Sound and Vision Saturday

Plenty of delights for all of your senses this Saturday. After you pick up your free t-shirt for helping with the Highland neighborhood clean-up, fill the rest of the day with art.

Steven Soffer's Sound and Vision Show opens with a reception at 1 pm at Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum, 3201 Centenary Blvd.

Also there's all day long Lead Belly Blues Festival at Festival Plaza in downtown Shreveport. Wrap up your night with Katfish and Kocktails at 6 pm at artspace.

Ain't We All Mammals Swimming in the Grocery Lot Wishing for a Cantaloupe That Tastes Vine Ripened But Settling for a 6-Pack of Grape Kool-Aid Bursts

In honor of Earth Day 2009, Wednesday, April 22: Sci-Port will release butterflies at 11 am.
Leia Lewis at Sankofa Gardens has been the queen of Earth Day for the last four years. This KTBS video proves it. The fourth annual Sankofa Earth Day Festival is Saturday.

Down the Red River, Again

We love us some Dan Garner! And the puppies are cute, too.

Birthing New Music

The folks in Shreveport's Blanc et Noir Marching Society know a good thing when they hear it. They are terrific supporters of The Red and Black Brass Band from Grambling.

This week's show (February 25, 2009) on American Routes features young musicians in brass bands who are taking Louisiana's roots music into the 21st century.

Mardi Gras may be over for now but there's always next year. By joining Blanc et Noir Marching Society in Shreveport you can help this new/old form of marching band music continue to grow. Imagine that. Shreveport is a part of the vibrant Louisiana music scene and not just the Other Side.


Thank you Talbot Hopkins for the cool video of The Red and Black Brass Band in the 2009 Krewe of Highland parade.

Give the Gift of Local Art

Ralph and Alice started the market earlier this year. It was even featured on Trudeau's blog and can be found on the listed on the Shreveport Bossier Fun guide.

P.S. The sold out Christmas in the Sky is Saturday also. Many times art from local artists can be found there but that money goes to SRAC. The money you spend at the market goes directly to the artist.

P.P.S. Where would you be more likely to find the next Clementine Hunter, M.C. "Five Cent" Jones or Howard Finster? Downtown. Open air. Bring cash. Make deals. Go home happy and warm and fuzzy and do a winter dance around the cheerful glow of your newly acquired piece of art.

SB Magazine Photo Gallery

Back in October we encouraged folks to enter the annual SB Magazine Photo Contest. It's in their December 08 issue now on the stands (the Haynesville Shale's on the cover). They've put more photos on their website.

Bossier City Best for Kids?

Business Week says Bossier City is the best place to raise you kids in Louisiana. We quote it "is across the Red River from Shreveport." And that is why we had to draw this cartoon.

Welcome to Shreveport

We get all giddy inside when people on our screens, movie, television or computer, say the word "Shreveport." Rob Senska and Mindy Bledsoe say it bunches in their new web series, Welcome to Shreveport. The show is about a couple trying to break into the entertainment industry. Tune in and see how many SB Land sites you recognize.

Highland Jazz and Blues Festival

November 15 is the date for this year's Highland Jazz and Blues Festival. Like Trudeau recommends bring a blanket or chair.

The one day Saturday fest is packed with live music and local visual artists vending their wares.

Meet Artist Debbie Buchanan Engle this Saturday at 1:00

The opening reception for Debbie Buchanan Engle's show Mercy is this Saturday at Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum, 3201 Centenary Boulevard, from 1:00 - 3:00. The opening is mentioned on this page at The Shreveport Times along with Su Stella's jewelry making workshop Saturday at The Barnwell Center.

P.S. We Googled Debbie Buchanan Engle, Artist, Shreveport and got these hits: She's on the ShreveportBossierfunguide. We rediscovered this video of her. We'd forgotten we made it earlier this year. There are even pics of her work from a Gender Studies Conference at Centenary College back in 06.

South Highlands Walk

Longleaf Forest Song

I.
October falls to the ground
Red is a leaf is a dress
Flimsy. Cheap. Tight.
Wear ‘til someone tears it off
On Halloween costume backless
But tonight modest leather Birkenstocks

II.
The forest primeval?
Longleaf’s a road in the city
Home of the happy dog
It is the click of the clip on leash

III.
Scarlet leaved tree wish I knew your name
This far South most turn brown or not at all
Sun muscles out one blazing farewell
Time to circle back to the gold van
Before spiders fall out of trees
Waving thin crotchety legs
To work down tire swing chains

Kathryn Usher
October 28, 2008

Katfish 4 Kids

Mufasa by Josephine Carmody. Spotted near the fountain at Columbia Cafe in Highland. Part of the Volunteers for Youth Justice Katfish 4 Kids project.

Business Week Says Buy a House in Highland

Shreveport's Highland neighborhood is HOT. Business Week says so.

From the article:
"Artists turned around Soho and the Lower East Side of Manhattan in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s, and then Brooklyn's Williamsburg in the 1990s...Similar trends are occurring...BusinessWeek.com selected 15 urban neighborhoods that artists have discovered and where homeowners could see returns in coming decades."

The cities (followed by neighborhoods)

Atlanta Castleberry Hill neighboorhood
Austin East Austin neighboorhood
Boston Jamaica Plain
Chicago Pilsen
Los Angeles Echo Park
Miami Wynwood
Minneapolis Northeast
New York Bushwick, Brooklyn
Philadelphia Northern Liberties
Portland Alberta Street Arts District
Raleigh/Durham, N.C. Downtown Durham
San Franscisco Mission District
Seattle Georgetown
Shreveport Highland
Washington D.C. Atlas District (H Street)

Support Your Local Artists

Two of the best people Hurricane Katrina blew up from the Gulf Coast are Su Stella and Curt Harville. The artists now have a live work space in Highland where they do blacksmithing, cold and hot glass work, metal work, painting, and more.

This fall they will be vending, teaching and demonstrating their different disciplines at venues as varied as the Barnwell Memorial Garden and Art Center, LSUS Pioner Heritage Center Pioneer Day and the Highland Jazz and Blues Fest at Columbia Park.

You can purchase their jewelry in the artspace giftshop in downtown (by the way, artspace will be hopping Friday night with the opening of the Clyde Connell retrospective).

For more information on art events with Su and Curt
228-263-2333 Su 318-525-2164 Curt
OurFireflyRanch@hotmail.com
Visit their online store at etsy.