Avant Garde Arts & Craft Show Unwraps Unique Holiday Gifts

There are no potholders, stockings or dollies at the Avant Garde Arts & Craft Show. Founder Becki Silverstein knows shoppers are after something more special. "People want to show their uniqueness in a way that reflects their style and tastes, while also supporting their local community," she says. Started in 2011, the 14 annual Avant Garde shows are now home to more than 100 local vendors. Kick off the holiday shopping season early by stopping at one of these shows: Nov. 7 in Canton, Nov. 14 and 15 in Rocky River and Nov. 21 in Strongsville. For more show dates, visit avantgardeshows.com. If you need another reason to browse the whimsical bazaar, a portion of the show's profits go to different local charities, including North East Ohio Make-A-Wish and Cleveland Animal Protective League. We introduce you to five of the fun crafters you'll spot at the show.


Tiny Star Accents: Creator Cassandra Blasé's love for her home, her pets and comic books drives the vision behind her rustic and homey signs.  From the inspirational to the downright nerdy, her creations speak to all kinds of shoppers — especially ones born in Ohio. "I'm Ohio born and raised, so I want to do a lot more with Ohio."  Her hand-painted wooden signs also include varieties for animal lovers and signs with comic-book favorites Spider-Man and Transformers.
Buy This: "Ohio" sign for $15

Cleveland Candle Co.: Here's your chance to truly find your own scent. The company offers an in-house candle bar at its Mentor store. "You can actually sit around a bar top and build your own candles together," co-owner David Gin says. Those not able to make the trip out can choose from new holiday scents that will be debuting in December.
Buy This: 8 ounce fresh apple candle, $12

Necklascarf: Wearing a scarf has never been easier with the Necklascarf, which combines a magnetic necklace clasp with a vibrant statement piece. Entrepreneur Terri Brewer wanted a product that would appeal to women who found infinity scarves too bulky and complicated scarf knots frustrating.  In addition to being stylish, the pieces give back too. Her designer fabric is cut by Vocational Guidance Services, a nonprofit that helps educate and train people with barriers to employment, and sewn by Esperanza Threads, a nonprofit that teaches low-income individuals and immigrants industrial sewing skills. Helping make the trend more approachable is fulfilling to Brewer too. "I just delight in seeing women that come to shows and put these things on and get a big smile on their faces," she says.
Buy This: Patterned Necklascarf, $36

BootEmUp Designs: Bev Burkhart's boot jewelry takes your favorite cold-weather footwear from simple to eye-catching.  Made by hand, the jewelry combines durability, beauty and versatility: tough enough to withstand Ohio winters, each piece is also wearable as a necklace or even as a belt.  The Columbus-based artist loves sharing her passion for boots. "When people put the boot jewelry on, they have a sense of pride about themselves: they pose differently," she says. "It's so incredibly amazing to watch how this transforms people."
Buy This: Flowered piece, $27.50

Dream In Color Jewelry: Artists Sarah Friedenberger and Erica Speer's desire to break away from more traditional gemstone jewelry lead them to create steampunk-style pieces with found objects such as keys, gears, and typewriter parts. "We are recycling objects that tend to get thrown out," says Sarah. "Our motto is 'find your missing piece', and that's exactly what we want our customers to do." So find unexpected creations such as a wire-wrapped skeleton key that takes form as an owl pendant created from watch parts.
Buy This: "A Piece of Time," $40

By Katherine Blubaugh

Radio Show Host Ken Schneck Says Cleveland is So Gay

It's been seven years since Ken Schneck's radio show, This Show Is So Gay aired its first episode in Brattleboro, Vermont. Two hundred and eighty episodes later, the associate professor and director of the Leadership in Higher Education Program at Baldwin Wallace University is hosting the show in Cleveland. "The central theme of the show is, 'How can you use your voice in your own unique way to make a difference?' " says Schneck, whose show is broadcasted online and on iTunes. "I wanted to reclaim the idea of something being 'so gay' and actually have it be so gay."

His next guest coming up, 19-year-old Caleb Laieski, is a former commentator on the show. At 15 years old, he was trying to build transitional housing for homeless LGBT youth, but now he's returning for the 281st episode after he filed the first ever federal lawsuit against the Food and Drug Administration to fight the ban on gay men donating blood. "I can't think of a guest on the show who hasn't had the most incredible experience," Schneck says, having hosted everyone from emerging indie-pop stars A Great Big World to openly gay comedian Suzanne Westenhoefer.

