Munro: Artist sees art as collective experience

March 16

Caleb Duarte speaks so softly that sometimes you have to tilt your head forward to hear him. When he walks into a recent Bee photo shoot with a group of lively fellow artists, he strikes an unassuming figure, letting others do most of the talking. There's a reserve to him, a quietness, that might be mistaken for shyness.

But make no mistake. Duarte, whose work is part of the impressive "Breakthrough" show at the Fresno Art Museum, is an artist whose work -- and views on art -- are anything but gentle. Read more →

Concert review: Fresno Philharmonic's Mozart Requiem

March 09

The opening word in Latin stabs like a dagger: "Rex!" the chorus sings. And again, and again: "Rex!"

The lyric in Mozart's Requiem Mass in D minor is one of those moments in choral music that cuts to the bone. Though the words of the "Rex tremendae" movement speak of a "King of awesome majesty who freely saves those worthy of salvation," the moment is not one of happy praise but of desperate submission -- of urgent beseeching -- from a piteous sinner. There is eternity at stake, and you feel the tension. I imagined the slightest of chills descending upon the Shaghoian Hall as the internal temperatures of each audience member notched down a fraction of a degree. The opening phrases of the movement are that cold and beautiful. Read more →

Munro: Taunting of the scribe, 'Spamalot' style

March 03

There it is, on the stage just over there: The imposing castle of the French bastard Gui de Loimbard.

Like anyone traveling through King Arthur's Britain, I ride my "horse" toward it by knocking two coconut halves together. Read more →

Munro: Valley partnership introduces school kids to ballet

February 23

When was the last time you danced? I mean really danced, with total abandon and joy in the moment, like a 6-year-old stretching out rigid arms and legs and bopping across the room like a happy bug?

Well, perhaps not the bug part. Read more →

Chamber music in Fresno charms with its intimacy

February 15

Two very different recent experiences of chamber music in Fresno:

I'm sitting in the sanctuary of Fresno's Westminister Presbyterian Church for a concert by the chamber group Moment Musical. The golden tones of the solo French horn played by Jennie Blomster fill the room, anchored by the steady, jaunty presence of Alan Rea's piano. The Faure piece they're playing is an intriguing instrumental combination: the horn sounding like it wants to extend beyond the confines of the sanctuary and out into the sky, the piano playfully tugging it back to Earth. I sit back in the pew and let the sound fill my brain and, more important, my soul. It's my most relaxing moment of the week. Read more →

Art show shares valentines that span 26 years

February 08

Merced assemblage artist Karen LeCocq isn't a big fan of most of the major holidays.

Christmas? Big shrug. Read more →

Ah, the comfort of watching 'Love It or List It'

February 01

Let's drop down a few clouds from the usual lofty heights of this column -- my weekly musings about art, performance, classical music and the such -- and focus on my current fixation:

"Love It or List It." Read more →

'Breakthrough' brings up-and-coming artists together

January 25

Just call it the power of six.

Taken individually, the half-dozen artists in the Fresno Art Museum's terrific new exhibition "Breakthrough" could mount a respectable individual show on his or her own. From Julia Woli Scott's intriguing cotton-bleached palette in her series of paintings of "mental landscapes" to Terrance Reimer's gorgeously saturated photographs of an "everyday" Central Valley that through his eyes is anything but, there's a vitality and vigor that in each of six cases stands on its own. Read more →

Cuts leave museum facing challenges

January 17

In the annals of the arts in Fresno, it’s hard to imagine a more rotten couple of weeks.

We lost the Fresno Metropolitan Museum on Jan. 5, of course, and the community still reels. Read more →

'Locker' brings you into war's addiction

August 16

This and that from the culture beat:

Defying the conventional wisdom that small/serious films in Fresno wither in the hot summer months for one or (at the most) two weeks before flitting off to greener pastures, “The Hurt Locker” is holding strong at Regal Manchester. Read more →

His Broadway tour debut spells out lots of fun

June 07

A is for “accommodate.”

That’s the word I imagine having to spell as I look into my bathroom mirror. I practice saying the letters slowly and clearly: a-c-c-o-m-m-o-d-a-t-e. Yes! The audience murmurs its approval. I am a double-letter king. Bring ’em on, baby. Read more →

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