Skate back in history with Portraits on Ice
TERESA CHIYKOWSKI / METRO OTTAWA
If you plan to take in some of the exciting sights of Winterlude this month, don’t be surprised to skate upon an art exhibit of a different kind — Portraits on the Ice. This refreshing outdoor gallery returns to the Rideau Canal Feb. 3, this time to mark the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812.
The exhibit showcases 10 portrait reproductions that represent some of the French- and English-speaking militia and colonists, British officers and First Nations allies who were a part of, or were affected by, the War of 1812. The original works of art were created in a variety of media — paintings, prints and photography.
Read the rest of the story on Metro Ottawa online: Skate back in history with Portraits on Ice
First Annual Fringe Gala: Playing with Fire
Proudly presented by MediaStyle & ZenKitchen
Wednesday, June 8th, 2011
7:00 pm
Zen Kitchen
634 Somerset Street West
$75.00
$50.00 for students/unwaged (there are a limited number available)
*includes one drink on arrival + one toast during the evening*
This year is The Ottawa Fringe Theatre & Arts Festival’s 15th Anniversary and to spice it up, MediaStyle is hosting an evening like you’ve never seen before.
Taking place at the innovative and delicious ZenKitchen, the gala will feature live performances, a prestigious live auction, photo booth, the launch of the Fringe Souvenir Book and much more!
Join us for a hot night of exciting entertainment & extraordinary encounters while sipping the special sizzling fire spritzer and supporting the love of Ottawa arts and culture. For tickets, visit www.fringegala.com.
*If you wish to pay in cash, please visit the Fringe Office at 2 Daly Ave, Suite 100 Mon-Fri 9-5*
Should you have any questions please contact the Fringe Office at 613-232-6162
The love afair between business and the arts continues to grow as more partners jump into bed with each other to have another SUMMER FLING.
The Downtown Rideau Business Improvement Area (DRBIA) is once again pleased to present the 2nd season of SUMMER FLING – A Theatrical Affair! This festival celebrates Ottawa’s unique performing arts community, providing a stage for new ideas and creative opportunities, including great dining offers and hotel packages. The 2011 program consists of 45 days of 65 performances in 10 shows at 7 venues with a selection of comedy, drama, dance, improv and music. A total of 24 partners from both business and the arts have come together to offer this year’s SUMMER FLING (7 culture, 7 dining, 7 venues, 3 hotels). Cultural producing partners include Arts Court Productions, Ottawa Little Theatre, Salamander Theatre, Ottawa Dance Directive, Crush Improv and Avant-Garde Bar & Gallery. The Ottawa Fringe Festival is a resource partner.
Ottawa Symphony Orchestra presents Community Day on May 15th!
Ottawa Symphony Orchestra presents Community Day! We invite you to Get to Know your OSO. Join us for fun, hands on, interactive ‘music-tivities’. Sit in on live OSO Rehearsal. Meet and greet our fantastic musicians.
Sunday May 15th 1:30pm-5:30pm Southam Hall, National Arts Centre FREE
For ages 9 and up. Refreshments will be served. Visit our website for more details www.ottawasymphony.com
Tulip Ball stunning in its new locale
Caroline Phillips, The Ottawa Citizen
Photo courtesy of Caroline Phillips, The Ottawa Citizen
It’s hard not to get giddy when you walk into the brand new Ottawa Convention Centre, and even harder when you head up to the fourth-floor Trillium Ballroom to sip champagne and enjoy the panorama of the downtown, as did 400-plus guests of the sold-out 2011 Tulip Ball on Friday.
In the words of Canadian Tulip Festival chairman David Luxton, it’s “a million-dollar view.”
That’s not to say the sights of floral gowns and ice sculptures inside the ballroom weren’t also breathtaking. The black-tie dinner showcased elaborate floral ball gowns created by renowned floral artist Joel Marc Frappier and fashion designer Sylvie Bigras.
