The Death of Artists

Time. You know?

December 31 and January 1 touch each other, yet we start over measuring time on January 1, and then lump it in with all of the following 364 (or 365) days, and judge it as one good or bad year.

So far, I'm hearing that 2016 sucks.

David Bowie died. I reeled from the shock.

Then Alan Rickman, and I cried.

And Doris Roberts. I was sad.

Last week, Prince. I wore purple for three days straight. I painted my toenails with paisleys. I wrote "Rest in Purple" on my arm.

Did you think I was kidding?

And I, like so many others, thought, "Why? Why so many artists who made our lives so much more enjoyable, who taught us so much - why so many, seemingly all at once?"

I don't follow celebrity gossip. I refuse to click the star bait, on principle. They're just people, for crying out loud. Their jobs happen to make them very well-known, but they don't deserve to be pestered like they are.

But these artists - they're important to us. For whatever reason, they insinuate themselves into our lives, and inspire us.

Maybe we want to emulate them. Because, somehow, by being a famous artist, they're cooler than we are. Maybe emulating them is one of the ways we learn who we really are, by trying on others' outrageous hats, and through that, slowly discovering what works best on us.

Maybe we like the escapism, and are grateful for them to create a world in which we're happy to get away from ourselves.

Maybe we just want to feel. That's what artists do best. By exposing their truth, they move us. Maybe we need their art to get through a tough time. Maybe it reminds us of what's important in the world. Maybe they make us want to dance, laugh, think, cry, howl at the moon, have sex, relax, smile, reach out to someone, get off our collective asses and do what we've been dreaming about.

So it hurts when they're gone. Partly because we never knew them, though it seemed like we did. It seemed like, through their work, they let us read their diaries. They played a big-enough role in our lives that, somehow, we should have known them.

And I caught myself thinking that 2016 sucks. Look at all the brilliant artists we've lost already, and it's only April. Next year's Oscars will cut out all acceptance speeches just to make time for the "In Memorial" segment.

In a whirl of trying to find something positive to hold onto, I thought, "What's the opposite of an artist's death?"

An artist's birth.

The first time I ever babysat a real baby (as in, not just a child), I think I was twelve. Maybe thirteen, who knows. I do remember watching this infant, just a few months old, and starting to cry because I realized that everything that was happening to him, he was logging somewhere, and creating his story of the world. I remember realizing that his brain was literally forming, and that weirdly, distantly, in a way he'd never remember, and that I'd never know how, I was helping to create the world he was experiencing. And I felt a tremendous sense of responsibility about that. If I was part of forming his world, I'd do my best to make that small part loving and fun and accepting.

We don't know which of the babies will grow to be our next Great Artist - the one who will inspire another generation to do more, feel deeper, and create new. They've already been born. You may already know them. They might live in your house, even. Or down the street. You may stand behind them in line at the grocery store. Maybe they'll catch you singing at the top of your lungs in the car, when you think no one is watching. Maybe you'll ask them about their favorite book, as they wait, with their parent, at the oil-change place. Maybe you'll see them pretending to be a frog in the middle of the department-store aisle, and maybe you'll tell them how cool frogs are.

Maybe they won't be an artist at all. Maybe, a scientist. Maybe the President. Maybe an inventor.

Maybe a teacher.

It's funny how thoughts and memories and connections all pile up and slam into you in a single moment, then you try to tell someone - or blog it - and it seems so long and tedious, but the thought, "an artist's birth" and the realization that I am an arts educator collided in a big beautiful emotional explosion.

And I feel a tremendous sense of responsibility about that.

It's a Beautiful Day for Good News, Vol. 9

Hey, there! I know, I know, it's been awhile. I missed you too! Oh, it's just been a crazy, CRAZY, few months. No, actually, a lot of it wasn't good. Or maybe it was, but it was in disguise, and I'm still trying to discover its secret identity. Of course - there have been lots of good things, too - really good things - but most of those came about by going through the bad stuff and making it to the other side. Or at least a small clearing.

I carry this Winston Churchill quote around in the corner of my mind, for such times:

IF YOU'RE GOING THROUGH HELL, KEEP GOING. 

Eventually, you will come to the end of your hell, but only if you don't stop and sit there. You've got to keep moving.

It's so much harder to avoid taking an indefinite journey in hell if the media is telling you that there is no end, that if you find your way through this hell, there's another waiting for you, and another, and another, it will never end. You should be scared. We have lots of "reasons" to be scared - look, here's another! Bet you hadn't thought of that one, huh? That's right, go hide under the bed. That's the only place where the monsters can't find you. Oh... oops. Sorry. I was so worried about making sure you were scared of the Out There Monsters that I forgot about the In Here Monsters. So many Monsters! They're everywhere! Aren't you terrified?