We asked Schneck to give us three things that make Cleveland so gay, and he delivered.


1. The LGBT Community Center of Greater Cleveland is stealing the spotlight after receiving a $1.8 million donation and a $500,000 matching grant from the Milton and Tamar Maltz Family Foundation to relocate and expand its facility. "Everyone should be keeping their eye on what's going on there, because they're going to continue to take an even greater role in building community here in Cleveland," says Schneck. "They already do incredible work, but I think they're on the cusp of just upping the ante even more."

2. Cleveland welcomed LGBT visitors and allies from all over the world in August to participate in the Gay Games 9 by flying rainbow flags all over the city — and some of them are still flying. "[These] visual artifacts make such a difference for visitors and for people who live here, and it sends a really strong message in a state that is in the minority right now," he says, noting that Ohio does not have marriage equality and employment protection.

3. Sometimes it's all about the good vibrations — and Cleveland is still roaring with pride months after the Gay Games left. Just next month, on Nov. 2, the LGBT center is hosting an event to keep that momentum going. "There seems to always be some sort of rally or book reading or drag show where you can go and meet new people," he says. "It's one of those things that you can easily take for granted, but given the larger umbrella of the lack of equality in Ohio, Cleveland is definitely so gay."

Pedal Power

The Thriller BMX bike show was a crowd favorite.

Urban cyclists now have their own Cleveland festival. The first NEOCycle, held Sept. 26-28 at Edgewater Park and University Circle, celebrated the region's two-wheeled movement with races, unique rides, BMX shows and food trucks. More serious cyclists competed in races at the Velodrome while those looking for fun donned glow sticks and costumes for the Night Ride. Live music from local heavyweights such as Jessica Lea Mayfield and the Cloud Nothings added another draw. The Hub, a festival village, offered pre-ride SpyngaFlow yoga sessions, bike polo, Ray’s Indoor Mountain Bike Park build-out and pedal-themed vendors. If you didn’t have time to give this year’s fest a spin, NEOCycle returns for another installment next fall, hoping to carve out a niche as a premier Midwest urban cycling fest.

New Moon Rising keeps the feel upbeat on Sept. 28.

Young pedalers conquered the kids' obstacle course.

Geek Cred

When Joe and Anthony Russo were seeking an endorsement to become the directors of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, they asked Steven Soderbergh. The Oscar winner, who had produced their Hollywood directorial debut Welcome to Collinwood, had a simple question: “Tell me why you want to do this movie,” Soderbergh recalls.

He wanted to confirm the upstart indie directors he discovered at Slamdance Film Festival in 1997 weren’t just trying to advance their careers by taking on a high-profile property.

“You don’t understand,” they responded. “We have a comic collection worth [$60,000]. We’re obsessed with this stuff. That’s why we want to do it.”

Joe and Anthony Russo field fanboy questions at the 2013 San Diego Comic Con International

Soderbergh called Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige and told him, “I think they’ll totally deliver for you.”

Marvel believes they have. The two sides have held negotiations for Captain America’s next adventure, too, says Anthony.

“You need to have some street cred in terms of your knowledge,” Soderbergh says. “The fans of that stuff really smell a dilettante.”

Joe’s knowledge has been building for 32 years.

“My uncle Ron gave me a box of 100 comics from his collection from when he was 10,” says Joe, who collected for about 20 years. “I read 'em all in a few days.”

And like with any good origin story, there was a dash of foreshadowing.

“One of the first was 'Marvel Team-Up' with Cap and Falcon, ” Joe remembers. “When we found out we were going to do this movie, it was very resonant for me. It felt like it had come full circle. You laugh because you think of all the money you spent on comic books as a kid actually came to fruition.”



Joe and his uncle would add to their collection a few times a month, digging for rare finds at comic conventions. Most memorably, he struck geek gold at a garage sale when he was 12.

“I bought The Incredible Hulk No. 181 for 25 cents at a garage sale,” Joe says. The issue features the first full appearance of Wolverine. One copy fetched $150,000 at a 2011 auction. “I felt guilty, because at the time it was worth a couple hundred bucks. So I asked her, ‘You know what this is worth?’ ”

“She said ‘I do. I just want to share my collection with kids, so take it.’ ”

Joe was blown away by the gesture, which stuck with him. “One day, I’m going to sell everything in my collection for a quarter at a garage sale to a bunch of kids.”

