Dust off the top hat and put on the tails for this weekend extravaganza of top-class ballroom dancing. Over the weekend, 700 pairs of professional dancers and 500 pairs of amateurs will be strutting their besuited and besequinned stuff to that old-fashioned beat. On the first day, the pros compete for the prize in Latin dance, the amateurs for their prize in modern dance, and on the second day the order is reversed. If it’s true that it don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing, then this is the most meaningful day out in town.
November 28, 2008
November 26, 2008
Mata Rangi
A fascinating and somewhat surreal event. The explorer Kitin Muñoz and a group of Aimara Indians have set up camp on the beach at the base of the luxurious Hotel Arts in the Olympic Port. They have begun work there on the ‘Mata Rangi’, a 20-metre boat made entirely out of bamboo and rushes. The plan is to finish the craft by October 15 and then set sail for the Americas, following Columbus’ route. The project is sponsored in part by National Geographic and the work site includes a detailed exhibition of other voyages made in similar craft, most notably by the explorer Thor Heyerdahl.
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November 24, 2008
November 20, 2008
Brett Whiteley – Nudes
Some 40 paintings, drawings and sculputes make up this exhibition of Australia’s most charismatic artist’s work. The heart of Whiteley’s inspiration was his wife, Wendy, who is the subject of many of these artworks and the subtext of most of the others. Whiteley freely admitted his obsession with sexuality, explaining that ‘I see sensuality, sexuality everywhere – in clouds, in mountains, in fruit. It’s a very, very deep force. I try as overtly as possible to allow that – that force – to key my painting’.
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November 18, 2008
Fever at the Kitchen
The latest new club night for Dublin is Fever, playing every Friday at The Kitchen. This is a night for clubbers who take their dancing moderately seriously but with pinch of irony. The style is dressed-up with the emphasis on comfort, and the music takes the form of deep tech-house and progressive house grooves. Since the U2-owned venue stopped being the place to celebrity spot, it has taken itself a little more seriously as a club venue and offers a good night out for dance fans -with no ABBA to be found anywhere in da house…
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November 10, 2008
Violent Femmes
Imagine The Velvet Underground playing rockabilly and you’ll have some idea of the quirky delights of Gordon Gano’s Violent Femmes. Veering from the party pop of ‘Blister in the Sun’ to the scary vision of ‘Country Death Song’, the Femmes never failed to bring a giddy smile to the lips of warped rock fans. Fifteen years since their inception, their witty gems leave younger anoraks for dead, as new album ‘Freak Magnet’ proves. Who else could make a chorus like ‘What’s for breakfast? What’s for lunch? What’s for dinner? Captain Crunch’ sound existential?
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November 4, 2008
Pipilotti Rist
Pipilotti Rist has created a total video environment, linking assorted video technologies, installation and music via a fictional Paris apartment, its occupant Himalaya Goldstein, and her body. The camera scans over, then pauses on details of the body projected above the white kitchen units, while in the living room, videos are projected out of sofas, over an old master, or on to the dining table, and photo furniture on a wall mingles with the real. If the individual elements are less captivating than the watery, maritime fantasy recently seen at the Swiss Centre, and there’s a hint of gimmickry, there’s no shortage of things to watch.
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