Personally, I battle the Dark by looking for the Light. It's there, always, but most people seem to be so fixated on the Dark, that it's hard to remember that if it wasn't for the Light, the Dark wouldn't even be there.

So here is the ninth installment of my semi-regular post of Light. Seems appropriate for this time of year, seeing how we just passed the solstice, and are on our way to longer, warmer, and (literally) brighter days.

I just noticed that all of these stories are about children. That's also a lovely coincidence with the holiday season.

A child leaves a note of apology in a book at a Toronto library.

Another child calmly, silently confronts a shouting bigot with a symbol of love.

A seven-year-old donates the contents of his piggy bank to a vandalized mosque.

A touching father-and-son moment happens on-camera after the Paris attack.

An unbelievably eloquent six-year-old describes how she wants her parents to behave after their divorce.

Happy holidays, everyone. Keep going. You'll make it.

"I'm trying to focus on the good stuff here, people! Lalalalala! I can't hear you!"

It's a Beautiful Day for Good News, Vol. 8

Yes, terrible things happen in the world, but I contend that more good things happen, they just don't bring in the ratings. The "We Have Twenty-Four Hours to Fill" news programs would have you believe that the world is terrible, people are mean, and everything's either currently on fire, or will be soon.

So, in my tiny little attempt to balance that out, here's some Good News for you.

High schools students cancel their senior trip plans for something even better.

A single mom has her lost purse, and all of its contents, returned to her - by the homeless man who found it.

This eight-year-old girl receives gifts from her unusual friends.

Over fifty years into their relationship, a couple is finally able to tie the knot.

The Girl Scouts return a $100,000 donation, because it was not intended for all of the girls.

After both of his parents die, a six-year-old decides that the world needs more smiles.

And to wrap it up, let's laugh at a kid. Actually, I feel bad for the little guy, but his deadpan reaction kills me.

If you set your mind to it, ALL THIS can be YOURS!

Reflections on Opening Night(s)

First of all, I'd like to thank my doctor and modern medicine. This has been the most manageable tech week ever for me, and I opened THREE shows last night.

"Silver: A Noir Ballet" opened at 6:00. We had to hold the house for ten minutes, because there were so many people buying tickets. Fringe necessarily keeps a very tight schedule, but I knew the running time of the show gave us a little wiggle room.

The way Fringe tech works is this: Every company gets exactly three hours in their performance space to get everything technically ironed out. Considering most theatre companies, who don't share a venue with seven other shows running in rep, have at least four or five days, and sometimes even weeks, in the space to make sure everything goes smoothly on opening night, this is virtually no time at all for anyone to create a well-oiled machine.

But that's part of the charm of Fringe. The audience knows it's different than anything else they're likely to experience, and there's a hectic party atmosphere to the entire Festival. It's really as if the audiences are part of the team. Everyone is very supportive, and everyone's ready to have a good time.

I've never done any show EVER that didn't have some hiccups on opening night - or even, every night; it's live theatre, ladies and gentlemen!

The house for "Silver" was packed. I didn't get a house count, but this is my eighth year doing Fringe, and I've never seen an opening night that full. Composer Christian Hankel has poured everything into this show, and I was so happy for him, to have such a large audience on Day One.

After the show, I packed up props as quickly as possible (remember, each company shares the space with several other companies, so there's no leaving things out for tomorrow's show), and ran across the hall to the planetarium for the "Voyage to Voyager" opening at 8:00.

NASA confirmed that Voyager 1 has left the solar system. Voyager 2 is on the cusp.

I was rather scattered at this point, to be honest. Words were hard for me to find, and I felt frantic and awkward before the show. I'm very grateful that the "Voyager" team is extremely capable, and so I could be a blathering idiot without fear of the entire thing falling apart.

And again, I was shocked at the turnout. Audience members were in line before I even got there! I had to ask the audience to move toward the center of the aisles, so the people who hadn't found seats yet could actually sit with the people they came with. What a great problem to have. It was very close to being a sold-out performance. I'm still reeling with gratitude.

I celebrated opening night with some fun, sent to me by a secret admirer, who obviously knows me extremely well.
 

Afterward, I had about 30-45 minutes of downtime, which I chose to spend eating the crackers, cheese, and tomatoes I had packed. And then, I was off to City Stage again - this time to perform in "Badder Auditions" at 10:30pm.

