Month: May 2015

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News News Blog

Man Convicted for Downloading Child Porn at Best Buy

Nesler

A man was sentenced to 10 years in prison this week for downloading child pornography at an East Memphis Best Buy.

In September 2012, John Nesler, 51, used three different computer tablets on display at the Best Buy store at 5821 Poplar to pull up pornographic photographs of female minors, according to information from the office of Edward Stanton, United States Attorney for the Western District of Tennessee.

Nester then took pictures of the images on his cellphone.

On September 10, a Best Buy employee witnessed Nesler downloading the pictures and alerted store managers. They called the Memphis Police Department. Nester was still in the store when police arrived.

Officers arrested Nesler, seized his phone, and the tablets he’d used. Police found about 114 sexually suggestive images of female minors that had been taken between September 3 through September 10. A search of the tablets found that they had been used to search for child pornography.

Nester had been convicted in 2007 for downloading and viewing child pornography. He had been sentenced to five years in prison and 10 year supervised release for the offense.

Charges from the 2012 Best Buy incident netted Nesler 10 years in prison and a lifetime of supervision.  

Categories
Cover Feature News

Sunrise, Sunset …

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

The night was beautiful.

The weather was perfect. The crowd that descended on Tom Lee Park for the last-ever Sunset Symphony was enormous. And they say that the fireworks display that closed this year’s Memphis In May (MIM) festival was the largest pyrotechnic show the city has ever witnessed.

That last bit may very well be true, but as impressive as the fireworks were, the night’s biggest bang wasn’t launched from a cannon set up behind the stage. It was delivered by conductor Mei-Ann Chen and the musicians of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra (MSO), who tore through a diverse selection of patriotic anthems, popular favorites, and classical crowd pleasers, pulling out the stops at every turn.

Earlier this year, Memphis In May President and CEO Jim Holt announced that the Sunset Symphony, a festival tradition since 1977, was being discontinued. The concert, he said, had reached the end of its natural life span and would be replaced by a new, more participatory event that won’t be announced until sometime in the first quarter of 2016.

So, for their 39th, and possibly final riverside concert for Memphis In May, the MSO packed the park front to back and gave the diverse and multigenerational crowd a generous taste of what they’ll be missing in the years to come.

“For me, this kind of program isn’t just about the kinds of things we love as lovers of classical music,” Chen said, explaining her method for selecting the appropriate sunset material. Chen has proven to be an especially thoughtful music director, who worked with Memphis In May to develop a nostalgic program that satisfied expectations, while still leaving room for some surprises.

“It’s about the community and creating a memorable concert experience for the widest audience we ever reach. It’s about creating that rich communal experience and doing whatever it takes,” Chen added.

In this case, Chen thought the appropriate communal listening experience required a healthy mix of familiar classical works, like Rossini’s “William Tell Overture,” some of the more romantic passages from Bizet’s Carmen, and three selections from Prokofiev’s Romeo & Juliet. The last Sunset Symphony also saw the return of popular favorites such as “Old Man River” and George Gershwin’s “Summertime,” as sung by Memphis-based soprano Kallen Esperian. Even piano-pounding Senator Lamar Alexander, who wowed MIM crowds back in 2008, showed up to play a medley of Memphis songs backed by the MSO.

“I’m here because I play piano just a little bit better than other senators and governors,” Alexander quipped modestly, as he sat down to the keyboard, name-checking the recently deceased B.B. King and reminding Memphis of the tremendous cultural gifts the city has given the world.

Not only was this year’s concert the last Sunset Symphony, it also marked the first and only time that Chen, a dynamic rising star in the world of classical music, has conducted at the event. “I did make it clear to [Memphis In May] that I would like to do at least one Sunset Symphony before I wrapped up my tenure,” Chen said, explaining that she often books guest conductor gigs several years in advance, and May is a popular month for scheduling concerts.

“We didn’t know at the time this was scheduled that this concert was also going to be the sunset for the Sunset Symphony. But I am so honored and grateful that, at least, I get to close the door. It’s such an honor to be on the podium for such an important, historic event, even though it’s bittersweet.”