The Cleveland premiere of Captain America: The Winter Soldier is 6 p.m. tonight at the Cinemark at Valley View. Tickets are required for the event. More information can be found at clevelandfilm.com. The nationwide release is April 4.

Reintroduction to Community Affairs

So you're counting down the days until Captain America: The Winter Soldier premieres nationwide April 4. You've read our April feature story and know the trailers by heart (we're a little partial to the Super Bowl version), hunting for glimpses of the West Shoreway, Theater and Warehouse districts.

But if you need even more insight into what Cleveland natives Anthony and Joe Russo have done with their piece of Marvel's universe, it's time to sign up for Hulu Plus and binge on Community.

That's because, while the duo was in postproduction for the first blockbuster of 2014, Joe directed two episodes of the show they got off the ground.

And you don't need Superman's X-ray vision to see the big screen's influence on the quirky NBC cult-comedy.



“His directors’ eye is even keener,” says Yvette Nicole Brown, the Cleveland native who plays Shirley Bennett. In “Geothermal Escapism,” the Community students play a schoolwide game of hot lava (you remember that kids game, right? You must walk on chairs, tables or whatever to avoid the floor, which is deadly) to win Abed’s (Danny Pudi) prized $50,000 comic.

“We don’t have a huge budget on Community, but Joe made that episode look like a movie,” she says.

The action-packed episode was loaded with special effects, stunts, laughs and even LeVar Burton. It echoed the premise of the paintball saga the brothers directed to conclude season two, which put them on Marvel’s radar and got them their career-changing gig.

“He’s learned how to make it even bigger with even less,” Brown says.

“Geothermal” also marked the final episode for Donald Glover, who plays Troy Barnes. “Most of us were blubbering messes,” recalls Brown. But Joe kept the set light and loose, which allowed the actors to stay composed long enough to pull off the scene’s “heartstring moments.”

And for a look at how proudly geeky the brothers really are, queue up “Advanced Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.” Anthony read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy three times each by the end of high school and Joe collected comics for 20 years.

"I was a big fan of Marvel growing up, a big fan of X-Men, Wolverine and Spider-Man," Joe says. That should make it a fun summer of movies for the Russos. Besides their own Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Sony's Amazing Spider-Man 2 debuts May 2 and Fox's X-Men: Days of Future Past opens May 23.

Still Life In Sharp Focus

When we watch the news or read the newspaper, we sometimes forget the people behind the camera. But photographers have an important job — and their profession is the centerpiece in Dobama Theatre’s fall opener and Tony Award nominee Time Stands Still, which runs through Oct. 6.

Sarah, an accomplished war photographer, returns home from the Middle East after a near-death experience. As she recuperates, she is forced to confront life at home in her Brooklyn flat, which she shares with her partner James, a war correspondent. But these tense scenes, crafted by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Donald Margulies, are cleverly balanced with much needed snarky, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf-esque jabs between the couple and another pair.

With the Syrian conflict still very much on the forefront of current events, the play inadvertently situates itself in the center of nearly everyone’s conscious. The timing couldn’t be better. But if that isn’t enough to get your drama juices going, then here are three other reasons why you should catch this play:

Photo by Steve Wagner

Push/Pull Factor: Sarah is an adrenaline junkie. Time spent at the center of horrific war zones gave her a sense of purpose and excitement.  Despite the nightmares and symptoms of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder she experiences, Sarah is relentless in her attempts to go back out, even if it costs her everything she has back home. But a conflict arises because those moments of running from bullets and bombs have long faded for James, who is ready to settle down and have children. 

From the Front Lines to Brooklyn: The play begins by projecting war images on the glass of the couple’s Brooklyn flat. The imagery is powerful and fast, but more importantly, effective in immediately throwing the audience into the eye of the camera. What strikes the heart of this narrative is the question of the exposure to violence — where do we draw the line? By the end of the play, you may be asking yourself where you stand.  

Cast: These are first-rate performances executed with great depth. Each member of the cast exhibit qualities that we can all relate to in some way or another. During a Q&A before the show, Director Nathan Motta touches upon the complexities of Sarah’s character, saying, “Despite the people she cares about, she has to look through this rectangle, time stops around her, and I think we all know people like that.”

For more information on theater this fall season, check out Cleveland Magazine's Arts & Entertainment Fall Preview here.

