Author Archive
30 Artists – 15 Dollars
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That’s 50 cents an artist! The MAP and Black Mountain College Museum are throwing a fete you don’t want to miss. This is an outstanding collection of all kinds of great artists:
“On Saturday, March 20th (the first day of spring), the original grounds of Black Mountain College host an event showcasing over 30 artists from multiple disciplines.
{Re}HAPPENING: a feast for the senses is a joint fundraiser for the Media Arts Project and Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center. It’s the first in a series of events celebrating innovations and collaboration in the arts.
The evening includes drinks, dinner, appetizers, dancing and appearances by local artists and creators. Here’s the lineup:
New media work from Scott Furr, Mark Koven, Megan McKissack, Gene Felice, Mark Hanf, Marnie Muller, Lorraine Walsh, Lei Han & Wray Bowling will be on display.
Participating dancers include Claire Elizabeth Barrett, Julie Becton Gillum & Sara Baird.
Sculpture and ceramics will be shown from Jinx (Sean Pace) & Mellissa Terreza.
Performance artists incude Graham Hackett, Queen Mae & the Bells, and puppeteer Madison J. Cripps.Sound installation and performance will be created by Wayne Kirby, Dave Hamilton, Salvatore D’Angio, Ross Gentry & Chris Ballard.
Guest chef Mark Rosenstein represents the culinary arts.
The night’s entertainment consists of two halves: The first begins at 6 p.m. with a cocktail social, leading into a seated “family style” dinner served at 7. Various art and performance events take place throughout the cocktail hour and dinner. The second half begins at 9 p.m. and includes drinks, light appetizers and an extended evening of art, performance & dancing…”
Click here to find out more and get your tickets!
Mountain Xpress adds:
There are two tiers of admission. The early evening portion of the program is $40 and features a dinner, with food from Chai Pani, Vinnie’s Italian, Ultimate Ice Cream, Early Girl Eatery, Nona Mia, Filo Bakery, French Broad Chocolate Lounge, Short Street Cakes and more. 7 p.m. at the Dining Hall.
Then, from 8:30 to 11 p.m., the action gets going with myriad performances, installations, creations and more. It’s what they used to call a happening, and it likely will be. It may even evolve into a later-night dance party. Tickets for that part of the program are $15.
The LaZoom bus will run a $5 shuttle from Asheville to Black Mountain…
Friday Open Thread: Great Googly Moogly
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Fill out a Community Application (seriously – it’ll take you five minutes).
Come out to Asheville’s Google Fiber Initiative Town Hall meeting on March 18th at 6pm at the Asheville Civic Center Banquet Room.
While some may argue the virtue of diminutive pipes and the value of Charter, this is also a thread for everything else under your suns. Illuminate. Reflect.
All Ears #9
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s Thursday, Asheville, and that means it’s time for a fresh installment of All Ears. In an effort to create ease of access to government, I’m opening this thread for all of your Asheville concerns. Whether it’s Larchmont or Richmond Hill, leave your observations, visions, rants, and gushy love letters here. Tell your friends that there’s a new way to interact with your City Council.
Google AVL – A Business Perspective
Posted by: | CommentsThis post is ripped directly and whole-heartedly from googleavl.com – Kudos to author Clark Mackey of Sparkdog for putting virtual pen to paper.
You are who you hang out with.
The first time I heard that line, I was in junior high. It was a warning from an adult and sure, it’s a cliche, but I think this idea – that the quality of your peers rubs off on you – has a corollary for doing business:
The city you live in can accelerate, or limit, your potential.
Consider this quote from a Business Insider article:
“Does the city you live in really matter?
While you have a lot of good choices for where to build your company, don’t let anybody fool you into thinking that location doesn’t matter; in fact, it does. Here’s why:
- Different locations have different entrepreneurial support communities...
- Talent pools around location…
- In-person meetings are just as important as they were five years ago…”
Here’s how it matters for Asheville:
- Asheville’s got talent. We’d like bandwidth to match. By selecting Asheville, Google will be partnering with a town full of kindred spirits who would like to push the technology envelope and make the world a better place.
- As a business owner, fiber for Asheville means our city will be attracting more technology talent in the future. Already I can bump into local business owners, web designers, network security experts, PHP programmers, and starry eyed dreamers while waiting for a lunch table at Early Girl. Let’s kick that up a notch.
I’d like you to do two things.
