Pittsburgh, Youngstown, Akron, Cleveland Arts And Livable City Blog

Youngstown's Rust Belt Brewery looking to expand, turns to Kickstarter

2012-03-06T15:16:00.000-05:00

"The brewery has struggled to meet rising demand for its product, especially after it introduced four of its beers — the Irish Red Ale,

Blast Furnace Blond Ale, Coke Oven Stout and Old Man Hopper’s IPA — in six-packs late last year.

Beer was previously available in 22-ounce bottles; the switch to standard 12-ounce bottles doubled labor time, including labeling and boxing, which still is done by hand."

Rust Belt is already stocked at local Giant Eagles and a other stores in the Youngstown, Akron and Cleveland area and it's beer distributor would expand sales into Columbus and Cincinnati... if Rust Belt can produce enough beer.

Check it out on Kickstarter.

Karen Lillis Book Release Party Thursday March 8th

2012-03-06T08:36:00.005-05:00

Thursday Night Book Release Party in Polish Hill!Karen Lillis, a wonderful writer, is having a book release party this week
Events will be held at Lili Coffee Shop and Copacetic.
6:00pm Meet & Greet at Copacetic... (3rd Floor)
7:00pm Reading at Lili Coffee Shop (1st Floor)
8:00pm Book signing at Copacetic (3rd Floor)
From CP Short List:

Thu., March 8 — Words
Blogger, journalist and small-press advocate Karen Lillis is as busy as anyone on the local lit scene. Lillis' experience with small presses also includes publishing on them: Watch the Doors as They Close (Spuyten Duyvil), her second novella and fourth full-length work of fiction, bows tonight with a release party and reading at Copacetic Comics. The novella's narrator is a Brooklyn woman struggling to create a portrait of her recently departed lover. Joining Lillis is acclaimed, and now-Pittsburgh-based, zine-maker Ocean Capewell (High on Burning Photographs). BO 6-9 p.m. 3138 Dobson St., Polish Hill. 412-251-5451 or www.copcomco.com

Additional presss release information about Karen Lillis and Ocean Capewell:
"Karen Lillis is the author of four books of fiction: the novels "The Second Elizabeth" (Six Gallery Press, 2009) and "i, scorpion" (Words Like Kudzu Press, 2000); and the novellas "Watch the Doors as they Close" (Spuyten Duyvil, 2012) and "Magenta's Adventures Underground" (Words Like Kudzu with New York Nights, 2004). Her fiction was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2010, and her article on the independent presses of Pittsburgh was a finalist for a Golden Quill Press Award in 2007. She blogs at Karen the Small Press Librarian and she is the creator of the online literary portal, Small Press Pittsburgh.
Ocean Capewell was born in Queens in the 80's. She moved to Pittsburgh purely for the hell of it, and is the creator of the long-running zine "High On Burning Photographs". She recently completed her first novel, "The Most Magnificent Rot", a queer punkhouse tour de force that's searching for a good publisher. She spends her days battling bureaucracy at the welfare office and spends her nights baking cookies, writing her second book, and trying to unblock her second chakra."

Cleveland Heights moves to green up it's zoning code

2012-03-06T00:03:00.004-05:00

From Green City, Blue Lake

Cleveland Heights is an inner ring suburb just east of Cleveland very close to University Circle.

With its new mixed-use zoning designation and new maximums for parking lots, Cleveland Heights looks to set the stage for more infill development—an act to strengthen its traditional, pedestrian friendly districts. New developments can preserve green space instead of parking; by not requiring a minimum number of parking spots tied to retail square footage formula, the city can alter land-use patterns and break the mold on the worst aspects of big development—the one size fits all solution of paving over lots of open space for a too-large parking lot to fit only the busiest day of shopping in the year.

The city is to be commended for encouraging more biking, especially for those short trips which can be avoided by “requiring conveniently placed, well-designed bike parking for new uses and long-term. Covered bike parking with locker and shower facilities will be required for offices, university buildings and hospitals exceeding 25,000 square feet.”

Bike parking has been consistently cited as the biggest impediment to increased trips made by bike, so the security of knowing there will always be a place to lock up is a good first start (the city would make an even stronger case by developing a bike parking design guideline so that its clear which bike racks are of high quality, and to spell out placement, lighting, security and shelter options).

Sounds off hand to be really great but it's not a done deal.

"The Planning Commission will hold public hearings on the proposed sustainability zoning at 7 p.m. on March 14 and April 11 in Council Chambers at City Hall, 40 Severance Circle. City Council will host a public hearing at 7 p.m. March 26 at the Community Center, 1 Monticello Blvd. The Planning Commission will forward a recommendation to City Council, which is expected to approve the amendments at a regular meeting April 16."

Here are the actual proposed updates

This post is not actively supporting these proposals. If it were up to me, almost all zoning would not exist. (one can still have basic safety-fire regulation) However, if one is to mandate zoning it would be much more logical to allow logical mixed use density and cap the amount of allowed parking, rather than force parking minimums like most zoning codes do. The general thinking here seems right.

Private art collector to open exhibition space in Columbus, Ohio

2012-03-05T17:34:00.002-05:00

Ohio, actually has a much larger number of major contemporary art collectors than the Pittsburgh area.

Ron Pizzuti, a Columbus area real estate developer with a considerable contemporary art collection will open an exhibition space in Columbus's Short North arts district.

Pizzuti Collection

The Pizzuti Collection is a non-profit organization, which will present exhibitions of contemporary art with a mission to foster cultural understanding and educational exchange.

In Fall 2012, the Pizzuti Collection will open in our permanent home in a newly renovated building in the Short North, Columbus’ Arts District, at 632 North Park Street. We will have a program of temporary exhibitions of contemporary art, selected from the private collection of Ron Pizzuti. There will also be a series of artist talks, guest lecturers and an art library/reference room

I'm a pretty big fan of small museums and exhibition spaces which often connect better to their neighborhoods as well as show off the personal tastes of collectors.

This one looks like a potential gem.

Images from The Met's New American Wing

2012-03-05T10:21:00.006-05:00

Even though I have a press pass to The Carnegie, I don't feel free to take pictures in a museum with a pretty strict no photo policy.

Allowing, photography has it's pros and cons. In a crowded museum, like MOMA, one can be overwhelmed by the masses who want a picture of themselves in front of every work on their "bucket list". And, yes sometimes a flash goes off, which is really bad for most work. Damaging flash bulbs are one of the good reasons many museums banned photography.

The Met, being large enough to rarely feel too crowded allows photography in most of it's permanent collection.

I don't take shots too often, but here's a look at some of the newly reinstalled American Wing.

Boy, it looked great! Somehow the museum was so huge, this part of the collection sort of got lost before. A few highlights.

A collection of early American art and folk art--on semi permanent loan from the troubled Museum of American Folk Art

Great Collection of Early American and early colonial Paintings

Whole room of amazing John Singer Sargent paintings

Several really important Thomas Eakins works.

A very strong display of American impressionism- Mary Cassatt, Childe Hassam etc...

A strong display of works Frederic Remmington and other western artists.

A very strong selection of Augustus Saint-Gaudens sculpture.

An incredible selection of Tiffany Glass

Some great Albert Bierstadt paintings.

Many amazing Winslow Homer works.

From what I could see, the collection drops off at the start of the twentieth century and includes almost no American modernism, ashcan school or later American paintings. To a large extent, I think these are grouped in other parts of the museum.

The Whitney Museum is one of the best places to see American Modernism and regionalism. The Brooklyn Museum also is home to an amazing selection of Hudson River school, Winslow Homers and ashcan school works. Sadly, the cheesy, distracting, "educational" way this part of the collection is set up makes it hard to appreciate.

Nashville's new downtown zoning code puts human interaction and walkability above cars

2012-03-04T11:11:00.003-05:00

The stereotype is that the high growth, "new south" is all about highways and sprawl. Actually, a lot of cities in the region are building out light rail systems and opening up to more sustainable urban design.

Nashville might be taking the lead with it's new zoning code.

From The Switchboard Blog

“The Plan calls for a ‘thoughtful mixture of uses including residential, retail and office, to ensure that Downtown doesn’t close at 5 p.m. or even after the concert ends or the restaurants close, but is instead a welcoming home for a diverse residential population.’ Multiple stories encourage multiple uses within each building, increasing the likelihood that one of the uses will be active at any given hour. Compare this to one story buildings which lack activity during the off-hours of the single use.

“To be viable, Downtown must accommodate numerous services and functions. By promoting form over use, the DTC allows for a mixture of uses. Because various functions occur at different times of the day – working, shopping and recreating during the day, entertainment and home-life at night – mixed-use, 24/7 neighborhoods use existing infrastructure more efficiently and function in a more sustainable way . . .

“As stated in the Plan, ‘While residential development has flourished in recent years, the creation and enhancement of urban neighborhoods is still a goal. Residential living will thrive in Downtown when residents feel that they are part of a neighborhood, supported by shared public spaces and the services and amenities needed for daily life.’”

WOW! SOMEBODY, ACTUALLY APPLYING JANE JACOBS'S IDEAS INSTEAD OF JUST PAYING THEM LIP SERVICE.

One very important thing is that the code is not just aimed at a small area of dowtown, but is aimed at creating cohesive organic connections between a number of core districts.

My experience from NY, is that by real dynamic places can't live alone. To save a downtown, you must create a base of connected core neighborhoods.

One big thing is they are scrapping minimum parking requirements--something Brooklyn still hasn't done!

From Streetsblog

Two years ago, Nashville scrapped parking minimums completely for its downtown, a fact called to our attention by blogger Charlie Gardner. The elimination of parking mandates in the area seems to have proceeded without controversy, based on contemporary news articles.

New York City, in contrast, is moving toward reducing parking minimums in certain “inner ring” neighborhoods, but it remains to be seen whether they will be eliminated or merely reduced. Here, parking minimums are seen as politically necessary.

Tuskegee Airmen on Essential Public Radio, Essential Pittsburgh

2012-03-03T10:17:00.003-05:00

A new radio program on 90.5 called Essential Pittsburgh promises to have some interesting programming. A recent episode has fascinating interviews with men who were Tuskegee Airmen during WWII. Our area has a very strong connection to this group. For the rdio program, which has great interviews with 3 of the WWII pilots, go here
Regarding the Tuskegee Airmen:From the Tribune Review, Oct.8,2009:

The Tuskegee Airmen was a group of African-American pilots who flew with distinction during World War II as the 332nd Fighter Group of the Army Air Corps. Joyce Jones, new president of the Sewickley-based historical society and a former teacher, said there is no mention of the Tuskegee Airmen in school curriculum.

"These people came from this area," she said. "The children can relate to that. I'm very pleased, happy and excited (about the society's involvement in the new chapter)."

There were 983 Tuskegee pilots, eight of whom were from Sewickley.

"That concentration, because it's such a small area, is more than Chicago and Detroit, which have millions of people. They had more pilots, but the percentage here is greater," Effort said.

Tuskegee Airmen also came from other Pittsburgh neighborhoods, such as Beltzhoover, Homewood and East Liberty, said Effort.

"These guys are everywhere," said Effort. "Their legacy goes further than the war. They were the creme de la creme of the African-American race."

Effort's vision for the local chapter includes continuing the mission of preserving this piece of history, fundraising and getting children interested in flying.

Jones said the group is planning a large fundraiser for the chapter. Other ideas include starting a Sewickley Tuskegee Airmen Day and having representatives march in Veterans and Memorial Day parades. They are exploring the idea of putting plaques in town listing the men's names.

The society, entering its 40th year, would like to get local schools involved in teaching the Tuskegee history.

Bobonis, along with Effort and his wife, Elaine, are the other founders of the Greater Pittsburgh chapter. Her father, the late Sgt. Vernol Leapheart, was the crew chief of all the combat planes flown by Col. B.O. Davis, commanding officer of the Tuskegee Fighter Group that flew over North Africa and Western Europe during World War II.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_647023.html#ixzz1o4GM9AH5

The Radical Camera @ NY's Jewish Museum : A few Thoughts

2012-03-01T20:50:00.018-05:00

Stuffing in a few shows while I'm here, to see the Whitney Biennial.

The Radical Camera, which highlights some of the great photography associated with The Manhattan Photo League makes an important counterpoint to the Teenie Harris show.

The Radical Camera: New York's Photo League, 1936-1951

In 1936 a group of young, idealistic photographers, most of them Jewish, first-generation Americans, formed an organization in Manhattan called the Photo League. Their solidarity centered on a belief in the expressive power of the documentary photograph and on a progressive alliance in the 1930s of socialist ideas and art. The Radical Camera presents the contested path of the documentary photograph during a tumultuous period that spanned the New Deal reforms of the Depression, World War II, and the Cold War

The show included around 200 works by around 50 photographers.

Sid Grossman
Bernice Abbott
Bill Witt
Ida Wyman
Wegee
Lee Sievan
Arthur Leipzig
Morris Engel
Lisett Model
John Vachon
Ruth Orkin
Aaron Siskind
Rosalie Gwathmey
Marion Palfi
Jack Manning
Lucy Ashjian

Anyone who doubts that journalists, artists and photographers can change the world should see this show. In some ways, it was a bit chilling, given what we now know about the way their images of complex, vibrant communities like Harlem as troubled and damaged helped pave the way large scale urban renewal.

