Six Anchorage artists will get a financial hand up from the Rasmuson Foundation. The nonprofit announced its fall Individual Artist Project Awards in a press release yesterday, and cash grants are going out to:

Kevin Foster, $5,000, a blacksmith from Talkeetna
Lael Gordon, $3,440, a furniture maker from Seward
Christopher Hanson, $4,950, a jeweler from Ketchikan
Susan Serna, $5,000, a jeweler from Anchorage
Ginger Placeres, $5,000, Athabascan beadwork from Fairbanks
Joan Kane, $5,000, a poet from Anchorage
Keith Liles, $4,950, also a poet from Anchorage
Vlad Basarab, $5,000, a performance artist in Anchorage
Asia Freeman, $5,000, a mixed-media artist from Homer
Ben Huff, $5,000, a photographer from Fairbanks
Bonnie Landis, $5,000, a photographer from Anchorage
Da-ka-xeen Mehner, $5,000, visual artist from Fairbanks
Sheary Suiter, $2,961, a painter from Anchorage

The awards are part of the foundation’s 10-year $20 million investment in Alaska arts. The next round of grants for individual artists go out in the spring. Applications must be postmarked by March 1, 2008. For more information, visit the foundation's Web site.

By Sarah Henning
Anchorage Daily News

“The Abduction from the Seraglio” is the musical equivalent of the White House Christmas tree; it’s bright, classic and ornamented to the hilt. Thankfully, the Anchorage Opera has gathered a talented ensemble of singers who are trained to navigate Mozart’s intensely embellished work.

Pasha Selim (Roland Burks) and Constanza (Amanda Pabyan) in the Anchorage Opera's "The Abduction of Seraglio." Photo by Bob Hallinen.

The opera’s season opener Saturday evening in the Discovery Theatre was heavy on the vocal gymnastics, light on plot and positively drenched in comedy.

By Anne Herman
Daily News correspondent

UAA Dance Ensemble’s performance Friday night was more a taste of dance than a full-blown exploration of movement styles and moods. Three works by Katya Kuznetsova and Brian Jeffery gave the dancers the chance to try out actions and sequences without plumbing their artistic depths.

The UAA Dance Ensemble rehearses "The Distance Between Us."

Jeffery and Kuznetsova are mature choreographers whose facility with movement and gesture was apparent in the hour-long performance in the Harper Studio Theatre. But one couldn’t help feeling more was needed to complete these works, with one fine exception.

By Don Decker
Daily News correspondent

Put your mind in the head of an artist. Then put your head in a 12” cube. That is the essence of appreciating “No Big Heads.” Literally measured and restricted in size and weight, the specificity regularly results in a small show of small pieces, with the devil in the details.

No Big Heads 2007: "How Self-Imposed Limitations, Labels and Stressors Effect My Life" by Z. Denise Gallup won Best in Show at "No Big Heads 2007."

The 22nd show is much like the others, an eclectic mix of media and styles, student and professional work, traditional and conceptual. The format requires a narrower focus on the part of the viewer. You have to sweat the small stuff.

By Maia Nolan
Daily News correspondent

There is no place in the United States where the urban-rural divide is more pronounced than it is here in Alaska. And there may be few people who have experienced the reality of that divide more fully or with more immediacy than Jack Dalton.

Jack Dalton

Dalton shares his story in the world premiere of "My Heart Runs in Two Directions at Once," a one-man show running through Wednesday at Cyrano's Off Center Playhouse.

Actually, to call Dalton's performance a one-man show is to do it a disservice. Dalton is a storyteller – a gifted one – and "My Heart Runs in Two Directions at Once" is less theater than it is an extended story told to a captive audience.

By Leland Smith
Daily News correspondent

In “The Disfarmer Project,” a Grammy-winning guitarist inspired by early 20th century photos presented a multi-media show full of talent, unique ideas and amazing interplay.

Bill Frisell: Bill Frisell

Bill Frisell’s project graced UAA’s Wendy Williamson Theater on Tuesday night.

The program featured a variety of musical compositions and sonic experiments designed to accompany and express the inner beauty, humanity and fragile honesty of Mike Disfarmer’s brilliant portrait photographs. The visuals were melded with the music of a trio: Frisell on guitar, Jenny Scheinman on violin and Greg Leisz on steel guitar.

By Anne Herman
Daily News correspondent

Flamboyant, and a bit over-the-top, the nine-member band Leahy has taken neo-Celtic music into new realms of jazz, country, and pop sounds. And that’s not bad, coming from a family of Canadians raised on a farm with a fiddler father and a champion step-dancer mother.

Leahy: Leahy

Leahy, which had six family members and a friend on board Saturday, lit up the Atwood Concert Hall with songs, music and dancing that took your breath away. From fiery works like “Cape Breton Medley” to more traditional songs like “the Anniversary Waltz” and “Sheamus” to a slew of pop-driven works, Leahy had the capacity audience practically jumping out of their seats all night.

By MIKE DUNHAM

Breaking the pattern, I avoided downtown on Nov. 2 and headed for First Friday art openings off the beaten path. Actually, it started the day before with the "No Big Heads" Juried exhibit at the UAA Student Gallery, which had back-to-back receptions two nights in a row. Juror Akio Takamori's background in ceramics was reflected in several splendidly-crafted 3-D pieces, George Skladal's haunting "Refugees" and Kat Hollimon's jolly "Dual Personality" pairing of gaily-colored heads.

On display now: Encaustic painting by Janet Hickok at Doriola's.

November features a bevy of events celebrating Korean culture hosted by Anchorage's Korean community. Here's a list:

• Nov. 3-4. KOREAN CERAMICS DEMONSTRATION, 1-4 p.m. both days. Free with museum admission.

