Art By Cell An Easy Sell
Watching people take in the exhibit “Something Borrowed, Something Blue” at Carnegie Mellon University’s Future Tenant gallery Downtown, you might think cell-phone use had reached a new low … is everyone ordering a pizza or checking messages instead of appreciating the art? But actually, patrons are listening to the artists explain their work,…
Susheli
Location: 2118 Murray Ave., Squirrel Hill. 412-421-3113 Hours: Sun.-Thu. 5-9 p.m. Prices: Starters $3-11; sushi a la carte $4-12; sushi combos, $17.50-39 Fare: Sushi Atmosphere: Casual Asian café Liquor: BYOB Smoking: None permitted We can debate whether Pittsburgh is culinarily conservative, but it’s indisputably geographically inland, a place where for years the category of seafood…
L’Enfant
The first time we see Bruno holding his newborn son in L’Enfant is just before he sells him. Bruno is babysitting for his girlfriend, Sonia, who’s waiting in a queue. But as a thief by trade, he knows selling the baby on the black market will score cash and avoid hassles. So he…
Abusing a Privilege
While thumbing through the June edition of the Northside Chronicle in an East Ohio Street watering hole, I learned that Rev. Ronald Wanless of the New Hope United Methodist Church and a prisoner-rights advocate named Kenneth Sible are demanding an independent investigation into the operations of three state prisons: SCI Greene, SCI Somerset and SCI…
Freddy Sanchez: Bargain Baseman
If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all. That’s what my grandmother says. The tough part is that we live in Pittsburgh, and it’s baseball season. But I’ll give it a shot. Jason Bay is playing like Jason Bay again. Imagine how much press he’d get if he played for the Mets,…
I’ve found old pictures in which the Carnegie Institute has two towers. When and why were they removed? Why were they there in the first place?
Back when the Carnegie was built, architecture didn’t always have to serve any practical purpose, so long as it looked impressive. That may sound quaint today, although a similar function is played by the state Capitol building — and by many of the people working inside it. A gift of industrialist Andrew Carnegie, the Oakland…
Making Amends on Gay Marriage
This gay marriage debate has almost made me nostalgic for traditional values. What happened to the good old days when men were men, women were women — and Harrisburg Republicans proudly proclaimed their own bigotry? Sure, last week the state House passed a “Marriage Protection Amendment” by a lopsided 136-61 vote. “Only a marriage between…
Warm Is the New Cool
Hot enough for you? Pittsburgh’s slide toward the really grueling hot weather seems to be gradual, but it’s only a matter of time before the debilitating waves of heat and humidity blanket us. Of course, the first temptation is to crank up the air conditioning: Let the miracle of modern Freon drop the…
Bill All Posters?
The final battle for the telephone poles and lampposts of Pittsburgh may be on. So far this spring, city inspectors have clamped down on everyone from concert promoters to literary-event organizers, even the owner of a lost dog, threatening them with fines for tacking up advertising. One of their targets, American…
Muckrakers in the Outfield
Last April was an important moment in the history of American journalism. After reading the explosive steroids-scandal book Game of Shadows, written by two San Francisco Chronicle reporters, baseball commissioner Bud Selig finally emerged from his cocoon of denial to announce an investigation into the performance-enhancing drugs that have cast a cloud over the sport…
It’s 5 AM
Day Players in the Makeup Trailer By Hayden Saunier I’m sitting in between a dead girl and a prostitute. I play a nurse … no nonsense … powder, touch of lips, “those test results you wanted just came in” and they’ll be done with me. I shake hands with the prostitute.…
Natacha Atlas
Radio Thailand: Transmissions from the Tropical Kingdom Sublime Frequencies Radio Algeria Sublime Frequencies The Belgian-born Egyptian-Brit singer Natacha Atlas has been trading in Indo-Arabic, global pop fusion since her days with early ’90s multiculti collective Transglobal Underground. By the end of track one on her latest, Mishmaoul, you think…
A Conversation with Brian Joly
If you’ve got a hitch in your giddy-up, rolfer Brian Joly can probably help. He’s been offering the alignment-based bodywork style, developed by Ida Rolf in the 1950s, at the Nuin Center, in Highland Park, for the past three-and-a-half years. When he’s not helping people learn to reduce their own pain by paying…
An Inconvenient Truth
Oh, there’s the anti-Christ, superheroes in peril and white-knuckle car chases. But the summer film designed to freak you out and rattle your cage is An Inconvenient Truth, a documentary on global warming and its potentially devastating impact. It’ll have you nibbling your fingernails along with your popcorn, as it dares to suggest…
Cars
Generally speaking, there’s nothing terribly wrong with Cars, the latest animated family film from John Lasseter and the gang at Pixar. Set in a car-only world, it follows shiny selfish race-car Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) as he gets sidetracked in the dusty Southwestern town of Radiator Springs and learns about loyalty…
Health careHousing Solution: When AIDS Isn’t The Only Issue
A small group of people committed to helping chronically homeless AIDS patients wants to demonstrate that there is another way to house them … one that isn’t dependent on the government, but that can be a medical boon to patients. Social worker Dana Davis, who founded the group The Open Door, Inc., was tired…
Gay RightsTwo Pride Sides Marching
Pittsburgh’s gay PrideFest won’t include a parade this year … it will instead be a “pride awareness march,” says Jeff Freedman, who chairs the event. The new label is “a statement on why we’re here for the day.” One reason is to counter the General Assembly in Harrisburg, where the House has passed, and…
