Clarion Content

This Fall, our #FashionDriveBy features role reversals in more ways than one. Modeled by Angela Goldman and Kara Pezzimenti, normally the behind-the-scenes stars responsible for the incredible hairstyle coordination you've seen in the past, and featuring styling and dresses designed by our Creative Director, Cady Childs, we all put our hands in the pot a little differently this time.

First Edition, Cady Childs' line, had its true premiere at the DTown ReFASHIONED show back in July. Her inspiration behind the styling and creations of this shoot were the hauntingly heartbreaking faces, silhouettes, and wardrobes of the silent film stars of the 1920s, their sensual fabrics contrasted with stark, harsh lines, perfect hair waves, and heartshaped lips. Their overly expressive faces showing every action and happening twice as dramatically as we would in film now makes for an air of incidental glam that was best captured in that time, when the actors only had their faces and motions to truly tell the story between quote captions. But instead of implying their sensuality and femininity meant needing a man to come to the rescue, we wanted our damsels to flip the script, and escape from distress on their own accord.

Thanks to The Real Laww for being our DURM styled bandit, HT Jewelry for the accessories, and of course, the eye behind the lens that makes all our visions come together, the photographer, Jessi Blakely of Jessica Arden Photography.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Fashion, Fashion Drive-bys, Pop Culture

The Carrack Modern Art: Looking back at year one
by:Cady Childs



I walk up to the Carrack Gallery on a Friday in downtown Durham at high noon, to be greeted by Jon Wendelbo, sitting on the church pew-like bench outside with a tiny, fluffy white dog attached to the leash in his hand. He smiles when he recognizes my face. We sit and small talk about their smashing birthday party until a bright-eyed woman walks up the street, commanding the space as she moves. Laura Ritchie is one of those people you are intensely aware of when they are around you, their presence and energy almost palpable. We head upstairs, where Sarah Goetz is already above, putting the final touches on her installation, ‘just between us’. As we open the door, I see the most beautiful, dream-like mobile hanging from ceiling to floor, dappling shadows over Sarah as she walks around the space, making sure everything is as it should be, and telling her story in this comfortable welcoming environment.

Ritchie and Wendelbo’s personalities are part of what brings this air of openness to the Carrack. Their zero-commission policy sets the stage for frequently changing shows and encourages work in a multitude of mediums. The responsibility can put a lot of pressure on the artist to stage and carry out their exhibition in as little as three days, but it allows the creator to take full control of the space, breaking it down and building it back up in the way that best serves them.

“Every artist has surprised me in some way,” Ritchie said of the past year. “That’s the beauty of having this open-ended space where the artist has complete freedom.”

Many of the installations have taken advantage of the no-rules environment by building multi-form installations combining music, art, film, performance, and more. Last September, Louis Franco’s installation involved spoken word performance during the reception. Aimari and Alex Young’s ‘SOLA’ installation this March; combining dance, body art, display, sculpture, and music was on a level the likes of which Durham really hadn’t seen before.

“They (Aimari and Alex} completely took over, and created this place that didn’t have a linear narrative, and no boundaries,” Ritchie said. “They completely changed the space, and in hand, what they created was changed by each visitor.”

After many doubted and spoke skeptically about their business model and the prospect of letting outsiders have complete control of the space, it is the validation that gives the two founders the most joy. Looking back on a year of trusting a Durham community that has not only confirmed their faith, but also given back time and time again, nourishes their spirits.

“Creative energy just feeds more creative energy,” Ritchie said, telling the story of how multiple musicians simply walked up to the Carrack on the eve of their birthday celebration, offering to play their instruments for the event.

The Community Art Show, held during the last weekend in April, ended up exhibiting thirty-one local artists. There was an almost bohemian theme to the reception, as artists brought their own mediums to the event.

“One person brought some wine, and another brought some canvas and started painting, and then this whole thing just sort of kicked off,” Wendelbo said of the night.

Clearly, our Durham community has been building this sort of energy for some time, as the response generated by The Carrack Modern Art demonstrates. Having a space where creativity is welcomed and a vital part of the institution is something we need and value.

“Each show has gotten bigger and bolder as they’ve seen examples of the shows before them,“ Ritchie said of the building cloud of no-holds-barred artistic stimulation surrounding #111 West Parrish Street, “It’s been incredible to watch what happens when you just trust someone.”

The quickly changing schedule of artists exhibiting at the Carrack has lead to involve heavy hours on Wendelbo and Ritchie’s part, but as the artist’s take on the set-up and take down responsibilities, their shorter shows only concern the two in the sense that some artists may be better served in a longer format.

“The three day shows work well for pop-up art intention, like the community show, but there are some artists that I think would be better served by a long period of time.” Ritchie explained. Even the Durham community sometimes struggles to keep up with the whirlwind of exhibits.

While, the word is that they may slow down the pace for 2013, giving the artist’s more time to show and the community more time to absorb and appreciate, the Carrack is not changing its basic model. It will continue giving artists a chance to have access and control like never before and continue giving the arts community opportunities to see the innovation and feel the creative pulse.

“It’s like a mirror,” Wendelbo said. “We are reflecting the energy of the artist on the community, and the community’s energy is reflected back to the artist, and so on.”

In true collaborator fashion, Ritchie is already following his thought process along the way, and finishes his thought for him.

“We’re just holding the mirror.”

For more information on the Carrack, it’s past shows, how to donate, and more, visit their website at www.thecarrack.org.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

Sola: A performative installation by Marissa Bergmann (Aimari) and Alex Young





Cady Childs, the Clarion Content's intrepid Arts and Culture columnist, swung by the Carrack Modern Art this week and has sneak peak at the weekend's upcoming show.


This Friday the Carrack Modern Art is hosting the opening reception for Aimara and Alex Young’s mixed media installation, as part of Durham’s monthly Art Walk. These two young women, both graduates of Duke University, first installed their unique conjunction of graphics, luxe fabrics, body art, and found objects in an apartment they shared during college.

“We’d moved everything out, and it was this great, huge space for us to play with,” Aimara said while sorting through massive stack of painted white branches.

During our visit, the two were installing a parachute like fabric, that was pulled and puckered with string that would be later be connected to a turn-table to make the cotton roof bob and flow on it’s own.

“Our installations are experienced, not just to look at. We want them to feel an intimate experience when they walk through,” Aimara explained. “There’s also a deep connection to trees in this installation, we’ve always collected branches and twigs, and wanted to include that.”

In this town’s growing art scene, it’s easy to get started slowly, with small-scale shows of a young artist’s work, trying out the water before diving in head-first. Instead of taking the easier route, these women are putting their all into an immersive space where the viewer gets to peek inside of their heads, and follow the creative twists and turns found from unexpected objects. The unknowingly haunting, almost ethereal feel of the video and photography released so far of the project is already enough to show these talented young artists made the right choice.