Sugar High

The first time Chagrin Valley Little Theatre opened their season with the Murder By The Falls event 20 years ago, a fake body was dumped into the Chagrin River as a prop. Held this year Sept. 6 and 7, the annual audience-participation benefit brings less shock and more sweetness with Cereal Killer, a satire featuring our morning mascots as mobsters and gamblers entangled in a sticky murder mystery. Set in the mostly fictional Horseshoe Casino, high-rollers Count Chocula, and Boo and Franken Berry meet their demise on the betting floor, leaving Inspector Gotcha to solve the serial ... uh, cereal killings. Director Greta Rothman gives us three reasons why Clevelanders should check out this sugar-coma-inducing thriller.

Star Struck: Jan Jones, known for appearing on The Morning Exchange, is a Murder By The Falls mainstay appearing this year as seedy gambler, Mini Wheats. After seeing YouTube videos of past years' shows, NewsChannel5 news anchor Leon Bibb auditioned for the part of crime novelist Grayson Bran. Bibb is already comfortable in front of a camera, says Rothman, "but now he's on a stage, looking up to the actors as the professionals. It's the flip side of what we're used to."

Local Limelight: Don't just watch the ridiculous cereal-themed characters flounder for clues,  but become a private eye yourself. Audiences members group into squads of deputies to solve the crunchy slayings. Businesses join in the fun, so you could find yourself canvassing downtown Chagrin Falls for gooey evidence. Officials such as Chagrin Falls Mayor Thomas Brick also pop in for cameo appearances. "Incorporating different levels of experience is the true essence of community theater," says Rothman.

Full Plate: For the price of a ticket ($60, $30 of that is tax deductible), theatergoers get to nosh on hors d'oeuvres, a dessert buffet and can partake in a cash bar. You may walk away with a door prize, and if you're a sleuth on one of the best teams, you could win tickets to more CVLT shows. "It's a good night out," Rothman says. "After a few drinks, people are ready to have fun and laugh at bad puns."

Sun Salutations

It may not be as warm as we'd like it this month, but the atypical weather isn't stopping yogis from celebrating the beauty of the sun. This Friday, Free Akron Yoga will be hosting its 4th Annual Summer Solstice Festival at Howe Meadow where participants will perform 108 sun salutations with the rise of the sun.

"It's an opportunity for a very high-energy community of people to come together and celebrate the longest day of the year," says Nancy Holland Myers, co-founder of Free Akron Yoga and co-director of the festival. "The whole idea behind yoga asana is to use breath and use movement to arrive at a quiet meditative state. There's a certain point where it becomes so fluid we literally stop thinking about the to-do list, our iPhones and what happened last Thursday.”

Photo by Litsa Varonis

The gates will open at 5:15 a.m. for visitors to park and register for free with the celebration beginning at 6 a.m. As participants arrive, they will tread down a path lit by luminaria into the field where the festival takes place.

"We hope to circle the entire practice area with luminaria and the effect will be this sweet, kind of cosmic glow," says Myers. "It's going to be magical."

Brian Feltner and The Help will play an acoustic set, creating a peaceful, meditative environment during the practice. Afterward, participants can sample breakfast-related food and drink from Miss Julie's Kitchen and KC Coffee Co.

Nancy Holland Myers
Photo by Lynn Keller Photography

Before the business of summer ensues, Myers encourages people to take a break and head to the picturesque Howe Meadow to welcome the season in peace.

“By doing 108 sun salutes in a beautiful setting like the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, we have that sort of double-dip opportunity to be fully present in our bodies in one of the most beautiful places around."

For more information, visit facebook.com/FreeAkronYoga.

Chalk Fest colors University Circle

At the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Chalk Festival this weekend, volunteers who looked like worker bees in yellow and black T-shirts buzzed along the Fine Arts Garden's paths, helping participants find their stone canvases. Armed with soft pastels and sometimes seat cushions, artists from all zip codes and ages set to work.

Though the talents of some three-year-olds with chalk had mine beat, the featured artists stole the show. Community arts coordinator Nan Eisenberg says the artists were asked to look to the museum’s Youth and Beauty exhibit, which ended this weekend, for inspiration.

Featured artist Joshua Maxwell, 22, focused on the Art Deco trends of 1920’s art. “Metropolises were symbolic of the grandeur of the 1920’s,” he said. “I wanted to depict Cleveland as that kind of up-and-coming metropolis with its own grandeur.”