"Being a photographer is making people look at what I want them to look at" ... Ruth Orkin

The whole show has a great push and pull between photographs taken to make a point about poor working and living conditions, racism and social injustice and a gut level love and fascination with the street life of New York. (about 75% of the shots are of NY)

Check out the site which includes a number of videos and an amazing map of where some of the pictures were taken.

The Radical Camera: New York's Photo League
The Jewish Museum in New York
November 04, 2011 - March 25, 2012

Columbus Museum of Art

April 19, 2012 -Sept 9, 2012

Pittsburgh Area Lenten Fish Fry Map

2012-03-01T11:30:00.000-05:00

An amazing map showing what looks like almost every Fish Fry in the Pittsburgh region.

Fish Fry Map

Teenie Harris Images "re-tell the musical history of black America in the 20th Century"

2012-02-29T20:55:00.000-05:00

Wow! another knoockout story on Teenie Harris, focusing on shots of the incredible lost music scene in The Hill. Many of these shots taken in the Hill, but also at locations like Oakland's Syria Mosque. Other shots were taken at Harlem venues like The Savoy Ballroom.

Sarah Vaughan, Lena Horne, Duke Ellington, Ethel Waters, Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson, Earl 'Fatha' Hines, Erroll Garner, Billy Eckstine, Roy Eldridge, Honey Gun band, The Ink Spots, Mary Lou Williams, Eartha Kitt, Nina Simone, Art Blakey, Billy Strayhorn

From the UK's Daily Mail

Melvin Rose, master craftsman and son of Cleveland's Rose Iron Works founder dies

2012-02-29T11:36:00.011-05:00

From The Cleveland Plain Dealer.

"He was the custodian of one of the great legacies of the Arts and Crafts movement of Cleveland," said Stephen Harrison, curator of decorative arts and design at the Cleveland Museum of Art. "He wore that mantle with humility and pride, and that pervaded everything he did."

Harrison said that Melvin Rose continued to ensure that Rose Iron Works "became a haven for craftsmanship and artisanship when machines took over and began taking the men out of the craft."

In 2008, Melvin Rose was awarded the Cleveland Arts Prize Lifetime Achievement Award for Design."

Cleveland should get more attention as a center of great craft manufacturing and industrial design.

A great in depth profile of The Rose Iron Works from The Plain Dealer

Rose had founded the company that bore his name in 1904, and Feher, who had moved here from Paris at his behest, would be his most famous colleague and collaborator. While the iconic screen was used to illustrate the breadth and depth of American Art Deco, you could also say, zooming in more tightly, that no one could write the history of design and architecture of 20th-century Cleveland without considering Rose Iron Works. "It's the best Art Deco ironwork ever done in the United States," says Henry Adams, an art historian and professor at Case Western Reserve University, who once devoted a graduate seminar to the firm's work. "Not only is their workshop extraordinary, but the story of Rose is the great American story."

Examples of the firm's artistry have been featured at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Renwick Gallery in Washington, D.C.

In Cleveland, the company's legacy penetrates the present and past -- whether manifested in elaborate dressing-room doors at Halle Bros. department store, the sculptural sign for the G.W. Mercer floral shop on West 25th Street or the gates of the Van Sweringen estate in Shaker Heights. Not far from the art museum, you can find an iron mural by Martin's son Melvin on the walls of the Cleveland Botanical Garden and an adjacent gate Melvin designed at the Western Reserve Herb Society.

Through the early 1950s, the company was one of the nation's leading designers and creators of ornamental and functional works, crafted in wrought iron, stainless steel, aluminum-copper alloys and glass.

Rose Iron Works website

Cleveland sports teams wanna crap on the city's head again: asking for extension of "sin taxes"

2012-02-29T07:49:00.000-05:00

Yup, it's the new world where having a drink or two is a "sin", but pillaging the public treasury is not.

From The Plain Dealer

Voters and fans supported the sin tax in 1996 to help build a new stadium to ensure a football team return to Cleveland.

But since the Browns returned, the team has struggled on the field changing coaches and quarterbacks, routinely leaving fans frustrated with a last place team. Still the Browns are owed the money for repairs per the sin tax and lease agreement with the city under the Mayor Mike White administration.

Monday afternoon Browns officials and city leaders met to talk about how to pay for $5.8 million in repairs to seats, ramps and concrete at Browns Stadium.

Well, it's better than in Pittsburgh, where people voted against the stadiums and got them anyway.

The irony here is rich since these were no doubt sold as investments that would help the local bars, clubs and entertainment venues. Instead, they are being driven under by taxes.

The Browns want credit for the money they have given to local charities. Scumbags--you are a charity living on the dole.

Rumors are flying that The Indians and Cavs will join the lobbying effort for a tax extension.

From The Cleveland Leader

The sin tax was originally approved by Cuyahoga County voters in 1990 for a term of 15-years to pay for the construction of Progressive Field (formerly Jacobs Field) and Quicken Loans Arena (formerly Gund Arena) through what was known as the Gateway project. Then, in 1995, voters approved extending the tax for another 10 years to help build Cleveland Browns Stadium. The sin ax put a tax on cigarettes of 4.5 cents per back, 16 cents per gallon of beer, 32 cents per gallon on wine and mixed beverages, and other spirits at $3 per gallon.

By the end of 2015, bonds issued by the city of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County to pay for their shares of the construction of all three projects will have been repaid. Each of the three professional sports teams has 30-year leases that put the burden of capital repairs on the city and county governments.

Please Cleveland, respect yourself and stop being kicked around and treated like garbage.

Pittsburgh's Creative Scene

2012-02-28T15:19:00.000-05:00

Pittsburgh is finally starting to gain national traction as a place where technology, art and creativity meet.

Best part about this video is how little thay had to stretch to make it. I can think of a lot of great area companies, game makers, ad agencies, designers and particularly architects that were not included. Also doesn't include the very large number of area firms applying creative technologies to things like weapon systems--something that they might not want to hype.

It's an easy come easy go situation, in that many of these start ups may not be around in a little while, but it looks like there's a lot more on the way.

A few of the companies listed.

Schell Games
Deep Local
Body Media
Songwhale
Maya Design
ModCloth
4 Moms
Interbots
Lightwave International
Beatbots
Animal
LEMUR
Evil Genius Designs

Some stuff they left out.

Yinzcam
Edge Studio
Slate XP
Left Right Studios
Etcetera Edutainment
ClankWorks

New Collaboration to create the largest film production facilities outside of California

2012-02-28T07:58:00.001-05:00

From The Post Gazette

"The best film and video production facility for movies outside Southern California will reside in Pittsburgh with the collaboration of a Strip District production studio, Carnegie Mellon University's entertainment technology program, Paramount Studio Group and the company that produced the digital imagery in the movie "Avatar," .

A big part of this project is an expansion of CMU's Entertainment Technology program, allowing students to take classes at the new studios in The Strip District. When completed, the studios will be the largest sound stage outside of LA.

Great talk about Kickstarter, crowdfunding and DYI culture

2012-02-27T19:45:00.001-05:00

The Huffington Post has this amazing, if now slightly out of date video about, Kickstarter and the rapidly emerging culture of DYI, creativity and invention that's out there.

Lot's of good points are made about how the process adds a level of connection and sense of personal ownership between projects and their funders.

Kickstarter expects to pass the NEA in arts funding

2012-02-27T12:49:00.007-05:00

Depending on how you look at it, this is either a really good sign of grass roots, creative funding or a grim look at how little we value arts at the federal level,although the federal government also funds the arts through the NEH, educational grants and a wide range of other programs.

Personally, I'm mostly in the camp that sees this as totally great! The NEA while a core funder of some major institutions, has failed completely at supporting a dynamic and creative ecosystem. Most likely, one can't expect it to do so.

From The Huffington Post

In general, Kickstarter projects follow a looser definition than the NEA's, described as "creative" projects rather than solely artistic ones. The NEA's recent grantees include Magic City Smooth Jazz, supporting their Jazz in the Park series, and the Puppetry Arts Theater, Inc. in Brooklyn, NY, to support a production of a new musical, "Antropomorphic" (see a list of recent grant recipients here), and are often meant to promote arts education as much as specific projects.

Strickler added that the company views the implication of the $150 million number "in both a good and a bad way."

It's best described as the National Endowment For Certain Famous and Connected Institutions, Artists and Curators. (the folks who likely need that kind of funding-the least)

Hopefully this is just the start of a trend, both online and off to better fund creativity at all levels. Remember also that Kickstarter supports seed funding for projects rather than continuing support for institutions.

(P.S. In spite of the term "endowment", the NEA, has no funds set aside or invested and is funded on annual basis out of the general Federal budget)

Wow, Youngstown having troubles with downtown free parking. Installing Meters

2012-02-25T18:44:00.003-05:00

Who knew poor, depressed Youngstown is now having some pretty big parking problems. More than a thousand people now work downtown with more nearby at YSU. An emerging retail revival is causing big problems for store owners as parking for potential customers is taken by downtown employees, exploiting the two hour free street parking by moving their cars around every two hours.

The city plans to install meters. Good for them!

Discovery Channel casting for new show: Looking for America's Top Engineer

2012-02-25T13:14:00.000-05:00

The Discovery Channel is looking for America’s most creative and daring techies, machinists, inventors and engineers to design, build, and BLAST their way to a Grand Prize on their new competition TV show TOP ENGINEER.

A handful of lucky men and women will be chosen to take on exciting challenges from various engineering fields at the state-of-the-art WET design facilities (www.wetdesign.com) in California.

No, you don’t need to have an engineering degree to compete on this show, but you MUST be able to design, build, test and integrate an idea into a final product that WORKS. These will be fast-paced, hands-on, VISCERAL challenges! If your experience is strictly behind the keyboard, then this show is NOT for you.

We are looking for visual effects experts, accomplished home shop machinists, contractors and engineers with backgrounds in electrical, civil, structural or mechanical engineering.

If you have an outgoing personality and are ready to get your hands dirty for the chance to win a GRAND PRIZE and the title of TOP ENGINEER, then we want to hear from you.

Remember, this is a competition on reality TV, so really shy folks, not into the stress, constant creative challenges and public spotlight, are likely not right for this.

Full details here.

Brite Winter Illuminates Cleveland Creatives + Ohio City

2012-02-24T14:30:00.000-05:00

Clevelandevents have few prouder glories than highlighting its greatest neighborhoodsuccess stories. Last week’s Brite Winter celebrated both the blossoming of thestart-up festival in its third year and the city’s most progressively developing district, Ohio City.

If there were any doubts OhioCity is now one of Cleveland’s premier arts and culture hubsthey were quelled by Brite Winter Festival’s line-up of the city’s mostpromising and most established creative forces. Moving from last year’slocation in the Flats to directly adjacent to the bustling West 25^th,the festival turned the usually lively neighborhood into a complete block partytakeover.

The night was lit with interactive installations created by many of the most up-and-coming designers in the Clevelandart scene. As the evening went on the crowd swelled and a giant snowflake by cyancdesign glowing in the usually vacant lot became a symbol of the festival.Nearby, open pit fires burned alongside an audience dancing to jangly indie buzz act The Lighthouse and the Whaler on the outdoor main stage. Thewhimsical scene was accented by the presence of art event leaders The YoyoSyndicate, who brought the 50 People 1 Question film project, and Cleveland festivalveterans Ingenuity Cleveland, who examined the art of sound with their ‘Whisper-ma-phone’.

Most engaging of all was Brite Winter Festival’s use oflocal businesses as musical venues. Not only were bands stationed throughoutthe night at Ohio City mainstays such as GreatLakes Brewing Company, Garage Bar, and Touch Supper Club, crowd favorites were the mostunconventional stages: Bonbon Café, Joy Machines Bicycle Shop, and MarketAvenue Wine Bar. The folk of Jack and the Bear has never sounded so intimate asplaying a floor set to a wall-to-wall crowd in the trendy newcomer bakery Bonbon.A block away, Clevelandhip-hop was at its most organic, on ground level in the dark basement of TouchSupper Club with the stylings of DJ ESO.

A sensory overload marked the triumphant return of thisyear’s Brite Winter Festival. Beyond the charming and ambitious art, beyond thepacked bars and stages, Brite Winter’s move to Ohio Citywas a testament to the possibilities of local businesses investing in localtalent. And that’s what makes Cleveland’sculture keep blossoming.

More Thoughts on Civic Branding on Urbanophile: Don't Brand Your City

2012-02-24T12:43:00.003-05:00

Another post about urban branding, seems like it's in the air.

Don't Brand Your City

The North Shore Connector: Can We Make It a Train to Somewhere?

2012-02-23T13:23:00.008-05:00

The Post Gazette put up this promo film of the soon to be open North Shore Connector.
Powerful. Awesome. An amazing asset built at great expense. Now, let's see what we can do to make this pay off beyond linking to the stadium, casino a few events and hotels.

The North Shore is most certainly not "nowhere", but our misguided, development patterns have come close to making it so by putting cars above human based development.

I will try to come back with more thoughts soon.

Video compilation of Teenie Harris profiles in the national media

2012-02-23T11:17:00.004-05:00

The Westmoreland Museum, which hosted a earlier Harris retrospective, uploaded a montage, highlighting some of the attention paid to Harris and the communities he photographed. Almost all of them are really well done, so don't just skip through it.

Seems like many were done during the period of the earlier show, but some are newer.

"what he shows so clearly and forcefully in these photos is the sense of community that existed"

Great talk about city brands on Rust Wire: Some advice from Don Draper

2012-02-22T14:41:00.010-05:00

Rust Wire put up a post about Cleveland's latest efforts to tinker with or create it's brand.

