Art

Without gallery openings or open studios, artists are heading online to connect with their audience. A new YouTube series from the Institute for the Humanities at the University of Michigan is giving them a platform to do just that. 

Today on Stateside, we check in with a fire department, an animal rescue group, and homeless advocates to see what work is like for them during the record-setting cold weather. We also talk with an artist whose first large-scale museum exhibition was inspired by her time in Flint. 

Today on Stateside, Michigan's funding for schools has declined more than any other state, according to a new study. We get reaction from the state senator who chairs the committee overseeing K-12 funding. Plus, an exhibit by a new artist-in-residence at the University of Michigan paints an apocalyptic environmental future over nostalgic images of America's past. 

Today on Stateside, U.S. Representative Elissa Slotkin (D-Holly) tells us what she thinks it will take to end the longest partial federal government shutdown in United States history, now in its fifth week.  Plus, we hear about some up-and-coming artists in the Detroit's music scene, and say goodbye to a legendary guitarist from the city. 

Creating Connection Michigan is a series of intimate, first-person stories about the power of art to change lives. This week, we hear from a Kalamazoo woman whose art-making helped her cope with tragic losses.

Today on Stateside, we talk to one of the recently-elected members of the Michigan State University Board of Trustees about what changes she wants to see at the university. Plus, new West Michigan music that ranges from folk to psychedelic rock.

Stateside is featuring intimate, first-person stories about the power of art in a new series called Creating Connection Michigan. Over the next five Tuesdays, you'll hear from Michiganders across the state about how local art programs have changed their lives.

We begin the series with Otis Cornelius, a student at Fired Up, a Benton Harbor glassworking program, and Lynne Clayton, the executive director at Water Street Glassworks.

Detroit artist Brendan Patrick lost his vision, and nearly his life, to cystic fibrosis. Now he's making the most of the time he's been given by creating art and raising awareness of his disease.

An Arizona quiltmaker is exploring one of the most contentious issues in the U.S. today: immigration.

Her traveling exhibition, “Beyond the Border Wall: The Migrant Quilt Project,” will open next week in Grand Haven’s Loutit District Library. 

The Ann Arbor Art Fair is underway, and as usual, it is a huge event. This year's fair features around 1,000 artists, and will draw thousands more visitors to the city's downtown.

Stateside's Lester Graham braved the the crowds and the traffic to talk to some of the artists showcasing their work, and the people who came to see it all. 

The first ever Detroit Art Week is set to run July 20, 21, and 22. Organizers bill it as "a self-guided tour and celebration of contemporary art and culture in Detroit."

Amani Olu, the founder and executive director of Detroit Art Week, joined Stateside to tell us about the event.

Stateside loves to hear from listeners with ideas for stories and people we should cover. Here's a great tip we got from Stateside listener, George Bollinger: Crowns of Courage. 

The art of decorating the body with henna is truly ancient, going back over 5,000 years.

The intricate henna tattoos might be applied simply for their beauty, or they can symbolize passages in life. 

Detroit artist Paul Johnson has produced a lot of work that explores the female form — a curvy, tiny-waisted, large-and-drooping-eyed figure. 

A unique collection of Inuit art is being given to the University of Michigan Museum of Art. More than 200 stone sculptures and prints from the Inuit people on Baffin Island in Canada, just west of Greenland. The collection is valued at $2.5 million. There are additional funds to endow an Inuit art program. These gifts from from Phil and Kathy Power.

The story behind the collection is as interesting as the art itself. Phil Power gave Lester Graham a tour of the collection in this extended version of the interview.

Turning shame into pride.

That’s the idea behind an exhibit of black velvet paintings. It’s called “Black Velvet: A Rasquache Aesthetic,” and it’s happening at the Latino Cultural Center in Detroit's Mexicantown.

It's funny how the smallest details about someone we love can stay with us.

For example: a scent. Any whiff of Shalimar instantly makes host Cynthia Canty think of her great-Aunt Verne because it was her signature perfume.

For artist Carl Wilson, it's the memory of the chewing gum his mother always had in her purse — and that led to the title for his first solo museum exhibition.

For six years now, the Detroit Unity Temple has held a quilt exhibit in February. Many of the quilts – but not all – are tributes to African-American history. This year a quilt that’s getting a lot of attention is called “Strange Fruit."

You can help kids read books. And you can help as they draw pictures. But an app created in West Michigan blends the two together. It’s called Wimage, from the combination of “words” and “image.”

It’s being taken into classrooms where students are able to combine their imaginations with the app’s technology. And it’s also being used in art therapy, to help wounded veterans heal through art.

Two iconic Michigan artists are in the spotlight, thanks to an important exhibition at the Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University.

The works of Jim Shaw and the late Mike Kelley are being displayed in an exhibition at the MSU Broad called "Michigan Stories: Mike Kelley and Jim Shaw." It is running through February 25th.

Soon, the entire park-like area we’re in will echo with the sound of pounding, metal against wood. It’s nearly a ringing or gong-like sound.

But first, Jeff Strand strips the bark from a black ash tree log. Then he takes out a knife and scores the end of it, a sort of pie wedge cut.

“So that the undergrowth rings have relief, so they’ll come up out of it as I’m crushing the growth rings. The ax is for crushing the fibers in between the growth rings and when you do that, they release,” Strand explains.

You create a special space for children with special needs: the Friendship Circle.

It’s a great success, but what do you offer those children when they grow up?

The Next Idea

Science Gallery has been described as a place where science and art collide. The result? Creative ways to tackle some of the world's biggest problems.

The first Science Gallery Lab is in Dublin. Now, Michigan State University is launching Science Gallery Lab Detroit.

“If we can feel sad for what happened to children in Poland, we can equally feel sad about what is happening to children in the Middle East.”

That’s the message that artist Wojtek Sawa and community space owner Alissa Shelton want to bring to the people of Hamtramck.

Happy 164th birthday to the man who is the personification of the "tortured artist."

Vincent Van Gogh was born on this day in 1853.

University of Michigan medical historian and PBS contributor Dr. Howard Markel joined Stateside to talk about some of the mysteries that still remain about this iconic artist. He started with the famous story of Van Gogh cutting off his own ear. 

Remember the 2008 Olympics in China? The stadium, nicknamed the “bird's nest," was one of the most iconic visuals from the games. It was designed by Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei.

Weiwei's work, titled "Natural State," is on exhibit at the Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park in Grand Rapids.

"Mystic River," "Shutter Island," and coming in December, “Live By Night” are just some of the major Hollywood films based on stories by Dennis Lehane.

After building a career as one of America’s most popular and most respected crime novelists, Lehane began writing widely acclaimed historical fiction. But he’s also built a parallel career in the worlds of television and film, including time as a writer for HBO’s “The Wire” and writing the screenplay for one of James Gandolfini’s final films, “The Drop.”

As the Grand Rapids Artprize competition continues to grow and evolve, Stateside’s Lester Graham sat down with the very first winner of the competition, painter Ran Ortner.

It's been a noisy couple of weeks with the political conventions. Speeches. Shouting. Protestors. In fact, it's been a loud, noisy, campaign season that's left our country angry and fractured.

However, a lot of voices and viewpoints haven't been heard, and a contemporary art project called "The Truth Booth" is giving people the opportunity to be heard.

People from the Adrian area and local historians know the story of the “wreck on the Wabash.” But outside of those circles, the train crash that took place in 1901 isn’t especially well-known.

There are many tragic elements to this story and for a thorough sense of what took place, you can read historian Laurie Perkins’ book, “Wreck on the Wabash” (written under the name Laurie C. Dickens).