The show runs from March 12---March 22, with the opening reception tomorrow from 7pm to 10 pm. To learn more about the Alex & Aimara’s past projects (and also the amazing photographer behind the haunting flyers you’ve seen around town, Yuma) visit their tumblr here and see quotes and photos from the project and other works by the artists. For further info on the event, visit the Carrack Gallery’s site at here.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

Invisible and The New Obsolete

by: Cady Childs



Mechanized music meets mechanical man


In the late nineties, Mark Dixon and his friend, Bart Trotman, responded when Raleigh’s Lump Gallery called for art installations that made noise. And, they haven’t stopped creating since.

“I was curious about making instruments,” Dixon, who has a background in sculpture, said. “I really loved the interaction that performance and music can create with an audience.”

The New Obsolete, the group’s most composed and pre-planned show to date, is now in residency at 108 Morris Street, with three performances already on the books: Feb. 11th, 17th, and 18th, featuring different special guests at each show.

Dixon and company began composing the show in January 2011, about a year before the first performance.

“”We wanted to push ourselves to use the instruments more intentionally,” Dixon said.

This weekend marks Durham’s last chance to witness this ‘mechanical museum’ in action, with tools such as the Rhythm 1001 (an electro-mechanical percussion machine), the selectric piano (a typography to piano note transmitter), and Elsewhere’s Roof, a new drip-driven drum machine inspired by a leaky roof during a residency program in Greensboro. The experience of nature provided its own mixed tempo for the group. The moment was first recreated for an audience with ice blocks held up to heat lamps strapped to the ceiling. Elsewhere’s Roof is the portable version, with five small drips controlled by the musicians through glass valves suspended on ten-foot wooden legs, with a dune buggy gas tank.

“It always does something exciting,” Dixon said of the new machine. “No two drips are at the same rate, and they cycle in their relationships, forming complicated rhythms that no human percussionist or electronic drum machine could play.”

Their inventions tap into a connection between technology and true human interaction that we normally don’t see in this digital age, turning old junk into sound making, aesthetically pleasing devices, creating both the machines and the music out of primary and familiar elements of life, like a human’s pulse and dripping water. This methodology of repurposing goes beyond common artistic and musical forms, forcing the audience to look at the way technology shapes the way they see the world. Forcing each of us to confront how technology can change our impressions of ourselves and our setting.

“I kind of evaluate myself as a machine sometimes in a weird way, and I think that’s not uncommon,” Dixon explained. “That’s not necessary a permanent position, but a good one for exploring.”

To find out more about INVISIBLE and The New Obsolete, visit their website here, featuring videos of some of the above mentioned innovations in action. And don’t miss their last two performances this weekend, Friday and Saturday night at 108 Morris Street, with events starting at 7:00 and INVISIBLE performing at 8:30.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, music, Pop Culture

Pinterest? What's up with that?

by: Cady Childs



I’m sure you have all been hearing the buzz about the latest social networking hub to distract us from reality and face-to-face interactions. Pinterest, the spot that is bringing crafty back.

While there is certainly not a lack of male presence on the site, I’ve found most of the people buzzing to their friends about it, offering them an exclusive invite (that’s right, you have to be invited) are twenty-something women, who are just now honing their homemaking skills: they are, to generalize, obsessed with urban and modern interior décor, cocktail parties, recipes, and DIY.

Speaking as one of these individuals, it’s kind of our adult way of playing dress-up.

I can personally attest to visiting Michael’s Crafts on five different occasions since joining Pinterest. Simply type ‘DIY’ into the search engine on the site, and you will find an infinite variety of links to guides on how to re-create every canvas, throw, shelf, and candle holder found in this month’s Anthropologie catalog, a how-to on melting crayons to canvas for wall art, an explanation on transferring newsprint to fingernails, and of course, thousands of pictures of sparkling cake pops.

Pinterest literally functions as an online bulletin board to ‘organize and share the things you love.’ (See the example above.) Suggested board ideas include planning a wedding, redecorating your home, and saving your favorite style picks. DIY guides found through the site yield enough bookend, wall art, photo frame, jewelry, headboard, makeup organizer, duvet cover, and curtain options to exhaust one’s free time for the next ten years. And that’s only the beginning of the list--- we didn’t even mention the party decorations.

Co-founded by 29-year-old former Google Inc. employee Ben Sibbermann, the site launched in March 2010 through a series of invites sent to the creators close friends. All the growth of the site since then has been through this same process, spreading the web a little farther as each new user is added.

“I think Pinterest taps into a really common human desire to share your taste,” Sibberman, on his personal blog, noted.

The site is also a great form of brainstorming for bloggers, photographers, and artists. While picking items to link in a post, instead of saving the image to a hardrive and copying the link to a word document, this site allows bloggers (like myself) to click a simple ‘Pin It!’ button on their browser’s navigation bar, select their board, and all the information is saved without clogging up desktops. These boards can later be linked to in the post, for further content and networking.

Obviously boasting our lust-worthy lists and redecoration plans has the addictive nature that all opportunities for showmanship have on our mentis. But, in a world of Facebook feed refreshing detritus and nonsense, Pinterest is eye-opening. it’s take on a social network doesn’t assume we’re all narcissistic, boring, self-interested individuals. Instead of sharing a status update on what kind of sandwich you had for lunch, Pinterest gives you a chance to share what inspired you at lunch.

Much more interesting.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Pop Culture, technology

by: Cady Childs

If there’s one event to be sure not to miss on tonight’s art walk, it’s Liberty Arts live aluminum pour at their old foundry adjacent to Durham Central Park.

The pouring will occur between 6pm and 7pm tonight.

“It’s a new year, and we want to show we’re still here,” Jackie MacLeod, of Liberty Arts, said. “Pouring is always very sparkly and very dramatic- you won’t want to miss out.”

For more information on the Liberty Arts group, visit their website at LibertyArtsCasting.org. And check out their new location at the Cordoba Arts Center, located in the Golden Belt District. Durhamites, get a peek at the new space before the grand opening March 16th. Right next to Scrap Exchange's huge new spot. Perfect to hit up after a Friday night stroll through Golden Belt's studios.

The Clarion Content is hoping to persuade Scenes from my Lunch Hour to take some photos of tonight's pour.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

from the Clarion Content's Art, Style, and Fashion columnist
on the Durham beat...
Cady Childs



From the opening of the Wendelbo-Malo-Digiulio exhibition
All photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour


The Carrack Modern Art Gallery, located at 111 West Parrish Street, directly above Loaf, is one of those aesthetically addictive spaces you just don’t want to leave. Exposed brick, warm wood floors, comfy, familiar armchairs, and massive windows gazing idly down to the street below lay the backdrop for what happens when two creatively inclined, organized people put their heads together.

“This all evolved in a way we didn’t expect,” Laura Ritchie, co-founder and co-director of the Carrack, said.



At the gallery
All photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour


The gallery functions in a way not often seen in today’s art world. The Carrack is not a co-op. Artists do not pay out a commission on pieces sold during exhibitions, there are no membership fees, and, other than being available for rent to the public for special events, the space is maintained completely through donations and community faith. In December of last year, a KickStarter campaign culminated with a $12,000 pool of funds, securing the space for the entirety of 2012, and confirming just how vital an entity the Carrack has become to the Durham community.

