Get back in there, you mock turtle

What's happening this week.

Law And Order Party
July 13 – July 19

            James Payne, Isolation (2020) at Shoreby Hill
        

Outdoor Arts Experience
Jamestown, RI

Jamestown Arts Center celebrates its tenth anniversary with the Outdoor Arts Experience, a summer-long public art project featuring the work of nine artists and one yarn-bombing collective. The exhibit was concepted well before the pandemic, with an open call for artists closing over a year ago, but the timing actually worked in its favor since one can view all the work without having to venture indoors or into crowds. Not everything went exactly as planned, with two pieces postponed until next year because of pandemic-related logistical hiccups, but overall it’s just great to be able to look at new art again.

Seven of the ten works are located within a half mile of one another, from the lawns of the town library on North Road to the BankNewport by the ferry launch on Conanicus Avenue. You’ll want a car or a bike to access Godena Farm (about three miles north), the police station (near the Newport Bridge), and the fishing pier at the end of Fort Wetherill Road (about a mile and a half south of the others). I actually wish the works were scattered a little more widely across the island, because Jamestown is actually full of public spaces ripe for works like this.

On the other hand, the density is convenient because only some of these works really warrant a major detour. At the top of that list is Nicholas Benson’s fascinating @, on the lawn of the Town Hall. A slate carved with linguistically meaningless text forms, the piece resembles a tombstone that from a distance appears to be tagged with a spraypainted @ symbol, only with a capital A in its center. On closer reflection, you realize the form is actually carved into the slate, creating a mysterious and slightly sinister memorial to written text.

Just a few doors down is another favorite piece...

Keep Reading

Art (and Music) Books for July at the Law and Order Party Bookshop

8 Things To Do This Week

Outside the House

Film
Wednesday – 8:45pm
His Girl Friday
The Collaborative 02885
Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell star in His Girl Friday, a 1940 comedy about a newspaper editor who will do anything to prevent his ex-wife (and star reporter) from remarrying. This is a drive-in screening on the back of the building at 30 Cutler Street in Warren. On Friday they're showing Bill Murray vehicle What About Bob?.
($15 per carload; advance registration required)

At Home / At Specific Times

Theatre
Wednesday – 7pm
The Droll {Or, a Stage-Play about the END of Theatre}
Bard at the Gate
Paula Vogel's new staged reading series Bard at the Gate continues with Meg Miroshnik's The Droll, a 2011 play that attempts to answer what it would have been like "to discover a passion for acting during the 18 years in which theatre was illegal in 17th-century Puritan England". (Youtube; donations accepted)

Books
Thursday – 7pm
Masha Gessen
Harvard Bookstore
Journalist Masha Gessen virturally visits Harvard Bookstore, where they will discuss their new book Surviving Autocracy: A Status Report. Born in the Soviet Union, Gessen takes a cross-cultural approach to compare the governments of Russia and the United States, a topic they will discuss with with Russia scholar Joshua Rubinstein. (pay what you can; $5 suggested)

Performance
Thursday – 7:30pm
Virtual Toy Theater Festival
Great Small Works
After a successful virtual run earlier this spring, the Virtual Toy Theater Festival is back for a fifth day of puppetry and miniature entertainments. (Facebook Live; free; 90 minutes)

Science
Friday – 9pm
Top 10 Museum Dinosaurs
Atlas Obscura
I mainly use Atlas Obscura for its map of roadside curiosities, but the Seattle-based website also offers online experiences. This week there are talks on bad art forgeries, space origami, and the first of a four-part event for adults called Dino 101, which involves a look at the 10 best dinosaurs from museums across the United States. (Atlas Obscura; $7)

Workshop
Saturday – 1pm
Leveling Up: How to Grow & Monetize Your Podcast
What Cheer Writers Club
This panel discussion features some local and national podcast hosts like Daniel Denvir (The Dig), Caitlin Durante and Jamie Loftus (The Bechdel Cast), Mary and Blake Larsen (Wicked Rhody) and Cristina Severino PVD’s own Spark Up podcast. Moderated by Chris Revill of Let’s Chat with Chris Revill, this panel will give podcasters the tools they need to professionalize their podcast. (Pay What You Can; advance registration required)

At Home / Any Time

Opera
Any Time
Breaking the Waves
Opera Philadelphia
A physically ruined husband scores vicarious thrills after convincing his wife to sleep with other men along the desolate Scottish coast. Twenty years after its original release, Lars von Trier's 1996 drama was adapted for the operatic stage by Missy Mazzoli & Royce Vavrek. Opera Philadelphia's world premiere production is streaming for free through August 31. (Youtube; free)

Art
Any Time
Instagram's Shadow
42 Social Club
From their earliest days, social media platforms have claimed to offer free and open places for expression while simultaneously censoring work and shaming artists and writers who veer from family-friendly norms. Curated by New York painter Jac Lahav, this online exhibition is subtitled "The Story Of How Instagram censors artists, erases the LGBTQ community, and shames women’s bodies." NSFW, of course. (midnightsociety.org; free)

In Case You Missed It

"I feel like my entire life has been a protest," says Central Falls native Viola Davis in a new Vanity Fair cover story, one which also mentions the Rhode Island Black Heritage Society. Dario Calmese's photographs are wonderful, and also mark the first cover story shot by a black photographer in the magazine's history (!!).

Great White, the band whose pyrotechnics started the 2003 Station fire in West Warwick, performed to a maskless crowd in rural North Dakota over the weekend.

A number of local performance groups are beginning to mount socially distanced outdoor events. Island Moving Company is performing around Newport, while Contemporary Theatre Company is doing an improv musical on its outdoor stage.

Brickley's Ice Cream has closed its Wakefield location because some adult customers are unable to eat ice cream without throwing a temper tantrum. Hopefully they don't also like musical improv.