Except for the getting-pretty-for-the-stage-after-hours-of-sweating part, I was pretty relaxed. The show is mostly improv; each actor in the revolving cast (I'm doing all of the performances though) has the barest outline for what might happen during their "audition" onstage. There aren't lines or blocking to memorize, there are no tech cues, you just have to go with the flow. As with all improv, sometimes a joke just doesn't land. Last night, I estimate 90% landed. And that is a pretty darned good percentage. I laughed out loud very many times, and my jaw dropped more than once at the sometimes-R-rated antics onstage. I like to see envelopes genuinely being pushed.

And then, it was over. The night I was so stressed about. History. On to the next.

Today, "Badder Auditions" is at 3:00. Director Kevin King and I have some sort of interview with Channel 41 before that, but I don't know when it'll air or anything. "Silver" is right after, at 4:30. Then I get to actually SEE a show or two before "Voyager" at 9:30.

I don't know. Maybe I'll have dinner too. We'll see.

The Fringe website has all the info you could want, or ever need, about the festivities. This year, there are 116 performing groups presenting over 480 shows at 20 different venues. You WILL find something you like, for sure. Unless you only like naps and bratwurst. I don't think you'll find those there. But you never know.

The Voyager Mission and the Pale Blue Dot

When I was a kid (I now include teendom in this category), I would look up at the night sky and try to wrap my brain around the knowledge that those points of light are the past. They are so very far away that what I was seeing was literally many years old. (The closest star to us is Alpha Centauri, which is nearly four-and-a-half light-years away. This means, just in case you're unsure of the definition, that the light from Alpha Centauri takes almost 4.5 YEARS to be visible to us.) It was stunning to me. Most of these stars were bigger than our sun, but they're so far away that they're easily obscured by streetlights. How tiny is Earth? How tiny am I?

 

"When I was a kid." Ha. I still do this, constantly.

 

Voyager I was launched on September 5, 1977. Its primary mission was to study the gas giants of our solar system. Its secondary mission: send a message of peace and understanding into interstellar space, to be found, hopefully, by intelligent life. The form this greeting took was what became known as the "Golden Record."

 

When Voyager I passed Saturn in 1980, Carl Sagan, head of the Golden Record committee, asked that the spacecraft be turned around to take one last photo of Earth. He knew that the photo would have no real scientific value, because it was too far away to make out any detail, but he thought it would be an important image for understanding our place in the cosmos.

 

Most scientists on the Voyager Mission team thought it was far too risky, that taking a picture of Earth, so close to the sun, would irreparably damage the camera. It took ten years for the Voyager team to agree that it would be worthwhile, to recalibrate the instruments, and smooth out other assorted bumps.

 

On February 14, 1990, Voyager I was 6 billion km/3.7 million miles/40.5 AU from Earth when it took this photograph:

 

 

The remarkable "Pale Blue Dot" photo. Yet another gift from Carl Sagan.

 

See that tiny point of light in the far right sunbeam? That's the Earth.

 

In his 1994 book, Pale Blue Dot, Sagan wrote:

 

"From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known, so far, to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."

I can't possibly add anything to this. Sagan was far more brilliant and eloquent than I'll ever be.

I suppose some people might find this depressing: we're so insignificant. I find it exhilarating: we're so insignificant. That's amazing. That's freeing. That makes all one's worries and disagreements and fears and mistakes even tinier. If you try something big, and you fail, it means nothing, compared to the vastness of the universe. If you confess your love for someone, the risk is infinitesimal. If you embarrass yourself, no one will remember it by the time the light of Alpha Centauri reaches the Earth.

This is us. We have to take care of each other, because this 0.12 pixel is all we have.

Voyage to Voyager, a multi-media play about the creation of the Voyager Golden Record, opens at the Gottlieb Planetarium in Union Station on Fri, July 17.

"Voyage to Voyager" at the Kansas City Fringe Festival

 

 

Ever since I was a kid, I've been fascinated with astronomy. I wanted to be an astronomer when I was young. I didn't understand that other people weren't as fascinated with the books on planets and black holes and such that I regularly checked out from the library.

 

When I was eight years old, I'd heard that a craft had been launched that was going to investigate Jupiter and Saturn. I thought I would die of suspense long before it ever reached Jupiter - how could I possibly wait all those years? And there was an even longer wait for it to get to Saturn, which, clearly, was the coolest planet in the solar system. I mean, RINGS, people.

 

I was also aware that there was a record on that craft, and that the record had music and messages that would hopefully find their way to intelligent, extraterrestrial life. And then, they'd know about us, and come here, and that would be so cool!

 

I had no idea how to find out what was on that record. But truly, what made my young mind reel was the question How did they decide what to put on it? What was on it was important to me, but thinking of the process of creating it was almost overwhelming.