After working together at the Carrboro Arts Center, John Wendelbo, founder of the Durham Sculpture Project, brought Ms. Ritchie on board to take his vision to the next level.

"The community wanted a space like this, and we needed to put together the funding, space, and work to do so," said Ms. Ritchie, a graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill and native of North Carolina.

"We wanted to make the Carrack it’s own entity from the Durham Sculpture Project, but they will always be intrinsically linked.”

From a curatorial perspective, Ritchie has already laid the foundation to secure the Carrack a space in the now crackling Durham art scene. One of the first places the Carrack popped up on the Clarion Content’s radar, if you’ll forgive the pun, was last October’s PoPuP III organized by Richie and Durham artist and bon vivant, Adrian Schlesinger. Now, the gallery is almost completely booked through December 2012, with just about every medium imaginable represented at least once during the course of the year. Richie’s verve and energy are a driving force.

The current Wendelbo-Malo-Digiulio exhibition features a collaboration of three artists (including John Wendelbo, the Carrack's co-founder). It is on display now through this Friday, January 13th, featuring large-scale sculptures and paintings coloring between the lines of abstraction and realism.



Wendelbo-Malo-Digiulio exhibit at the Carrack gallery
All photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour


Michelle Gonzalez Green’s ‘A Sense of Place’, opening January 16th, explores the ‘inner sanctum’ of finding one’s creative place, and what settings artists choose to put themselves in during that search. The exhibition will be an inner look at seventeen days of creating in Green’s studio, using original materials that inspired, infuriated, or entranced during the time recorded.

Other upcoming exhibits include works by Gracelee Lawerence (January 30th-February 10th), Dipiki Kohli (February 10th-February 12th), and Melissa Smith (February 13th-February 24th).

The Carrack, named after a type of European ship from the 15th century that lead to the discovery of new worlds, is living up to it’s metaphorical name. It is giving artists a new paradigm, truly modern, post capitalist insatiability, a new take on a collaborative, community-run space, and providing a supportive environment. In exchange for the free space, the artists are expected to largely manage their own staging and promotion. When these individual artists needed a space, the Carrack was there. Ritchie and Wendelbo are in for one exciting year.

For more information on the Carrack’s exhibitions, calendar, booking, and rental, visit their website at www.thecarrack.org.



Wendelbo-Malo-Digiulio exhibit at the Carrack gallery
All photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

A romp through Parker & Otis

by Cady Childs
our lead columnist for Durham, Culture, Fashion and Style



¹The Clarion Content can verify that Jennings learned this one from personal experience too... ;)

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture, Practical Advice

We've been running around town this week visiting the artists installing for the newly minted Durham Storefront Project which is running in conjunction with downtown this year's Durham Holiday Art Walk. The Durham Arts Council's Catherine Howard, coordinating the event for the DAC, hooked with up with the Durham Storefront Projects' co-organizers, Chris Chinchar and Jessica Moore. The result? More than fifteen installations in all that can be seen on the streets of downtown Durham, so be sure to look out for displays everywhere you turn as you walk between stops on the Art Walk this weekend. Thanks to all the artists and business owners for letting us get in your way for a few minutes, and for allowing a peek into your process.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, photos, Pop Culture

This Friday, one of Clarion Content’s favorite Durham musical acts, LiLa, will be performing at the Casbah, along with Beatnam and Toon, two other groups you’ve probably heard around town as names to be on the look out for.

The Clarion Content is particularly excited for Toon. He is a Durham School of the Arts graduate, known for his live energy and beats that stay stuck in your head for hours. The first time he crossed our radar, he rapped to the Parlour for ice cream. And they gave it to him! His blend of personal charisma, pop piano, catchy lyrics, and bass on ‘Be Famous’ shows an intuitive grasp of people, what we want to hear and how we hear it. Visit his Reverb Nation site to take a listen.

Of course, most of you, dear readers, already possess a story about a great night that starts with a LiLa show. Their concoction of well-written, quick-witted lyrics, intense musicianship, hip-hop beats and sensibilities, set in a plush musical pastiche that ranges from modern jazz, to Sublime-like riffs and back to melodic swing notes, has a way of forcing even those who hate to dance to sway their hips.

And you know what we always say around here, if you can’t keep your hips still, it is a darn good sign for the music.

LiLa is a show you simply cannot miss. Period. If not now, when? If you wait, you will only ask yourself why later.

Their newest album, ‘III’ is set to release December 23rd, but you can listen to the first single, ‘8-bit kid’ here. The Clarion Content’s sources say that they will be dropping another single today. Check here. They have also partnered with Clarion Content's electric creative team, Cady Childs and Jessi Blakely, to stage a fabulous faux press conference shot in the Cordoba Center for the Arts in conjunction with Liberty Arts Foundry and featuring Bernard's Formalwear. But you know what they say---it’s not true 'til you see it in writing. Still, a picture is worth 1,000 words…


A preview of the upcoming LiLa photoshoot...Keep an eye to the Twitter for the full set soon, music fans.


Tuxedos courtesy of Bernard's Formalwear.
Space courtesy of the Cordoba Center for the Arts and Liberty Arts Foundry.
Photo by Jessi Blakely of Tamara Lackey Photography.
Styling by Cady Childs of the Clarion Content.


LiLa is playing the Casbah tomorrow night. Don't wait, pre-sale tickets for the show are available through e-tix here. Doors open at 8pm, and the show starts at 9pm. For more information on the Casbah, visit their website here.

Article by the Clarion Content's lead columnist for Culture, the Arts and Durham, Cady Childs.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, music, Pop Culture

Matt Zigler installing in the windows of Coulter, Jewell, Thames PA, at #111 W. Main Street, Durham

Photo credit and layout by Cady Childs


Durham’s annual holiday Art Walk, sponsored by the Durham Arts Council, strikes the streets of downtown this weekend with a fresh new look.

Thursday (November 17th) a ribbon cutting ceremony at 4:30 p.m., marks the highly anticipated official re-opening of Carolina Theater and the Durham Arts Council (DAC) building after a multi-year renovation and kicks off a weekend celebrating the arts and the revitalized, vibrant downtown of Durham.

“These renovations are beneficial to the council, the theater, the city, and of course, artists, all at one time,” Margaret DeMott, an institution at the DAC, said. “It’s a great, fulfilling, collaborating process.”

New additions to this year’s Art Walk include twenty-two installations and displays in the windows of bustling downtown Durham, in business storefronts such as Scratch bakery, Coulter, Jewell, Thames PA, and Center Studio Architecture, as well as in under-utilized spaces, such as the former Bargain Furniture building. Many of the displays are built from materials provided by Durham’s Scrap Exchange and Jerry's Artarama, as a part of what is being billed as the Durham Storefront Project, an independent group of artists and art supporters organized specifically for this project.

Musical performances will be happening all day Saturday and Sunday along the Art Walk route, with performances by among many, many others, Rebecca and the Hi Tones and the Willie Painter Band.

