| Green fashions finding a following among designers
At the "aWear: An Eco Fashion Event," an all-day teach-in and celebration of sustainable style held recently at Green City Gallery in Berkeley, designer Kirsten Beneke showed off her dresses made from recycled fabric scraps. To conserve electricity, Beneke didn't use a sewing machine, instead making an elegant pink evening gown by simply cutting the fabric and securing it with a purple sash. Other attendees showed their support for ecological fashion by participating in a clothing swap that featured fuzzy scarves and lots of fluorescent caftans (it was in Berkeley, after all). "I made sure everything I was wearing tonight was sustainable" - as in purchased at thrift stores, said Abraham Kneisley, the gallery's spokesman. Even though "aWear," an event put together by Beneke, was sparsely attended, it points to a growing area of fashion interest among those who aren't just obsessed with having the latest looks from the hottest designers on the pages of glossy magazines.
Advertising giant Grey Global re-launches in Cairo by op...
Born in Aswan, Abdel Dhaher has both Nubian and Saeedi roots. Although he left Aswan as a child and came to settle in Cairo, Abdel Dhaher never really left Egypt's most magical city. “My painting style is social realism. I paint the reality of life in the South. I've loved to paint the daily life or the environment in the South ever since I was a student of Fine Arts," he says. Armed with a sketch pad at all times, Abdel Dhaher quickly draws everything he sees, a zir (water jar), a cousin feeding the chickens, another cousin feeding the ducks, his nephews' double wedding, or the belly dancer and zammar (flute player) at a wedding. Few people have heard of a Saeedi painter. It's not that Upper Egyptians aren't blessed with artistic talent. They are. It is just that those painters who originally come from Upper Egypt more often than not tend to stray away from their roots and try to become urbanized.
Mystic Studio opens in Denison
The newest art studio in Denison, Mystic Studios, at 110 S. Houston Ave., is a gallery an art lover can browse in all day and still not see everything.Mystic Studio was established in 2000, in the Houston area with the purpose of promoting the artistic work of studio owner Joni Beamish. She started her career as a studio potter in 1998 and gradually moved into her own diverse style. Beamish said the tremendous amount of support given to the artists in the Denison area is one of the main reasons for bringing her fresh and new experience to the Denison art scene. "I am here mainly because there is a lot of support for artists here. I feel this area is going to be the next McKinney, and I wanted to get here before the rush," said Beamish. "In order to be able to afford it you need to buy now. In McKinney, the buildings are like $1 to $1.5 million.
Laurie Metcalf
Right out of college, she and a group of Chicago friends started Steppenwolf Theatre, which grew into one of America's most distinguished companies. (Her 20-minute monologue in Lanford Wilson's Balm in Gilead is an off-Broadway legend.) Later, she picked up a little sitcom called Roseanne, which rewrote the rules of television comedy with its unblinking look at blue collar life. Now Metcalf is exercising her gift for being up to the minute on Broadway, co-starring in David Mamet's new comedy November. It's a Mamet play unlike any other, with the structure of a classic comedy in the Kaufman & Hart vein but filled with scabrous jokes on such hot-button topics as the torture of prisoners, campaign fundraising, the Middle East and gay marriage. Nathan Lane stars as a U.S. President willing to shake down the national turkey lobby to save his faltering re-election campaign, with Metcalf as his lesbian speechwriter, who's not above a little blackmail to get married on national television.
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