Backstage at the Utah Arts Festival 2015: Out into the streets, Kurt Wenner’s art resonates in profound social significance

Focused on tackling the consequences of what remains a large cultural problem that has, as he explains in an interview with The Utah Review, “really dislodged artists and set all of them out in the streets,” Kurt Wenner lived in austere conditions as a young artist – even camping out in a sleeping bag in one of … Read more

Backstage at the Utah Arts Festival 2015: ‘Art Lives Here’ takes shape in many forms

Somehow managing always to remain calm, cool, good-humored and eternally organized, the staff and coordinators for the 39th Utah Arts Festival could run clinics for organizations on how to conduct effective, concise, fast-paced meetings where every participant can walk away at the end feeling something notable has been accomplished. In April, two months before the … Read more

Teen coordinators help craft vision for TiltShift Festival, Utah’s first for teen media arts students, filmmakers

A team of nine teenagers played a large role in crafting the vision for what will be the Intermountain West’s first media arts and film festival exclusively for teens. The TiltShift Festival highlights a slate of five feature-length films selected by nine teen coordinators, along with nearly 40 short films submitted by students between the … Read more

‘Reunion’ concert at the threshold of Repertory Dance Theatre’s 50th anniversary

In the midst of an exceptional season for Salt Lake City’s dance and ballet companies, this week’s forthcoming ‘Reunion’ concert (April 23-25) by the Repertory Dance Theatre (RDT) will remind the community of why dance enjoys an amazingly diverse and nationally recognized presence in the Utah arts scene. In 1966, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater … Read more

Spring perfect time for uplifting Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, Salt Lake Electric Ensemble collaboration

The artistic promise of Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company’s upcoming concert evokes every imaginable aspect of spring. There is the uplifting, rejuvenating force of Netta Yerushalmy’s new choreographed composition that vividly uses the extensive movement vocabulary of dance along with costume changes and fast-shifting designs of stage lighting to deconstruct metaphorically traditional narratives. It is the dancers’ … Read more

Plan-B Theatre’s ‘Pilot Program’ brings polygamy forward in living room drama

“The Lord showed me by vision and revelation exactly what would take place if we did not stop this practice. If we had not stopped it, you would have had no use for … any of the men in this temple … for all (temple sacraments) would be stopped throughout the land. … Confusion would … Read more

JazzSLC: three shows left in the season

jazz slc logo

JazzSLC is a non-profit concert series that is produced and funded by the GAM Foundation. The GAM Foundation was founded by Gordon Hanks and Michael MacKay in 1994 in an effort to increase awareness and garner appreciation for our jazz community. Since its inception, the GAM Foundation has produced more than 200 concerts and featured … Read more

RDT’s Charette, Iron Choreographer competition set to mark 10th anniversary

Going for a three-peat in Repertory Dance Theatre’s Iron Choreographer competition, Nathan Shaw, a full-time dance teacher at Judge Memorial High School in Salt Lake City, follows a few simple rules. Lay off the abstract. Tap into the humor vault. Be courageous, knowing the weakest link could be the strongest. In last year’s competition at … Read more

Plan-B Theatre’s latest world premiere ‘Mama’ promises touching, honest remembrance of motherhood, sacrifice

Mama playwright

“I was 40 years old. I had a life. Especially with [daughter] Chiara — will we feel guilt forevermore? Of course, yes. But the truth is, I could not spend every day with her. I didn’t want to do that. I looked for all kinds of reasons not to do it. … I’ve been working … Read more

PetDance Film Festival on January 24

  While it might not be an entire day of cat videos like I was hoping, PetDance Film Festival looks like a purrfect way to spend a Saturday. The folks at Pets in the City Magazine, a local weekly paper dedicated to pets, decided to claw on the coattails of Sundance Film Festival with their own petcentric … Read more