Just beyond Maxwell, Debra Sue Solecki surveyed her adaptation of Henrietta Shore’s "California Data." As she drew, two precocious pre-teens blurted out praises. “It’s such a different experience to draw in front of a crowd,” said Solecki, “For them to become a part of the process -- it’s a really good energy.”

Robin VanLear, artistic director for community arts, has been bringing this energy to University Circle every fall since she started the event in 1990. On Saturday, she, like many of the artists, had only just begun. “If they finish by the end of day one, they’re not doing their jobs,” she said with a laugh.

This MOCA Isn't Coffee, and It's Coming to Cleveland

Jill Snyder gestured to a dirt lot scarred with tire marks and dotted with piles of gravel, explaining how in just a few months, that same space will be occupied by a tree-lined plaza.

Snyder, Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland’s executive director, was one of about 50 people mingling and marveling at MOCA’s new house of art in University Circle during its “signing off” event yesterday. Donors and members of MOCA’s board signed the building’s stainless steel cladding with permanent marker, marking the completion of its exterior.

The building is an odd shape. It resembles a bulging Chinese takeout container, but one for a king, or maybe Batman. The outside, although black, reflects the sun and the surrounding environment, giving it a look that’s dark and edgy, yet somehow colorful and interactive at the same time. The chic exterior almost teases passersby, with windows showing off only certain segments of the museum.

The new building, at the corner of Euclid Avenue and Mayfield Road, opens Oct. 8, replacing MOCA’s old house in the former Cleveland Play House complex in Midtown. The move is a product of “opportunity and necessity,” said Stewart Kohl, a MOCA board member and co-chair of the building campaign. The old location “wasn’t convenient to our constituency.”

The building itself is a work of art that will complement the pieces on display. A virtual tour shows broad white staircases, Navy blue outer walls and light fixtures illuminating art on white inner walls.

The $35 million project involved a decade-long effort from brainstorming to completion, but only took 16 months to construct. More than 60 donors gave $25,000 or more, with several more contributors at lower levels.

The museum is expected to be a central fixture in University Circle’s Uptown district, a new retail and residential neighborhood.

Snyder and Kohl addressed the small crowd, which Kohl dubbed “MOC-ites.” They ranged from elderly art lovers to yellow-vested Donley’s construction workers clad in hard hats. Many ate Sweetie Fry ice cream as they stood in the sun. One woman described the move as “wonderful.”

“I love the architecture,” said Elaine Harris Green, an abstract painter who donated $10,000 to the effort. “I can’t wait to go inside and see the art.”

Kohl, who had just returned to Cleveland on a flight from New York, noted how he could see the building “clear as a bell” from the sky, which prompted some ooh-ing and ahh-ing from the audience.

“And the finishing won’t just be the bricks and mortar, but it’ll be the lights and the program and the people that this is going to generate,” Kohl said.

“This is going to become one of the most exciting corners in Ohio, if not the U.S.”

From Talent Show to the Rock Hall: Dylan Baldi of Cloud Nothings Plays Summer Series Wednesday

In 2008, Dylan Baldi was one of many students playing an instrument in Westlake’s talent show, The Green and White Revue. The program included a blank page for autographs, an idea that seemed laughable.

From the catwalk hanging over the audience of Westlake High School’s Performing Arts Center, I shined the massive spotlight on Irish dancers, baton twirlers and cute four-foot-tall elementary school pianists who punched the ivory keys as if they were those of a typewriter. What were the chances that any of them would produce a signature that someone might actually look back on?

No one knew that just a year later, Baldi would drop out of Case Western to begin writing songs. Or that his band, Cloud Nothings, would become one of the country’s fastest growing indie bands, featured in the New York Times and Rolling Stone and touring the United States and Europe. Or that, this Wednesday, Baldi, will play in front of the temple of musical greats: The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Cloud Nothings just returned to the United States after playing two shows in Japan, performing in Osaka and in Tokyo before a crowd of 2,000.

“They actually know who we are, which doesn’t make any sense to me,” Baldi says. “It was pretty weird to go over there and play for that many people.”

Cloud Nothings’ live set relies heavily on their newest album, Attack on Memory, recorded in Chicago and released this Jan. 24. Baldi describes it as more complex than his previous record.