The result, amazing free public art, shows what happens when organizations like the DAC, the Art Institute, the North Carolina Songwriter’s Co-Op, Vega metals, and more come together to put together an event of this magnitude. New venues and cool spaces abound in downtown Durham these days. The entrepreneurs that are flocking to Durham in droves love that their community puts art at their fingertips and in their footsteps. Art builds community and brings people back to the revitalized downtown loop. It is just one more example of how when Durham comes together, it is better than ever.

“We are interested in what new partnerships and components we can create,” Sherry Devries, director of the DAC, said. “There are so many entities in this town, it makes it a good time for revising and adding.”

DeVries also noted that more than 6,600 jobs in Durham are classified as highly creative and even during this time of economic stagnation and recession these jobs have increased by 10%.

With over forty-seven locations involved, 200 artists, an entire day of music, and everything else now happening in downtown, the Durham Art Walk is certainly something that you won’t want to miss. Spend a day and you will know why Durham’s reputation as national center for arts and music is being noted near and far. The event kicks off Saturday at 10 a.m. till 5 p.m., and continues Saturday from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Visit the Durham Art walk website here for a complete list of venues, entertainment, and sponsors.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

A few months back now... The Scrap Exchange just moving into the new space.

Surely Durhamanians know that The Scrap Exchange, an old community stand-by, a veritable institution, has moved to a new location, the Cordoba Center for the Arts. But have you been there yet? Have you given a thought to just what a valuable, local resource it is? Ask yourself, is it really a coincidence that we have the kind of creative, burgeoning artistic community that we do here in Durham? What Durham is, it is built on what Durham was.

Clarion Content Arts & Culture columnist, Cady Childs, digs deeper into the story, reminding us, pooling our collective recollections with the latest news about what's going on at 923 Franklin Street, Durham, 27701.

Keep an eye out for her upcoming piece on another Durham institution that has moved into the Cordoba Center, Liberty Arts.


***********************************


As a child, if I made it through a trip to Northgate Mall with my parents without spending too long drooling over carousel globes and sparkly shoes, my reward was always a $5 grab bag at The Scrap Exchange store. Bins taller than I was, filled with millions of metallic scraps of paper, plastic nozzles and keyboard keys, floppy disks and pieces of fabric, bins full of the ideas rolling around my bright little mind that hadn’t brought themselves to fulfillment till I stepped in to the store. I couldn’t widen my eyes enough.

Now, The Scrap Exchange, owned by Ann Woodward, is located in the new Cordoba Center for the Arts, next door to East Durham’s Golden Belt, with space for studios, free workshops, and enough aisles and raw materials to seed and yield more projects than could fit into most childhoods.

“The expanse really shows how materials can occupy the space in so many different ways,” Woodward, who manages over thirty employees in the new location, said. The shelf behind her built from dozens of old VHS tapes stacked like bricks certainly flourished her point.

Since the original relocation in mid-June, the Scrap Exchange has been spreading it’s fingers and stretching it’s limbs more and more into the new opportunities provided by such a massive building.

Among the new projects and endeavors Woodward has been putting together is a woodworking shop, with classes taught by local artisans and a tool library free to the public, as well as craft workshops, often lead by Woodward herself. An artist’s marketplace, featuring over sixty local artists using reused, sustainable pieces provides retail space for craftsmen, as well as examples, for those of who aren’t sure where to start.

These endeavors give Durham residents a chance to experience, first-hand, how far their imagination and inspiration can truly go.

“There is so much potential in the world of reuse as a job creator,” Woodward said. “It is an unlimited opportunity in so many ways, individuality, resources, the environment. It’s a big resource to any community.”

The importance of reuse and the creativity it brings is clear to patrons of Scrap Exchange, both young and old.

“From the containers I use in my garden to the wreath on my door, I was able to build it out of what I got at the Scrap Exchange, “ Amber Crews, Durham resident, said. “Whether you are looking for materials for collages, fabric scraps, buttons, or just some inspiration, they have it all.”

The creative opportunities in these multifarious mediums are certainly motivating to anyone artistically inclined, but to a child’s eyes these items simply are more pliable, more malleable, more cross-applicable, one’s artistic inclination in adulthood is shaped by these kinds of memories.

“Scrap Exchange gives a question to kids in Durham that every child should be asked,” said Eli McDuffee, lead singer of Durham band, LiLa, “They said ‘Here are the objects---now tell me what you want to make out of this.’ It can be whatever you want, but it’s got to be all you.”

The creative stimuli in the air between the walls of The Scrap Exchange's new location is so strong you can smell it as soon as you walk in the door. On the way out, a small girl in a tie-dyed tank top and cut off pink shorts sits on the ground, sorting buttons into piles of similar shapes, holding each one inches from her eye, clasped tightly between her fingers, taking in their character fully before filtering them into their respective genre. Though we don’t know yet what she’s making, even she may not, we know what Woodward and The Scrap Exchange are helping her build- an outlet for her young mind to speak through. I can’t help but remember I used to have almost the exact same shorts when I was her age.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

Artist Jeff Israel...all photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour

This Friday, October 21st, Craven Allen Gallery, on Broad Street, opens a show called “Homegrown-Under 35 “ featuring sixteen young artists who all built their foundations in the Durham Public Schools.

Helen Griffin, curator of the show, was the art teacher at Riverside High School for over two decades and worked with all of these artists in their educations. “A teacher’s goal is for the students to go beyond what we teach them,” said Griffin, the 2011-2012 recipient of the Durham Art Guild’s Artist-In-Resident Award, “It’s special when you get to see that happen first hand.”

Artists featured in the show include Chris Alton, Harlan Campbell, Diana Ciompi, Mark Coffman, Jermario Couch, Bryan Crabtree, Jeff Israel, Whitney McDonell, Joe McDonough, Hannah Reed, Damian Stamer, Jacob Streilein, Robert Talley, Lizzie Tucker, Tyson Watson and Leigh Werrell.

A reception with the artists and Ms. Griffin, Saturday night from 5 P.M. to 7 P.M., officially kicks off the exhibition, which will be on display through November 26th.



Craven Allen, 1106^1/2 Broad St....all photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour

A quick preview of the works shows a diverse, impressive collection of mixed media, sculpture, photography, painting, and graphic arts. It is a mélange of challenging works befitting the diversity of Durham. The echoes of this place ring true from scenes of Ninth Street institutions in a snowstorm to much more personal memories and iconography. The rich textured array of images, burbled forth from the wellspring of memories in these young minds: Durham.

The artists’ ages range from 18-35, all in different parts of their careers and creative discoveries, much like what is happening in our dear city, the ideas of ‘emerging’ and ‘established’ are becoming interchangeable. The new is rooted in the old. What is would not be possible without what was. Ms. Griffin’s years in the classroom, and her one time students fruits of their labors, bear literal testament to that truth.

The importance of arts education is a more heated topic than ever for our school systems, with the North Carolina General Assembly cutting $800 million from state public school spending this year alone. Arts programs across the state are under fire. A place like Durham, with our institutions and our individuals, is ever more important as a cultural reservoir, valuing, preserving, nurturing the arts in these challenging times.