The event was more bitter than sweet, in some regards. In February of this year, Chen, a highly sought after guest artist with an explosive and theatrically charged conducting style, announced that she would also be leaving the MSO when her contract ends in 2016. “But Memphis will always be home,” Chen said. “I will always come back.

“And I want to also let people know,” she said, “that even though the Sunset Symphony is ending, the Memphis Symphony Orchestra is always going to be here serving our community through incredible concerts.

“We’ve got so many talented musicians, and they are indispensable assets to our community. That’s why I also wanted to build into this [concert] music that would showcase the musicians before I wrap up my tenure here.”

The MSO’s CEO Roland Valliere has only lived in Memphis for 18 months or so, but he has a strong sense for what the event has meant to the city and faith that the MSO will find newer and better ways to connect to the community.

“The Sunset Symphony has been a signature event for the orchestra for a period of time,” he says. “It has been an opportunity for the orchestra to reach a broad segment of the community, and it’s something the community greatly enjoys,” Valliere said.

For many Memphians, he added, the Sunset Symphony and the Memphis Symphony Orchestra have become synonymous. “We’re exploring other possibilities, having active conversations about what might happen next, but we’re not prepared to announce anything definitive as of yet. Still, we are optimistic and encouraged about the future of this event or something similar.”

Although the MSO has depleted its modest endowment and continues to struggle financially, Valliere has good reasons to be optimistic.

“A year ago, the orchestra was faced with some significant challenges, but we have made remarkable progress,” he said, while allowing that the musicians have taken steep pay cuts and were “extraordinarily impacted” by changes as the organization shifted into austerity mode.

“But the community has really responded,” Valliere said. “Now we have some cash and some time. So we’re in a much better place than we were a year ago. We’re not out of the woods, but we’re on the path out of the woods.”

The Sunset Symphony has always had a patriotic edge, coming as it usually does on Memorial Day weekend. From the roar of retired war planes in the traditional airshow to the rousing strains of a John Philip Sousa march to usher in the closing fireworks, it has remained an old-fashioned community picnic.

Until he retired in 1998, bass-baritone James Hyter entertained the Sunset Symphony’s diverse crowds with multiple encores of “Old Man River,” the Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein classic contrasting the hard life of African Americans with the slow-moving Mississippi River’s endless ambivalence.

“You take the high note, and I’ll take the low note,” he’d say, encouraging the audience to sing along.

The song was powerfully revived by baritone Richard Todd Payne, who, like Hyter before him, was brought back for repeat performances.

“After ‘Old Man River,’ nothing can follow that,” Chen said. Nothing except for a reprise of “Glory,” the recent Golden Globe-winning theme song to the civil rights film Selma. The MSO, which had performed “Glory” in April at the National Civil Rights Museum with rapper Al Kapone, made the protest song its parting shot, prior to the “1812 Overture.”

“Resistance is us,” Kapone chanted, in what may have been the most socially relevant moment in the history of the traditionally conservative Sunset Symphony. “That’s why Rosa sat on the bus. That’s why we walk through Ferguson with our hands up.” Like Payne before them, Kapone and baritone Donald O’Connor were brought back for an encore.

Then, as it has for 39 years, the Sunset Symphony ended with the “1812 Overture” and “Stars and Stripes Forever,” while fireworks lit up the night.

Then it ended it for good. The music faded, the trucks selling funnel cakes rolled away, the families milled back to their cars. But old man river just kept rolling along.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

Pomp and Circumstances

I attended the White Station High School graduation ceremony last weekend. My stepson crossed the stage without incident, got his diploma, and is now ready to fly the nest, come September. He’s a great kid, a good student, and we’re very proud of him. (Not as proud as a few families, who, despite pleas from the principal to refrain from applause and demonstrations of enthusiasm, went nuts when their family member crossed the stage — signage, horns, etc. We opted for the restrained and tasteful, “Whoo!”)

The speeches by the valedictorian and salutatorian were sweet and touching, if somewhat predictable: “It seems like only yesterday, we were lowly freshmen, wandering the halls, lost and confused … .” Right. Give it a few decades, kid. It’ll still seem like yesterday. And you’ll still be lost and confused.

