First Friday ARTS Pick: Maryann Lincoln

Colors and patterns have adorned the path Maryann Lincoln follows to inspiration since the start of her creative journey. Carefully choosing her fabrics, the fiber artist blends materials to compose pieces ranging in tone from peaceful and wave-like to sparklingly bright. Whether stitching together a city scene or a natural landscape, she reaches artistic harmony […]

ARTS Pick: Woman in a Tiled Room

Four County Players stages the amateur world premiere of Woman in a Tiled Room by local playwright Shawn B. Hirabayashi. The two-act, two-character dramatic thriller takes place in an abandoned bathhouse in New York City and plays out the intense and increasingly bizarre relationship between Piers and her recently acquired man-friend Mart.

Local filmmaker takes on the civil rights struggle from a foreign perspective

Eduardo Montes-Bradley drove nearly 50,000 miles up and down the East Coast with his family, searching for a place to put down roots. The Argentine-born filmmaker settled on Charlottesville for a variety of reasons—the University, the proximity to mountain and ocean, and the public schools. “There was a series of factors but the most important […]

Fear factor: These film fest frights keep you on the edge of your seat

Who says you can’t celebrate a holiday for two weekends in a row? Halloween may be on the 31st, but the Virginia Film Festival continues the fright with creepy offerings to audiences every night during its four days in Charlottesville beginning on Thursday. THURSDAY:The waters haven’t been this unsafe since Jaws in Thursday night’s mockumentary […]

Aliens invade! WTJU broadcasts “War of the Worlds”

Don’t be surprised if you hear about crop circles and UFOs landing on farms in Crozet tonight. Halloween has arrived, and WTJU 91.1FM is broadcasting a re-imagining of “The War of the Worlds,” the infamous Orson Welles alien invasion radio drama that terrified the country 74 years ago tonight. The UVA public radio station will […]

ARTS Pick: Mock Star’s Ball

The mark of a truly superlative Halloween costume is commitment. Sure, you can get by with a half-hearted zombie nurse, but tame decisions beget tepid treats. Let’s say that you get your band together and tog up like legitimate music legends—now you’re getting somewhere.

Album reviews: Tift Merritt, Muse and Mumford & Sons

If you have been a fan of folk or Americana music at any point during the past decade, the chances are good that you have heard Tift Merritt’s arresting vocals, beautiful musical arrangements, and insightful lyrics. Merritt has been casting a spell on audiences and critics since day one, but on Traveling Alone she demonstrates that she is not above tossing out a few surprises.