By Luke Williams Despite the chilly February evening, Second Street Gallery was filled with warm energy for the opening of “Stuart Robertson: A Suh Wi Dweet.” The exhibition offers a never-before-seen collection of portraits by Robertson, a Jamaican artist. The patois title translates roughly to “This is How We Do It,” foregrounding Robertson’s love of […]
Running for repair On March 3, 1865, Union army troops arrived in Charlottesville, liberating over 14,000 enslaved people—more than half of the city and Albemarle County’s population. In celebration of Liberation and Freedom Day, the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center is hosting its second annual Reparations Fun Run/Walk from March 1 through 6. The […]
All that you can’t leave behind: What if you had to say goodbye to Earth forever? In UVA Drama’s How to Live on Earth, four contestants win the opportunity of a lifetime—a trip to Mars—with the condition that they stay there forever. Playwright MJ Kaufman drew inspiration from the Mars One project and reality TV […]
Smooth sax: Tenor saxophonist Charles Owens has been performing, composing, and teaching music for over 25 years. Owens got his start in New York, where he attended The New School. He’s released nine albums and regularly performs at venues in Charlottesville and Richmond, bringing listeners peace and happiness through the rich, mellow sounds of his […]
Shreddin’ it forward: Growing up in Agadez, a desert village in rural Niger, Mdou Moctar built himself a guitar after seeing YouTube videos of Eddie Van Halen performing. Moctar combined Van Halen’s six-string techniques with traditional Taureg melodies to create a modern Saharan-rock sound, full of rhythmic drums, epic guitar shreds, and plenty of noise. […]
By Matt Dhillon Since The Fralin Museum of Art at UVA was built in 1935, it’s had to close its doors a few times—once during World War II and again in the ’60s when the space was requisitioned for classrooms. In 2020, the growing pandemic shut the museum down for a third time. “There’s certainly […]
Squared up Charlottesville’s Historic Resource Committee continues to work toward replacing the Court Square slave auction block marker, which was thrown into a river by a local resident in 2020. During a February 11 meeting, University of Virginia graduate students Jake Calhoun and MaDeja Leverett presented their research on Court Square to the committee. Over […]
By Finn Lynch I see a dead body at least once a week. The decedent in front of me today is an old man who died in hospice care. We have him dressed for viewing in a dark suit and his favorite striped tie. His clothes are a little too big for him now. We […]
Local roots: Fluvanna music educator Horace Scruggs and his band, Odyssey of Soul, perform unique concert-lectures that cover topics such as the civil rights movement and African influences on American music. In 2020, Scruggs turned his attention to local history and released Resilience, Recovery, and Rebirth: Sustaining Hope in Trying Times, an emotional, humorous, and […]
No regrets: Indie-pop band Sun June makes mesmerizing music with a hint of melancholy. The quintet formed in Austin, Texas, where lead vocalist Laura Colwell and songwriter/lyricist Stephen Salisbury met while working on director Terrence Malick’s Song to Song. After adding Sarah Schultz on drums, Michael Bain on lead guitar, and Justin Harris on bass, […]