An Illustrated History of Cleveland’s Varied Attempts at “Rebranding"

Cleveland Rocks by Ian Hunter

A commenter than linked to this awesome article about urban brands with some advice from Don Draper.

"Face it you can't escape from who you are"

The problem, it seems, is a fundamental misunderstanding of what branding a city really means. Talk of “creating a brand” suggests a blank slate, a point of ground zero where we begin the process of establishing who we are. But cities are living organisms, with a legacy of past behaviors and no shortage of current, on-the-ground realities, which means–like it or not–they already have a brand.

Jackie Benson, a long-time player in place-based marketing, puts it this way: “If you’re the guy who doesn’t return phone calls, it doesn’t matter how much you talk about your personal commitment to your clients. You’re still the guy who doesn’t return phone calls. That’s your brand.”

People imagine that folks know nothing about the city and will believe anything pumped out by the PR team. The reality, is often that they know, a bit, and that you already, for better or worse, carry that brand.

Cleveland's biggest moment of civic branding happened in 1969

It was the city where the river caught on fire.

What's the ad guy gonna say? No, The River Didn't Catch on Fire?

Now we have some new branding for Cleveland.

It's the city with the former county executive on trial for large scale political corruption.

OK, and then it's the city that's home to The Cleveland Browns-etc....

My point is you can't hide or evade the things people already know about your city and culture that are true. If they are really, bad like being known for lots of violent crime, pollution or corruption, you likely have to work on changing those facts.

If your leadership fails to engender trust, you can’t sell strength. If your policies are not incentivizing what you want and penalizing what you don’t, you can’t sell vision. If your zoning promotes sprawl and your citizens are disconnected from civic participation, you can’t sell community.

What you can do is build up and sell the great things about who you are even if they won't appeal to everyone.

Like Cleveland might not be a great place to go on a diet.

But you know, a few people might like that. In fact, Cleveland has lots of great and very real things that many people would love.

Part two soon.

What is Transit Oriented Development?

2012-02-21T13:59:00.004-05:00

Yes, you heard right--

"In the first 6 months of 2009, 18% of all housing construction permits for the entire state of New Jersey, were in Jersey City."

"People who used to own two cars, now only own one, people who own one care only use it on occasion."

"We don't require parking in most of the development, that your looking at."

There's a maximum parking ratio for much of this development, but there's no minimum.

"A key part of it is changing the zoning."

It's not just something they are doing in New York and New Jersey.

Hopefully, a conversation about this will develop in Pittsburgh, Cleveland and other communities around the region.

Potentially Great Moment for Transit Oriented Development as The Cincinnati Streetcar Breaks Ground

2012-02-20T15:17:00.004-05:00

Can we say it? Pittsburgh's transit situation is an epic clusterf...k with service on even the most critical core routes being cut or eliminated.

A core problem is that we have always sold transit as basically a charity item (or jobs program) and never properly connected transit investments with development. Am I excited about the opening of the North Shore Connector? Only mildly, since it mainly connects to a sports facility used a few times a year and a gambling casino targeted at a broad base of car oriented gamblers.

For purely political reasons we supported many suburban money losing routes with few riders which helped people think that transit is a waste of money. (when is the cost of a road ever questioned)

Cincinnati's streetcar excites me-because it actually is the product of a new way of thinking about how people get around and how land will be used. I'm not saying they will get this right, but they are thinking in the right way.

Ground Broken For Cincinnati Streetcar

Something tells me, suburban voters get it, which is why they hated this project from the start. The streetcar means the city property owners can use land for something other than storing cars.

Great website reviews and maps hundreds of Ohio Festivals

2012-02-20T10:10:00.004-05:00

Beneath Ohio's image as a bland state is a huge amount of history, diversity and just plain weirdness. Festivals are a great way to discover all that.

A few examples--from the over 200 festival reviews on the site.

Cleveland Asian Festival

The Port Clinton Walleye Festival

Taste of Cincinnati

Tremont Greek Festival

Medina Ice Festival

Avon Heritage Duct Tape Festival

Gene Autry Days – Kenton

Larchmere PorchFest – Cleveland

Toledo Lighthouse Festival

Bucyrus Bratwurst Festival

IngenuityFest – Cleveland

Ohio River Sternwheel Festival

Skunk Fest – North Ridgeville

Pyrotopia Fire Arts Festival comes to Homestead: April 27th & 28th, 2012

2012-02-19T13:04:00.004-05:00

Pyrotopia overview from Pyrotopia on Vimeo.

This now long awaited event got delayed a bit but now has finalised dates and location. It will now be held around The Pump house in Homestead.

Keep up with the details here.

It will be the East Coast’s first-ever festival dedicated entirely to fire arts, presenting fire’s diversity of use by artists and celebrating humankind’s primal fascination with fire.

Pyrotopia will entertain and enchant attendees with the use of fire and related media such as electricity and light in artistic ways. Activities at Pyrotopia will include
• fire dancing, spinning, hooping, swallowing and other performances
• interactive fire sculptures and games
• fire-related demonstrations
• a gallery show of fire-related and inspired imagery, sculpture, video and other media
• workshops and lectures on fire science, history, safety and other topics
• and more

Anyone who went, want to share a post about Cleveland's Brite Winter Fest?

2012-02-19T10:03:00.007-05:00

This is a time sensitive request. If you went to The Brite Winter Fest, in Ohio City and have pictures, video or thoughts about it, you can share, it would be much appreciated. Cross posting is fine.

Email: diggingpitt@gmail.com

Cleveland's Cash Mob Movement shows off it's Awesome DYI Culture

2012-02-18T16:02:00.006-05:00

Yes, Cleveland is home to Jimmy Dimora, and a lot of just plainly misguided city leaders.

How, does it survive? Well, Cleveland also has a totally awesome, DYI, and local craft businesses culture. Born in Cleveland and spreading around the country is the cash mob movement, a grass roots way to connect, discover and support local shops.

From the Plain Dealer

An enthusiastic 'cash mob' gathered in front of The Grog Shop concert venue at Coventry Road and Euclid Heights Boulevard to, as organizer Andrew Samtoy said, help "get people back into the habit of supporting their local businesses."

After Samtoy announced the cash mob 'rules' - participants must spend $20 and meet three new people - the crowd of mostly 20 and 30-somethings made their way down the bustling Coventry strip to the night's target business; Big Fun Toy Store.

Owner Steve Presser warmly greeted the surge of new customers, as the mob quickly descended upon the store's seemingly endless supply of vintage memorabilia. Billed as offering "a shopping experience like no other", Big Fun's quirky stock of everything from Troll dolls and KISS refrigerator magnets to Dick Goddard greeting cards and 'Billy Bob'-style teeth produced plenty of smiling faces and a steady stream of purchases.

May Building Plan gives Cleveland Negative buzz In Atlantic Cities

2012-02-18T09:15:00.004-05:00

I know this plan is allegedly dead,(I don't believe it) but I can't drop it. It symbolises so much of what has gone wrong in downtown development plans that so often put attractions for tourists and suburban commuters above the basic structure and design of the city.

Atlantic Cities picked up the story which has some very good comments.

This is a building almost everyone who has been to downtown Cleveland has seen and admired. It's not just beautiful, but screams out how useful it is for almost anything from retail, to office and residential.

Owners of Cleveland's Historic Downtown May Building propose gutting it for Casino Parking

2012-02-17T16:06:00.008-05:00

Image from the Wikipedia (public domain)

More about this building

OK, they were turned down by the city planning commission.

The building's owners, a Florida-based investor group, had hoped to create 734 parking spaces on four floors and remove the windows for ventilation.

An architect working on the project said that that building's ground floor would be maintained for retail, and that housing and offices were possible on the upper floors. But plans submitted to the city focused on the parking proposal, which was limited to the second through fifth floors.

The commission seemed shocked that with all the "investment", in the area, like the nearby, football, baseball and basketball arenas, the soon to be constructed massive convention center and casino, that the owners didn't see more value in renovating the building for any higher use.

Of course- creating massive single use facilities, specifically aimed at bringing in huge crowds to such a small area was almost certain to inspire just this kind of development. Already several other historic buildings had been torn down for casino parking.

My sad guess is that these neighboring developments, taken as a whole subtract, rather than add to the building's potential value for offices, or residential. How many people say, gee I want to have an office right by a casino (a small casino might be different) or a huge stadium? Fewer are likely to want to live there.

Even so, Cleveland, still has the bones of a great downtown-and this building is a very big part of that. There is also a tight and growing demand for residential space downtown. One can only hope this building can make it.

2013 Carnegie International Curator's Blog getting Some Attention

2012-02-17T12:21:00.003-05:00

I have to say, I liked the last Carnegie International, but it didn't exactly stretch your brain, consisting to largely of established American and European art stars-showing works in the very tight confines of a traditional museum and making very little use of Pittsburgh's unique landscape or history. Not surprisingly, the curator pretty quickly skipped town.

I have heard some rumors, that the new curatorial team is looking to possibly use some alternate spaces outside the museum. I sure hope so. If their blog is any indicator, they are much more involved in the neighborhood art scene. Their curatorial trips also indicate a show that spans a much wider range.

Write up in Gallerist NY

Some sample posts.

Symposium on building art institutions in Africa-In Senegal

A look at a sculpture park made out of garbage in Senegal

Political Puppet Theater from Poland

A look at Beirut's Arab Image Foundation

Artist Apartment Talks in Lawrenceville

A trip to The Maxo Vanka Murals

The Cleveland Museum Extends it Reach with a New Annex in Ohio City

2012-02-16T13:50:00.003-05:00

This is not exactly news to many people but it was news to me.

If you dig around on the blog, you can see I've been somewhat negative about The Cleveland Museum's very ambitious-almost dangerous efforts to supersize itself-while in my opinion doing nothing to better integrate itself into the city.

My feeling about this plan to create an annex on Cleveland's West Side is totally different. Wow! nice.

I love the comments from the Bidwell's about the annex becoming much more of a place for experimentation.

"The Cleveland Museum of Art and the Fred and Laura Ruth Bidwell Foundation announced on September 16, 2011 a collaboration that will bring additional exposure for contemporary art to Northeast Ohio and for the first time in its history expand aspects of the museum's programming and exhibitions to dedicated space outside of its University Circle campus. Titled the Transformer Station, this new arts venue takes root in a former transformer station built in 1924 at 1460 West 29th Street in Cleveland's Ohio City neighborhood."

Up until a short while ago one would not have guessed from it's institutions that Cleveland is home to a good number of very important contemporary art collectors. In the next few years that will be totally changed, with the opening of the new Cleveland MOCA, The Transformer Station Gallery; Spaces Gallery and expanded Cleveland Museum contemporary galleries and of course The Akron Art Museum.

Cool Blog by West Virginia Artist, Robert Villamagna

2012-02-14T12:58:00.004-05:00

Took me a long time to find, Robert Villamagna's personal blog where he documents some of his creative process, teaching experiences, exhibits and other random stuff. It's also a peak at many of the art happenings going on in West Virginia.

Check it out. http://wvartist.wordpress.com/

New Street Art: Benjamin Banneker Sign In The Hill District

2012-02-13T12:30:00.009-05:00

I really like this raw folk art/ street art piece I saw in The Hill District. I think it's on Centre Ave but I'm not sure.

One thing street art can do is make people more aware of their regional or cultural history. My guess is that was the main intent of the creator of this work I saw in the hill. Sad to say, I had only a very vague idea of who Benjamin Banneker was-but I looked him up after seeing this.

From the Wikipedia

"The title page of an edition of Banneker's 1792 Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia Almanack and Ephemeris stated that the publication contained:

the Motions of the Sun and Moon, the True Places and Aspects of the Planets, the Rising and Setting of the Sun, Place and Age of the Moon, &c.—The Lunations, Conjunctions, Eclipses, Judgment of the Weather, Festivals, and other remarkable Days; Days for holding the Supreme and Circuit Courts of the United States, as also the useful Courts in Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia. Also—several useful Tables, and valuable Receipts.—Various Selections from the Commonplace–Book of the Kentucky Philosopher, an American Sage; with interesting and entertaining Essays, in Prose and Verse—the whole comprising a greater, more pleasing, and useful Variety than any Work of the Kind and Price in North America.

The 1792 almanac included the times for the rising and setting of the sun and moon. Weather forecasts and dates for yearly feasts were also included. Readers also saw a tide table for the Chesapeake Bay and home treatments for illnesses. In his 1793 almanac, Banneker included letters sent between Thomas Jefferson and himself.[17] The title page of a Baltimore edition of his 1795 almanac had a woodcut portrait of him as he may have appeared, but which a writer later concluded was more likely a portrayal of an idealized African American youth."

I liked this work a lot.

Eat Your Heart Out, Pittsburgh: Cleveland's West Side Market Celebrates 100 Years

2012-02-12T08:09:00.004-05:00

Warning--this video is not for vegetarians.

Why is it so hard for a Pittsburgher or Clevelander to acknowledge one great thing about the other city? Just admit this is pretty great.

A whole bunch of celebrations are planned.

From Cleveland.com

A traffic-stopping street festival is planned for Oct. 7, a rare Sunday that the market will be open, and will include food by local restaurants and celebrated food trucks, as well as a parade with costumes created in workshops led by the Cleveland Museum of Art's Parade the Circle organizers.