I’ve never given a graduation speech, but I have heard lots of them. Some were notable: Patriots Coach Bill Belichick gave the commencement speech at my son’s Wesleyan graduation. (I don’t think he said anything about always making sure your balls are properly inflated, but it was a while back.) But most graduation speeches are pretty predictable. If I were ever to give one, I would keep it short, mainly because everybody just wants to go take pictures of their grad and get their mimosas on.

Life is precious and goes by quicker than you can imagine. Don’t risk losing yours because you want a thrill, e.g., jumping off a cliff with a parachute or putting street drugs in your body or standing on your head to chug a beer. Darwin was right. Nature winnows out the idiots. Don’t be one.

Love your family and friends. They are your refuge.

Avoid the herd mentality. Don’t be a blind follower or a pleaser. Learn to step back and assess situations and have the courage to say, “Nah. Y’all go ahead.”

Fail. If you’re not failing once in a while, you need to reassess your life and find something that challenges you. Everybody gets fired at some point. You’ll survive.

Find work that makes you happy, and don’t stop trying until you do. When you discover your purpose, everything else gets easier, including relationships. Some people spend their entire lives bitching about their job, instead of changing it. Or themselves. Don’t be that person.

Don’t take yourself too seriously. Pretty much everything is funny, eventually. Including you. And that stupid beard.

Keep up with what’s going on in your community — in government, politics, the arts, its public spaces. Read the local news. Get involved and work for the change you desire. Being a hater and cynic will eat your soul. Being clueless or apathetic gives the power to others.

Go outside and disengage from the grid. Find your natural self. Be quiet.

Find a release for your creativity, whether it’s music, art, photography, or writing something that fills a column space each week.

Categories
Editorial Opinion

OPED Issues at Shelby County Schools

CREDIT: Danziger

Like probably every other publication in town, as well as any other Memphians and Shelby Countians who have some degree of involvement with or interest in public affairs, we are on retired citizen Joe Saino’s mailing list. Saino, whom we made the subject of a Flyer profile some years ago, keeps a close eye on how taxpayer money gets spent, and he is generous about sharing his research, which almost always runs to the ways that we (and that “we” is our governments) are spending — or have committed to spend — too much, without taking the necessary steps to properly fund our liabilities.

Saino is much like Tennessee’s junior U.S. senator, Bob Corker, in that he not only frets about public spending, he itemizes his anxieties and, as often as not, proposes solutions that are equally itemized. And, further like the senator, who most recently vented his concerns about overspending at the national level at a Chamber of Commerce luncheon in Memphis two weekends ago, Saino sees himself as a voice in the wilderness, a prophet of sorts who isn’t being sufficiently listened to.

The initials OPEB (“other post-employment benefits”) are a familiar element of the public dialogue these days, and Saino, as much as anybody, is responsible for raising public awareness about them. In essence, OPEBs — which include such benefits to retirees as life insurance, health care, and disability payments — were at the root of some painful budget decisions made in city government over the past couple of years (and will figure significantly in this year’s city elections). And they have now come front and center in discussions concerning the budget of Shelby County government for the fiscal year 2015-16.

County government bears the brunt of expenditures for local public education, and Shelby County Schools (SCS) has just presented the county a bill for a $14.9 million budget increase that has to do — largely or at least significantly — with the OPEB matter. At least, that’s the opinion of Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell, who saw fit to scold the SCS administration for ignoring the need to limit OPEB expenses while county government, voluntarily, and Memphis city government, more or less involuntarily but realistically, had been dealing with the issue in recent years. Luttrell went so far as to advise SCS, “Maybe you need to look at layoffs.”

In budget committee meetings last week, the Shelby County Commission provisionally agreed to adopt an administration plan that cut the SCS request in half, but that won’t be set in stone until the next public commission meeting of June 1st, if at all. And if it does get final commission approval, the SCS board and administration will have little choice but to make some difficult decisions of their own. A day after the commission reached its preliminary conclusions, an SCS board meeting on Thursday took up the OPEB matter but reached no firm conclusions about what to do.

Should SCS join an ongoing suit by the Chattanooga school system against state underfunding to localities of BEP (Basic Education Program) funds? Of course, it should. But that’s long-term. Hopefully, school officials can reach a Solomonic decision on OPEB cuts by themselves — before June 1st, if possible; before July 1st, by necessity.