“These artists are all homegrown- they all came from here, and part of them will always be here,” Griffin said. “It can be hard for artists to find their niche- but Durham will always be home to them.”


Artist Harlan Campbell...all photos courtesy of Scenes from my Lunch Hour


Craven Allen Gallery is located at 1106^1/2 Broad Street in Durham. Gallery hours are from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday. For more information on the show visit www.CravenAllenGallery.com, or call the gallery at (919) 286-4837.

See more photos of the exhibit here.

Special thanks to Scenes from my Lunch Hour for the photos.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham

All photos courtesy of Allie Mullin Photography

About a year ago, Emily Hill was visiting Durham, N.C. with fellow Haymaker company members Akiva Fox and Dan VanHoozer. She found a $20 bill on the ground, and took this as the universe confirming what they already were starting to pick up on.

They were looking for a town that was growing. The kind of place where the community was positive and excited, the audience was diverse, where people liked to say yes. They ran through a long list of the usual suspects, Portland, Seattle, Baltimore and Philadelphia. They felt they would know the place when they found it. The energy in Durham rose up to meet them first through twenty bucks on the sidewalk, then Dan VanHoozer popped into the Manbites Dog Theater and was greeted with open arms.

The Haymakers say this has been the story throughout their year in Durham. Support and encouragement everywhere they turned, genuine generosity and warmth, a spirit that says: to assist you is to build our community, organically, from within. It started with Jeff Storer and Edward Hunt at the Manbites Dog Theater. The Haymakers found the same kind of help from artist Julia Gartrell on the design of their media material and logo. Likewise their promotional photographs, some of which accompany this piece, were taken by Allie Mullin in the same spirit. “How can I help?”

VanHoozer and Fox noted to the Clarion Content that in many places, including Washington, D.C. where they moved from, power is aggregated by saying no. The people in power try to deny access and opportunity to the up and coming, distrust, fear and negativity permeate the system. In Durham, they found, “everyone was so much nicer than they had to be.”


All photos courtesy of Allie Mullin Photography

And what is Durham’s reward?

This Thursday, October 20th marks the group’s first performance at the Manbites Dog Theater at 703 Foster Street, a three-week running showing of the self-written, self-starring, and self-produced work ‘Living with the Tiger’.

The play starts with a young couple in need of a change. Their mutual dream of owning a tiger lends to the group’s exploration of the ideals behind our ‘pursuit of happiness’ society, of the self-devouring urge for more and the constant chasing of these often fatal aspirations, of what happens when something is simultaneously captivatingly beautiful and heart-stoppingly terrifying.

“We like to start with something that grabs us by the throat, and punches us in the gut,” Akiva Fox said, when asked about what prompted the subject, “There are five-thousand domesticated tigers living in America, and only three-thousand left in the wild. A lot of these people [the owners] live in apartments, in cities, and areas where a tiger just isn’t meant to be.”

There are two sanctuaries for rescued tigers in the Triangle area alone, making this subject even more relevant to Durham than some might initially realize. These sanctuaries are home to tigers that were eventually given up by their owners, because they discovered, too late, just what they were getting themselves into.

“It shows you the good and bad side to the land of wonder,” Dan VanHoozer, who also works with the Playmakers Theatre Group, said. “Where is the end, satisfaction, if we’re always chasing?”

"Living with the Tiger," directed by Colin Hovde, at Manbites Dog, as part of the theater’s "Other Voices" series, will run three weekends, starting October 20th-23, and continuing on through Saturday, November 5th. For more information on the show, visit the Haymaker site at www.gohaymaker.com, or the Manbites Dog site for box office inquiries and other productions from the Other Voices series at http://www.manbitesdogtheater.org/.

Look for a review in the Clarion Content next week.

Edit. note---Please forgive our misspelling of the Manbites Dog theater in the title of this post. Our error. Unfortunately, changing the title of the post now would break any existing links posted with the old title. We humbly beg your forgiveness. Manbites Dog Theater! Sorry.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

Picture credit to the kickass folks at Carpe Durham

The Clarion Content is delighted to invite you to come along on a magical ride as Pop Culture columnist, Cady Childs, once again takes us "Searching for Ringside." This fictional look at life in Durham explores the common trials, travails and misadventures that so many Durhamanians face. The metamythical characters, Andrew, Vita, John, and Megan, and their sordid but bemusing stories will resonate with those of you who carouse in Durham. Cady knows our collective experience, she shines a light on it and relates it back to us with a laugh and a smile.

Check out earlier chapters here [you will have to scroll down]...


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Chapter IV, "What do you mean, relationship?"


John was on strike from his own head. He was stoned, bleary eyed, and watching Boardwalk Empire, trying to ignore the pulsing in his hand, that wanting to reach out to the pillow on the other end of the couch. He could faintly sense the smell of cloves and sex it was giving off, a scent he was lusting to bury his head in so badly it may as well have been crack.

Under normal circumstances, she would have been gone after two hours of hanging out, he would spray his house the minute she left with Slatkin & Co. room spray, Spice, and that would be that. And he wouldn’t be so tempted by this damn pillow. Or her mouth. Or her knowledge of hyphens. He went into his bedroom to read Martin Amis, a man who always helped him to think clearly.

Megan had accidentally run into this guy in a leather jacket the other night, and she ended up kissing him on her porch while motorcycles streamed by whistling and hooting, leaving the biker bar up the block. It’s not like she regretted it, but sometimes she wished her soul could be a little more Catholic so she had the option of making herself feel guilty. The leather jacket had done her in, but she refused to expect him to call (it had been four days, and he wasn’t going to). The funny thing was, what she was wishing for wasn’t far from the truth- she held herself back so much, she might as well have denied herself the experience if she wasn’t ever allowed to feel it.

Her leather jacket was hanging in the closet, and she thought about putting it on and going out to kiss a stranger. She cleaned the kitchen instead.

Andrew’s roommate was out of town. This meant he didn’t have to feel self-conscious whenever his bed creaked, and he could play Minecraft while blasting Nas all evening to his heart’s content. He drank cheap scotch and put up a Red Light District-esque alley in his medieval town, completing each window with the newly added feature that inspired his modern European tribute in the first place- red torches.

He didn’t want to talk to anyone, especially the junior from campus who had been making his phone buzz and twirl and jump like a cheap carnival ride every ten minutes, since 2 A.M. Thursday night. He’d dropped her off and nearly licked off her lips they made out for so long, but it was clear in the first five minutes she wasn’t going to give it up on the first date, which meant she wouldn’t on the second, or the third. He really didn’t have time for all that, and he should have listened when his older brother advised him ‘never give out your number’.

Vita was sick of compromising. Her roommate (who wasn’t as good at quoting Dylan Thomas as she was, but her hair was longer) had been almost permanently camped out at her flavor of the month’s place for the past two days. It was too quiet in her empty apartment- but she gave it roughly two more days before her roommate would be sobbing in her arms again, swearing off assholes between sips of cheap sparkling wine and changing the music about forty-five seconds into every song.

