Photo of Magdalena Kaluza is by Jessica Jones and it appears courtesy of Magdalena Kaluza by Profile by Alison Morse   December 30, 2008, seventeen years old, walks to the mic at the Target Performance Hall in Minneapolis�s Open Book. She is part of a reading called �No Vote, No Voice,� created and performed by inkTank, the Loft Literary Center�s teen council. These writers, who are all too young to vote…

YOU COULD BE FORGIVEN FOR THINKING FONTS AREN’T FUN. An ancient and esoteric craft, typography exemplifies the hard ideals of clarity and consistency, imbuing the printed word with authority and stripping it of the messy irregularity of handwriting. You’ll find a dozen paths to typographic conformity on a standard PC, from the machined refinement of Helvetica/Arial to the tweedy legibility of Times…

“Smuda at the gate of Art Basel Miami) This and all photos by Sean Smuda Prelimbo, or: We were just outside of Basel when we heard the retiree death metal band Art Basel is the largest, most prestigious international art fair in the country (at least according to their press materials). Originating in Switzerland, this festival takes place once a year in South Beach, Miami, FL and attracts the sort of…

by Essay by Marya Hornbacher   December 22, 2008 A man, a director, sat alone in the audience, going over his notes. He used a yellow notepad, always, wrote on only one side of the page. He had a pack of cigarettes in his left breast pocket. He smoked, ashing on the floor. He called out, �Next.� A woman, an actor, walked across the stage. She was beautiful, or was so startling-looking that she made you think she…

Photo of Carl Bentson, the eponymous character in “Mr. Positive” directed by Mike Hazard and Emily Rumsey. (See the short film on TPT channel 17 December 20) by Article by Britt Aamodt   December 17, 2008message. Could it be from his comatose daughter? Meanwhile, in fashion land, lovers Bruno and Fillipa emerge from seclusion to astound the world with the “most dangerously stunning creation the world has…

*Editor’s note: This essay specifically refers to the iteration of the Deep North exhibition on view at the Rochester Art Center in late 2008. Chris Larson’s installation is now on view at the Burnet Art Gallery in Chambers Hotel, in downtown Minneapolis, from April 17 through June 13, 2009. One will not expect to find here the mellowness of cities, villages and countrysides in the older States. With…

Photo of Jessica Lind and Jason Peterson, co-founders of Yellow Tree Theatre, on stage in “String” (Photos by Rachel Wood appear here courtesy of Yellow Tree Theatre) by Profile by Matthew Everett   December 11, 2008life often imitates art. But in the case of Yellow Tree Theatre in Osseo, so far it’s worked the other way around. Take their holiday show, for example. Yellow Tree had plans to produce a…

Photo of Ann Ledy, courtesy of College of Visual Arts and the artist MUCH OF ANN LEDY’S ARTWORK EXISTS IN BETWEEN—between drawing and collage, between sculpture and installation. Often, too, it hovers between dimensions. A series of steel plates embedded in a wall, 1995’s untitled 7 casts pointy shadows like the teeth of a saw. Arranging shadows on floors and walls is one of Ledy’s methods of drawing…

by Profile by Britt Aamodt   December 1, 2008 of Western and Selby in Saint Paul and heads for Nina’s Coffee Caf�. Nina’s occupies hallowed ground. Beneath the coffeeshop, at garden-level, Minnesota’s homespun teller of tales, Garrison Keillor, has established that most venerable of American retail institutions�the independent bookstore. Patrons burble up from the stairwell of Common Good Books, toting…