Categories
Letters To The Editor Opinion

What They Said (May 28, 2015) …

CREDIT: Greg Cravens

Greg Cravens

About Kevin Lipe’s post, “How the World Ends: Game 6, Warriors 108, Grizzlies 95” …

As a Warrior fan (since 1965) I would like to say that the Grizzlies are a classy, hard-nosed team with classy fans. They gave the Dubs all they wanted, that is for sure. Also, I will say that I enjoyed reading your columns during this series and I wish you all the best!

GHN

About Bruce VanWyngarden’s editor’s letter, “The Big Empties” …

Yes, positive things are happening downtown and in Midtown. But rather than the obligatory references to Jack Belz and Henry Turley, I would like to see the grass-roots organizations, most notably Memphis Heritage, get credit for the endless amount of energy they have expended in making all of this a reality.

The Belz family certainly jump-started downtown’s rebirth when they purchased and restored the Peabody, but, as a founding member of the Chickasaw Bluffs Conservancy, all I remember of Henry Turley is he and Mayor Herenton fighting us tooth-and-nail for 10 years to prevent the Bluffwalk from being built on the site where Turley’s million-dollar homes overlooked the river.

Research all the restoration projects listed in that article and you will find Memphis Heritage and other activist groups heavily involved in all, including the battle at Overton Square. Good article, and easy to mention the household names, but there are foot soldiers out there working on these issues every day.

Gordon Alexander

The comment regarding the work of MHA director Robert Lipscomb — especially concerning public housing redevelopment — deserves closer examination. As a graduate student in city planning at the University of Memphis, we have examined both the city’s treatment of public housing and its strategy of using huge sums of public money to finance big-ticket development projects in our studies. 

In regards to public housing: While this system has assuredly had many problems in Memphis and throughout the country, affordable housing is a critical need for the most vulnerable of our population. As one example of the importance of public housing, low-income single mothers often use subsidized housing as a stepping stone to a better life as they are able to save more money and/or get additional training that leads to better employment opportunities. 

When bundled with needed social support systems, HOPE VI (now Choice Neighborhoods) can work, but these safety nets are often absent in the aftermath of relocation. In the worst cases, relocated tenants end up homeless when they cannot keep up with utility bills that were formerly subsidized in public housing. The new mixed-income communities offer minimal affordable housing units, thereby essentially facilitating gentrification. 

In regards to big-ticket development projects that have been the calling card under the Lipscomb’s direction, it is hardly time to declare victory in the use of this strategy. Before we hand him his gold watch, I think a balanced examination of Lipscomb’s record is needed.

Travis Allen

About the Bipartisan Sportsmen’s Act …

Imagine you are out for a hike with your dog and he gets caught in a steel-jawed leg trap that someone set out on our public lands. Or your children are exploring the woods and they come across a trap. That will be very possible if a bill now moving through Congress becomes law.

The bill, known as the Bipartisan Sportsmen’s Act (S. 405), is anything but sporting. Already, the majority of our public lands are open to hunting, so there is no shortage of access for hunters. But this bill would, for the first time, expand the federal definition of “hunting” to include trapping, and that would open all U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands to hunting and trapping. Steel traps, basically landmines for wildlife, introduce another risk to your child or pet. Traps are notoriously cruel and barbaric, with animals struggling in pain for hours or days before death. The American Veterinary Medical Association reports that up to 67 percent of animals caught in leg traps are not the intended target and that many “mistakenly” caught and then released do not recover.

This legislation is unnecessary and unfair. Senator Lamar Alexander is an important vote on this bill. Please contact him and let him know that you oppose trapping on public land.

Cindy Marx-Sanders

Categories
Politics Politics Feature

Memorial Time

CREDIT: Jackson Baker

The past week, properly enough, has been one of official memorials for the military veterans who have made the supreme sacrifice for their country, and — in this corner, anyhow — has also been a time to remember others who have left us or suffered significant harm on some other kind of firing line.

It was, for example, inspiring to see former journalist and current FedEx customer service specialist Oran Quintrell out and in public and appearing to be of good spirit at the annual Bratfest sponsored by various of his fellow Democratic activists in southeast Memphis on Memorial Day. It was the first outing for Quintrell, a victim of diabetes, since the amputation of his lower legs and his fitting for prosthetic substitutes.