Read more: Canadian Tulip Festival: Tulip Ball stunning in its new locale
‘Jane’s Walks’ to celebrate Ottawa, Jane Jacobs
Maria Cook, The Ottawa Citizen
In her famous book, The Death and Life of American Cities, Jane Jacobs urged city-dwellers to get to know the places where they live, work and play.
“While you are looking, you might as well also listen, linger and think about what you see.”
Inspired by Jacobs, the fourth annual Jane’s Walk Ottawa festival is this Saturday and Sunday. The event features 45 free walking tours of Ottawa neighbourhoods and spaces.
In Ottawa, a number of tours are also in French. The program is at www.janeswalkottawa.ca.
Read more: ‘Jane’s Walks’ to celebrate Ottawa, Jane Jacobs
Ottawa StoryTellers Events for May, 2011
May 5 | Ottawa StoryTellers Story Swap: Open Stage Night
7:00 – 9:30 p.m.
Library and Archives Canada, 395 Wellington Street, Room 156.
Free admission
Ottawa StoryTellers offers Story Swap, an open stage night, on the first Thursday of every month at Library and Archives Canada (Room 156). This is an opportunity to experience the art of storytelling for the first time or for new storytellers to practice before an audience. The evenings also include stories by experienced tellers so that new tellers can learn the art. People are welcome to come and listen, but anyone wishing to tell a story should register on arrival with the evening’s host, and s/he will be given a time slot. Stories should be no longer than ten minutes and must be told, not read. They may be traditional stories, folk tales, literary stories, or personal stories.
May 10 | Music in my Life
Kim Kilpatrick and Lynda Joyce
Stories and Tea
The Tea Party, 119 York St.
7pm-8:45pm
Pay what you can
May 19 and 20 | My Words Fly Up: Stories About and From Shakespeare
Gail Anglin, Daniel Kletke and Leah Sander
7:30 pm, NAC 4th Stage, tickets at the NAC box office
$20/$12 students and seniors
The plays of William Shakespeare are some of the most recognized literary works of the English speaking world. Within these great plays, there are stories that make us laugh, stories that make us cry, and stories that inform our culture, from high art to the latest romantic comedy at the movie theatre. Tonight, stories from and about the Bard are presented in a new way: decide for yourself who the real Shakespeare was, find out what happens when Hamlet is transported to Africa and Iago is sentenced to community service. Frolic with the faeries, sigh with the lovers, and laugh at the rude mechanicals! With Elizabethan music on the recorder and guitar, arranged and played by Andrew Huggett and Toby Kiesewalter. Not the Shakespeare you learned in school!
May 24 | It Could Have Been Me
Kathie Kompass and Nancy Morris
Stories and Tea
The Tea Party, 119 York St.
7pm-8:45pm
Pay what you can
May 27 | The Spirits of the Times
ONE NIGHT ONLY! 7:00 p.m.
Billings Estate
Tickets are $15 (incl. admission to the museum) and are available from the Billings Museum (613-247-4830)
Come back with us to 1902, when a Chautauqua troupe visited Ottawa and set up its tent on the grounds of the Billings’ estate. From the 1880s to 1930’s, Chautauquas were North America’s most popular form of what we now call “edutainment” – education and entertainment – for adults. It was radio that eventually spelled the demise of the Chautauqua, but in its day it was unrivalled.Our Chautauqua has several world-renowned speakers, such as, the intrepid African explorer Nehemiah “Crikey” Persimmon, the famous games mistress Eliza Ross, that well-known Methodist cleric Reverend Murdoch Troome, and the British musical hall sensation Rodney Ramsbottom, all accompanied by a specially commissioned brass band!
May 27 | Once Upon a Slam
7:00 pm, Mercury Lounge Underground (aka Bar 56) 56 Byward Market,
$7 cover charge for listeners (slam participants get in free)
Once Upon a Slam is Ottawa’s new monthly story slam series! A story slam is much like a poetry slam, except for it features narrative stories of all kinds. Each performer has 5 minutes to TELL a story (and we do mean tell, no reading). Judges are randomly selected from the audience to give a score to each story. Highest score of the night takes home all the marbles. Fairy tales, ghost stories, personal stories, whatever kind of story you like, as long as you tell it in your own words. There are 8 spots available, doors open at 6:30PM. After the Slam, stick around for feature performer Luna Allison.
