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Friday, March 05, 2010

Youth Art to be exhibited at Community Arts Center through Mar. 27

March is Youth Arts Month at the Community Arts Center in Hancock. The reception for this exhibit will be from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, March 6. (Image courtesy Community Arts Center)

HANCOCK -- The Copper Country Community Arts Center is featuring artwork from area elementary, middle and high school students March 5-27. This is an exhibit not to be missed! The Youth Gallery and the Kerredge Gallery will be filled floor to ceiling with amazing youth art.

Plan to attend the opening reception, which will be held from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, March 6.

March is a time where our young artists get to shine. It’s a time not only to celebrate youth art, but to appreciate the art teachers who work throughout the school year encouraging and inspiring their students. Their instruction and guidance has a lasting impact on the lives of our youth.

The Copper Country Community Arts Center is located at 126 Quincy Street in Hancock. Call 482-2333 for more information.

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Calumet to hold First Friday events March 5

CALUMET -- Calumet's First Friday events this Friday, March 5, include exhibit openings at art galleries as well as music and arts and crafts demonstrations.

An opening reception for "Life on the Keweenaw," an all-media, juried open show, will be held from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. this Friday at the Miskwabik Ed Gray Gallery, 109 Fifth St. For more information call 906-281-3494. The exhibit continues through March 31.

At the Calumet Art Center Duane Stephenson and piano students will perform from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m., while artists Eve Lindsey and Lynn Anderson will give a Weaving Demo.

"New Visions of Place" by Kathleen Carlton-Johnson is the March exhibit at the Vertin Gallery, 220 Sixth St. An opening reception will be held from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Friday, March 5. The exhibit continues through March 31.

Copper Country Associated Artists (CCAC) Sharon Abramson and Dolly Louma invite visitors to join them at the CCAC Gallery and Studio for a creative event beginning at 6:30 p.m. on Friday, March 5. Together with these artists, using hand and eye and your creative mind, discover what you can do with a piece of copper wire and a piece of leather -- maybe a feather, a bead from a reed or an old pebble or two from that jar on the dresser. Or even a note from the fridge door. Not only will you discover what you can do with a copper wire, you can wear it home as well. (A $ or two could help with the glue.)

First Friday CCAA demonstrations are an opportunity to introduce visitors to a variety of arts and fine craft techniques by some of the area’s most talented practitioners.

The CCAA Gallery is located at 112 Fifth Street in Calumet. Winter Gallery hours are Thursday, Friday, Saturday -- 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. First Fridays, the Gallery is open from 11 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. For more information about the CCAA call 906-337-1252 or visit their web site at ccaartists.org.

Wednesday, March 03, 2010

Michigan Tech faculty members, family and student survive earthquake in Chile

HOUGHTON -- Over a fuzzy phone connection to Santiago, with slight delays, Michigan Tech's Chuck Wallace, a visiting Fulbright Scholar at the Universidad de Católica, relays how scared -- and lucky -- his family was during the Chilean earthquake.

"It was 3 in the morning," he says, "and we were in bed on the fifteenth floor, would you believe? It was shaking like something I’ve never felt before, and I was raised in California."

Wallace, his wife, Susanna Peters (also a Michigan Tech faculty member) and their two children, Sam and Cecilia, were "thrown from wall to wall"; and they braced themselves at those walls during a seemingly endless one and one-half minutes of shaking ...*

Sam Wallace, age 10, writes his first reactions to the earthquake

Sam Wallace, a fifth grader at Houghton Elementary, writes the following in a letter to his class:
"Around 3:30 in the morning there was a HUGE earthquake. It was SO scary even though I didn't even get the least of it. We are on the fifteenth floor in an apartment house, but the building was super sturdy, so after the tremendous shaking which was so huge I'll never go on a fair ride again . . . most of the family is up and my mother is yelling 'WAKE UP CECI IT'S AN EARTHQUAKE!!!' . . . And by the way I have to tell you that this earthquake was going on for about 2 minutes, only getting worse, and 2 minutes is huge for an earthquake. Complete with sound effects of a bunch of breaking glass (which turned out to be most of our plates and cups) ...

And from Cecilia, age 13, after she wakes up:

"CECI WAKE UP… IT'S AN EARTHQUAKE!" I was up in a second. Hmm… this explains the turbulent boat drem. . . No one was really dressed and we were all hanging on to the doorframes just to stay up. I was convinced that our floor was no longer in line with the rest of the building and was just about to fall off the top and we were all going to die. That's a really different feeling than I have ever had before. . . Then I tried to hug Mom because I figured that if I was going to die I was going to do it with someone. Except that she was looking around for -- of all things -- jackets! While we were all about to die. Maybe her last wish was to die with thermal clothing clutched in her hands??? Then we held on for life and then it stopped and we could move again ...**

* Read the rest of Dennis Walikainen's March 1 article about the Wallace family on the Michigan Tech News.

** Read more from Sam and Cecilia Wallace on Tech Today.

Also in Chile on a study-abroad program, Evan Johnson, a Michigan Tech student based in Santiago, was safely on a field trip in the far south of the country. He is studying through the Universidad Andrés Bello in Santiago. He has assured Tech's International Programs and Services office that he is OK.

How you can help

If you would like to contribute to earthquake relief in Chile, click here for the Huffington Post's list of aid agencies.

