Arts & Culture

What makes a nerd? Nerdist podcast host Chris Hardwick says it doesn’t matter whether it’s Sailor Moon or Star Trek you’re into; it’s the intensity of the obsession that matters. “What makes someone a nerd is how passionate they are about something and how they will try to understand that…

“Heirloom vegetables have always been around,” notes John Smith of Paulino Gardens, “but they’re becoming more popular, and the seed companies are offering more heirlooms to pick from than we’ve ever had before. And heirlooms are, in some cases, easier to grow, because they have been tried and true for…

The fantasy of high-school prom night can be shattered by the reality of a hefty price tag, but today’s Prom Dress Exchange aims to ease that. For just a $10 donation and a student ID, teens can peruse a showcase of 2,000 gently worn prom dresses — along with some…

Jose Mercado isn’t prone to taking on easy projects. The local actor, theater director and educator, who’s dug into tough territory through the years by producing Zoot Suit with students at North High School and other edgy works, and worked tirelessly to bring back the old Elitch Theatre, is now…

The spring exhibitions at the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art opened last week, including Edible?, by Viviane LeCourtois, a retrospective of the artist’s food-related work from the past twenty years. And that seemed a perfect tie-in for BMoCA’s Present Box, wherein the museum store is transformed into a temporary exhibition…

Local light artist Collin Parson has been stepping into the limelight with hip-to-be-square works like his recent “Square Variations,” featuring illuminated geometric shapes and patterns of straight lines that create visual echoes of the boxes containing them. But this month, he says, he’s rounding a corner. “I’ve always been influenced…

Colfax & 15th, an independent film set and produced in Denver, provides a glimpse into a world that many of us simply drive by on our way in and out of downtown: the concentration of businesses that provide high-interest, high-stakes loans to bounce people out of jail. In their fictional…

Hosted and facilitated by — and dedicated to — female poets, the Women of the World Poetry Slam keeps close to its gender roots. Sponsored by Poetry Slam, Inc., the competition is in its fifth year, but its first in Denver. “You have to put in a bid like it’s…

Among the dozens of galleries, hundreds of shows and twelve packed First Fridays in the Art District on Santa Fe in 2011, it’s inevitable that arts lovers missed something spectacular. “There are so many events that go on, and we wanted to give some recognition for different galleries,” notes Sarah…

The second annual Women + Film Voices Film Festival begins tonight with the documentary Ethel and follows with five more days of thought-provoking films by and about women. Over the course of the week, more than a dozen films will get their due, along with complementing salons and question-and-answer sessions…

Maybe you never thought the day would come when suburban-Cali neo-punk would take to the Broadway stage. But, as American Idiot more than proved, the idea was neither a bad nor a far-fetched one: Based on Green Day’s eponymous, Grammy Award-winning concept album, the edgy musical took Billy Joe Armstrong’s…

Dan Jacobs, director of the Victoria H. Myhren Gallery at the University of Denver, has endeavored to present shows that document the efforts of local artists both historic and contemporary. Being on the DU campus in the School of Art and Art History, Jacobs has a built-in roster from which…

Miss Julie, playwright August Strindberg’s spare, sexy classic, was written in 1888, but its themes of class and control resonate loudly in the Occupy era. Set in the kitchen of an aristocratic estate, the play — and the ensuing tension — unfolds over one afternoon, as an unstable heiress trades…

“Showing your work at a Santa Fe gallery is like having your mom and dad home at a party,” says artist Vincent Fasano. That’s why he and twin brother Charly (also known as “City Mouse”) have been putting on art shows at the Phoenix Gallery in the basement of 3…

Nathaniel Adams Coles, better known as Nat “King” Cole, was born in Alabama, the son of a Baptist minister. He learned to play the organ from his mother, who accompanied his father in church. Originally a keyboard phenom, he later studied classical piano, but it was jazz — and the…

For the majority of the population, leap year, and subsequently leap day, isn’t given a second thought. But for a tiny sliver of the world called “leaplings,” or people who’s birthdays fall on February 29, leap day is a big deal. And, as it turns out, there’s a lot more…