Posted By Jordan Adams on Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 11:28 AM

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Courtesy of Alpenglow

Alpenglow

Alpenglow continue to propel themselves into the future with their dystopian, virtual-reality-inspired new video for "Flicker Flutter." Since leaving Vermont for Brooklyn, the band members have shed much of their earlier, folksy leanings and embraced psychedelia for their 2016 debut effort, Callisto. Alpenglow take their farthest trip over the electro fence with  "Flicker Flutter." 

Tags: alpenglow , music video , electronic , virtual reality , peter coccoma , swimmers collective , callisto , Image , Web Only , Video

Posted By Sadie Williams on Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 10:16 AM

"White Squad V" by Leon Golub, 1984

Highly successful Wall Street trader and art collector Andrew Hall has been had. The cofounder of the Hall Art Foundation in Reading, Vt., recently filed suit against a former New Hampshire art history professor and her son for allegedly selling him 24 fake paintings. He had been told the works were by the American painter Leon Golub (1922-2004), known for his expressionistic depictions of inhumanity and violence. 

Hall is asking that the sellers, Lorettann and Nikolas Gascard, provide restitution of $676,250, the amount he paid for the artworks.

The New York Times broke the story in an article posted online on Monday. The piece details how Hall acquired the 24 paintings from the Gascards. Hall had intended to mount a show of more than 60 Golub artworks at his Reading gallery, according to court documents. In the process of corroborating the Gascards' account of the paintings' provenance, Hall learned from Golub's family that they were forgeries. 

Lorettann, 68, and Nikolas, 34, are currently missing. They're also difficult to find online. A search for Lorettann turns up an unrelated 2014 disability suit she filed against her employer, Franklin Pierce University of Rindge, N.H., and a short editorial piece in the Berlin Observer from 1994 (scroll to page 6 for a photo).

Lorettann obtained her doctorate from the Free University in Berlin in 1978. The article profiles her work teaching art history to American students studying abroad. "'My goal is to get the students to learn to read, not just view, art,'" the article quotes her saying. "'I tell them to build a relationship with the piece, communicate with it, don't just look at the pretty colors of interesting scenes.'"

The Hall Art Foundation did not respond to a request for comment.

Tags: Art , forgery , Hall Art Foundation , Lorettann Gascard , Andrew Hall , Leon Golub , Image , Web Only

Posted By Dan Bolles on Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 6:30 AM

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Courtesy of Mike Birbiglia

Mike Birbiglia

Mike Birbiglia is a comedian, actor, director, writer and English muffin pizza savant. His latest film, Don't Think Twice, centers on a close-knit NYC improv comedy troupe that begins to splinter when individual members attract the attention of a network sketch-comedy show called "Weekend Live." It's a not-so-subtle stand-in for "Saturday Night Live," long the holy grail for improv comedians. 

In the thoughtful, shambling style that has become his signature, Birbiglia explores themes of jealousy and ambition. Perhaps most potently, he also ponders the inevitable moment when aging artists are forced to confront Peter Pan syndrome and reconcile creative passions with the desire for conventional stability.

Birbiglia stars in the film alongside the likes of Keegan-Michael Key ("Key & Peele") and Gillian Jacobs ("Community"). Among the film's other notable comedic talents is Vermont's Steve Waltien, who plays the supporting (OK, minor) character Hugh Finn. Waltien is a Shelburne native and an alum of the iconic Chicago improv theater Second City. He's presently a writer on Jon Stewart's forthcoming animated HBO series. (Full disclosure: He is also one of this writer's oldest and dearest friends.)

On Sunday, October 23, Birbiglia brings his new show, "Thank God for Jokes," to the Flynn MainStage in Burlington. Ahead of that performance, we checked in via email to ask him about comedy, his new movie and his mastery of English muffin pizzas. 

Tags: Mike Birbiglia , Steve Waltien , improv , standup , Video , Image , Web Only

Posted By Sadie Williams on Mon, Oct 17, 2016 at 1:41 PM

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Ecovative

A table made by Ecovative

Eben Bayer is coming home to talk about mushrooms. The Vermont native who grew up in South Royalton is  speaking at the University of Vermont today, October 17, about his new line of homegrown furniture. Well, factory-grown. Bayer's company, Ecovative, just released a line of furniture made entirely from mycelium and organic matter, such as corn husks and other agricultural byproducts.

His presentation, titled "Disrupting Everything: How Biological Technology Will Fuel the Sustainable Revolution," is on the fourth floor of the Davis Center at 4 p.m. Its sponsors are UVM's  Community Development and Applied Economics, the Energy Alternatives class, and Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility. 

The furniture joins Ecovative's existing line of  biodegradable packaging materials, which are used by corporate giants including Dell and Crate & Barrel, as well as smaller folks such as Rich Brilliant Willing, a lighting designer and manufacturer. Those molded items, Bayer says, are incredibly lightweight. They're also a heck of a lot better for the planet than Styrofoam, or polystyrene, which takes hundreds of years to decompose. Not to mention it's a carcinogen.