It would be overdoing it to say that Quintrell was jaunty, but both he and his wife, Joyce, were satisfyingly whole and back to normal in any number of impressive ways, and gave every indication that they will be on hand to add their good cheer and stimulating company in all kinds of social situations to come.

Quintrell’s disease and rehab regimen have served as a “wake-up call,” observed his longtime friend Steve Steffens, a co-host for the Bratfest affair.

Diabetes has been much in the news of late. It was given as the proximate cause of death for the legendary B.B. King, who has been the subject of several memorials since his death last week in Las Vegas and was to be honored with yet another on Beale Street on Wednesday of this week.

And it was the focus of attention at the recent fund-raising banquet of the West Tennessee chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF).

Held at the East Memphis Hilton on May 9th, the event was co-hosted by honorary Chairman David Pickler, the former longtime Shelby County Schools president, whose company, the Pickler Wealth Advisers, is an annual sponsor of the event and whose daughter, Katie Pickler, is chief development officer of the West Tennessee chapter. Emcee for the JDRF banquet was Darrell Greene, news anchor for WHBQ-TV, Fox 13.

Speaking of “satisfyingly whole” and “of good cheer,” it is hard to imagine anybody more suggestive of those phrases than Greene, a former star athlete during his student days in Arkansas and the very embodiment of public good health. Yet Darrell is one of the many victims of juvenile diabetes. After being diagnosed at the age of 24, he has had to submit to the same daily insulin regimen as other JD1 sufferers, a treatment routine that is necessary to sustain normal life, or, in some cases, life itself.

The JDRF banquet, which had a Roaring Twenties theme, attracted numerous luminaries, no few of them from the world of politics. The auction of items and services donated by various individuals and institutions raised more than $365,000 for research.

Juvenile diabetes (also known as Type 1) is so-called because it appears to be innate (i.e., likely present in some form from birth) and is not necessarily the result of specific life circumstances. Type 2, which accounts for most known cases, is more usually attributed to specific developmental circumstances, like obesity or overuse of sugar. Both kinds of diabetes involve impairment of the body’s metabolism and ability to process blood sugar and are threatening to life and limb.

• Last week also presented three occasions for friends to remember former state legislator and women’s rights activist Kathryn Bowers — memorial services at St. Paul Catholic Church on Friday (where video clips from her time in public life were shown), followed by a funeral mass there on Saturday and burial on Tuesday at Calvary Cemetery.

Bowers’ observances occurred on the same weekend as events in Memphis connected with the annual convention here of the Tennessee Federation of Democratic Women, an organization in which she had often figured large.

Bowers, a longtime member of the Democratic leadership in the House, was well-liked and respected across party lines despite the fact of her arrest in 2005 (almost 10 years ago, exactly), along with several other legislators, in the FBI’s Tennessee Waltz sting. Bowers’ arrest occurred only days after she was sworn in as a state senator after winning a special election to fill a vacancy.

After serving a brief prison term for bribery, Bowers devoted much of her time in recent years to charitable activity and to voter registration drives.

• As this is a column largely devoted to memory and memorials, I will take the opportunity to express some overdue condolences — to Adrienne Pakis-Gillon, a former candidate for the state Senate and a Democratic activist, for the death of her father, Jim Pakis, and to Susan and George Simmons, activists also, for the death of their son Forest, whose extraordinary good nature so clearly derived from that of his parents.

Even more overdue: condolences to the survivors of Shirley Boatright, a tireless campaign worker and strategist for all sorts of candidates and public figures, across all kinds of ideological lines, who died back in December 2013.

This list of overlooked remembrances is by no means complete and will be added to in the course of time.

• And, speaking of memorials, there was one clear message from the crowd of advocates and celebrants who showed up for an all-day “Roundhouse Revival” event on Saturday at the site of the long-dormant Mid-South Coliseum, now threatened with imminent extinction as a result of ongoing development plans.

And that message was: Rumors of the Coliseum’s uselessness have been greatly exaggerated. Discussed at the event, intermittently with music and even some ‘rassling featuring Jerry Lawler and Bill Dundee versus some certified bad guys, were a number of proposals, including one for a wrestling museum, which would allow the Coliseum to be rehabbed and retrofitted for new life.