She knew it was better not to be like this, but she missed the tumble and tangle of affection and rage rolling together so often, and so quickly. In other words, actually saying it out loud- she needed to let guys treat her like dirt to write something truly great- it was the stupidest shit that she had ever mumbled under her breath. The moment she uttered it, she jumped up, knocking two magazines off the arm of the couch in her zealous haste to get dressed and go out, as soon and as fast as possible. There had to be something left to do in this town.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Searching for Ringside

Photos thanks to Scenes from my Lunch Hour

The opening reception for artist Catherine J. Howard’s ‘Veil Tease’ art installation and exhibit at the Carrack Art gallery building will be this Thursday, from 7pm to 10pm.

Hosted by the Duke Center for Eating Disorders, this exhibit creates a story of women’s struggles to balance between their internal illumination and the way society views them, their public "pose" and their hidden "veiled" personalities. The work, using fifteen fabric scrolls, combining graphite pencil outlines and oil painting, highlighting the stark contrast between these two mediums, lends itself to the emotional transparency and sensitivity of this subject and its long history. The tall, fabric pillars, standing alone and exposed, allude to the ‘vulnerable interior self’ that we all try to keep hidden away. Areas of body and self-image awareness observed and addressed by Ms. Howard include racial ambiguities, emotional abuse, failure, and self-preservation.

For a more detailed peek into the artist’s motivation and outline for the project, as well as an opportunity to discuss intended messages and misconceptions with Howard and other female artists from the area, the Duke Center for Eating Disorders is hosting a guided tour and panel discussion this Saturday, October 8th, from 1pm to 3pm at the Carrack at 111 West Parrish Street.


Photos thanks to Scenes from my Lunch Hour

In addition to these two special events, the space will be open from the hours of 2pm to 8pm, Tuesday through Friday, and every third Friday from 7pm to 10pm. For more information, visit the Carrack’s website here.

Labels: Art, Cady Childs columns, Durham

designed by Runaway Clothes

Looking at the Runaway Clothes collection, it’s impossible to tell they’ve only officially been in business for about three months.

"It’s been an aspiration of mine for a long time," said Gabriel Eng-Goetz, a native of Durham who studied illustration at Syracuse University, after graduating from Jordan High School. "It’s a process, but you’ve just gotta go in and put everything on the table."

Runaway Clothes is a company with that hip, Nuevo, southern metropolitan vibe seen from other up and coming designers, promoting a street feel of independence, creation, and rebellion that seems to come hand and hand with well done, graffiti-inspired designs.

Although some of Eng-Goetz designs certainly hone in on the widely felt Durham vibe, he also takes inspiration from many other outlets. His sophisticated and detailed illustrations, and his constant thirst to do more, are what make the label different, setting it apart from others like it.

After studying illustration at Syracuse University, he spent time in Australia. It gave him an opportunity to witness first hand the ways street art can make social change and commentary accessible and unavoidable, and also how it can be expressed in new ways.

"Sydney, in particular, has a prevalent street art scene," Eng-Goetz, who also took inspiration from street crossing signs he came across while overseas, said. “While living and walking through the city, I was exposed to this growing scene and the social impact it can have."

Eng-Goetz creates a balance of play, technical skill, and imagination in his designs, giving wearers a chance to wear a statement without emblazoning it on their chest in stark, harsh, billboard-like manner. For instance, the ‘Prime Cuts’ tee, a map of historic Durham neighborhoods viscerally showcased in the jigsaw cuts of the infamous bull. In the ‘Southern Summer’ illustration, a half melted Rocket popsicle comes shooting out of your childhood memories. The ‘Lonely Drifter’, a silhouette of a young boy tagging a wall with Runaway’s logo, highlights the label’s graffiti influence and reads like a modern day The Boxcar Children promotional flyer.

The image of a train and the ideas that come along with it have had a wide influence in provoking the sparks that feed many of Runaway’s designs, and not just on his Durham shirts. The philosophies of old train hoppers in constant transit, running away from convention and literally living in motion lends to the movement away from convention and societal norms Runaway’s designs are sparked by.

After doing some time in the gallery scene of the art world after college, Eng-Goetz has found this collection to be the most fulfilling. He wanted to take his message and his work directly to the people. He recognized that the gallery scene was cost prohibitive for some his most fervent fans.

"A t-shirt is a piece of art, but it also goes to a bigger audience," he said. "It more interesting sometimes to show your art on a different level, in a different way."

Showing up on many different levels isn’t something that Eng-Goetz will be stopping anytime soon. Some of Runaway's collection already appears in the swanky local gift boutique Morgan Imports, as well as the cute and kitschy, Vaguely Reminiscent on 9th Street. Between an upcoming new collection with more cut options and styles available for women (and men) due out in late October, his recent shirt designs for Durham-based band LiLa, and other upcoming collaborations, we can only expect to see more from this transient inspired, exciting new line. To view the collection, visit www.RunawayClothes.com, and for more work from the artist, Gabriel Eng-Goetz, go to www.PorkFriedArt.com.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, Fashion, Pop Culture

Durham's Five Points

The Clarion Content's brilliant new Culture columnist, Cady Childs, has the first of a two part series rethinking Durham's Centerfest. As likely most of you know, dear readers, Centerfest, a thirty-seven year-old Durham tradition, is taking a hiatus this year. What was sad news for many Durhamanians at first, may end up being a wonderful opportunity as the beloved, one-time street festival reconciles itself to Durham's vibrant, exploding, downtown cultural scene. Durham loved Centerfest when nobody outside Durham loved Durham. Now Durham pride and patriotism are everywhere: our food, our music, our art are undergoing renaissance of proportions not seen for generations¹, it is time to bring Centerfest into this era.

Cady Childs channels her personal experiences at the height of Centerfest's popularity to envision what it might become again.


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Imagine being ten-years-old, in the passenger’s seat of your Dad’s truck, the whole booth packed back tight and cozy behind you, dusk-tinged sky in front. A cream soda bottle clutched in your fist drips chilly beads of condensation over your hands and thighs, leaving streaks from where it cuts through the street grime clinging to your palms, fingers, legs, and arms. You’re singing in harmony with Whiskeytown’s ‘Avenues’, and the then bare, dirty, and empty Morgan Street streams outside your window. You’re clutching a tile you made all by yourself out of tiny little mosaic squares, mapping out a gray sword with an off-white border, a present for your older brother’s upcoming birthday. Proudly, you hold it up to your father, his show hat secure to his head with a leather cord, big nineties shades and a t-shirt line peeking out from under his sleeve. It is 1998, Centerfest is at its peak, and your mind is a sponge sucking up everything around you.