For more information on our programming, visit www.ottawastorytellers.ca
Join the Ottawa Storytellers facebook group to get invites to our events, or follow us on Twitter @ottawastory.
OST programming is supported by the City of Ottawa, the Ontario Arts Council, Heritage Canada and Canada Council for the Arts.
MAGNETIC NORTH THEATRE FESTIVAL’S FIRST 5 à 7 FUNDRAISER!
Join us for a glass of wine and mingle with industry performers and fellow patrons of the Arts to kick-off this year’s Magnetic North Theatre Festival!
Don’t miss your chance to bid on a variety of fabulous items in our live and silent auction, including a trip to the set of popular Canadian television series the Republic of Doyle to meet co-star Allan Hawco.
WHERE: Club SAW (SAW Gallery) – 67 Nicholas Street, Ottawa
WHEN: Thursday, May 19 2011 from 5:00pm-7:00pm (doors open at 4:45pm)
TICKET PRICE: $35 (includes a complimentary beverage)
» Click here to find the downloadable ORDER FORM to purchase tickets for this entertaining event!
Tulip Festival will officially unveil spring season
By Sabine Gibbins, EMC News
Source: Walker on Flickr
This year’s Canadian Tulip Festival may have visitors viewing the annual blooms in a refreshing new way.
Visitors to Ottawa’s premiere spring event can wave goodbye to beds of tulips planted in stretches of solid colour, and say hello to an array of colourful blends which unveil a unique design.
The festival takes place from May 6 to 23.
The theme for this year’s Tulip Festival is ‘kaleidoscope – a celebration of spring awakening through colour, culture, and community’, according to the official website.
Read the full story on the EMC website: Tulip Festival will officially unveil spring season
New Edinburgh Players’ Benefit Performance for the Crichton Cultural Community Centre
It’s Show Time Once Again!
New Edinburgh Players’ Benefit Performance for the CCCC
Wednesday, April 13th, 2011, at 7:30 p.m.
Mackay United Church Hall
Dufferin Road and Avon Lane
Tickets: $20
Once again this year, the New Edinburgh Players will stage a benefit performance of their annual Spring production to raise funds for the CCCC. In this watershed year for 200 Crichton, when the building is to be listed for sale and the CCCC is in the throes of an all-out effort to acquire it for the community, we need your presence and support more than ever before!
Please MARK YOUR CALENDARS NOW to save the night of Wednesday, April 13th for an evening of great entertainment and sociability with your neighbours in support of a vital community cause.
Tickets will be on sale at the CCCC Office and Books on Beechwood in the coming weeks, and you are welcome to pre-order by calling the Office at 613-745-2742 or sending us an e-mail at communitycentre@rogers.com.
This year’s production is a thoroughly comic murder mystery entitled Busybody, by Jack Popplewell.
Here’s a brief synopsis of the play to whet your appetite for a hilariously funny evening:
Detective Superintendent Harry Baxter, played by Anthony Pearson, is plagued by a head cold and two busybodies – a corpse that vanishes and the officious office cleaner, Mrs. Piper, played by Linda Barber, who found it.
Trying to glean the facts from the morass of Mrs. Piper’s chatty verbosity taxes Baxter’s never large store of tact and patience. Motives for murder abound – all the office staff and the corpse’s wife are suspect. His self-control snaps completely when the corpse walks in alive and well.
But Mrs. Piper still insists that there was a body, though she no longer knows whose. Baxter is persuaded to continue his investigation, enthusiastically hindered by Mrs. Piper.
PLEASE BE SURE TO JOIN US ON APRIL 13TH AND SHOW YOUR SUPPORT FOR THE FINAL PUSH TO KEEP CRICHTON PUBLIC!