The market's actual birthday is Nov. 2, a Friday. The gala event will be celebrated Saturday, Nov. 3 (billed as the first day of the market's next century), featuring homeboy restaurateurs and award-winners Jonathon Sawyer and Michael Symon -- along with a dozen or so of their nationally renowned chef friends. Tickets will be priced at three levels, with the most expensive providing the closest access to chefs. The Great Lakes Brewing Co. will be releasing a centennial brew.

New Organization, Alternative Appalachia aims to support non traditional arts

2012-02-11T18:21:00.008-05:00

http://www.alternativeappalachia.org/

"Alternative Appalachia aims to provide exposure to filmmakers, musicians, visual artists and writers living in Appalachia whose art form does not conform to traditional regional styles. We intend to initiate social awareness of the wide spectrum of creativity occurring in the region through our website and other platforms. Alternative Appalachia strives to challenge stereotypes of art in the region and will create a support system for artists and develop interest in their work"

Check out the submission guidlines for each art form

P.S. No exact definition is given for what they consider, Appalachia, but all of West Virginia, the greater Pittsburgh area (actually most of Pennsylvania) and South East Ohio, is usually considered in this region.

In an earlier version of this post, I made the assumption, they gave grants. After looking further at what's on the website, I think they are more about creating a forum to make people more aware of alternative work being made here.

Just a heads up that they exist--check out the details.

James Simon's Welcome to Uptown Sign

2012-02-11T14:22:00.003-05:00

Sorry about the low quality of these images, I don't drive and this is not a spot I normally pass with a camera at hand. When I did, there was a pretty serious back lighting situation.

Both me and Jean were a bit surprised by the weird location of this sign, which is in a parklet few neighborhood people would go. In fact, you really can only see it well, as you leave the area and head towards the South Side.

Beggars can't be choosers, and this was the spot the city must have given. James did a wonderful job bringing a creative and colorful entrance to the neighborhood.

You might know that James also did an amazing Welcome to Braddock sign.

"Industrial Strength": The South Side's Emerald Art Glass House profiled in The Times

2012-02-10T17:46:00.004-05:00

We were watching as this weirdly great new house was starting to loom over a factory on Pittsburgh's slopes.

From The NY Times

"It took three years to build, but the Emerald Art Glass House (named after the Zielinskis’ company, Emerald Art Glass) now hovers above the factory in the South Side neighborhood, overlooking the Monongahela River, railway line and bridges.

Eric Fisher, the couple’s architect, says proudly that the cantilevered extension is three times the length of the one at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater. And that it recalls the tradition of the owner living over the shop."

It gives a lot of the back story of how it was built and the owners who built it. Also has a nice slideshow.

In case the Times link doesn't work, even if you subscibe and log in, here are a few more related links.

In Rusty Bridge

On Wreck and Salvage

Amazing Milestone: Two Kickstarter projects raise over a million dollars.

2012-02-10T15:37:00.004-05:00

So many things I should post about.

Wow, most people assume you can't raise really big money through crowdsourced funding and most people and organizations don't try.

"LOS ANGELES — Last night at 6:42 pm in New York, a Kickstarter project raised $1 million. Double Fine Adventure, a video game designed by San Francisco game designer Tim Schafer and his team at Double Fine Productions, is a downloable “point-and-click” graphic adventure game. Backers get both the game and a real time documentary filmed by 2 Player Productions as the game develops."

From Hyperallergic

Stunning but not a record because 4 hours earlier another project passed the million mark.

Obviously, I find so many reasons to love this. In spite of supposed efforts at outreach, the vast majority of conventional government and foundation funding goes to the same folks and ideas over and over.

What is the record for an art project?

Call For Artists For Youngstown Mural Project

2012-02-09T18:21:00.004-05:00

I am getting more press releases which is cool. FYI, I can't post everything and am still very interested in people willing to do their own full posts on the blog.

Calling All Artists!
(on behalf of the Youngstown Playhouse)

Glenwood Neighbors Beautification Project!

The Youngstown Playhouse is pleased to announce an upcoming mural project in the Glenwood Avenue area on the Southside of Youngstown!

PROJECT DETAILS

The project is an effort to beautify the Playhouse Grounds and surrounding environs through a highly collaborative mural art display. Debris and brush will be removed and a mural painted by community residents and institutional partners on a large and highly visible wall adjacent to playhouse grounds. This project ties into greater efforts to beautify and improve the Glenwood corridor and to strengthen community partnerships between non-profits and neighborhood residents.

PROJECT TIMELINE

Friday, March 23 - Response DEADLINE

April 15 - Selection of artist

April - May - Design

June -July - Mural Installation

APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS

· Cover letter, stating your interest in the project, as well as how you
would approach the project if you were selected

· Examples of past work, jpg files on a CD (max 10)

· Annotated image list to accompany jpg files

· Resume with three references and contact information

All materials must be submitted by MARCH 23, 2012

Applications and materials may be sent to:

The Youngstown Playhouse

600 Playhouse Lane.

P.O. Box 11108

Youngstown, OH 44511

QUESTIONS
Please contact Sean Posey at sposey@yndc.org, or by calling 330.480.0423.

Youngstown Playhouse website

A Favorite Pittsburgh Mural: Kate Bechak's Worm's Eye View

2012-02-09T11:29:00.003-05:00

Crap, I live not far from this but somehow never got around to photographing it. Sorry, I need to get a wider angle shot to give one the full three panel image.

The theme here is explained by the title, a trippy landscape as it might be seen by an urban worm. Catch all the subtle but hilarious details, like the gangsta pigeon, the gum pulling from the bottom of the sneaker and some kind of weird bacteria action.

Kate is a highly creative artist who's work I see too rarely.

Devastating, Depressing Slideshow of Pittsburgh's Lost Architecture

2012-02-09T08:45:00.002-05:00

I came across this slideshow on line, while searching for images and history of The North Side Market House. Ohio City in Cleveland is celebrating the happy 100th birthday of it's West Side Market. Allegheny City will never have that happy moment, after losing 500 buildings at it's heart to urban renewal in the 1950's, along with it's connected street grid.

It's not so much that all these buildings were lost--life goes on, and building and adapting is part of life-it's that a vast number of them were replaced with ugly parking garages, highways, failed developments and often just empty lots. I rarely feel that way about losing buildings in Manhattan since most (not all) are replaced for good reason, most often taller and more urban structures.

Anyway, it's depressing and there's a whole lot more one could show-entire communities just blown away in a few years of destruction.

Small Instalation of Romare Bearden Work at Warhol through the end of February

2012-02-08T19:33:00.007-05:00

Got this press release but could find no info on their website.

From a Warhol Museum press release

"In celebration of Black History Month, The Andy Warhol Museum has installed a selection of Romare Bearden artworks, which are on view through February 29,2012. This installation features 10 Bearden screen prints and collages, on loan from Pittsburgh art collectors. This installation also features five Andy Warhol works, including a series of three Ladies and Gentlemen (1975) prints, Two Horns (1958),and Martha Graham: Satyric Festival Song (1986)."

Works are on display until February 29

The first of three Antiques Roadshow Episodes shot in Pittsburgh air on Monday

2012-02-08T15:35:00.004-05:00

I'm excited to see the discoveries people from the region brought in for PBS's Antique's Roadshow last year.

Finds included

A "folk art", carved wooden devil bought for $10 which survived a flooded basement, valued at $4000-$5000

A Louisville Slugger bat used in a game in 1960 by Roberto Clemente and signed by the baseball legend. Valued at $25,000

A First Edition set by Charles Darwin brought in by a West Virgina man valued at $284,000

A Rockwell Kent Painting valued at $150,000 -$200,000

A 17th century Chinese carved rhinoceros horn cup bought for $1, valued at $350,000 - $400,000

Story in The Pittsburgh Post Gazette

8 p.m. Monday on WQED, Channel 13

No Surprise, The Cleveland City Council approved another give away to the Cleveland Browns

2012-02-08T14:04:00.004-05:00

When Cleveland's mayor was begged by small music clubs and musicians to cut back an 8% admissions tax he shot back- "I have a city to run.".

From The Cleveland Plain Dealer

Today, we got an idea of the kind of spending the city considers vital. Cops? Education? Street repairs? No, another give away to a favored sports team.

"City Council voted 16-2 Monday to let the team take the money from a city-administered tax on alcohol and tobacco sales. Cleveland, which leases the stadium to the football team, is required to provide only $850,000 a year for major improvements."

My guess is we will see some of these scumbags in a puppet theater show soon.

A Blogger's Visit To Youngstown on Urbanophile

2012-02-07T19:18:00.004-05:00

From Urbanophile

A Clevelander made a day trip to Youngstown, visited The Youngstown Historical Center's Museum of Labor and Industry, walked around downtown, stopped in at The Lemon Grove Cafe; had a a few beers at Rust Belt Brewing Company; walked through Mill Creek park and drove through the struggling Idora neighborhood. Along the way he met a few people who decided to move to Youngstown, and so far are pretty happy about it.

New Documentary about Kraynick's Bike Shop being shot. Do you have a story to tell?

2012-02-07T04:11:00.009-05:00

More Than Two Hands from Jennifer Caple on Vimeo.

Wow, an awesome project indeed. If you/yinz know and love Kraynicks, it's history or just a lot about the Pittsburgh bike scene? Perhaps you should contact the filmmakers.

"'This is Your Bicycle' is a documentary that is currently being filmed in Pittsburgh. As we continue interviews and filming on location at the bikeshop,
we are looking for photos, interviews, and personal stories for the film. Email films@jennifercaple.com or join our RSS feed for updates on screenings and events."

Follow the project at thisisyourbicycle.com

Small Clubs and Local Musicians Work To Fight Cleveland's Destructive 8% Admission Tax

2012-02-06T20:17:00.004-05:00

Ever wonder why in spite of an incredible asset like The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Cleveland's living small club scene still struggles?

First reason is that small music clubs almost everywhere, don't often rate as the world's most profitable businesses. Add to that the range of licencing fees and taxes on the one steady moneymaker, alcohol sales and Cleveland's special gift-An 8% across the board tax on admissions.

From Cleveland.Com

"Mayor Frank Jackson has shown no interest in a tax break for music clubs, telling The Plain Dealer: "People owe, they should pay. We have a city to run. We can't run it on air."

The Cleveland Music Club Coalition is growing, and it's planning a big push in February to get hearings on the legislation and to raise awareness with a single night of concerts at their venues called "Defend Music: Stop the 8 Percent," said Sean Watterson, owner of the Happy Dog on Cleveland's West Side."

LOL my flippin ass off. What do the Cleveland Brown's, Indians and other freeloaders do to pay off the tens of millions in cash they took from taxpayers?

Recent plans to collect on back taxes (To fund Cleveland Browns Stadium repairs?) have driven a number of clubs to the wall.

From Cleveland.Com

"Cindy Barber, owner of the Beachland Ballroom on the city's East Side, said this week that she faces a demand for $400,000 -- three years' worth of taxes plus penalties and interest.

Peabody's, near Cleveland State University, recently began adding the 8 percent tax to the price of tickets but also remains on the hook for collections dating back three years."

Local musicians are trying to desperately to repeal the tax.

Kirby is urging them to send a copy of their CD, cassette or mp3 to Mayor Frank Jackson, along with a note of support for Cleveland Music Club Coalition and a pending ordinance which would exempt small music clubs from the admission tax.

He’s asking them to do so by February 29th “for maximum impact,” saying “I would like to make a huge impression on Mayor Jackson to support our local venues and musicians that helped bring $840 million dollars of income and $91.6 million in taxes to Cuyahoga County in 2010.”

Here’s how to get your music to the mayor via snail mail or email:

Mayor Frank Jackson
Cleveland City Hall
601 Lakeside Ave.
Cleveland 44114
mayorsactioncenter@city.cleveland.oh.us

Downtown Cleveland ... Is It For You? Promotional Video Hypes Organic Energy

2012-02-06T15:59:00.005-05:00

Gotta take all Promotional videos with a grain of salt, but I like the focus on small business, creative energy and convenience in this video. The Food Trucks, Pop up stores, non chain gourmet dining scene and landscape make Cleveland's downtown actually look like a unique and special place- which it is.

I also like the open ended sales pitch which in many ways is similar to Pittsburgh's "Imagine what you can do here", campaign.

The word made flesh

2012-02-04T17:47:00.002-05:00

Seeing the foot traffic on Penn Avenue, it was hard to believe that it's February. It was a great night for a brisk stroll among the galleries and artspaces open for first Friday. The last three winters have seen heavy February snowfalls, which is a huge deterrent for all but the most stalwart of art patrons. Last night was a happy intersection of lovely weather and a fantastic exhibit.

I have been looking forward to the Stephen Tuomala exhibit at Modern Formations, and it did not disappoint. The show is beautifully installed, and the work is really engaging. Mr. Tuolmala's loose interpretation of the body is raw with tension.

The works are ink on bible pages, taken from a couple different volumes. The larger works were crated by joining multiple pages together. An installation of dozens of skull drawings cover an entire wall, exhibiting a remarkable and subtle variation in form. The work emulates the Otranto Cathedral, with its wall of martyr's skulls. The presence of the work is intense. Across the room are three unflinching nudes that are disorienting. The life-sized figures float in a field of inky darkness, seemingly placid in the state in which they are depicted.

Modern Formations has regular gallery hours, so if you missed the opening, it's not too late to see the exhibit.