I remember wandering up and down the blocked off grid of Main, Corcoran, Chapel Hill, and Morgan streets, the potters, painters, leathermakers, quilters, photographers, jewelers, and sculptures sitting under their white canopy tents, most with portable fans clipped to the back pole to cool them off. These blocks, instead of yielding to the traffic headed for the Durham Freeway, were packed with people, their brightly toned shirts and hats making a hodge-podge, a spotted flag out of downtown. I would stop and stare with child-like wonder at everything I saw, and while the craftsmanship was impressive, it is the people I remember the most. Many of these artists, my father included, knew each other from other shows. They were a community. They had shared booths next to each other at the Eno, been a few spots away at Virginia Beach. They had watched each other’s children grow older, had mutually observed one another’s art develop.

The familial and the familiar was always more apparent at certain shows than others, Centerfest felt to me, a kid who grew up around it, more like a reunion than anything else. I spent the afternoons quietly walking around the Durham Arts Council, sneaking into a dance studio I knew on the top floor from summer camp. It was always unlocked and empty, a great place to play. I’d roam the hallways, peaking in at artists quietly at work, teenage actors sitting on the back steps flirting with each other before their afternoon performances. I would stare at prints and paintings on the walls. Enjoying how hushed and quiet it felt in the corridors, almost, hallowed and holy, almost church like, the thick wall of crowd noise and humidity that hit me as I walked out the door always felt dramatic, vibrant, alive with community and art: more talent, more voices, more mediums, more life than most children’s heads have an opportunity to witness or experience throughout the entirety of their elementary educations.

Recently, Centerfest has been such a hot topic for papers, news stories, blogs, conversations over lunch, etc., it’s hard to be left out of the loop or miss the buzz surrounding the Durham Art Council’s recent decision. After several years of declining attendance, squeezed budgets and funding, the conclusion was to “rest the festival for 2011 in order to launch a one year visioning/production process for the 2012 expanded arts and entertainment festival format.” This new format, according to Sherry DeVries, executive director of the DAC, will include additions such as a food festival, and perhaps synchronization with other Durham events and entertainments such as Full Frame and African-American Dance Ensembles, taking note from successful festival models such as Bele Chere, Asheville’s yearly booze, food, music, and art weekend celebration.

I am personally struggling to see how Centerfest (not parking lot Centerfest---old, Five-Points Centerfest) did not already serve as the festival of converged Durham cultures, tastes, sounds, and smells it seems DeVries is hoping to create (and find the funds for). Budget cuts are something we can understand, now more than ever, and certainly no one is pointing a finger of blame at the first person to suggest attempting to attract art lovers into a barren parking lot on a sunny, unseasonably hot, autumn day. The loss of what Centerfest used to be is apparent, almost self-evident and the why it happened is not one answered with one name or one group. It is a question of place.

Breaking the festival away from the Arts Council building that has served as its beacon, its central hub, was likely rooted in the financial reality rather than in the ideal world. A parking lot cannot stimulate the character of city streets. This loss of character and eroding of the community vibe has been clearly visible in the steady drop in attendance since the festival’s move. But now, with a commitment to making it better than ever being heard and felt across so many Durham demographics, the step to take Centerfest back to it’s original form and location seems more possible and achievable than ever.

Local businesses, restaurants and foot traffic are ever more prevalent inside the Loop. Downtown Durham is thriving! Imagine what could be created with all the amazing new establishments as a part of the process. Imagine the representative canvas it would paint, local artists, musicians, performers, and small business owners working together each year on a celebration of our cultures, our ideas, our community and its people. Durham.

Considering the exposure the Arts Council and everything surrounding it would receive in those two days, it’s hard to think that there aren’t enough people to create the necessary coalition and financing for the festival to be heralded home to it’s literally, street form. And personally, I can’t think of a better form to base this re-envisioning process on than the Centerfest of the past.


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¹Just ask the New York Times. Or check out this month's Durham Magazine. (Of course, if you only read The Independent, you'd never know...)

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture

Picture credit to the kickass folks at Carpe Durham

The Clarion Content is delighted to invite you to come along on a magical ride as Pop Culture columnist, Cady Childs, once again takes us "Searching for Ringside." This fictional look at life in Durham explores the common trials, travails and misadventures so many Durhamanians face. The metamythical characters, Andrew, Vita, John, and Megan, and their sordid but bemusing stories will resonate with those of you who carouse in Durham. Cady knows our collective experience, she shines a light on it and relates it back to us with a laugh and a smile.

Check out earlier chapters here [you will have to scroll down]...


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Chapter III, "This was gonna be the big one, folks."

Andrew sat in his living room, surrounded by unread newspapers strewn about in angst, watching a woman with bumpy skin and a brunette bob pointing and gesturing to clouds, maps, and water on a screen behind her. A tone of destruction in her voice made the whole broadcast seem like it was meant to be foreboding, but it read like a mock local news station skit, her arm fat jiggling as her hands waved, traveling the scope of the east coast and up into Canada.

He’d heard it all before. Every year, around mid-September, the meteorologists threatened their southern city with the hurricane of the century, keeping them in check, aware of their respective places in the universe, and giving everyone a reason to scramble around in a frenzy, preparing themselves to be bunkered in and hunkered down. But if you were faced with a natural disaster, would you really be huffed up on getting the last loaf of bread at the store, or would you be searching for something else to get you through the tides?

Andrew did not believe in disaster shopping for milk and bread with the rest of the throngs, but he was fully stocked on Lucky’s, Jim Beam, Vienna sausages, and had an entire pound bag of ground coffee from the shop up the street. He’d even broken down and bought his own French press. Just in case. He didn’t want to be without his familiar companions, even in the eye of the storm.

Vita was in her bedroom, sprawled out on the bed and blasting Florence and the Machine. She hated storms, and since she was a kid she always felt safest in bed, attempting to ignore the wind whipped branches tapping hello at her window, the lightning flashing brighter than sunshine to hung over eyes was somehow easier there. She was playing ‘Hurricane Love’ over and over, ironic as it was, but she had been doing this off and on before the storm hit, so there was no sense in stopping now. She thumbed through Lookbooks on her phone and drew multiple pictures of the same dress over and over in varying sizes on a page in her little lilac book. She awaited the end of the turmoil, one wary eye on the looming blob of red that was traveling slowly, showboating across the center of the state on the live Doppler radar broadcast.

John was laying on the couch with the chick in the Alexander Wang dress. Two days later, and she hadn’t done anything to annoy him yet, or said something that sounded ditzy. He kissed her temples, working his way down to her mouth. She was still emanating scents of cinnamon and peppermint, even after rolling around all night in his bed, which he knew reeked of cedar from the woodchips he put underneath his mattress (it ensured a boyish, woodsy scent that made girls feel safe, at ease). They were laying in front of three glass windows that ran from ceiling to floor in the front of his apartment, playing chicken to see who would get scared of the Tempest worthy display first.

She wasn’t real. Girls like this didn’t move to this town and smell like this after having sex all night, or laugh at hurricanes. And they didn’t know enough about grammar or Cummings to call him out on the extra comma he had put in that quote on his wall.

“That’s supposed to be a hyphen there, you know,” she was swaying, drunk after the bar, and he was noticing how much he liked the way her lips were shaped when she smiled, than noticing it was really strange that he noticed something like that about her.