“Every time I sit down to write a song, I want to do something new with it that I haven’t tried yet,” he says. He hopes to keep moving farther away from his start, determined that experimenting with sound will push his music to a better level. Cloud Nothings’ edgy, alternative style is certainly a product of evolution from where he started as a little kid: piano lessons and the saxophone.

Now music is Baldi’s full time job. His songs, once written solo, are now truly a collaboration. “I write the words and the melody and my guitar part, but whatever [the other band members are] playing, they figure it out on their own for the most part.”

Attack on Memory recently made MTV’s "Best Albums of 2012 (So Far)" list. An autograph no longer seems far-fetched.

Cloud Nothings will kick off the Rock Hall’s Summer in the City Series this Wednesday at 7 p.m. with Herzog, another Cleveland indie rock band. The free concert will take place in the plaza outside the museum, or inside in the event of rain.

Brite Winter Festival Lighting Up Ohio City

Sunglasses are in order for this Saturday’s free Brite Winter Festival on Ohio City’s Bridge Avenue.

This year, the third annual arts and music celebration will embrace its name with a theme of light and ice. General Electric is donating enough lights to decorate a whole town of Christmas trees.

The fest will remain aglow from start to finish thanks to a wall made of 15,000 shades of LED-light-injected ice bricks, lit custom ice sculptures, open-sided box trucks with lights pulsing to music and lit balloons hovering at the doors of all seven walking-distance indoor music venues.

“We’re hoping that it gets overfilled throughout the evening,” festival co-chair Thomas Fox says.

Forty bands, most of them local, will play between 5 p.m. and 2 a.m., including Lighthouse and the Whaler, Black Taxi, and Modern Electric. Guests can fight the frost at the outdoor stage or huddle in heat in the seven indoor locations on West 25th Street and Lorain Avenue, from Touch Supper Club to Joy Machine Bike Shop. The event is designed so visitors can’t see every performance and will feel overwhelmed by all the options.

“It’s amazing to feel that way,” Fox says. If you’re not happy with one band, he adds, just move to the next one.

Along with the 15 art displays and eight music venues, a 24-foot game of Skee-ball will challenge even the most seasoned Skee-baller. A grown-up version of grade-school “Telephone” will let grown-ups listen to a whisper in the “Whisper-ma-phone” and then try to repeat what they heard.

The Brite Winter Festival has grown since its inception in 2010 when two Case Western Reserve University graduates decided Clevelanders needed something to look forward to during the slush and mush of winter months. They threw the party with financial help from Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative and Case student organizations.

Now, the festival has 15 sponsors and has moved from Hart Crane Park in the Flats to Ohio City. Organizers expect to more than double the turnout from last year.

Salvaging Art

All of the items in Collective Upcycle were intended for a recycling center or, worse, a landfill. But thanks to crafty local artists, materials such as plastic bags, bicycle gears and seat belts have been salvaged and transformed into trendy purses, wind chimes and belts.

The shop, located at 6710 Detroit Avenue in the Gordon Square Arts District, is open for a limited time, from June 11 to July 3. Late last year, to promote “reuse artists,” local artist Nicole McGee launched a pilot store, The Pop-up Gift Shop, in Trinity Commons for the holidays. It proved popular, so she’s back at it with the new name Collective Upcycle and 30 artists. Although the store is new, the name has been on her mind for 2 1/2 years. It represents the idea of coming together, she says, and “taking something else and giving it a new, creative life.”

McGee, who markets her own art under the name Plenty Underfoot, says the store represents Cleveland’s up-and-coming reuse economy.

“There’s this creative force of people who are not buying something new at the craft store,” she says. “For me, and I know for other people, there is something inherently creative about taking something leftover and saying ‘What do you want to be?’ and ‘I’m going to turn you into it.’”

One artist featured in the store converts wedding dresses into christening gowns. Another makes furniture out of wood from deconstructed Cleveland buildings. Anita Tucker of Wine2Wick repurposes wine, beer and liquor bottles into candleholders.

“It's extraordinary how many bottles go into a landfill that aren't recycled,” Tucker says.

She says the store has provided her with a community of artists. They help each other out by saving items others use for art. Friends say her art gives them a motive to drink wine so they can give her the bottle. She even sees customers bring in items for artists to use.

McGee doesn’t plan to operate the shop full time, but she assures customers that Collective Upcycle will pop up again somewhere in the city in time for the holidays. Stay tuned.