ANCHORAGE KOREAN LANGUAGE SCHOOL: Students perform traditional music and dances.
Photo: Anchorage Korean Language School[

• Nov. 3. KOREAN MUSIC CONCERT at 7 p.m. $15 for museum members, $20 for non-members, 45 for children younger than 12.

• Nov. 10. ANCHORAGE KOREAN SCHOOL'S 25TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION, 10 a.m. - noon at Northwood Elementary School, 4807 Northwood Dr.

National Novel Writing Month begins at midnight, so fuel up on coffee and Red Bull, and start scribing your next best seller in a month or less by joining more than 100,000 writers from around the world in trying to write 50,000 words or more by November 30th.

No one wins awards or fame in the NaNoWriMo "write a novel in a month" contest, but sixteen of last year’s participants in got book deals. Why shouldn't the same happen to some of the 250 Alaskans signed up to participate this year?

To join the race to "the end," simply sign up now and start writing after midnight, then post the results on the NaNoWriMo Web site by the end of the month.

Medicine Dream

Mingle with the new museum director, Jim Pepper Henry, and listen to music by the intertribal First Nations group, Medicine Dream, on the first day of Alaska Native Heritage Month Thursday, November 1, at the Anchorage Museum (121 W. 7th Ave.). The free event begins at 5:30 p.m. with live music at 6:30 p.m.

The celebration features a drawing for several artworks by local Alaska Native artists, but the month continues with various activities throughout the state. At the museum, the Movies for Your Mind program will highlight films written or directed by Native Americans at 6 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays throughout the month.

'COMBUSTION' IGNITES ALASKA CROWD

By Leland Smith

Nick Kendall and Chris Brubeck: In the lobby of the Alaska Center for the Performing Arts a few minutes after the world premiere of Brubeck's "Spontaneous Combustion" on Oct. 27, 2007. Photo: Leland Smith.

It was an evening of stunning synergy and invention with the world premier of composer Chris Brubeck’s marvelous violin concerto “Spontaneous Combustion,” featuring the virtuoso talent of Nicolas Kendall 29, performing with the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra Saturday night at the Atwood concert hall.

Ron Holmstrom, Managing Artistic Director for Anchorage Community Theatre, was interviewed on “Your Neighborhood Stage” on Monday. Holmstrom talked about the origins of ACT, which is Anchorage’s oldest theater company, its upcoming season and future plans.

The national community theater podcast is dedicated to school, church and community thespians and is brimming with news and information for theater types everywhere. The program, Holmstrom noted, has a limited audience, but it IS national. We can only add that there are no small roles in theater — especially community theater.

Alaska College Track 2

The American dream embraces educational opportunity as an equalizing force, a tool for smashing glass ceilings and class assumptions. Documentary film, “Alaska College Track 2,” explores these assumptions and hopes as several Native students begin their first year at the University of Alaska.

The first segment of the series introduced these students as high schoolers with high hopes. Now coursework, social life and cultural identity influence how they adapt. Even if you missed first segment of the series, don’t miss "College Track 2" by KTOO-TV and the University of Alaska Foundation. It airs tonight at 9 p.m. on KAKM channel 7.

Click here for reviews of this weekend's performances by Alaska Dance Theatre and the Romeros. Add your comments about these shows or anything else you saw and want to share.

Read about the Anchorage Museum’s outgoing (Pat Wolf) and incoming (James Pepper Henry) CEOs in Sunday's Arts section. Then, share your thoughts about the transition in the comments section below.

James Pepper Henry: James Pepper Henry will become the new director of the Anchorage Museum on Oct. 22. Photo: Kristine Brumley

Pat Wolf: Pat Wolf (ADN 2005 file photo)

Here's a few comments from Pat Wolf’s colleagues and friends to start things off:

The Alaska Design Forum will present three designers from the Swedish firm of Claesson Koivisto Rune at 7 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 22 at the Anchorage Museum. Here are some photos of some of their work.
Check out their website at www.claesson-koivisto-rune.se

Claesson Koivisto Rune: Courtesy Alaska Design Forum
Claesson Koivisto Rune: Courtesty Alaska Design Forum[img_assist|nid=112145|title=Claesson Koivisto Rune|desc=Courtesy Alaska Design

The Anchorage Opera has plumped up its online offerings this season.

Abduction opera graphic

“The Abduction from the Seraglio” doesn’t open until Nov. 10, but click here and you’ll find there’s already a wealth of information about the production on the organization's Web site.

Content includes a 15-page study guide and a condensed, six-page “cheat sheet” in case you can’t slog through the full guide; quick Q&As with all the guest vocalists, a Mozart primer and a brief dictionary of opera terms. Much of the content is kid-friendly.

The Bear Tooth confirmed that Blues Traveler will howl in the New Year in Anchorage with two performances on December 30 and 31. Tickets cost $45 and $55, respectively.

Tickets go on sale on Tuesday, October 23, at the Bear Tooth Box Office or online at www.beartooththeatre.net.

Good luck! And if you've heard the band play before, let us know what makes Blues Traveler a worthy/unworthy way to welcome 2008.

--Dawnell Smith

Dawnell Smith
Daily News Correspondent

Saucy Jack and the Space Vixens: Power to disco, sister

If you want theater to wow you with climactic enlightenment, forget Saucy Jack and the Space Vixens. The human condition matters less than the condition of glitter boots in this 1995 script.

But if you consider "Climactic Enlightenment" a bomber name for a superhero or glam band, then Saucy Jack will fulfill your deepest, sauciest wishes. The campy musical about love, fame, envy and plastic fetishes tells the story of a trio of intergalactic, disco-abiding lawwomen who pursue a lowlife serial killer cleverly disguised as a cabaret owner in a fishnet shirt.