Modern Formations
Stephen Tuomala
The Word Made Flesh
Modernformations
4919 Penn Avenue
Pittsburgh PA 15224
412.362.0274
Thursdays 7pm - 9pm
Saturdays 1pm - 4pm or by appointment

Operator of NY's Taxpayer Financed Yankee Stadium Garages Nears Default

2012-02-03T13:13:00.005-05:00

Don't ever say governments don't invest in our communities. Allegheny Center, was an investment that took the heart out of The North Side, while Mellon Arena was an investment in the lower Hill- which just happened to remove it's residents and businesses.

The Cross Bronx Expressway was an amazing feat of engineering, leaving a wonderful gash through the Bronx. Often tax investments are given to vital interests like sports teams who have the community's interest at heart.

Few were as misguided and despicable than the 2005 deal between NY City and The New York Yankees. It's blowing up now.

From The Daily News

THE FIRM that built and manages the new Yankee Stadium parking garages can’t repay $237 million in tax-exempt bonds the Bloomberg administration arranged for it four years ago, new financial records show.

Bronx Parking Development Company LLC is running perilously low on cash reserves and faces a looming default by the end of the year, according to a report filed Friday by a trustee for the firm’s bondholders.

Time is running out, in other words, to avoid one of the biggest failures in decades of bonds issued by a New York City agency.

Local politicians who supported the deal like Council Speaker, Christine Quinn thought...

“I think it would be great if people could go to sporting events exclusively on mass transit but that’s not going to happen,” she said. “So one has to, when they’re developing projects like this, have a reality sense of what the needs are as it relates to parking.”

Even though more than fifty percent of game goers used mass transit.

The positive thing is that, as the garages go belly up, people are finally thinking of actual money making ways to use the land, like building hotels and conference centers. The problem is that, with the city so eager to bend over and hand out tax dollars, sports teams have little incentive to make good use of their properties. Honestly, George Steinbrenner's obsession with expanded parking revealed how little he thought of The Bronx.

In Depth Post About The Gas Drilling Slowdown in The Post Gazette

2012-02-03T09:39:00.004-05:00

The Post Gazette has more details on how low gas prices are affecting local gas drilling. Included is a longer list of drillers who are slowing down and a map of the so called wet/dry gas line.

From The Post Gazette

Resignation of Important Cleveland Museum Board Member Creates Doubts at a Critical Time

2012-02-02T14:51:00.006-05:00

A few years ago, I posted about the huge expansion of The Cleveland Museum of Art, which had caused the museum to tap into the interest from funds set aside for acquiring art.

Let's hope everything works out, but the loss of a major board member, who had already given $5 million to the institution raises new concerns. The Plain Dealer has a long in depth story detailing some of the history.

From The Cleveland Plain Dealer

"The loss of a generous donor - Horvitz and his family have contributed more than $5 million to the museum’s expansion and renovation - also raises questions about how the museum could have alienated someone with the potential to do more for it in the future.

The timing is troubling, too. While the museum has raised $230 million for the expansion and renovation, it still needs an additional $120 million to pay off its debt, a huge sum for any institution in Cleveland."

Low Gas Prices Force Drillers to Shut Down Wells

2012-02-01T13:01:00.005-05:00

Governments counting on the cash and jobs bonanza from shale drilling might soon be out of luck, as a long period of very low gas prices is causing drillers to shut down wells.

Chesapeake Energy, Conoco-Phillips, Noble Energy and Consol Energy have all announced plans to cut back spending and close off wells.

Low prices deflate natural-gas rush

People looking at the falling prices, were wondering how long the drilling boom could go on. Unlike, coal or oil, gas is almost impossible to ship without a pipeline, creating a very localised market.

If You Live in Cleveland, You Might Want To Check Out This Co Working Space in Ohio City

2012-01-31T11:37:00.004-05:00

Say hello to Cowork Cleveland from Cowork Cleveland on Vimeo.

One thing that bothers me about urbanist discussions is that many people feel it's just a lifestyle choice. Many people, particularly the self employed see real economic value in collaborative environments.

Ohio City, Tremont and Detroit Shoreway are becoming great places for small business people and the self employed.

From Freshwater Cleveland

"McDermott and Veysey visited similar coworking spaces in other cities, including Chicago, before they decided to launch Cowork CLE. “This is something that’s become popular in bigger cities,” says McDermott. “We chose Ohio City because it is an artisan neighborhood. We believe our clients are creative, independent artisans who are yearning for a collaborative environment."

The owners of Cowork CLE hope that the space will function as a kind of entrepreneurial incubator. By developing relationships in a shared work environment, their customers will be able to share useful information, help each other grow and eventually even refer business to one another, they say.

“We’re hoping people will make connections,” says McDermott."

You might want to check this place out if you live in Cleveland.

Texas Art Site, Glass Tire Creates Southern California Regional Site

2012-01-29T15:00:00.009-05:00

As a New Yorker, The Los Angeles area always struck me more as a brand, masquerading as a city. The one thing they do well is slapping a cohesive mental image on a vast region of disparate parts, none of which alone would warrant such a high level of attention.

Not so surprisingly, the ten year old, famous art website, Glass Tire that did so much to connect and brand the Texas Art community, is creating a spin off site linking Southern California.

Glass Tire: Southern California

The map's tire icons link to art events and stories in each sub region-

Santa Barbara
Santa Monica/Venice
West Hollywood/Midtown
Culver City
Downtown LA
LA -Other
Orange County
San Diego

This is a vast area of 215 miles, between Santa Barbara and San Diego with a travel time of almost 4 hours, much further than the distance between Cleveland and Pittsburgh.

Wouldn't it be amazing if we thought a bit more regionally. What factor do state borders and old money foundations have in creating artificial distortions? Do people who visit or live in one place know much about what's happening so close by?

Nakama Becomes First Major Tenant of the North Side's Garden Theater Block

2012-01-28T12:45:00.007-05:00

Jean, was excited that the popular South Side, Japanese restaurant, Nakama would be opening up on the North Side. I was somewhat less, impressed since I assumed they would be locating in the semi dead zone around the stadiums that has hosted a revolving door of sports bars.

Wrong! Nakama, instead will be locating in a gorgeous historic building at the edge of the Mexican War Streets.

From The Tribune Review

"Nakama, the popular Japanese steakhouse and sushi bar on the South Side, will take 5,000 square feet in the Masonic Temple building at North and Reddour Street, said co-developer Craig Totino.

"They are viewed as an anchor for the Federal/North project," said Totino, co-owner of Collaborative Ventures in Mt. Lebanon. The firm and Zukin Development in Philadelphia formed Allegheny City Development Group, the joint venture that's developing the block."

"Our goal is to start construction this summer and take about nine to 12 months," Totino said. "So Nakama should occupy in summer 2013 -- possibly earlier, in the spring."

A delusional, Yinzer myth seems to be that the whole North Side was dragged down by the former porno theater next door.

More about the building.

"Built in 1895 in Romanesque Revival style, the Masonic Hall was originally used as a fraternal meeting house with four separate ground floor storefronts: three along West North Avenue and one along Reddour Street."

Fine--If the government wants to claim credit for the revival of the block, ignoring decades of efforts (see the post about Randyland) by local residents, perhaps they can take some responsibility for the highways and misguided projects like Allegheny Center which did so much harm to The North Side.

Randyland On The Today Show

2012-01-27T12:09:00.003-05:00

Sorry, I don't watch much TV aside from a few Steeler's games. This story on Today about the North Side legend is a few years old. I believe it's Randy Gilson's birthday and the Mattress Factory tweeted this.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The old Pittsburgh art blog has a good post with links to a long list of pieces about Randy and his ongoing creation.

Who Knew? It's Legal to Hail a Cab and Pittsburgh Transportation Group Wants to Promote it

2012-01-26T13:24:00.006-05:00

Why do discussions about increasing urban convenience, vitality and reducing the parking footprint so rarely mention taxis or any other non standard transport like shuttle buses or mini vans? It's driving, big transit (perhaps biking) or nothing.

One look at the Burg told me this had the makings of a great cab city since so many of the key areas of town, The North Shore, The Strip, Downtown and The South Side are so close together. The problem is that it's hard to boost residential and business density in these areas without cabs and it's hard to run cabs without that density. (It's a whole lot harder if the land is hogged by mostly empty stadiums)

A new program by the biggest city cab company, Pittsburgh Transportation Group aims to dedicate at least 15 cars to just these areas.

From The Pittsburgh Business Times

"So here's the solution: Come March, Yellow Cab will roll out a fleet of black and white, newer model cars dedicated exclusively to the greater Golden Triangle Area-Downtown. South Side, North Shore and parts of the Strip District."

An ad campaign promoting the service will use catchy phrases like "What the Hail" and "Hail Yes" to promote the still foreign concept of flagging down a cab on the street here.

Personally, I have a few doubts about the service if it doesn't extend to include a slightly wider area like Bloomfield, The War Streets, the whole Strip District and most of Lawrenceville. Still, I like the thinking here.

Creative Clash! How Can Pittsburgh Take It's Tech and Creative Industries to the Next Level? Talk @ Carnegie Museum

2012-01-25T18:46:00.005-05:00

This event, which costs $45 tomorrow night seems to be full, so I'm just passing it along.

Thursday, January 26, 2012
5:00 PM - 8:00 PM

Location: The Carnegie Museum of Art, 4400 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh 15213-4080

Pittsburgh is a city rich with creativity and innovation. Now, how do we take our success to the next level? Heralding the Council’s new Creative Technology Network, and presented in partnership with the Carnegie Museum of Art, Creative Clash! will explore Pittsburgh’s history and future as a key innovator at the intersection of art and technology. Today, industries including design, gaming, filmmaking, advertising, education, fine-art, production, robotics, digital media – and much more – are coalescing to make Pittsburgh home to a thriving creative technology community. Join us, and join the conversation, as we examine what it takes to sustain and grow this exciting community!

Details here.

Gabe Felice Mural in Greensburg

2012-01-25T15:35:00.004-05:00

Still getting together my posts from my Greensburg trip. One unexpected highlight was coming across this mural by Greensburg/Pittsburgh artist Gabe Felice. Most of the other murals we came across were pretty tame and historical.

The size, is for a mural pretty small, but this piece is loaded with color and content. I like the way the design works with the structure of the brick surface in a creative, playful way.

It was Sunday, so almost everything was shut down, however the little block, the mural is on, is now home to a few stores, a hipster coffee shop/gallery and Seton Hill's new art studio building.

Gabe Felice Website

Documentary About Cleveland's Industrial Music Scene City/Ruins: Art in the Face of Industrial Decay

2012-01-24T20:30:00.004-05:00

"This is the trailer for the first full length feature by Petrus Filmwork. City/Ruins is a documentary about the Experimental Industrial movement in a city crushed by Industrial collapse. Examining the effects of the mired economy on this underground art community and the art that is produced in it's wake. The story is built around interviews and performance clips of those involved in the scene, intertwined with visual evidence of Industrial decay, via montage of decayed landscapes."

Anyone seen this or know a lot about the scene there? Please comment with more info.

Westmoreland Museum Of American Art Gets an $8 Million Grant From The Richard King Mellon Foundation

2012-01-24T14:57:00.004-05:00

Me and Jean drove over to Greensburg to catch the last day of The Tides of Provincetown show. The Westmoreland is really worth the trip and will be getting a whole lot better with a planned museum expansion.

Press Release From The Museum.

"The Westmoreland Museum of American Art has received an $8million grant from the Richard King Mellon Foundation in support of their capital and endowment campaign. The campaign includes plans for an architecturally significant new wing, renovation of the existing building and a complete re-design of the grounds. The gift is the largest contribution to-date received by the Museum. Of the $8 million, the Foundation indicated that $2 million is to be reserved to shape a challenge to other donors later in the campaign. The fundraising goal of $35 million includes $15 million for construction, $15 million for endowment and $5 million to support Museum operations during the life of the campaign.

Planning for the expansion/renovation was initiated in 2009 in response to the continued growth of the Museum's collections, educational programming, and critically acclaimed exhibitions program. The Museum's 50-plus year old building was also in need of reconfiguration to serve the needs of an art museum operating in the 21st century. The Westmoreland is currently in the design and programming phase of planning"

I will be back to post about the show and my recent trip around Greensburg. A bit of advice, if you can help it, visit on a Weekday or Saturday since the town really shuts down on Sunday. The town itself is a treasure, that only shows hints of what it could be.

Google Will Be Adding 70,000 SF of Space at It's Bakery Square Offices

2012-01-21T17:36:00.002-05:00

From The Pittsburgh Post Gazette

"The Mountain View, Calif.-based search company has reached a deal with developer Walnut Capital to lease another 70,000 square feet of space at Bakery Square, a $130 million development.

With the decision, Google will occupy about 115,000 square feet of the 250,000-square-foot building. It now has about 45,000 square feet on two floors.

It plans to occupy some of the space later this year and the rest next year. Officials also have been told that with the expansion, Google may have as many as 500people working at the site.

The company approached Bakery Square officials late last year about adding more room and had a lease signed by the end of December"

Yes, they are hiring. follow the link for details.

Cleveland News Station Turns Political Corruption Trial Into Puppet Theater

2012-01-20T21:37:00.004-05:00

Cleveland is having one of those, do you laugh, cry or shoot yourself moments with a sadly absurd public corruption trial.

With no cameras allowed in court, WOIO Action News has decided to put on little skits based on the day's court transcript.

