News & Notes, Honors & Accolades
Last updated: December 9, 2007
Jean Burke
In October we were profoundly disappointed when Jean Burke was denied entry with the work that was to be our Mini Gallery Exhibit. She has been good enough to furnish us with some photographs of “Endangered Species” (a prophetic title, as it turned out), the show that never was. You can see them online. Here are a few of them, but you just have to see the colors and the textures, which we can’t show here. See front page also. Check out our web site after December 5. (It will be a little late this month because our web master is in North Carolina).
Textile Art by Jean Burke—"Endangered Species" |
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Christmas Concert at LSSU
A wealth of regional talent will gather in LSSU’s Arts Center at 7 p.m. on Thursday, December 6, for An Evening of Traditional Holiday Music. Performers include John and Lise White and the Sault Swing Band, the Sault Area High School Concert Band and Sault High Choir, and STARS Youth Orchestra. The holiday music will include selections such as Winter Wonderland, I’ll Be Home for Christmas, Silver Bells, Oh Holy Night, Let It Snow, Greensleeves, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas Medley and more.
Tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for all students, available now at the Norris Center ticket office and online at www.lssu.edu/artscenter. For more information, call 906-635-2602.
A STARS Candlelight Christmas
The Soo Theatre Project will present A STARS Candlelight Christmas Sunday, December 2, at 3 p.m. at St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral, 320 E. Portage Avenue in the Sault. This second annual STARS concert will feature Singers United Community Choir, Youth Orchestra, Lake State Chorus with STARS voice students, Flute Choir, Harp Ensemble, Recorder Consort and the “Not Quite Ready for Prime Time” Players. The suggested donation is $5 for adults, $3 for children and $12 per family. Donations will benefit the STARS Music Department.
Directors leading this program are Dottie Case, Youth Orchestra; Michael Drumheller, Singers United; Karen Hughes, harp ensemble and LSSU chorus; Jennifer Parker, recorder consort; Nancy Powers, “Not Quite Ready for Prime Time” Players; and Meg Stevens, flute choir. For more information on classes and lessons, call the STARS office, 632-1930.
Thanks to the Alberta House Staff
Special thanks to the volunteers who staffed Alberta House during November. We wouldn’t have been open without them!
Mary Barry
Judy Colein
Ron Corey
Rita Dale
Joan Gerrie
Judy Hamilton
Kyung Hatfield
Donna Jarvis
Maureen Mousley
Joan Muckelbauer
Jeanne Tubman
Note to Presenters
Plans are underway for a concerted effort to publicize summer artistic events in the Sault area. The thrust is international—both Saults, the Sault International Arts Festival—the idea being to emphasize to visitors that they can come and enjoy a number of both visual and performing arts events during their stay here. The effort is being led by LSSU and involves a number of presenters and organizers on both sides of the river. In order to take advantage of this effort, presenters must make their programming plans know to local arts councils as soon as possible.
Sault, Michigan presenters should be aware that many Sault, Ontario presenters have their 2008 summer programs already in place. The time to finalize plans and set dates is now, to avoid conflicts and to gain maximum benefit from publicity efforts on your behalf. More and more, the Sault area is a beehive of summer activity. It’s time to get organized and make the most of it! Call or write Jean Jones (437-5463—saac@saultarts.org) if you have questions or information, or drop brochures or information by Alberta House.
And speaking of information, copies of the Sault and District 2007-2008 Arts Calendar, Applause, are available in Alberta House. Applause not only gives you a concise summary of what’s going on in Sault, Ontario—it’s an illustration of the benefit to arts groups of planning ahead. The Sault Area Arts Council would be happy to publish such a yearly calendar of its own, if Sault, Michigan presenters would make the information available early enough so we could do so.
