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Fringe Effect
Without KC Fringe, the local theater scene would not be what it is. The Fringe, which will present its 14th annual potpourri of performances, film, visual arts and youth activities spanning 10 days in July, got off to an unwieldy start in its inaugural year— mainly because nobody had attempted a fringe festival in Kansas City before. KC Fringe, like other fringe fests around the country, took its cue from the Mother Ship: The Edinburgh Fringe, which began in 1947 in Scotland.
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Mona Hatoum: Reimagining the Familiar
Can a wheelchair pose a threat? Does menace lie in a bunk bed? Is there a hidden agenda lurking in a kitchen — as an ominous electric buzz humming through chairs and tables suggests? In the art of Mona Hatoum, the familiar can be disorienting and unsettling, challenging our assumptions and upending our expectations. “Terra Infirma,” an exhibition on view at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in St. Louis through Aug. 11, spans the four-decade career of the Palestinian multimedia and installation artist.
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Arts Marketing Goes to the Dogs
Have you noticed how pets and other animals are everywhere? In addition to ubiquitous social media postings about silly pets and media stories extolling the latest sweet, brave or otherwise inspirational animal in the news, critters are helping to market all manner of goods and services these days. The art world has taken heed.
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‘My Happiness’ a Kansas City Hit
Sixty-five years ago, an assembler at the machine shop M.B. Parker Co. walked into Memphis Recording Service and paid $3.98 to play guitar and sing two songs that were recorded onto a lacquer disc. That assembler was 18-year-old Elvis Presley, and this self-financed session on July 16, 1953 (more than $37 in today’s dollars), eventually led to his signing to Memphis Recording Service’s record label, Sun Records.