The Pittsburgh Public Theater wowed patrons of its Gods and Goddesses-themed gala on May 5 with a shimmering evening that began with producing artistic director Ted Pappas awaiting the arrival of his 400 guests while surrounded by strapping gladiators.
Behind the scenes technicalities of Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens’ latest exhibit, Super. Natural. involved 500 pieces of hand-blown glass that had been meticulously packed into 122 boxes for a cross-country trip from Seattle to Pittsburgh on a 52-foot-long tractor trailer.
“Iris van Herpen: Transforming Fashion,” the first exhibit of its kind to grace one of the main galleries of the Carnegie Museum of Art, drew 210 guests for the Haute Wired Gala on April 28. The event toasted the final days of an exhibit co-organized by the High Museum of…
Just as Colette could say, “There are no ordinary cats,” one could say that there are no ordinary productions from Quantum Theatre. “Collaborators,” the 2011 play by John Hodge (who also wrote the adaptation of the film, “Trainspotting”) is violently alive in a way so few new plays are these…
The Andy Warhol Museum’s first two exhibitions of the year are a great pairing. Jessica Beck’s excellent My Perfect Body brought together work from Warhol’s entire career that focused on body issues, from the nose picking and acne of his youth to the scars from being shot in 1968 to…
On Saturday from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. the Maridon Museum will hold a gala opening of its exhibit and art sale “A Cosmic Contemporary Collaboration.” The exhibit, which runs April 8 through June 3, will feature paintings and a performance by internationally recognized poet Huang Xiang, one of China’s…
Although thirteen ancient Greek poets wrote Oedipus tragedies, only Sophocles’ play, “Oedipus Rex,” has survived. The Roman philosopher Seneca wrote a version, as did Julius Caesar. So did the 17th century poet John Dryden, as well as the 18th century philosopher Voltaire.
More than 400 guests filled the August Wilson Center Thursday for the Private Performance and Premiere Party kicking off Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre and Dance Theatre of Harlem’s two-week collaboration celebrating the diversity of talent and styles in American ballet.
Critics have argued that we cannot evade Shakespeare’s influence on our conception of human nature, nor Freud’s influence on our understanding of psychology, and I would suggest, as a corollary, that we cannot escape George Orwell’s influence on our notion of the political. The Orwellian ethos, manifested in works such…
Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Drama manages to combine some of the strongest and rarest elements of great theatre in their production of Christopher Marlowe’s “Edward II”: rawness, mystery, risk and precision. This is the kind of performance of a classic play that eschews the pitfalls of tired masterpieces, and…
Most Pittsburgh artists are getting by financially but find it difficult to make a living off of their art alone. And African American artists are much less likely than their white counterparts to rely on their art as their sole means of support, according to recent survey.
Photographer Clyde “Red” Hare moved to Pittsburgh in 1950 to work on the Pittsburgh Photographic Library, covering the city’s Renaissance I, with noted editor Roy Stryker. Hare had his own car and camera and Stryker offered to pay him $50 a week to photograph the city.
When Melia Tourangeau joined the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra as President and CEO in July 2015, she immediately faced a problem she hadn’t anticipated: massive debts from a nearly insolvent pension program. Last fall, the PSO endured a 55-day strike that ended when two donors made one-time gifts and musicians agreed…
Pittsburghers could read “Leave Me” for the same reasons they’d see a movie filmed and set here. It’s a kick to see the city as a backdrop, collecting references to your favorite coffee shop (Commonplace in Squirrel Hill), local slogans (“I Bleed Black and Gold”) and outright praise (“she stared…
For his second act, Pittsburgh novelist Jacob Bacharach has turned in another work of enormously entertaining literary fiction set in Pittsburgh. It’s less cosmic than his debut, the 2014 sci-fi sendup “A Bend in the World,” but equally peppered with highbrow cultural references, trenchant social observations and turns of phrase…