Christmas Traditions
Interesting, isn’t it, how Christmas traditions get started? We never have tinsel on our Christmas tree because our first dog, a pedigreed blue blood named Vagabond Prince James (Jimmy), had a taste for glitter. He collected foil—from garbage all over town, from wastebaskets, and patiently, piece by piece, from the Christmas tree. We gave up tinsel, just as we gradually shifted to mostly unbreakable ornaments as we added a baby who ate small glass balls and a cat that insisted the tree was for climbing and was convinced that she should be on the top of it. Last year I mentioned our Christmas fish, made by Polly Allison. She has made three more such ornaments for the Christmas show—cut of wood and beautifully painted and finished. We’re trying to convince her to make more of them because they will be heirlooms.
Jeanne Tubman has ornaments with her original paintings on them—freighters, lighthouses and more. Brimley artist Raulaniesa Aranda has painted ornaments with flowers and rustic scenes on both clear and frosted glass balls, and painted cutouts—all painted freehand in acrylics. Ron Corey has ornaments as well. They’ll all be in the Christmas Show.
Ornaments |
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Christmas octopus by Polly Allison. |
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Hand-painted ornaments by Raulaniesa Aranda |
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Ornaments by Ron Corey: $10 in Alberta House |
A great Christmas present and easy to mail is Bernie Arbic’s Sugar Island Sampler, now in its third printing. We have them in Alberta House. We have his Fighting Fires in Sault Ste. Marie as well. A photo display commemorating the Sault Fire Hall Centennial will be in the LSSU Library Gallery during December.
Books by Bernie Arbic in Alberta House |
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Sugar Island Sampler by Bernie Arbic |
Fighting Fires in Sault Ste. Marie: From Horses to Horsepower by Bernie Arbic |
Honors and Accolades
Blue Ribbon for Bob Muckelbauer!
Bob Muckelbauer took the Blue Ribbon for the best hooked rug at the recent New York State Sheep and Wool Festival, for “Secret Garden”, a hooked rug in the primitive style. (Yes, that’s “Bob”, not Joan, and it surprised him, too. His daughter entered the rug for him.)
So when are we going to see more of his work??
Bob Muckelbauer's Blue Ribbon Rug |
"Secret Garden" by Bob Muckelbauer |
Lotte Steube
Lotte Steube won an Honorable Mention in the 51st Northern Ontario Art Association Annual Juried Exhibition this fall for “Reminiscence”, a watercolor painting. Lotte’s paintings and reproductions have long been in the Alberta House Shop and in our annual Art Auction and she has had work in the Olive Craig Gallery’s annual juried exhibitions as well as a dual exhibition with Ellen Hadath in the Olive Craig Gallery.
The Cyprus
Dave Stanaway has written a new song, “The Cyprus,” commemorating the discovery of a one hundred year old wreck of the Cyprus by Tom Farnquist. He and Susan Askwith sang it at the recent Chippewa County Historical Society tea. A video can be see online at: http://www.9and10news.com/category/story/?id=121806
Bayliss Library Receives Citation of Excellence Award
The Library of Michigan announced on November 8, that Rawson Memorial District Library in Cass City won the 2007 State Librarian’s Excellent Award, a trophy and $5000 in privately raised funds to be used for library service.
The Bayliss Public Library in Sault Ste. Marie and the Peter White Public Library in Marquette each received a Library of Michigan Foundation Citation of Excellence, including a $1000 prize and trophy. Criteria for the State Librarian’s Excellence Award are demonstrating that the library provides innovative and superior services to its customers in a cost-effective manner, with a can-do attitude and by always delivering on promises, demonstrating the library’s commitment to high standards of customer service, and more.
Noted in the press release was the Bayliss Library’s focus on creative writing, the Superior Poetry Café, the new software system that eliminates lines at the circulation desk to sign up for use of public-access Internet stations, free guest passes for seasonal visitors, and library programming.
Bayliss Public Library Receives Citation of Excellence Award |
Bayliss Public Library Director Ken Miller, with trophy, is 2nd from right. |
Sault Area Arts Council - 217 Ferris Street, Sault Ste. Marie, MI 49783 - saac@saultarts.org - (906) 635-1312