 

How did they do it? There's a LOT of music in the world, and this was the '70s, so I knew how short records were. How did they (whoever "they" were) narrow down the choices, and most importantly, agree on what should be included?

 

The Voyager mission taught us that Saturn may not be the coolest planet, or at least, not because it was the one with rings. We learned that all of the gas giants have rings. Voyager discovered twenty-three new moons.

 

In 1979, Voyager 1 took these photos of Jupiter, and we could finally watch the movement of the Big Red Spot.

 

In 1989, Voyager 2 took this photo of Neptune. Gorgeous.

 

Most breathtaking, for me, is the "Pale Blue Dot" photo taken of Earth from over 4 billion miles away. See it? In the far right "sunbeam," that tiny, 0.12 pixel point of light? That's us.

 



The Pale Blue Dot. There we are.

 



I will probably blog more about the Pale Blue Dot photo at a later date, because it blows my freaking mind.

When I learned that NASA has confirmed that Voyager 1 has left the solar system, and Voyager 2 is close (in astronomical terms) behind, I had to learn more about this mission that's captivated my imagination for nearly 40 years.

Now we have the internet, and it's easier to sate my need for information about the Voyager mission. I'm still thrilled and overwhelmed. The more I learn, the more I want to know. For instance, check out the ticker on the NASA website, showing how far away the Voyagers are.

So, we wrote this play, about how the Golden Record was put together. Carl Sagan led the project, and who doesn't love Carl Sagan? Then we found out that the Gottlieb Planetarium at Union Station was excited about having us do it there. How perfect! And then we talked to Billy Blob, a local animator, and he was enthusiastic about contributing fantasy story elements from thousands, or millions, of years in the future. And the cast. The beautiful, slightly off-kilter-in-the-best-ways, asking-the-hard-questions, motley crew of a cast. They're delightful.

In the meantime, check out the western sky. Venus and Jupiter are hanging out together. Look at them, and know that Venus is currently about 70 million miles away, and Jupiter is 489 million miles away. The surface area of Jupiter is 120 times bigger than Earth's. I am not able to fully grasp this. My mind just stretches and twists and turns and tries to comprehend that size and distance, but can't.



So here's the official blurby stuff about the show. I really hope you can come see it.

In 1977, Carl Sagan was asked by NASA to create a peaceful greeting to extraterrestrial life; a Golden Record that would be included on board the Voyager Space Mission. The next six months were filled with frantic calls, governmental red tape, unexpected egos, miscommunication, and last-minute changes, but most of all, the question: "What does it mean to be human?"

The creators of the 2014 Kansas City Fringe Festival's Best-Attended Show, “Red Death,” invite you to the magical dome of Union Station's Gottlieb Planetarium, where live actors, animation, and outer space collide in a comedic, informative, and unconventional theatrical event for all ages.

"Voyage to Voyager" is co-written by Bryan Colley and Tara Varney, the authors of "Hexing Hitler/Sexing Hitler" and "KHAAAAAN! The Musical." Tara Varney also directs. The play stars Coleman Crenshaw as Carl Sagan, Jen Benkert, Claire Davis, Andy Garrison, Michael Golliher, Parry Luellen, and Shelley Wyche, and features original animation by local artist Billy Blob.

7/17 - Friday - 8:00pm
7/18 - Saturday - 9:30pm
7/19 - Sunday - 6:30pm
7/22 - Wednesday - 8:00pm
7/24 - Friday - 9:30pm
7/25 - Saturday - 8:00pm

Tickets are available at the door, or through the Fringe website.

Also, don't forget the one-time purchase of a Fringe button, which you can use over and over to get into other Fringe shows and events, helps sustain the Festival operations, as well as being a nifty status symbol to show off how artsy and cool you are.

 

It's a Beautiful Day for Good News, Vol. 7

Just in case you're new here, "Beautiful Day" posts are my effort to remind everyone that the world is an amazing place, and that it's filled with incredible people doing inspiring things. Don't watch the news. Unless there's a tornado warning.

A 102-year-old former chorus dancer sees herself on film for the first time.

A Pittsburgh detective's heart breaks, and he helps a couple of kids like no one else could.

"Wanksy," a Manchester, England "street artist," finds a new way to get potholes filled, and quickly.

A moment of anonymous generosity on the 6 Train, caught on video.

A scientist accidentally invents sunglasses that correct color blindness, and a dad sees the color of his children's eyes for the first time.

You may or may not know that I'm a big ol' bird nerd. (I caught it from my dad.) So, some of my personal good news last week was adding a new bird to my Life List, when a great-crested flycatcher landed on my back deck!


This guy, here. Or a relative, anyway.
 

Look for good news. It's there, it's just that ugly news is often louder.