When I first moved to Detroit six years ago, people told me I was crazy. Since then, there have been times I have believed them. However, I have also begun to realize that at other times the crazier we are, the more creative and ambitious our endeavors can be. This is why, when I first […]

This Labor Day weekend, Detroiters and metro-Detroiters may have faced power outages, but there was no shortage of exciting cultural happenings. With Knight Arts grantee The Detroit Jazz Festival, Arts, Beats & Eats and the Hamtramck Labor Day Festival keeping the streets alive, the most concerning problem was choosing which event to attend. Ominous skies loomed […]

Whitdel Arts galley in Southwest Detroit wanted to kick off its season on a strong note, so it stayed close to home. “We wanted to pay homage to our arts community,” “Detroit Artists Feature” co-curator JenClare Gawaran said, adding, “There were so many high hopes for our season last year, and I think a lot […]

Upon researching Dublin artist Mark Garry for this article, I was comforted to find that I am not the only individual who had a difficult time defining his work. The artist uses his gentle and delicate sculptures skillfully placed around Detroit’s Cave gallery to make viewers consider how to navigate the space. The added sound […]

“We just wanted to make recycling cool,” says Matthew Naimi, director of operations at Recycle Here! “Artists and musicians make people come back.” Recycle Here! was started in 2005 and now functions as the city of Detroit’s recycling program. Since then, it has recycled more than 4,400,000 pounds of material from more than 73,000 visits […]

With “Manifest Destiny (there was blood on the saddle),” the Hinterlands, a Detroit-based physical theater troupe, is redefining the medium. The two-hour show was one of the most imaginative performances I have ever seen. The vaudevillian comedy, sing-alongs, pseudo-history, puppetry, feats of strength and skill, dreamlike imagery and the smell of frying bacon blend into a […]

In “Rise of the Basement Dweller” at the 323East gallery, legendary Detroit graffiti artist Fel3000ft shows a much more conceptually sophisticated and politically charged side. The paintings on canvas share some similarity to his street murals: bright colors, round-shaped figures and an air of comical jest. Still, he confronts some of society’s more controversial issues […]

With Detroit under the national spotlight as a hub for creativity, many people are chomping at the bit to see what the buzz is all about. As Forward Arts rounded out its first year as an organization, it added Art Ride to its repertoire of projects that use art to transform and engage the community. […]

“Stone Soup” is an exhibition of varied tastes at Work Detroit, a gallery in Midtown Detroit facilitated and operated by the University of Michigan School of Art & Design. “Stone Soup” is a folk story about a group of strangers that convince a town to cook with them a feast by adding bits of sustenance […]

71 POP, the most recent addition to Detroit’s’ Sugar Hill Arts District, gives emerging artists and designers a unique way to showcase and sell their work. The retail space and online store plans to work with 71 artists/designers over the next two years, providing them with free marketing and consulting, a virtual online pop-up shop, […]