From Cleveland.Com

"It's entertaining ... it's professionally done, but it's not news," said Randy Reeves, an associate professor at the University of Missouri School of Journalism and the executive producer of KOMU, the NBC affiliate in Columbia that is owned by the university. "This is a line I wouldn't cross. The visual distracts from some pretty serious stuff. Even at the end of the newscast, it's puppets. I can't get past that."

A second broadcast professor at Missouri, Barbara Cochran, called the segment "a comic way of dealing with the fact that in 2012, cameras are still barred from federal courtrooms, and the public is denied the opportunity to see for themselves what transpires at a public trial."

TEDx 1000Lakes - Chuck Marohn: Video Shows The Weird Unsustainable Nature Of American Infrastructure

2012-01-20T11:31:00.005-05:00

There's a lot of meat here in a fairly short video. Likely will be back with thoughts.

Ohio DOT Promised Billions in Road and Bridge Construction It Can't Pay For

2012-01-19T14:33:00.005-05:00

Anyone concerned about the 15 Trillion dollar reported Federal deficit should know that it's the tip of a much larger iceberg of looming costs most people don't know about.

Remember, the fight over pedestrian access to the brand new Inner Belt Bridge, Cleveland was gonna get? Surprise, it now looks like a new bridge may not be built till 2020 or later even though the current one may have serious structural issues!

Turns out the State transportation folks just wish listed important projects with little knowledge of how they might be paid for.

For years, the state has "over-programmed" for the money available, Wray said. Project commitments total $3.3 billion through 2017, but only $1.6 billion in revenues is projected for construction, he said.

Meanwhile, revenue from federal and state gas taxes has remained flat, while the costs of maintenance and construction have inflated, he said.

He expects disappointment not only in Cleveland but across the state with the draft list.

The West Shoreway project also doesn't fare well. It is not on the funding list, Wray said, despite a concerted appeal from the city of Cleveland for another $21 million.

Expect this to be an ever growing story. Ironically, in many cases, failing infrastructure offers a grand chance for cities to reinvent themselves in more sustainable ways.

Remember that The West Side Highway, in NY and Embarcadero Freeway in San Fransisco were only removed after partial collapses.

The Cleveland Browns Want More City Money For Immediate Stadium Repairs

2012-01-19T10:31:00.005-05:00

In most cases tax financed sports stadiums are the gift that keeps on taking.
Known in Cleveland, as the factory of sadness, Browns Stadium might take the cake.

From Cleveland.Com

"Under the complicated proposal, the Browns would get this year's $850,000 plus $5 million from the next six years of repair money drawn from the tax revenue collected countywide on alcohol and tobacco sales and administered by the city. In exchange, the city would not have to make its annual contributions from the tax money to a stadium repair fund for the next six years.

But what happens if additional needs arise during that time? Ken Silliman, Mayor Frank Jackson's chief of staff, said the city will consider dipping further into the so-called sin tax money."

The team contends they are fixing the effects of the harsh northern climate. (Hello, who chose to put it that location on the lake front?)

Pack up the truck and get lost, scumbags. IMHO, Cleveland is sort of a great town, it doesn't need this abuse and it could certainly put this piece of land to better use.

Amazing Site, RETROgrapher Maps Pittsburgh's Photographic History

2012-01-18T17:17:00.007-05:00

West Carson Street at Fernwood Street Southside

Hoffers Way, Hill District, 1924

Constructing The William Penn Hotel 1915

How did I not know about this amazing resource that posts the exact mapped locations of Historic Pittsburgh Photographs.

How it works?

All of the photographs on the site come from the City Photographer collection hosted and curated by the University of Pittsburgh's Archives Services Center

Retrographer uses Google Maps to make it easy for anybody to geotag these images. This geotag data is sent back to the Archives Services Center to become a permanent part of the archive.

About The Project

Retrographer was started in the Fall of 2010 as a project for the Senior studio Pieces taught by Dylan Vitone at Carnegie Mellon University. The project has evolved and lives on after the class has ended. So far over 5,300 photos have been tagged by people all over Pittsburgh

Retrographer continues to evolve. Check back soon on your smartphone, a mobile app is on the way.

If you have any feedback about Retrographer please email me at dpieri@gmail.com -Dane Pieri

You can really spend lots of time on this site.

RETROgrapher

All photos on the site seem to be in The Public Domain

The Internet As We Know It Is Threatened

2012-01-17T23:52:00.002-05:00

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

The following post is the opinion of John Morris and may not be shared by other contributors to this blog.

As with any other piece of pending legislation, it's hard to get a grasp of specifics. Let's just say, this doesn't look good. The above video gives what looks like the likely chilling effects of this open ended proposed law.

A good article from The NY Times about this.

Most scary is the very shrewd way it will use intimidation against search engines, social media and other websites to get them to censor content. Most people will not know it's happening.

Please learn about and act to stop this.

Good Conversation About Development and Consolidation On Urbanophile

2012-01-17T16:52:00.007-05:00

Sorry, I will try to get back to posting more.

Urbanophile has a post up, debating the common assumption that a large number of our regional problems would be solved by combining local and county governments. Insane fragmentation makes it hard to argue against some level of consolidation, but it might have a downside.

The blog's author lived in Indianapolis for many years and is very familiar with the two main examples of "big box", consolidation, Columbus and Indy. He notes that there are few examples of real failure in this model, but perhaps no shining example of success. Sooner or later, one runs out of land to consume and one has to face the work of good design and good government. There's always a county line to to flee across at some point.

But another thing occurs to me. Because Midtown is part of a much larger city, it suffers from the problem of a diffusion of responsibility. That is, it can assume the rest of the city will carry the load in some respects. This manifests itself in a strong anti-development NIMBY contingent that is opposed to urbanization. Any proposed development of any kind is greeted by wailing and teeth-gnashing by opponents, who’ve been known to do things like pull their kids out of school to serve as props at mid-day zoning hearings where commissioners are told neighborhood kids will literally die if new apartments are approved.

I don’t know what the sentiment is in Bexley, but they’ve certainly implemented more actual urbanization than Midtown. I suspect one reason is that Bexley knows it has only its own tax base to rely on. If its residents want to keep quality schools, they can either approve more commercial and intense development, or watch their residential property taxes go up significantly over time. That focuses the mind wonderfully.

So I also hypothesize that in addition to making redevelopment more difficult for reasons of the structure of government, big box government also inculcates an anti-development mindset to a greater degree than small box government.

Also, interesting is that many of the examples of urbanist innovation and success in these regions have come from independent suburbs like Carmel, Indiana and Bexley, Ohio.

The downside is this.

On the downside, it seems almost inevitable that many of these unconsolidated suburbs will turn into complete failed cities, often left ignored and forgotten. There are plenty of beyond dysfunctional suburbs in Chicago just like this. I presume it is similar in places like Pittsburgh. I think it is notable that consolidated cities like Indianapolis and Nashville don’t have any truly failed suburbs. Another benefit of the big box city.

Can Cheerleading Go Too Far? Debate On Rust Wire

2012-01-12T10:55:00.005-05:00

Seems a bunch of Cleveland area bloggers got together to talk about the pros and cons of civic boosterism. Things got heated and from what I can tell, a bit ugly.

From Rust Wire:

It's always a question, how much one should focus on the positive and ignore the often obvious problems out there?

A long quote from Cleveland blogger, Bridget Callahan:

"On one hand, the Boosters have understood this better than the rest of us. In their social media based world, it is important to stay on message, that’s how all good and effective propaganda works. You pick the message, in this case how awesome Cleveland is, and you pound it into people’s brains ad nauseum until it becomes unacceptable to believe anything else. The Boosters, by and large, are marketing people. They have a product, and they are pushing it. It’s not frank intellectual discussion, it’s not nuanced civic strategy. It is just straight up emotional reaction, and they want you to have it. The world has over and over again proved the effectiveness of propaganda. Most recently, let’s all think back to a certain recent Presidential election that had those Hope posters plastered on every rusty bridge and alley from coast to coast. Hope is not the way you run a government, but it is a way to get people emotionally involved. It breeds a feeling of us versus them, of camaraderie. It is true that lots of Clevelanders feel stupid telling people out of town where they are from. It can’t hurt to seed some civic pride. We’re a fucked up city, but lots of cities are, and the Boosters’ main mission is to convince other young people with expendable income to either move here or stay here because really it isn’t so bad. And for that particular population, it really isn’t so bad. Speaking from that class level, it’s pretty okay here.

( However, when you decide to bully people on their own blogs about their suspected lack of devotion to your message because they point out other people live here too, or when you yell at someone to leave town? That’s trolling. )"

My big problem with many boosters is what they are selling.

The real problem with professional boosters is that they are often promoting the wrong stuff. What their bosses say is good, whatever the latest new fad or project, the foundation and government crowd is chasing. Often, this turns out to be bad stuff. A good example is press stories about a corp or agency "investing" so many million dollars. In the short run, that's certainly great if you are a contractor working on the project (or a politician cutting a ribbon.) Rarely do stories look under the hood at what the long term positives or negatives are.

Cleveland needs boosters as long as they have their eyes open.

TEDxPittsburgh - Don Carter - 2.4 Million

2012-01-08T12:02:00.006-05:00

I will likely be back with some more to say about this thought provoking video. Although, he touches on some great points, I'm perhaps a little less sure, The Sun Belt will become the "Drought Belt". A huge amount of western water is used/wasted by agriculture. Even so, water is a huge asset here.

"Overall, agriculture accounts for 83 percent of all water used in California. It's true that California grows the majority of America's fruits and vegetables, so liberal use of water by its agricultural sector would not be unexpected. However, few people would suspect that growing feed for cattle is the predominant agricultural use of water in California. In 1997, 1.7 million acres of the state were planted to alfalfa alone. Irrigated pasture and hayfields consume more water than any other single crop in California - more than a third of all irrigation water. Together, alfalfa and hay and pasturage account for approximately half of all water used in the state.

The story is similar in other western states. In Colorado, some 25 percent of all water consumed goes to alfalfa crops. 2 In Montana, agriculture takes 97 percent of all water used in the state, and just about the only irrigated crop there is hay and pasture forage; more than 5 million acres in the state are irrigated hay meadows. 3 In Nevada - the most arid state in the country - domestic water use amounted to 9.8 million gallons a day in 1993. By contrast, agriculture used 2.8 billion gallons of water per day. 4 Altogether, agriculture uses 83 percent of Nevada's water 5 - and the major crop is hay for cattle fodder. In Nevada, while cow pastures are flood irrigated, wetlands at wildlife refuges and the state's rivers often go bone-dry."

Water, however is just one of a host of resources wasted in by current patterns in the Sun Belt. Most people also don't realise how vital access to water for manufacturers.

He downplays many of the other assets in the region like our colleges, which are not close to being fully exploited. The term "Tech Belt" seems limiting, but I wouldn't mind the term "Knowledge Belt".

Check it out and share your thoughts. All predictions should be taken with a huge grain of salt. How many people thought a few years ago there would be a natural gas energy boom around here now?

Pittsburgh Sprawl Map and Talk on Urbanophile

2012-01-06T12:34:00.005-05:00

Image from Urbanophile (Screen capture from TEDxPittsburgh - Don Carter - 2.4 Million)

Aaron Renn of The Urbanophile blog has a great post up, that includes a graphic display of sprawl in the Pittsburgh region. Also, included is the earlier and even more dramatic picture of sprawl in Buffalo, from a Chuck Banas post on the subject.

Read all the comments, which include many interesting links. Several people point out the map is a bit deceptive since it doesn't compare with the region's peak population of around 2.7-2.8 million reached in the 1960's. Even so, what one sees is a dramatic increase in land use for a population that stayed pretty close to the same.

A few people thought things didn't look that bad relative to sprawl in other regions.

My response:

I would love to see some kind of estimate of infrastructure costs per person. (LOL, since these are “public goods” nobody has likely tried to come up with that number)

My guess is that the Pittsburgh region has to have one of the highest costs. Whatever the relative level of sprawl here, one has to see every small bit of it as very, very expensive.

After, Venice, the Pittsburgh area has the largest number of bridges–over rivers, over hollows, over gorges and across valleys. These don’t come cheap. Add to that, a good number of tunnels.

Of course, that just scratches the surface of the massive environmental impact. Not surprisingly, the area is known for areas of very poor air quality and a flash flood risk from storm drainage problems.

The area also is pretty close to leading in the number of bridges considered substandard.

Washington Post Piece Says Pittsburgh is "in": Trashes Annoying Portland

2012-01-05T14:26:00.004-05:00

From The Washington Post:

As a born-and-raised Pittsburgher, I’ll go a step further. Portland, with its elaborate facial hair and abundance of strip clubs, represents irony. Pittsburgh, with its working-class pragmatism, is the opposite: earnest and straightforward. It’s a place where people drink cheap beer and wave their Terrible Towels without self-consciousness. Hipsters take faux working-class attributes —brusque beards, Pabst Blue Ribbon and occupations such as butchery — and integrate them into their lives with an ironic wink and a superiority complex. In Pittsburgh, you can find all of the above, only without the derision and affectation. The natural life span of the hipster has come to an end. What was a lifestyle adopted to make fun of the mainstream has now become the mainstream. There are no more [expletive] hipsters to be looked at (The blog “Look at this [expletive] Hipster” hasn’t been updated since September), and jokes about them — much like every skit on Portlandia — have started to feel a minute or a paragraph too long.

Right, Pittsburghers don't do irony very well. Love it or leave it, it's pretty real around here.