Among the political figures observed there, either as spectators or as participants, were City Councilman (and mayoral candidate) Jim Strickland, City Council candidate Chooch Pickard, and County Commissioner Steve Basar. This, too, is an incomplete list.

Categories
News News Feature

Good Moves

The second-floor classroom at Douglass K-8 Optional School was so quiet, you could hear chess pieces slide across the board. Pairs of students were bent over chessboards, their eyes flitting across the squares as their teacher, Jeff Bulington, leaned back in his chair.

He called out moves and the students shifted their pieces to match the directions, which to me sounded like another language. But these students, most of them girls, are fluent in chess and they have the record to prove it.

Last month, Bulington took two girls’ teams to the 12th Annual Kasparov Chess Foundation All-Girls National Chess Championships in Chicago.

Shimera Paxton, Aleha Cole, Marley Fabijanic, and Teiraney L. Biggs came in an impressive second place in the under-14 division. In the under-16 division, the team of Jerrica Randle, Christy Thomas and Jasmine Thomas also took second place.

Marley and Shimera both won a spot to compete at the Susan Polgar national tournament at St. Louis’ Webster University in July, Bulington said.

Bulington is clearly very proud of his students, who come from the middle school and the high school, which is next door. But he’s not effusive and perhaps following his lead, neither are they. I congratulate them and they smile politely. It’s as if they’re thinking: Of course, we did well at the competition. That’s what we do.

This self-assuredness and confidence isn’t in any formal curriculum, but it’s invaluable.

In his 18th-century essay, “Morals of Chess,” Benjamin Franklin remarked that “we learn by chess the habit of not being discouraged by present appearances in the state of our affairs, the habit of hoping for a favourable change, and that of persevering in the search of resources.

“The game of Chess is not merely an idle amusement. Several very valuable qualities of the mind, useful in the course of human life, are to be acquired or strengthened by it, so as to become habits, ready on all occasions.”

In a valiant but ultimately futile attempt to teach me, Marley and Christy face off.

I asked the girls how much each piece is worth. They hesitated. “It depends,” Marley replied. “A king could be worth five points, but if it’s not in a good spot, it’s not worth as much.”

“The position,” Christy concluded, “affects the value of the piece.”

In chess, that seems fair. In life, not so much.

How do these girls’ positions affect what society thinks they’re worth?

Geographically, they’re situated in North Memphis, firmly inside the C-shaped sea of poverty that cups downtown, North, and South Memphis. These are not neighborhoods from which residents have many obvious options — for employment, grocery stores, or shopping.

If you had to calculate their civic value simply by the amount of public investment here, you’d say they weren’t worth much. However as public school students, they’re priceless to companies like Pearson (and its shareholders), which can make millions off them as test takers.

This emphasis on high-stakes testing produces students who may be able to parrot back what they were taught, but it doesn’t produce thinkers who ask if we’re asking the right questions.

What happens under Bulington’s instruction is different from traditional education, where the knowledge is passed from the teacher down to the students. Here, students are engaged in the production and creation of knowledge, as they teach each other, he explained.

Then there’s the opportunity to travel to tournaments, to try different foods they wouldn’t have at home, to stay in hotels — even what it’s like to fly on a plane, as the team did for the first time on their last trip to Chicago.

Girls are typically marginalized in the chess world, but not here. On this morning in Bulington’s class, there are just three boys.

Bulington, who was also a chess coach at Lester Elementary, hasn’t taught these students long enough to know whether chess will boost their TCAP scores, but he has his own data.

Take Aleha, for example. She’s a relatively newcomer to chess, who joined the team after a stint playing violin in the orchestra. Bulington opened his laptop and showed me a chart that tracked her chess performance over the past year.

I note that the fever line tilts up at an angle that would make any investor’s mouth water.

“These,” says Bulington, “are my investments.”

