- Opening this week:
- Kill Your Television’s The Ugly One at the ATB Arts Barns, running May 13 – 23.
- The UofA Studio Theatre’s Tribes at the Timms Centre May 14 – 23.
- The Photo by Dana Rayment at C103 May 15 – 23.
- Train of Thought – a project that is about reconciliation and collaboration through participatory art-
making between First Nations and settler/immigrant artists and communities, involving a cross-Canada tour with stops in 20 communities – will be in Edmonton May 16 – 19.
- Closing this week:
- Becoming Sharp at the Backstage Theatre at the ATB Arts Barns, closing May 17.
- The Nextfest 20th Anniversary Showcase, featuring Code Word: Time and No One Showed Up to the Anarchist Rally, closes May 17 at the Mercury Theatre (formerly The Livingroom Playhouse, 11315 106 avenue).
- Check out my thoughts on the shows, the Journal’s, and Vue Weekly’s.
- And check out the What It Is podcast’s latest episode: Code Word Anarchist.
- Blarney Production’s workshop production of José Teodoro’s Mote, at La Cité Francophone until May 17.
- Check out my preview and review of the show, John’s thoughts on it, the Journal’s preview, and Vue Weekly’s preview.
- Kristen shares her thoughts on the Citadel’s Avenue Q, which continues until May 24.
- Today is the application deadline for Make Something Edmonton’s Placemaking Project Accelerator Grant, which will give up to $1500 to make “underused public space more beautiful, more strange, more welcoming, more… Edmonton?”
- The Edmonton Galleria Project has announced the creation of The Edmonton Cultural Trust Foundation, which will use any revenue from the Galleria to provide support to Edmonton’s Arts & Culture scene. The Trust is modeled after a similar organization in Pittsburg, which the group says has been very successful. The model seems to depend on the Galleria being independently profitable. I’m not as knowledgeable about the Galleria project as I should be, so it would be great if readers could leave a comment below on what they think of this development and how it will affect Edmonton’s arts scene.
- The Edmonton Arts Council has announced that its Annual General Meeting will be Monday June 8 at 7:00 p.m. at the Old Strathcona Performing Arts Centre. If you want to be on the Board of Directors of EAC, you have until May 15 to submit your application.
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After the House Lights 
I posted my thoughts on the Galleria at some length last summer: https://behindthehedge.wordpress.com/2014/07/20/a-few-thoughts-on-edmontons-galleria-project/
In a nutshell, I don’t think it’s the best idea for the City or for Edmonton’s arts communities, but, if it happens, we’ll make something great of it.
Now, a year after it was first announced, I feel almost certain that the Galleria will not go ahead in anything like the original proposal. The University is still not on board, the fallout of the drop in oil prices has finally hit jobs in Edmonton, and there are more important infrastructure demands on Edmonton City Council than another iconic Downtown mega-project.
As I said in June, the arts communities and the larger community would be better served by a diversity of smaller venues dispersed around the city.
I wish the philanthropic types behind the Galleria had followed that path.
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