Tags: Mushrooms , Design , Art , Furniture , Image , Video , Web Only

Posted By Dan Bolles on Mon, Oct 17, 2016 at 4:00 AM

It's Monday, which means it's time for your weekly dose of locavore levity: the Joke of the Week! This week's joke comes from Burlington expat and current Baltimore resident Richard Bowen. Take it away, Richard…

"I ain't goin' out like this." — The last words of a guy who was about to go to the club but realized his outfit was whack and then died.

About that joke

Says Bowen: "If I had a nickel for every time I have turned a popular phrase or idiom into a joke, I would guess that I would have 50 to 60 nickels." 

Tags: Richard Bowen , jokes , humor , standup , Image , Web Only

Posted By Rachel Elizabeth Jones on Sun, Oct 16, 2016 at 9:33 AM

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Rachel Jones

Panty Pulpers poster

Artist Drew Matott is now based in Hamburg, Germany, but he and the arts-activism initiative he cofounded, the Peace Paper Project, have roots in Burlington. Beginning in 2002, the South End Arts District — specifically the Green Door Studio — witnessed the transformation of Matott's personal paper-making practice into the Combat Paper Project with Drew Cameron. It has since grown into a robust network of international workshops and studios dedicated to paper making as a "vehicle for personal expression and cultural change."

Tags: drew matott , margaret mahan , jana schumacher , peace paper project , combat paper , chris thompson , champlain college , Image , Web Only

Posted By Amelia Devoid on Fri, Oct 14, 2016 at 6:30 AM

Emily Dumas

Ivamae in her element.

Hey, critters! Welcome to Playtime. Each Friday I'll be writing about my offbeat local music obsessions. If you're feeling especially drained today, your eyes sore from photo-retouching, your wrists strained from silk-screening, back thrown from squash-picking, I have the perfect sounds to pour some life back into you.

This week I'm stoked about sister of soul, Ivamae — aka Brittany Langdon — and her week-old debut EP, Ocean Studios EP. You should play it on the leaf-peeping drive between apple picking or with a nice hot cup of something.  

Tags: Burlington , singer-songwriter , soul , Thomas Pearo , Playtime , Ivamae , Image , Web Only

Posted By Rachel Elizabeth Jones on Thu, Oct 13, 2016 at 4:43 PM

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Steve Mease

James Keats '18 interacting with "Graffiniti"

In his opening remarks, Burlington International Airport aviation director Gene Richards dubbed the airport's two new interactive art installations as "advertisements, with a twist." Just behind his head, a red and yellow biplane toot-tooted cheerfully among digital clouds. The 70-inch wall-mounted monitor is the vehicle of "Flight," one of two new works developed by students at the Emergent Media Center at Burlington's Champlain College.  

In game programmer James Keats' words, "Flight" lets passengers and passersby do that thing that we all do as little kids: "pretend to be a plane." Adapted from a Microsoft Xbox 360 Kinect, the experience uses skeletal tracking technology — motion detectors — to let viewers standing in front of the screen "become" the plane/pilot and control its gentle, ever-forward trajectory through their own movement.

Posted By Dan Bolles on Thu, Oct 13, 2016 at 1:25 PM

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Jim Thorpe

Jim Breuer

When Jim Breuer swings through Burlington this weekend for a two-night, five-show run at the Vermont Comedy Club, he'll be doing so as part of his current standup comedy tour, "Marriage Warrior." He will not, sadly, be bringing his band.

That's right. Breuer, the veteran comic and actor — you might know him as Goat Boy from "Saturday Night Live" or the stoner Brian from Half Baked — has a band. And good one at that. Jim Breuer and the Loud & Rowdy recently released their debut album, Songs From the Garage, on heralded heavy metal label Metal Blade Records. That Breuer is now label mates with the likes of GWAR and Cattle Decapitation should give you some idea of just how legit his new venture is. The record itself will fill in the rest.

Posted By Jordan Adams on Thu, Oct 13, 2016 at 6:30 AM

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HARRY MCNALLY/MICHAEL VADINO

Alex Frankel

After years of fronting the New York City electronic-pop duo Holy Ghost!, Alex Frankel is taking a minute to strike out on his own. For starters, he became a business owner this year. He and his brother, Zach Frankel, along with El-P and Despot, opened Frankel's Delicatessen in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. A traditional Jewish deli, the shop specializes in brisket, bagels and smoked fish, among other fare. He's also just released first solo EP, Negative Space, on his own label ADF Records. 

Prior to recording Negative Space, the Los Angeles-based production/DJ duo Classixx tapped Frankel to sing on a track for their 2016 album, Faraway Reach. This collaboration would inspire/force Frankel to produce his first solo work (more on that below) and to do so on a strict deadline, which is something Holy Ghost! rarely, if ever do. The duo's label, DFA Records,  doesn't impose deadlines, which explains HG's leisurely release history — a string of singles and remixes, two full-lengths and two EPs, including the 2016 EP Crime Cutz, since forming in 2007.  

The Classixx collaboration would also lead to his current tour with that duo in support of the EP. Classixx and Frankel play on Wednesday, October 19, at the Higher Ground Showcase Lounge in South Burlington. Harriet Brown opens.

Seven Days recently caught up with Frankel by phone in the midst of that tour.

Tags: Alex Frankel , Classixx , Harriet Brown , electronic pop , Frankel's Deli , New York City , Image , Web Only