Burgh Diaspora digs deeper into comparing the two cities and points out that Pittsburgh has a large number of assets that are built to last. It dug up this quote about Portland.

Why Portland Sucks And Pittsburgh Does Not

“We’re a small town that does not have a major university, that does not have a major arts school,” Schiff says. “We’re off the map in a number of ways.”

Be back with more thoughts about this.

Don't go back to sleep

2012-01-04T18:45:00.000-05:00

Don't go back to sleep, Laurie Trok's solo exhibit, is a presentation of her collage work. The works are assembled from re-purposed materials, from manila folders to magazine pictures. Her approach to collage is complex, with multiple layers and dimension.

If you missed the opening in December, Laurie Trok's solo is having a last showing at 3634 Penn Ave this Friday.

Don't go back to sleep
Laurie Trok
January 6, 6-11PM
Closing Party
Morris Levy Gallery
3634 Penn Avenue

Cool Cleveland Seeking Northeast Ohio Musicians For Videos

2012-01-04T18:25:00.003-05:00

No, this is not exactly gonna be a high paying gig, but they do mention a small stipend and "big exposure". You know how this works, if your music stikes the right cord, you could be a viral star.

Wanted: Northeast Ohio Area Musicians

Cool Cleveland is putting together short videos on each of the cool neighborhoods in the region, from C-Town to Y-town, from the Football Hall of Fame to the Rock Hall, from Oberlin College to Lake Erie Wine Country, from Highland Square to the Erie Islands.

If you’re a musician or a band from Northeast Ohio and would like to have your music featured in one of our cool videos, we’re looking for you to help make these mini-movies relevant, energetic and enjoyable. All styles will be considered, especially uptempo. We’re not sure there’s a “Cleveland sound,” but we’re looking for it.

More details here.

On Screen/ In Person Tour Of Independent Filmmakers Accepting Submissions

2012-01-04T13:00:00.005-05:00

As you know, a personal peeve of mine is the relative lack of opportunities for local artists to show regionally or nationally. Pittsburghers can attend the Three Rivers Film festival and I'm sure Baltimore, Philly and DC have similar events. But, how many chances are there for someone in Baltimore to see a film by a Pittsburgh filmmaker? Thank god for YouTube!

On Screen/In Person is now accepting submissions for 2012-2013 tour of independent filmmakers!

Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation is seeking the best in new independent American film to tour through its On Screen/In Person program.

Selected films will be screened in communities across the mid-Atlantic region accompanied by their respective filmmakers.

Filmmakers collaborate with host sites on the tour to develop community activities, such as Q&As, artist talks, or workshops, among other options, to further engage audiences in the screened work. The Foundation will pay selected filmmakers a stipend for each host site visit, cover all travel and accommodation expenses, and provide a per diem.

Film submissions, including animation, documentaries, experimental and narrative work, are accepted online via Withoutabox. To submit your work or view the filmmaker guidelines, please visit On Screen/In Person at Withoutabox.com.

Deadline for submission: January 20, 2012

See the details here.

Surprising Opposition To Historic Districts Grows In San Francisco

2012-01-03T19:44:00.003-05:00

Pittsburgh, has very little of the extreme historic zoning they have in San Francisco.

The Times had a great piece about the revolt by many of the people, working to restore classic houses, one might expect to be avid supporters of these laws.

But even compatible plans can be frustrated by burdensome regulations, some property owners said.

“I consider myself a preservationist, and I encourage preservation,” said Robin Levitt, an architect who lives in an 1890s false-front Victorian house in the Hayes Valley neighborhood. Mr. Levitt said he abandoned plans to replace rotted staircases on the front of his house because historic preservation requirements were too expensive and time-consuming.

“When regulations make it prohibitive economically to make improvements on your property,” Mr. Levitt said, “it’s over the top for me.”

People tend to assume that giving a building or district historic status, instantly preserves the property. The reality is far more complex. Yes, It will make it hard or impossible to tear down the building--right now. But, unless there is lots of money available, it does nothing to fix or restore it. Often, it places barriers or costs that lead to the ultimate death of the structure.

A personal story, from NY which I believe to be true.

Back in the early nineties, I was involved in a group that put together art exhibits and other performance nights in the upper floor of a old courthouse in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. The area at the time was a mix of historic brownstones, but seeing an influx of many poor immigrants.

A few of the people helping with the music events had dreams of opening a non profit music school in a beautiful abandoned police station across the street. These people loved the building and wanted very much to preserve it. They also, didn't have much money, and needed it to function well as a school.

Here--I found a post with pictures and some history.

From what I heard, a big problem they faced was that landmark status made it impossible to make significant changes to the building. In this case--they needed to remove the jail cells-which didn't exactly fit their needs and made using a large part of the building difficult.

Sadly, in the time since, the building has further deteriorated and now is very likely to be torn down. Amazingly, I later heard about an old police station in the Bronx that went through a similar problem and was torn down.

One Town's Video Response To Being Listed as Dying

2012-01-01T16:01:00.003-05:00

Somehow, I missed this video which is being listed as one of the best marketing videos of the year--and by a few, the greatest music video of all time.

From Artsblog

On January 11, 2011, Newsweek magazine published a now infamous article titled “America’s Dying Cities.” It crunched U..S census data to list the top-10 cities with 100,000 residents or more that experienced the steepest population decline in the country.

Number 10 on that list was Grand Rapids, MI. But the residents of Grand Rapids were about to prove that the reports of their city’s death were greatly exaggerated.

The video is said to have cost $40,000, all of which came from the local business community but clearly the contributions of thousands of city residents are what make it powerful.

Street Art Project In Cleveland Plays On Local History

2011-12-30T22:02:00.004-05:00

From a distance, the main focus of the Art Collective, known as Cleveland SGS has been to document historic signs, and the unrecognised locals that make the city unique.

A recent project, took things a step further by covering a large building's windows with cryptic signs that reference a forgotten part of Cleveland's past.

From Vandalog: Cleveland SGS pays tribute to a neighborhood icon

The widely held belief is that this area, didn't have much of a past, or any prospects, until the Cleveland Foundation and The Cleveland Clinic, came along. The signs bring back the much more complex story of a highly successful local entrepreneur and a decades long fight to save his property.

From the Wikipedia

Winston Earl Willis (b. October 21, 1939) is a formerly successful American real estate developer who first came to local prominence in Cleveland, Ohio during the early 1960s. At the time, one of the most successful business owner/operators in the country, he created and controlled a corporation, University Circle Properties Development, Inc. (UCPD, Inc.) that owned one of the most strategic and valuable real estate parcels in Cleveland and was the largest employer of blacks in that part of the country. Under his solely-owned UCPD corporation at East 105th and Euclid, upwards of 23 successful businesses were running simultaneously and exhibiting tremendous success.

Winston was quick to see the opportunity to create businesses in the area near University Circle.

The acquired experience of having operated several successful small businesses led to a quick assessment of the local college community that would prove to have been very shrewd. After securing a lease on a building that was previously an automobile dealership showroom, 19-year-old Willis opened The Jazz Temple, a liquor-less coffeehouse/night club, to immediate success. Situated on a small triangular lot on Mayfield Road near Euclid Avenue and adjacent to the Western Reserve University campus, his institutional neighbors were the Cleveland Museum of Art, University Hospital, and Severance Hall, home of the Cleveland Orchestra. The club also bordered the ethnic enclave known as Murray Hill/Little Italy.

Willis approached such legendary jazz artists as Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dizzie Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, Cannonball Adderley, The Ramsey Lewis Trio, and Dinah Washington and convinced them to come to Cleveland to appear at his club. Not only did they appear and perform before standing-room-only crowds, but such notable acts at the trendy establishment also attracted visits from Malcolm X, and Stokely Carmichael, and booked performances from other notables such as comedians Red Foxx, Bill Cosby, Richard Pryor and Dick Gregory. The popular night spot, frequently referred to as “the Jazz Mecca”, was hugely successful and became a regular hang-out for college students from throughout and around the State of Ohio. But that success was short lived. As is typical of jazz establishments – there was much race-mixing and numerous interracial couples in attendance. This triggered community wide resentment in the racially polarized community, and after months of threats and intimidation, a vanguard of vengeful racists planted a bomb in the club, thereby ending the brief history of one of the most successful jazz spots of the region.

So anyway, as you might guess, the major power players like the universities, foundations and The Cleveland Clinic conspired to take his properties away.

Having found no support in the courts from a campaign of fines and other harassment. Winston turned desperately to putting up billboards.

I like the way, this project subtly brings up this injustice without being just angry and bombastic. It's a tribute to the man.

More about the project on Cleveland SGS

More

Blogging the Pittsburgh Literary Scene

2011-12-30T16:18:00.016-05:00

Zine writer Artnoose reads to a crowd at Belvedere's, July 2011.

Over at my literary blog, Karen the Small Press Librarian, I am posting year-end Best of the Small Press lists (as I have for the past few years) from small press authors, editors, reading series hosts, and other indie lit movers and shakers. This year I did something different and chose participants from the many small press folks who visited or read in Pittsburgh in 2011. This gives me a chance to highlight the Pittsburgh literary scene along the way (on my normally-not-Pittsburgh-focused small press blog).

I am sometimes surprised by how little is known (outside of the literary scene) about Pittsburgh readings. I get the impression that some people think the sum total of Pittsburgh's literature is a number of colleges bringing in national writers, and maybe a few local poets scribbling things in isolation, plus Michael Chabon. But the city has a flourishing, supportive scene of small presses, reading series, literary magazines, bookstores, homegrown poets, transplanted writers, and visiting authors, unconnected to/in addition to the universities.

So check out the December posts at my blog to see just a small fraction of what went on in Pittsburgh letters in 2011. I may extend a few days into January, too, so check back if it interests you.

Poet Nick Demske reads at Lili Coffee Shop in Polish Hill, September.

Poet Bob Pajich reads at ModernFormations with The New Yinzer Presents reading series, March.

Fiction author Gary Lutz reads at Awesome Books on Penn Avenue, August.

Writer Lori Jakiela (R) and teammate won the Literary Death Match at Brillobox in November.

Fleeting Pages pop-up bookstore brought small press books to a former Borders space in East Liberty, May 2011.

ArtPrize Still Sparking Debate On Twitter

2011-12-29T15:07:00.008-05:00

Sorry, I have a ton of posts I need to do.

Paddy Johnson of Art Fag city is getting feedback about listing ArtPrize as on her top shows list.

"Over at WNYC, Carolina Miranda takes issue with my naming of ArtPrize as one of the year’s best exhibitions. Frankly, I’m surprised it took this long for someone to say something. The contest doesn’t exactly meet the standard criteria us Chelsea folk use to evaluate art; experts (and collectors) do not determine the worth of a work but two rounds of public voting will. You can imagine the quality of these results. Plus, ArtPrize promotion is the hokiest of hokey. Using a formula that exalts the power of democracy by invoking both American-Idol and Internet 2.0 euphoria, the “radically open” contest rhetoric couldn’t be more grating."

Follow the talk on twitter by looking for the #Artprize hashtag. Likely that more than 80% of the commenters, including myself have never experienced the event.

Detritus - Tom Norulak solo at 709 Penn

2011-12-29T12:35:00.002-05:00

I love those unanticipated hours, where you aren't committed to being somewhere or doing something. Last week, I happened to have one of those little schedule gaps while I was downtown. Putting the time to good use, I swung by 709 Penn Gallery, and I'm so glad that I did.

I very much admire Tom Norulak's work, and his solo, Detritus, provides an overview of his etchings over the last several years. The images are predominantly of industrial and consumer waste, abandoned and overtaken by nature. Not just the softly decayed and greyed flotsam of paper wrappers, though. This series concentrates on larger pieces of waste, like old tires and abandoned oil rigs, and sawblades.

Without exception, the images are in black and white. While the works are grounded in objective imagery, the prints have abstract qualities that show a sense of exploration beyond the immediate. The lighter textures seem gritty and grainy, but on closer examination have an almost crystalline structure. The very deep blacks seem to come away from the surface, or in some instances appear calligraphic. The prints bear up to close examination, providing a complex experience of subject and aesthetics.

I think you can bring your own thoughts to this exhibit; Mr. Norulak has provided the viewer with the information to draw their own conclusions without the condescension of an arts-based "teaching moment" and without brazenly dictating an agenda.

Detritus
Etchings by Tom Norulak
November 25, 2011 - January 8, 2012
709 Penn Gallery
The Trust’s Education & Community Engagement department
412-456-6666

Back In Youngstown For The Holidays? Tour The Thriving Tech Incubators!

2011-12-24T10:00:00.004-05:00

The holidays can be a strange bittersweet time in cities in which so many have left.In both Cleveland and Pittsburgh,the diaspora swells The Warhol,Carnegie and Cleveland Museum after Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Recently, cities like Cleveland and Youngstown have made efforts to reach out, make connections and counter some of the negative opinions many who left may have had. Not an easy task, in a few short free days, most people are spending with their family.

Youngstown is providing tours of it's hot and rapidly growing, downtown technology incubators.

From I Will Shout Youngstown

Thursday, Dec 22
Tours from 9am to 5pm leave at the top of the hour, led by YBI Chief Evangelist Jim Cossler. RSVP needed.

Friday, Dec 23

Tours from 7am to 10am leave at the top of the hour, led by YBI Chief Evangelist Jim Cossler. RSVP needed.

