Backstage at The Utah Arts Festival 2015: Large-scale mural, sculpture, graffiti wall bring street swag to Urban Arts venue

One of the standout features in recent years in the Urban Arts venue at the Utah Arts Festival, Mason Fetzer’s 100 Artists / 1 image community mural project is taking on new significance in its fifth year. Previously, the finished pieces encompassing 100 tiles in a 20-foot installation – each painted by a different artist … Read more

Backstage at The Utah Arts Festival 2015: Artist Marketplace’s strong representation from across the country

This year’s Artist Marketplace at the Utah Arts Festival is by all measures the strongest in terms of quality and originality in aesthetics and technique. Of the 615 artists who applied to be in this year’s event, 169 were selected: 47 from Utah and 122 from outside of the state. More importantly: 59 are making … Read more

Backstage at The Utah Arts Festival 2015: ‘Juno,’ ‘Andante,’ ‘Hang On,’ ‘And Then There’s That’ highlight music, dance commissions

A blizzard and musical inspirations from two great composers and the unique therapeutic sounds of the handpan inspire this year’s newest Utah Arts Festival commissions for music and dance. The chamber music commission is sponsored by The Mandel Foundation. Robert Honstein, Juno, June 27, 4 p.m., City Library Auditorium Robert Honstein, 35, is in the … Read more

Backstage at The Utah Arts Festival 2015: From battling Sumobots to music-making Beat Bots, there’s something for every DIY enthusiast

For DIY weekend warriors in the area, Make Salt Lake is fast becoming the go-to clearinghouse for adventurous makers who believe they can learn quickly how to make anything and everything. One maker, for example, who built a cigar box guitar also designed a flux capacitor using Arduino and some welding, scrapping and soldering. Turning … Read more

Backstage at the Utah Arts Festival 2015: City Library, The Leonardo packed with performances, workshops, technology demonstrations

Once again, the City Library will have a prominent presence at this year’s Utah Arts Festival with an exhibition featuring award-winning art by 53 high school students, numerous visual arts workshops, a sneak peak at what the third annual performance art festival will feature this fall, and, of course, the entire schedule of screenings for … Read more

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