Glide-N-Gorge along Swedetown Creek March 7

The Maasto Hiihto River Trail (at left) follows the meandering Swedetown Creek for a scenic cross-country ski glide in the gorge. (Photos by Keweenaw Now)

HANCOCK -- The Keweenaw Nordic Ski Club (KNSC) presents the second annual Glide-N-Gorge from noon to 3 p.m. on Sunday, March 7. Glide in the Swedetown Creek Gorge on the Maasto Hiihto Trails for fine food.

Three tables will be serving homemade fare. The Glide starts and ends at the chalet at the Houghton County Fairgrounds in Hancock. All proceeds go for trail equipment. Tickets are $15 until Friday, March 5, and $25 thereafter. They may be purchased from any KNSC board member, at trail pass outlets, or at the chalet on the day of the Glide.

The well marked course of just 3.5 miles (extra loops available to work up your appetite) will guide you to the first food stop near Tomasi Road. This Hors-d'oeuvre table will feature delights from the Keweenaw Co-op. After this "warm-up," you'll descend along the Swedetown Creek on one of the prettiest trails in the Keweenaw!

Another lovely spot in the gorge offers changing views of the creek as the ice melts.

The next stop will be piping hot chili and soups galore at a scenic spot along the creek. You'll continue down the creek and then "cruise" up Sisu Hill. Once back at the chalet, you can celebrate the circumnavigation of the gorge with live music and delectable desserts. Stay and socialize!

Tuesday, March 02, 2010

Tom Rudd and Margo McCafferty to exhibit prints at Reflection Gallery March 3-29

HANCOCK -- The Finlandia University Reflection Gallery will host an exhibit of color reduction relief prints by Tom Rudd and Margo McCafferty, March 3 to 29, 2010.

"Yellow Dog Storm," a color reduction relief print by Tom Rudd and Margo McCafferty. (Photo courtesy Finlandia University)

An opening reception and artist talk will take place from 12:15 p.m. to 1 p.m. Thursday, March 4, at the Reflection Gallery, located on the second level of Finlandia's Jutila Center campus (old hospital), 200 Michigan St., Hancock. The reception is open to the public and refreshments will be served.

Tom Rudd, a sculptor, and Margo McCafferty, a painter, create work informed by their wooded surroundings on the Keweenaw Peninsula, often with reference to environmental issues, and especially the quality of water.

In addition to their individual works, for over a decade the two artists together have created series of color reduction relief prints which depict environments and events in places where they have lived or completed residencies.

Some of the relief prints focus on the Cascade Mountains in western Oregon, others on the Allegheny River Valley in western Pennsylvania, Isle Royale National Park, Pictured Rocks National Lake Shore and the Midwest ’s rustbelt. They are presently working on a series that reflects happenings and landscapes of the Keweenaw Peninsula .

The objective of Tom Rudd’s life in the arts is creating visual art that enlightens and stimulates aesthetic sensitivity. Rudd pursues this goal by making art, teaching, administrating, curating and advocating for artists and the visual arts. He has shown and placed his art in public and private venues throughout the world and has received numerous grants and awards.

Before discovering that art was her vocation, Margo McCafferty, a native of the Pacific Northwest, received a degree in political science from Willamette University, Salem, Ore. She began teaching in 1990 after earning an MFA in drawing and painting from Arizona State University. McCafferty’s teaching experience includes teaching English in Japan and instructing painting, drawing, design and printmaking classes for U.S. colleges and universities.

McCafferty’s other endeavors, along with making art full-time, include arts administration on the state level, jurying art exhibits and writing art reviews and criticism. Her drawings, prints and paintings are exhibited and collected internationally.

Rudd and McCafferty will conduct a greeting card printmaking workshop from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, March 20, 2010, at the Jutila Center. The workshop is open to the public. The cost is $25 per person, with supplies included. Please e-mail finlandiareflectiongallery@gmail.com to reserve one of only 15 available spaces in the workshop.

For additional information, please contact Yueh-mei Cheng, Finlandia associate professor of studio arts, at 906-487-7375 or email yueh-mei.cheng@finlandia.edu.

Sunday, February 28, 2010

African Night to offer dinner, dance performance Sunday, Feb. 28

African Night is tonight!! Click on poster for larger version. (Poster image courtesy Michigan Tech African Students Organization)

HOUGHTON -- "Africa: The Story from Within" will be the theme of Michigan Tech's African Night celebration tonight, Sunday, Feb. 28, with a dinner at 5 p.m. in the Memorial Union Ballroom, followed at 7 p.m. by a Performance in the Rozsa Center for Performing Arts.

During this event, sponsored by the African Students Organization, students from various African countries provide the audience with an exhilarating display of some of the dance routines from their countries. Food prepared using recipes from certain African countries is also served before the main event.

Apart from food and dancing, other performances such as African dramas, poems and presentations portraying lifestyles and culture unique to the beautiful continent of Africa are also shown. This year's special guest performers are the Hayor Bibimma Dance Company. This event has grown consistently over the years. African Night attracts an audience of over 300 people every year.

Ticket prices, which include both dinner and performance, are as follows: Michigan Tech Students, $10; Faculty/General Public, $15; children under 5, free.

Tickets are available at the Rozsa Center and at the MUB Ballroom (at the door, Sunday before 5 p.m.