Monday, Dec 26

Two tours at 11am and 1pm leave at the top of the hour, led by YBI staff.
Meet Dean Abraham of YSU's STEM College!
Check out the new OH WOW! Technology Museum!
Discounts for downtown eateries!

call 330-599-4583 to reserve a spot

City Of Asylum's Bookstore/Cultural Center Approved In Spite Of Insane Car Oriented Zoning

2011-12-23T18:31:00.002-05:00

Sometimes, I think all the posts I do about urbanism and design are a boring distraction on a blog originally started to cover the exciting cultural scene in Pittsburgh. But I'm constantly reminded how important they can be.

You may have been really excited to hear about plans to create a small bookstore/cultural center a few steps away from The Mattress Factory.

After years of complaints from residents about criminal behavior surrounding the bar, the Manteca closed voluntarily in April 2008 under threat of action by the Allegheny County district attorney a month after two patrons were shot, one fatally, upon leaving the bar.

At the time, Mr. Reese had an option to buy the bar as one of three adjacent parcels he wanted for an expansion of City of Asylum's presence and mission.

As Literary Ventures LLC, he bought a house two addresses from the bar in 2006. In October 2008, he bought the vacant lot beside it and the Manteca beside the lot. The two buildings will be razed to accommodate a nearly 4,000-square-foot building with an interior, glassed-in courtyard. The center will house a bookstore, a cafe, a public gathering space for readings, performances and other events, and two upstairs apartments.

What's not to love? A dangerous, poorly kept up bar and small empty lot in a still struggling but improving part the city is replaced by a small cultural center, run by a respected non profit. People can come and listen to poetry and music, thumb through a diverse selection of books, perhaps attend a workshop or class?

Oooops--wait--how many people? WHAT ABOUT PARKING??!!!

From today's Post Gazette

Zoning requirements for the integrated uses -- a cafe, bookstore and two apartments -- required eight spaces.

Thankfully, in this case of a popular project, in a very historic and walkable part of the city-an adjustment to these rules was made-after a study showing peak use would be unlikely to cause problems.

You have to wonder how zoning codes like this effect the rest of the city since the easy, default option is always to make more space for cars and less for people.

2012 Whitney Biennial List Released: Includes Former Braddock Native LaToya Ruby Frazier

2011-12-23T10:46:00.005-05:00

I still can never get, why this single show, in a moderately sized NY museum is still considered the standard survey of the new, cutting edge and important in what is now such a vast interconnected world.

"The Whitney Biennial is an exhibition held every two years in which the Museum gauges the current state of contemporary art in America." Fat chance. At best it' gives some insight into what the small clique of curators feel is hot.

Even so, here is the list of 2012 Biennial artists.

Kai Althoff
Thom Andersen
Charles Atlas
Lutz Bacher
Forrest Bess
(by Robert Gober)
Michael Clark
Dennis Cooper and
Gisèle Vienne
Cameron Crawford
Moyra Davey
Liz Deschenes
Nathaniel Dorsky
Nicole Eisenman
Kevin Jerome
Everson
Vincent Fecteau
Andrea Fraser
LaToya Ruby
Frazier
Vincent Gallo
K8 Hardy
Richard Hawkins
Werner Herzog
Jerome Hiler
Matt Hoyt
Dawn Kasper
Mike Kelley
John Kelsey
John Knight
Jutta Koether
George Kuchar
Laida Lertxundi
Kate Levant
Sam Lewitt
Joanna Malinowska
Andrew Masullo
Nick Mauss
Richard Maxwell
Sarah Michelson
Alicia Hall Moran and
Jason Moran
Laura Poitras
Matt Porterfield
Luther Price
Lucy Raven
The Red Krayola
Kelly Reichardt
Elaine Reichek
Michael Robinson
Georgia Sagri
Michael E. Smith
Tom Thayer
Wu Tsang
Oscar Tuazon
Frederick Wiseman

As usual, a few like Robert Gober, Mike Kelly and Nicole Eisenman are very established artists. The general flavor from what I have read and the few names, I recognize is a strong tilt towards work that blurs categories-lots of performance, film (Werner Herzog), photography, protest, etc...

LaToya Ruby Frazier, who for the last three years or so has lived in the NY area is on the list. It will be interesting to see what she does.

Nice Video About Creation Of Crop Bistro In A Classic Cleveland Building

2011-12-22T11:46:00.007-05:00

I'm not a historic preservation nut-there sometimes are good reasons for radically changing or demolishing historic buildings.

That being said, they just don't make places of dignity and elegance like this Cleveland Landmark every day. Here is a great video I came across about the transformation of the ground floor space into a highly rated restaurant.

United Bank Building

The 9-story, 1.5 million dollar United Bank Building opened in 1925 as the tallest and largest commercial building on Cleveland's west side. It was one of the last of a series of classical bank buildings constructed in Cleveland during the 1910s and 1920s, a golden age for the city's banking industry. The selection of Cleveland in 1914 as one of twelve cities to house a branch of the new Federal Reserve Bank helped fuel this growth, as did the city's emergence as a major industrial center around the turn of the 20th-century. Many of the city's banks, however, did not make it through the stock market crash of October 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression. The United Banking & Trust Company, founded on Cleveland's west side in the 1880s, was a victim of the crash, and it merged with Central National Bank just a month afterwards in November 1929

Crop is on Lorain Ave in Ohio City, a few steps away from the landmark, West Side Market.

Follow the link to learn more.

The Dark Knight Rises Official Batman Trailer #2...Some Familar Scenes Here

2011-12-22T09:06:00.004-05:00

Many cities in this trailer, I'm sure. But there are a lot of scenes of Pittsburgh. Fortunately, the atmosphere here in the Burgh isn't usually so dark and ominous. Unless, for example, the Steelers had a twenty point loss the night before and it is dark and rainy (like this past Tuesday).
Like so many others, I enjoyed seeing the movie being filmed here!!!! And I am looking forward to seeing it. For the trailer, go here

New to Cleveland: A Guide to Rediscovering the City: Review on Rustwire

2011-12-20T15:43:00.004-05:00

If Cleveland is to have a bright future, it will have to appeal to people who didn't share the same kindergarten class. Good guides to help those newcomers are pretty rare.

Rust Wire reviewed a new one.

"I like that Justin focuses on quality-of-life amenities that are important to the young professional crowd. The stuff that makes Cleveland neighborhoods livable, this book emphasizes, are walkability, transit access, cultural amenities, recreational opportunities (like yoga studios), and even (and I really like this one) diversity.

In my view Justin’s appraisal of city neighborhoods is much more honest and thoughtful that the usual appraisals we get in Cleveland, e.g. Cleveland Magazine’s “rating the suburbs” which encourages readers to adopt lifestyle choices that are liable to have their spending all their free time sitting on the driver’s seat of a car or on the couch (while “saving” a few precious dollars on taxes)."

The HillVille Looks At A Big Placemaking Trend: Downtown Skating Rinks

2011-12-20T10:34:00.007-05:00

The HillVille, is a new project aimed at creating dialog among Appalachian cities. I'm really digging it's positive vibes.

Cities On the Rink: Ice Skating Designed for Downtown.

"Greenville, S.C. and Lexington, Ky., opened rinks this November for the first time. Knoxville’s Holidays on Ice has been in Market Square since the mid-2000s, and a rink opened in Pittsburgh’s PPG Place in 2001.

While ice-skating is quintessential wintery fun, it also represents a movement by city leaders toward creating public spaces that are active, engaging destinations even in the coldest months.

Dana Souza, parks and recreation director for the city of Greenville, said Ice on Main, a 3,200 square foot rink surrounded by a hotel, city hall, offices and restaurants, is indicative of the city’s values."

Win Passes to Every 2012 Beachland Ballroom Show

2011-12-17T19:09:00.004-05:00

OK, if you live around Cleveland, this is a pretty great prize to go for.

Pretty much, just what it says. You enter on their Facebook page. Deadline December 29th

The Hillville, Online Journal Looks at Appalachia's Urban Side

2011-12-16T11:21:00.006-05:00

From The Hillville:

"Maybe it’s because we’re all attached to our region’s rural past, so imprinted are we with our grandparents stories, we can’t stop thinking or writing about it. Or, the issues that dominate conversation happen to be in our rural quarters, like mining, mountain top removal and ameliorating poverty."

A deeply flawed mythology, since Appalachia is increasingly an urban place, impacted by the role of cities in and around it.

"Almost 60 percent of the region’s 24.8 million people live in urbanized areas, and if current demographic trends hold, that number will increase. The feds define Appalachia as a 205,000-square-mile region that follows the spine of the Appalachian Mountains from southern New York to northern Mississippi. Within that span, there are larger cities with more than a 100,000 people, like Birmingham, Huntsville, Chattanooga, Knoxville, Asheville and Pittsburgh. And, there are dozens of medium-size cities like Greenville, S.C., Charleston, W.V., and Scranton, Pa."

Surprise, but a careful look shows that the emerging, giant of Atlanta, is at the edge of the region.

Even more surprising at least to those who carry the old stereotypes, is how popular and successful many cities like Chattanooga, Asheville and now Pittsburgh have started to become.

So far, I see a very high level of quality in the posts.

The Hillville

Buzz from the Atlantic.

Best Holiday Desserts and Pastries in Pittsburgh (Susan on CBS Local)

2011-12-15T20:19:00.005-05:00

I am sure this sugar plum mouse would be nibbling on these if she could.
A round up of the best sweet stuff for the holidays by Susan Constanse on CBS Local. For the round-up go here

Walking Tour of Johnstown's Amazing Architecture

2011-12-15T13:40:00.005-05:00

I have still never visited Johnstown but it always looks fascinating from the train, dramatic, Western PA landscape, old steel mills, churches and even an incline!

The Johnstown Area Heritage Association (JAHA), has a very in depth walking tour of some of downtown's historic and diverse buildings.

Once again, I will plug the idea of hosting a single day or weekend of tours so people can really discover these buildings from the inside.

A Walking Tour of Johnstown

Organizations Plan to Give Cleveland Area Homes To Immigrants

2011-12-14T14:23:00.005-05:00

I gotta admit to not knowing many details about this but I have a few thoughts, both positive and negative.

The solution is The Discovering Home Program, which is a joint effort by the Cuyahoga Land Bank and the International Services Center.

Together, they want to turn neighborhoods around by offering struggling immigrants housing. The refugees will have to agree to fix them up. The hope is that families will take great pride in their homes and help stabilize neighborhoods. Many believe it is a win-win situation

.

Right off the bat, I'm impressed by any efforts in the Cleveland area to not just obsess over everyone leaving, but attract new residents. Any thinking in that direction is a big plus.

I also, see that ownership is to be gained by fixing up the homes. Here, I have some pretty strong doubts. If no cash investment of any kind is made, one is likely to repeat the same kind of easy come-easy go buyers with no equity that helped create the housing mess. Remember that in many cases, you will be asking people to move into shaky and damaged communities in a region with abundant low cost housing.

I have doubts that incentives like this will draw people who find the homes and neighborhoods of real value since price alone is the main draw.

Contrast that, for example with efforts to attract artists who see the benefits of living in a place with lots of other creatives.

That being said, many larger immigrant families would fit well with single family housing stock.

Beautiful Letter From George Romero in Support of Chapel Restoration

2011-12-11T09:53:00.003-05:00

Earlier, I posted about efforts to save the Evan's City Cemetery Chapel, one of the last remaining major artifacts featured in George Romero's iconic, low budget masterpiece, Night of The Living Dead.

$50,000 is needed in less than a year.

From The Post Gazette:

"They welcomed us, in some cases fed us, and occasionally even agreed to play small roles in the film. They gave us all their support and then some. In this way they became the first people to not only approve but endorse what we were attempting to do.

"It was as if, in accepting us, they were willing to accept the far-fetched idea that a film made by what could only be called 'amateurs' might just possibly have a chance at success. The people of Evans City in effect 'teamed up' with us, subscribed to our hopes and dreams as if they were their own.

"The film, 'Night of the Living Dead,' was, as its title suggests, a horror film, which further prejudiced its chance at any sort of lasting attention, but the people of Evans City knew nothing about box-office shares or audience-response polls.

"We believed, so they believed. And, in a hundred ways, they enabled us to complete the film."

A long article. Apparently, Romero had tried to contact the people behind the efforts and after some bounced emails, had to send..a letter.

http://www.fixthechapel.com/

ArtPrize Boosts It's Juried Prize: Is That a Good Thing?

2011-12-09T14:06:00.005-05:00

Michigan's ArtPrize is an event that right off the bat combined creative placemaking, art, economic development and public interaction in ways that excited me.

Likewise, in spite of it's success,(and the fact it's not in NY or LA) the art establishment has mostly ignored or tried to look down on it. "Oh My God, they really voted a non ironic religious piece the top award!"

For better or worse, Artprize is tipping the scale away from public voting and more towards "expert jurors".

From Hyperallergic

The top public vote award will be a little smaller next year, $200,000 instead of the $250,000 offered this year, but the organization is adding a brand new juried award of $100,000, which puts it in the same monetary league at the Hugo Boss Prize (also $100,000) and considerably more than the Turner Prize with its £25,000 award (roughly $39,000).

Some facts about ArtPrize 2011:

-1,582 artists from 39 countries and 43 US states took part

-The participating artists installed their work at 164 venues in a three-square-mile district in Grand Rapids

-38,000 registered voters submitted 383,000 total votes for the public prize

-Smartphones increased voting 62%

Artprize 2011 Timelapse from Michael Cook on Vimeo.