Categories
We Recommend We Recommend

Queerly Ever After at Circuit

“I never really think of Canada as being a different country,” says Memphis actor and activist Carly Crawford. “I mean, I know it’s a different country, but we’re sort of the same, right?” The distinctions were driven home while visiting Buddies in Bad Times, the world’s oldest and largest professional company devoted exclusively to developing work that reflects the life and experiences of the LGBT community. Crawford recalls taking da walking tour of Toronto’s gay village when girls in her group asked what the gay village in Memphis was like. “We don’t have one of those,” she responded.

Crawford, who recently founded Q&A, an open and accepting queer youth theater group, says it can be lonely doing this kind of work in the South. There is a similar company in New Orleans and one in Lexington, Kentucky, but most of the theaters working with gay youth are concentrated in California and New England. “It can be pretty geographically isolating,” she says.

Crawford isn’t all alone in this endeavor, however. Q&A was created under the umbrella of Playhouse on the Square and is affiliated with the North American Pride Youth Theatre Alliance, which includes 24 theaters and Buddies in Bad Times in Canada. This week, Crawford hopes to raise her company’s profile and discover new friends and allies when Q&A opens its first play, Queerly Ever After, an all-original show that puts an LGBT spin on classic fairy tales.

“Fairy tales are great to work with,” Crawford says of the source material. “It’s so easy to turn them on their heads.” In this case, Queerly Ever After finds Cinderella trying on labels instead of shoes to see which one fits. Rapunzel is imagined as a lesbian locked away by her disapproving mother. And so it goes.

Although there’s no bad language and the situations aren’t too adult, Crawford recommends the show only to adults and children over 14. “Unless you don’t mind having conversations with your kids about what asexuality or pansexuality are,” she says.

“Queerly Ever After” at Circuit Playhouse Saturday, May 30th, at 2 p.m. and Sunday, May 31st, at 7 p.m. Pay What You Can — suggested donation $10 (937-6475)

Categories
News The Fly-By

Fly on the Wall 1370

Best Outrage Ever
A strange thing happened last week. Tennessee’s artsy-fartsy set and its tax-hating tea party set wound up, more or less, on the same side of an issue. You see, Tennessee has spent $46,000 for a new state logo. Now, when it comes to brand development, that’s really not much money to spend on a good logo. Then again, there’s nothing good about this.

The outrage was instant, and many fine things came about in the ensuing fracas. The Tennessee logo has its own parody Twitter account @TnLogo, of course.

But the very best thing to result from the logo outrage has to be Senator Brian Kelsey’s mirror selfie, which he took in support of a movement to preserve the state’s current logo. #Kelfie.

Categories
We Recommend We Recommend

Jun Kaneko sculpture at the Dixon

CREDIT: Takashi Hatakeyama

Jun Kaneko’s ceramic work is epic, mysterious, and colorful. Though his surfaces undulate organically, from even a slight distance they appear to be a smooth canvas for the artist’s abstract painting. His work also tends to be enormous, and he arranges it in a way where the works create an environment and converse.

Kaneko, who is coming to Memphis to speak at the opening of a show at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens, is probably best known for his “dangos.” In Japan, the word means dumpling, although the rounded cylinders, which are often painted with primitive-looking marls, look more like something you might expect to find on Easter Island among the moai. And, speaking of Easter Island’s moai sculptures, Kaneko is also known for sculpting enormous ceramic heads and painting them in ways that call to mind 1960s-era op-art.

After graduating from high school in Japan, Kaneko, who had been studying painting and printmaking, decided to attend art school in America. He felt that the Japanese system was too strict and too rigid. And so he left his family to study in California, where he became fast friends with groundbreaking ceramicist Jerry Rothman, who was anything but strict and rigid. Rothman, who had a studio in Long Beach, was part of a rebellious clique of ceramic artists, moving the form far away from its decorative roots. The highly regarded and influential sculptor gave Kaneko a cot in his studio and clay to experiment with new forms. Immediately, Kaneko began transforming a sculptural material into canvases to paint, and two works from that first summer with Rothman were accepted into the 1964 Syracuse ceramics competition.

Art enthusiasts interested in hearing Kaneko discuss the evolution of his process and walking among the dangos and floating heads may do so this week. On Thursday, May 28th, at 5:30 p.m., the artist will present a slideshow and lecture. The exhibit is on display through November 22nd.

Jun Kaneko sculpture at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens May 28th-November 22nd. Dixon.org.