- If you own or work at a business that depends on Internet access, programming talent, or entrepreneurial spirit, please leave a comment below. Consider mentioning how Asheville, as a community, is related to your success.
If you haven’t nominated Asheville yet, please do so. When the fiber network is built, you’ll benefit directly with better, faster Internet access and indirectly with even better talent to hire as your business grows.
Asheville City Council Agenda 3.9.10
Posted by: | CommentsAfter the jump you’ll find a rundown of what’s on tap for Tuesday’s City Council meeting. Click here to go to the City’s website and see the agenda with supporting documentation.
All Ears #8
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s Thursday, Asheville, and that means it’s time for a fresh installment of All Ears. In an effort to create ease of access to government, I’m opening this thread for all of your Asheville concerns. Whether it’s budget deficits or a better mousetrap, leave your observations, visions, rants, and gushy love letters here. Tell your friends that there’s a new way to interact with your City Council.
244%
Posted by: | CommentsFrom ThinkProgress:
A new report by the Southern Poverty Law Center has unearthed shocking data about the rise of militias, antigovernment groups, and other right-wing extremist groups. The report, titled “Rage on the Right,” has found that there has been an increase of 244 percent in the number of these extremist groups in 2009…
Let’s Change The World
Posted by: | CommentsGoogle is planning to launch an experiment that we hope will make Internet access better and faster for everyone. We plan to test ultra-high speed broadband networks in one or more trial locations across the country. Our networks will deliver Internet speeds more than 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today, over 1 gigabit per second, fiber-to-the-home connections. – Google Fiber Initiative
I’ll post the whole thing here at some point, but for now take yourselves over to googleavl to read all about Asheville’s effort to invite Google to town.
“You all heard about the Information Superhighway of the internet back in the day. Compared to a superhighway, this network is like a teleportation device. It’s so far beyond what anyone else is using that it gives Asheville the opportunity to dream big.”
Some CIBO With Your Tea?
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If you’re into seeing political candidates go head to head in public forums, then this is the week for you.
Thursday at Noon, barring another wintry postponement, Patsy Keever and Bruce Goforth will be fed identical meals of meat, green beans, and whipped taters before debating the issues of the day. CIBO is hosting this event at Magnolia’s. It’s ten bones to pay for your lunch, and the political theater is free. Read my previous post on the event here.
If you’ve got plans Friday night, you be better off bagging them and heading to the Tea Party at A/B Tech. The GOP candidates will line up at 6:30pm and get their liberty on. Erika Franzi, headmistress of the local Tea Folk, is soliciting questions from you and me. Click here to email her a question for the gang. The six candidates committed to attending are Dr. Dan Eichenbaum, James Howard, Ed Krause, Jeff Miller, Greg Newman, and Kenny West. Congressman Heath Shuler is invited as well, but he hasn’t signaled any inclination to sip from the same cup as the organizers or the broad field.
Dr. Dan has been winning straw polls across western North Carolina with his “We have seen enough ‘government solutions’” approach. The GOP faithful appear to be drawn more towards Jeff Miller and Greg Newman. But what do I know? If you’ve got the constitution, go see for yourself.
Big kudos to both groups for helping to educate the people and ask hard questions of the candidates. No matter our political differences, good campaigns make for better elections.
Pee en Zee
Posted by: | CommentsThe Planning and Zoning Board plays a very important role in our city’s development review process. In addition to reviewing projects to ensure they meet our city’s Unified Development Ordinance, they also review projects that are requesting zoning changes (like the current MHO affordable housing effort, known as Larchmont). As we move nearer passage of the Downtown Master Plan, P&Z may be the final say for nearly every project built downtown. They’re all volunteers who put a lot of time and effort into Asheville.
In considering candidates for the Board, I was looking for people who were able to understand, interpret, and apply the UDO. During interviews, that’s what I asked the candidates about. In the end, that left me settled on Mark Brooks and Joe Minicozzi. There were other candidates with great skills, but Joe and Mark seemed to me to be the folks who would best be able to faithfully execute the planning document.
The Mountain Xpress has a story on the Board Appointments here. It’s stirred up a debate over the future of an appointed board with an enormous responsibility. In retrospect, I wish I’d done the vote a little differently and asked for a discussion period rather than simply going around and naming our choices. The learning curve is an unforgiving mistress.
Because this thread has the possibility of going completely off the rails, I’m going to ask all you Hooligans to keep a couple of things in mind – 1) Keep it factual; 2) Remember that all of us, even when we disagree, want a better Asheville.