Photo courtesy of Collective Upcycle

Sparks will fly at the Temple of Tesla concert Saturday

The headliner at the Temple of Tesla concert this weekend isn’t an energetic pop star or hardcore rock band. It's a pair of 13-feet-high coils pulsing about 20 kilowatts of electrical currents to produce its own versions of tunes such as Girl Talk’s “This is the Remix.”



These coils and their mastermind, Ian Charnas, constitute the Tesla Orchestra. “We make musical lighting bolts,” says Charnas, the orchestra's project manager.

Saturday’s show at the Masonic Performing Arts Center will feature the coils pumping out music from the recent Open Spark Project and the orchestra’s 2010 world tour. Attendees can watch Charnas don a chainmail suit and dance with the 10-feet-long sparks. Daring audience members will be invited to sit inside a steel cage as lighting strikes around it. The Chicago-based Blue Ribbon Glee Club will open the show with a capella covers of punk rock songs.

Charnas, a 2005 Case Western Reserve University graduate, thought up the orchestra while watching a similar performance in Austin, Texas in 2007. “I thought, ‘That looks like fun. I want to do that,’” he says. He wanted to add theatrics and make it into a “sci-fi rock” performance.

Three years and $10,000 later, Charnas built twin Tesla coils with the help of CWRU students, graduates, faculty and staff. Building the coils was a “slow and painful” process, he admits, but it paid off when he could finally produce music by sending a signal through the coils to turn the sparks on and off. “Any noise that you can turn on and off, you can turn it into music,” he says.

Cleveland's street festival season kicks off

After attracting more than 10,000 visitors the first time, the Cleveland Asian Festival returns this year with one more day and two celebrities.

The festival celebrates Cleveland’s Asia Town neighborhood this Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. at Asia Plaza at East 30th Street and Payne.

Displaying surprising star power for a young festival, the event will feature Dat Phan, the original comedians from Last Comic Standing, on one of two outdoor stages. Yin Chang, the rising starlet seen in this month’s Prom and weekly on Gossip Girl, will do meet-and-greets.

This year the festival added a second eating contest to its lineup, giving guests two chances to watch competitors stuff their faces with samosas and egg rolls as fast as humanly possible. Guests who want to skip the stomach ache can put on an inflatable sumo-wrestling suit or watch a Vietnamese fashion show.

The festival is growing. It's already sold out of space for exhibitors and filled a waiting list. Organizers expect an even bigger crowd than last year's.

If you have a thirst for arts and crafts instead, the annual Hessler Street Fair takes place this Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to dusk on Hessler Road in University Circle. Going strong for 42 years, this fair is famous for hippie culture, on-site neighborhood art projects and musical performances every hour until the sun goes down.

Heaven's Rain cast attends Solon Cinemas film screening

Solon Cinemas played host to several Hollywood actors this past Tuesday during a screening of the new film Heaven’s Rain. Based on the true story, the film recounts the story of Brooks and Leslie Douglass, whose lives were irrevocably changed one evening 30 years ago when their parents were killed by drifters Steven Hatch and Glen Ake in a home robbery.

“The responsibility to get it right kind of falls heavy on your shoulders,” explains actor Mike Vogel, who played Brooks. “I couldn’t have done it if he himself [Brooks] hadn’t sort of opened up Pandora’s Box.”

A Philly native, Vogel came on the scene several years ago with a role in the 2003 reboot of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. These days his career is progressing nicely, bringing him roles in Cloverfield, as well as the awards-season darling Blue Valentine. But Vogel gained more than just experience working with Brooks.

“Brooks has also become a close friend and a brother,” Vogel says. “I hope I did him proud, and I hope that the message comes through in the story. Brooks is a remarkable guy. … He’s been able to turn the story on its head and really use the adversity to accomplish change.”

The idea of the movie first took shape when Brooks decided to explore his long-held passion for film and moved to L.A. After meeting writer and director Paul Brown in a screenwriting class, Brooks decided he wanted to try to write about his family’s story.

“I never thought I would write this story, but it was actually Paul that talked me into it,” Brooks explains. After describing the tale to Brown in class, Brown asked where the story came from and was floored to find it was a true story.

“I said, wait a minute, this is a real story?” Brown remembers. Though it was painful for Brooks, the men worked together to craft a screenplay based on the Douglass’ life.

Brooks even raised $2 million in order to finance filming. “All this energy was created around a story that had real emotional power,” he says.

For more information on the film and to request a screening in your area, visit www.heavensrainmovie.com