegan set flocks to the place) and an excellent selection…
(12 West 63rd Street, 816-361-8841) Cincinnati has been gaining momentum all season. Find $2 bottles of Coronas all day at this neighborhood bar in Brookside, and catch the Bearcats versus Virgina Tech in the Orange Bowl at 7 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays, 2008 Tags: cincinnati, Night & Day, Orange Bowl, Virginia Tech Hokies (Football)
Bob Dylan live at the Uptown
