by Christina Butcher for OLY ARTS On October 17, collagist Evan Horback and playwright Bryan Willis, both based in Olympia, were awarded funding through Artist Trust, a nonprofit organization that strives to enrich Washington state communities through support to artists. In total, 61 recipients across Washington received Artist Trust’s 2016 Grants for Artists Projects (GAP) …
Renowned author and poet Lucia Perillo died in her Olympia home October 16 of unknown causes. Her passing was reported by her publisher, Port Townsend’s Copper Canyon Press. She was 58. Perillo’s 2009 poetry collection, Inseminating the Elephant, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and won the Library of Congress’s Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National …
by Christina Butcher for OLY ARTS WEEKEND PREVIEW is your new, Friday guide to events in Thurston County. This week, there’s enough live music and theater to keep you on the edge of your seat with your eyes glued to the stage. NEW EVENTS: Oct. 21-28 Live Music Ben Folds and a Piano at The Washington Center Douglas …
by Christina Butcher for OLY ARTS Bluegrass artist Sierra Hull and accompanying double-bassist Ethan Jodziewicz will perform at Traditions Café and World Folk Art this Saturday night. The musicians are touring through Oregon and Washington this week, playing acoustic bluegrass music from Hull’s newest album, Weighted Mind, featuring Jodziewicz as bassist. Born and raised in …
by Adam McKinney for OLY ARTS Local music scenes like Olympia’s can’t always support bands built on classical influences. From a purely economic standpoint, not many struggling musicians can afford string or woodwind instruments like cellos or oboes, and audiences tend not to be as inclined to come out on a weekend to hear music …
(UPDATED October 18, 2016) On the third Tuesday of each month, Rhythm & Rye hosts StoryOly, Olympia’s most beloved “story slam” event. Half the suggested donation to compete or listen goes to Olympia SafePlace. Starting at 5:30 p.m., volunteers throw their names in a hat, and 10 are invited to tell an eight-minute autobiographical story …
THEATER REVIEW by Alec Clayton for OLY ARTS Now showing at Olympia Family Theater (OFT), Elephant & Piggie’s “We Are in a Play!” is a small play that packs a big wallop for kids. I was not familiar with Mo Willems’ series of Elephant & Piggy children’s books before reading about them in the program. …
VISUAL ARTS REVIEW by Alec Clayton for OLY ARTS The exhibition of drawings and paintings by Kathy Gore Fuss at Salon Refu offers proof positive that practice makes perfect. When she started plein air painting in the dense forests in and around Olympia, then later at the gritty, industrial Port of Olympia, she found her …
by Christina Butcher for OLY ARTS Geraldine Ondrizek, artist and professor of art in Portland, Oregon, works in the crossroad between visual art, architecture and medical research. Her ongoing exhibit, Tracing Genetic Inheritance, is a synthesis of three of her most-recent collections (Chromosome Painting Edition II 1-X, Shades of White and mtDNA) and addresses issues …
by Molly Gilmore for OLY ARTS Olympia comedian Sam Miller will compete in this year’s Seattle International Comedy Competition. He’ll compete in the first round of preliminaries Nov. 2-6, and if he finishes in the top five among that group, he’ll advance to the semifinals, including a Nov. 17 show in Olympia. The host of …