Arts

Joseph Ponder from Rochester, New York now lives in Columbus. Joseph and his brother, Jamell Ponder, are the co-authors of “Bentley’s Revenge” and “The crossover that won the game.” Joseph brings his real-life experience as a former drug dealer and Jamell brings his experience and knowledge as a social worker to the table when writing their books.

  Some subjects are so controversial that it’s impossible to address them without raising extreme emotions.
  The Iraq War is one. Even though director Clint Eastwood avoided addressing the politics behind the war in American Sniper, the film still sparks angry reactions. While some viewers hail it as an anti-war document, others see it as a defense of an invasion that most Americans agree was a disaster.  

  Equally contradictory emotions are likely to greet the documentary Above and Beyond—or they would if it attracted any viewers who didn’t already agree with its sentiments. Directed by Roberta Grossman (Hava Nagila: The Movie), it details the efforts of flying World War II veterans who returned to the air in 1948 to defend the new state of Israel.

  It’s a compelling story, and an uplifting one for those who see Israel as these Jewish Americans did: a haven for a people who’d been the targets of the Holocaust, and who could never fully escape the age-old problem of anti-Semitism.

An occasional column by JP Marat, provides Columbus Ohio artists and activists, the opportunity to speak for themselves.

Alternative / Industrial / House Music on WCRS 98.3 / 102.1 FM every Thursday Night from 10pm till 1am. . .Turn it On. . .Leave it On

WCRS 98.3 / 102.1 FM is Columbus Ohio’s only community owned, commercial free FM radio station. Their Thursday music night line up from 10pm till 1am boasts weekly Alternative / Industrial / House Music radio shows and podcasts arguable better than anything offered east of Los Angeles or west of New York City.

The Genres

Alternative / Indie

Each year the Columbus Black Theatre Festival deals with topics that pertain not only to the African American community but society at large and this year is no different. July 10 -12, 2015 come share in the three day event of workshops, plays and entertainment at the Columbus Performing Arts Center in Columbus.  This year the festival concludes the weekend with the stage musical “Come Alive” written and directed by the founder of the CBTF and Ohio playwright Julie Whitney Scott with music by Cassandra Stewart. This play tackles the issue of suicide in America head on as seen through the lives of college students and adults who have either attempted to or had someone they loved succeed at killing themselves.

“First Person Singular” an occasional column by JP Marat that provides Columbus artists the opportunity to speak . . . in their own voice. Thank you Free Press.

JP Marat writes:

  I’m fortunate. My radio show on WCRS 98.3 / 102.1 on Thursday Nights at 11pm (Big Barking Dog Alternative Radio Hour) gives me the opportunity to interview local musicians, artists and poets. In preparation for a radio show that aired on Feb 26, (“Columbus Musicians & Poets v2”) I spoke to an extraordinary young woman named Calla. If you attend any of the poetry slams around town, you’ve definitely seen her. Five feet nothing. Piercing brown eyes. Quick to smile. Strong & agile. Mischievous. Most likely a ninja in a previous life. We met at Kafe Kerouac on High Street. I let my audio recorder roll. We talked about gender, love, Skyline Chili and Tupac Shakur. The conversation that evening intrigued me. As the night ended, I needed to know more about her concept of “Body Politics.” Calla obliged. About a week later I got an email from her . . . Girl can write . . . Just Say’in.

Calla writes:

Glenn Brewer graduated with Honors and a BFA in Fine Arts from the Columbus College of Art and Design. He has created illustrations for numerous companies and publications including TSR, Inc., Visionary Entertainment Studios, The New Orleans Tribune, Frost Illustrated, Tygeron Graphics and Unchained Spirit Enterprises, a children’s book publisher. Brewer is best known for the six-part comic series Askari Hodari, which he wrote, illustrated and published. Askari Hodari was nominated twice and eventually won the Howard E. Day Prize. Brewer also was nominated for a Glyph Award in the Best Self-Publisher category for his Askari Hodari series.

1.      Describe for our readers the most compelling art piece you have made?

The cover for the first issue of my Askari Hodari comic.  It's an image of a man with his arms crossed on his chest holding two guns.  Readers had different reactions to it.  Some were disgusted while others got it. However the felt initially, the cover intrigued them enough to take a chance and give the book a read.

Sexual practices involving bondage, dominance, sadism and masochism are sometimes lumped together under the acronym BDSM. Whatever you call them, they’re all the rage at the multiplex.

  It was just a week ago that Fifty Shades of Grey started steaming up movie screens nationwide. And now the Gateway Film Center is offering a curtain call in the form of The Duke of Burgundy.

  The eccentric British film is about a lesbian couple whose sex life follows a rigid pattern of domination and punishment.

  The pattern begins when Evelyn (Chiara D’Anna) arrives to clean house for Cynthia (Sidse Babett Knudsen), a scholar who specializes in the study of butterflies and moths. Evelyn appears to take her chores seriously, but the poor girl invariably leaves something undone, and Cynthia finds it necessary to punish her.

  Though the pattern is cut-and-dried up until this point, what happens next isn’t—dried, I mean. Listening from the other side of the bedroom door, we realize that Cynthia is showering Evelyn with something, and it definitely isn’t praise.

Artist X
Artist X graduated from Thomas Worthington High School in 1991. He then went on to earn a BFA and MFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design and The Ohio State University respectively. For the past twelve years he's spent most of his time as a guerrilla city planner and Commons social entrepreneur trying to advance a disruptive innovation that would situate Columbus at the center of a new Arts and Crafts “Renaissance Revival” movement. He's currently shopping around for a lawyer to force the issue and otherwise take the Establishment to task.

1. Describe for our readers the most compelling art piece you have made: Generally

speaking, the most compelling art piece to me is whatever I am working on at any given

point in time. Right now I have about five projects ongoing. The first, started this past

summer, is a fence mural in the King-Lincoln District that deals with the origins of the

so-called “white race.” While that’s on the back burner, due to the weather, I’m working

There likely have been hundreds of films about men trying to tear themselves away from a life of crime. The scenario invariably involves taking part in one last “job” that goes horribly wrong.

Are you ready for a film about a man who tries to avoid falling into a life of crime in the first place? That, essentially, is the subject of A Most Violent Year.

Abel Morales (the chameleonic Oscar Isaac) is a naturalized immigrant trying to make his mark in home heating oil. It’s an industry that—in New York City in 1981, at least—appears to be up to its exhaust ducts in corruption.

In an early scene, Morales and his lieutenant, Andrew Walsh (Albert Brooks), make a down payment on an oil-storage facility. It’s a hazardous undertaking because Morales will lose his investment if he can’t come up with the rest of the money in 30 days.

Success is far from assured, as his competitors seem determined to force him out of business. Time after time, his trucks are waylaid by robbers who attack his drivers and steal his oil. One driver, a fellow immigrant named Julian (Elyes Gabel), ends up in the hospital.