“Yeah, well,” he murmured this phrase in an attempt to make her lean closer to him, and as she started to laugh, he grabbed her hips and decided some contact might be the best way to see why it was he kept staring at her mouth so hard. She didn’t object.

Megan loved watching the rain. She sat on her screened-in porch (it was the reason she paid so much in rent, so she may as well enjoy it), drinking red wine and feeling the strong wind blow drops of chilly precipitation on her cheeks, making pinprick tingles when they landed on her skin, which was flushed from the alcohol. There was something about the power of the weather that made her feel content. It had a way of settling things around it, whether they wanted to be settled or not. You didn’t have much of a choice in a hurricane- you just had to sit still and wait it out. She’d always thought she’d be great at storm chasing, but that might just be from seeing Helen Hunt being so badass in Twister at a young age. Still, there’s something to be said for someone that not only doesn’t mind a threat, but who seeks it out, so they can feel life a little more. She heard warning alarms going off at the school down the street, and reveled in her little rocking chair in the middle of it all, stretching like a cat in a pool of sunshine.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, Searching for Ringside

Picture credit to the kickass folks at Carpe Durham

The Clarion Content is delighted to invite you to come along on a magical ride as Pop Culture columnist, Cady Childs, once again takes us "Searching for Ringside." This fictional look at life in Durham traipses through familiar haunts. Cady explores the trials, travails and misadventures so many Durhamanians face. The metamythical characters, Andrew, Vita, John, and Megan, and their sordid but bemusing stories will resonate with those of you who carouse in Durham. Cady knows our collective experience, she shines a light on it and relates it back to us with a laugh and a smile.

Check out Chapter I, the Introduction, here.


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Chapter II, "They're baaaa-aack."

Andrew entered his daily coffee stop, looking down at his hands while he walked through the door-he had a bug bite on the web between his pointer finger and thumb, and was attempting to mentally will it to stop itching (he couldn’t scratch it-he was not one to easily give in). Not looking, he clumsily ran into the back of a small, curvy woman standing at the end of a very long line, polluted with university key chains and mother’s carrying those handbags that look like quilts. What was the line doing all the way back here?

The poor local behind the counter, the ends of her hair bright pink like they had been dipped in raspberry Kool-Aid, was being stoned by the crowd with inquiries about what café au lait is, and bombarded full force with demands about what frappucinos she had to offer, her sad little face getting more confused and red by the second. Andrew quietly ducked out the back door, barely stepping out of the way of two girls walking in high wedge sandals, who clearly hadn’t learn how to balance in them yet, sorority pledge ribbons already pinned to their ample chests with baby silver safety pins.

Oh, he’d forgotten. He’d forgotten. He’d forgotten summer was almost over. He’d forgotten about this weekend, like he did every year until it was already upon him. He seriously needed a cigarette.

Move in weekend was hell on earth for a twenty-something-girl with a shitty dye job serving brunch. Megan looked in the soap spotted mirror over the sink in the bathroom at work, willing herself to travel back twenty-four hours and warn past dimension Megan not to listen to the stylist’s idea to tint her hair ‘a few days in the sunshine lighter.’ She winced in the mirror at her Taylor Swift blonde locks, and pale skin. Not a good combination, unless you’re actually Taylor Swift and look like a fairy from Lord of The Rings. She sighed to herself, tightened her apron, and walked out into the dining room like a knight preparing to face the gauntlet.

And face it, she did. Three hours and forty some turns later, Megan stood behind a packed bar, making mimosas for a group of six that showed up with just twenty minutes left till they closed. Three guys sat in front of her, drinking champagne and talking about their lives loudly enough for everyone around them to hear just how amazing, fuckable, and sought-after they were. A blue-eyed, almost porcelain faced type, who looked like he used expensive moisturizer, and kept his legs crossed on his bar stool like a girl perched for a flirt, shouted at a high enough volume for a three-year-old girl playing with Cheerios at the table beside them to turn and coo, her eyes wide in surveillance, “I mean, I just hate that bitch. Any tall chick with a big rack and blonde hair just always looks like she wants to get fucked. Right? Am I right? She’s a joke, man.” His two buddies laughed and nodded, and one looked up to see Megan’s face, responding not only to the thought of someone letting this kid into college, but the visceral scene of the little girl staring at them like they were something on a television screen, ‘True Life: Low Self Esteem & Being A Dick’. She grabbed a paper cup and silently poured the rest of the champagne bottle into it, staring the jerk with the American Girl doll skin right back in the face, daring him to say a word as she walked toward the back of the restaurant, cup in hand.

John had exactly ten minutes to scribble something ironic on his chalkboard wall before his buddy Jack came over to pregame with some girls he had just picked up before they went out. He had frantically starting googling ‘unknown great Gatsby quotes’ while checking his hair in the mirror over his bed (yes, he had a mirror over his bed, and it was an antique with a big crack down the middle. He’d seen it in his sister’s Anthropologie catalogue and had to have it, of course, he would never admit this. He told people it was a family heirloom). He was interrupted by a new text from Jack: ‘Met some new freshies an they wanna get high. Im bringing them with.’ This gave John little to no info to work with in his preparations. Shit! He switched his search to e.e. cummings.

It would have been nice to at least know what the girls looked like, whether they were preppy or urban, if they were wearing heels (girls in heels loved it when he quoted Shakespeare, but if they were wearing little sparkly flats or something Mark Twain was a better stand-by). e.e. Cummings was the best neutral pick- he naturally turned girls on, made them feel special with his broken grammar, seemingly stuttering with awe. “You, Not Not You, Not Possible.” Damn, that was perfect. He heard his buzzer and rung them out, pulling back his curtain to see what to expect. He caught the back of one of the girls before they went in the lobby. Fuck. White cowboy boots and an Alexander Wang dress. Now he didn’t know what to do.

Vita did not, repeat, did not mean to wear a white, strapless sundress out on the week the influx of students returned. She had forgotten this was coming, and wearing the most generic looking piece she owned at such a time of excessive population was not, repeat, not, a good idea. She was a chameleon in the crowd, and two boys in bowties had already asked her what she was studying. She always responded with feminist theory when asked this by such characters, though she was not in school, it was a surefire way to insure they would leave her the hell alone for the rest of the night.

Looking across the room at her group of friends, who all had gotten started a little earlier than her, and who were all looking around at the swarms of people starting to charge the bar with the same expressions of uneasiness on their faces that she was feeling, she decided to call it an early night. Saying her goodbyes, she started to walk home (it was only a few blocks to her little converted one-bedroom), and made a last-minute, one more glass of sauvignon blanc stop at a wine bar a few store fronts away from her place. It was pretty empty, this place was far enough from the immediate campus to avoid being polluted by squealing girls and drooling boys (at least yet, anyway). She unlaced her little lavender notebook and opened it, but only so it looked like she was doing something. Sometimes she got bored pretending she wanted to be in action and surrounded by people all the time. Sometimes she just wanted to sit and listen to the quiet.

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture, Searching for Ringside