Arts & Culture

Multi-award-winning Blues musician, songwriter, painter, and craftsman James “Super Chikan” Johnson visited Florida Gulf Coast University this past spring to speak to students and make a couple of performances at Artis-Naples. During his visit he stopped by the WGCU studios for conversation about his life’s journey through music, his handcrafted instruments made from recycled parts, and how he got his stage name.

The Heights Center’s MOSAIC program provides opportunities for children from low-income households to learn to play a musical instrument and to perform with ensembles of their peers. We learn about the program in a conversation with musician, educator, and Director of Arts and Community Programs at the Heights Center, Melissa Barlow, who founded the program.

Printmaking is an art form that has been around since the Renaissance. To ensure that it continues to flourish, some fine art printing presses regularly invite painters, sculptors and mixed media artists to come in and work with a master printer to produce fine art prints. Paulson Fontaine in Berkeley, California has done this for 25 years and through August 10, the Sarasota Art Museum is hosting a traveling exhibit of some of their prints.

The Alliance for the Arts will close the month of September for renovations that will include upgrades focused on safety, efficiency and enhancing the visitor experience.

On exhibit at the Sarasota Art Museum is a body of work that examines memory, childhood and the notion of archive through large-scale chalk drawings and handmade ceramic sculptures. Titled “Where We Never Grow Old,” it features work by Chris Friday. Executive Director Virginia Shearer says that Friday is an artist whose career is ascending.

Three of the biggest stars of Broadway Palm’s “Annie” are making their theatrical debuts. Their names are Casey, Gritty and Teegan and they take turns playing the stray Annie rescues after she escapes from the orphanage.

“Vice & Virtue” fills all four galleries at Art Center Sarasota with two and 3D pieces that delve into the dualities of the human condition. Some shock. Some bemuse. All challenge viewers to reassess the shifting boundaries between moral, amoral and immoral in contemporary society.

The Gulf Coast Symphony continues to grow and offer year-round programming even as other regional symphony orchestras have closed. Gulf Coast Symphony Founder and Music Director Andrew Kurtz explains how the organization works to diversify its performance offerings and attract new audiences.

A town hall meeting at the Alliance for the Arts on Saturday drew a capacity crowd to the Foulds Theatre to discuss the future of the arts. Gov. DeSantis’ decision to deny arts and cultural grants to the vast majority of qualifying arts organizations in the state sparked the discussion.

Generative AI programs like ChatGPT and DeepAI allow anyone, anywhere, to generate imagery with the touch of a button. This software can instantly duplicate styles of artists for a much lower cost, upsetting artists in the visual and performing arts.