Monday Morning Distractions: Fire Arts Festival 2009

This year’s Fire Arts Festival was just as spectacular as it was in 2008 and 2007, but it was much bigger. That meant more art, more space, and much more fire. Here is some of what I saw:

It's a bit unclear above, but this creature is what its creator, Rebecca Anderson, calls a fishbug. I talked to her for a bit and found out that this is just the frame for the creature, which will be filled in with various materials in time for Burning Man. It already looks great, so I can't wait to see it finished. You can find out more info at http://fishbug.net/

There were strange creatures featured throughout the festival, including ones without fire elements.

There was also fire flora and fauna, like this field of fire flowers.

And one of my favorite pieces of the night was these hanging flowers, which lit up and played music when you touched them. It was great to see strangers interacting with the art and each other, with huge smiles on their faces.

Of course, there were other ways to interact, like at the flame shooting gallery, where anyone could get a brief training and then shoot fire....

At these poor innocent men.

2PiR, one of my all time favorite Burning Man pieces, was back. I can't tell you how much fun I've had on this creative, Oakland made art piece. You stand on the platform and dance, and the motion sensors on the platform set off fire. The mom and daughter above looked like they were having the time of their lives.

Of course, there was plenty more fire just to look at, some which was quite beautiful and artistic.

And the pendulum of fire that swung back and forth.

One of the most memorable parts of my night was seeing the gnome, which was made by a group of East Bay residents, including a friend of mine. Pictured above is the small fire that came out of his head, which anyone could activate by pressing a button.

But that fire was nothing compared to the hourly fire show Team Gnome did. They produced colored fire that shot 50 feet up into the air. This photo shows the orange fire, but earlier in the night they featured green and then purple fire. This creation is also unfinished, since the gnome doesn't look very gnome-like yet, but they'll have it complete by Burning Man. You can watch their progress at http://thegee-gnomeproject.blogspot.com/

July 13-19 Oakland Political & Community Events

Monday, July 13th – BART Police Department Review Sub-Committee Meeting

The BART Police Department Review Sub-Committee will meet on Monday, July 13, 2009, at 9:00 a.m. in the BART Board Room, which is located in the Kaiser Center 20th Street Mall, Third Floor, 344 20th St., Oakland, CA. If anyone attends this, I’d be very interested in hearing a report of what happens.

Monday, July 13th – Summertime in the East Bay Mixer, EBYD Style

East Bay Young Dems are hosting a summertime mixer on Monday. If you made it to our awards gala or inauguration party, you know that EBYD knows how to put on a good party. Join us for a cool summertime drink with fellow young leaders and organizers, local elected officials, and meet candidates in the 10th Congressional District race. Oakland Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan will also join us to update Oaklanders about the city’s vote-by-mail election coming up and the city’s package of proposed measures.This happy hour is FREE for members. (We request a $5 donation from non-members, though no one will be turned away.  All are welcome!) If you’d like to become a member, you can do so at www.ebyd.org. The mixer will be held Monday, July 13th from 6:30-8:30pm at the beautiful and new Grand Tavern, 3601 Grand Avenue, Oakland. Food will be provided for early arrivals and our brief program will commence at 7:15. Please find more details and RSVP on Facebook.

Tuesday, July 14th – Public Works Committee Hearing on Oakland Airport Connector

The Oakland City Council, via the Public Works Committee will finally have a chance to review the Oakland Airport Connector this Tuesday. This project has changed significantly since they last reviewed it so it is incredibly important for the Council to have another opportunity to weigh in. Please come to the meeting on Tuesday to voice your opposition to the current project and to ask the Council to support a study of a rapid bus alternative. The meeting will be held at 9:00 am in Hearing Room 1, City Hall, 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza. For background on why the City Council should weigh in on this project, check out my previous post on the subject. If you plan to attend, please RSVP on Facebook.

Wednesday, July 15th – Planning Commission Hearing on Pleasant Valley Safeway/Longs Project

This Wednesday, the EIR Scoping Session will be held for the Safeway Pleasant Valley project. As was abundantly apparent from my two posts on this project, many readers here care a lot about this development and have strong opinions. Whether your main concern is retaining the offerings of Longs or improving pedestrian access, this will be your first opportunity to weigh in. The meeting will be held at 6:00 pm in Hearing Room 1, City Hall, 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza and the full agenda can be read here.

Wednesday-Saturday, July 15th-18th – The Crucible’s Fire Arts Festival

If you like fire and art but don’t want to deal with a week on the playa at Burning Man, the Crucible’s Fire Arts Festival is what you should check out instead. The past several Fire Arts Festivals have been incredible, more fantastic year after year, but this year’s should be the best yet since they’re moving it to a MUCH larger location. That means more art, more entertainment, and most importantly, more fire! Out of 40 art installations, 35 of them will involve fire. Plus, there will be fire dancers and other fire performances. The festival will be be held Wednesday-Saturday, from 8pm-Midnight at 2020 Engineer Road in West Oakland. There will be a free shuttle from West Oakland BART, which sounds like the most convenient option, since free parking is a couple blocks away from the event. You can find out all the other details and buy tickets at the Crucible’s website. For photos and write-ups of the past two years of Fire Arts Festivals, check out my posts on the 2008 and 2007 festivals.

Thursday, July 16th – Temescal Street Cinema

This Thursday will be the last opportunity this year to enjoy the Second Annual Temescal Street Cinema at 49th and Telegraph (Bank of the West Building)! There’ll be live music and free popcorn, with the event getting started at 8 PM. Movies will start when it gets dark, no sooner than 8:30 PM. Come early or bring a chair! This Thursday will feature Migrations, a series of shorts: “Everyone’s moving from place to place, so travel from a border crossing simulation in Mexico to a giant Chinese mall, the biggest in the world.” Find out more details at the Temescal Business Improvement District’s website.

Thursday, July 16th – Oakland Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee Meeting

Oakland’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee (BPAC) meets monthly to discusses bicycle and pedestrian issues. The BPAC is extremely inclusive – any Oakland resident who attends three consecutive meetings becomes a voting member of the committee – so if you’re interested in bike and ped issues, you should consider attending. The BPAC will be meeting from 5:30-7:30pm in Hearing Room 4 of City Hall, 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza.

Saturday, July 18th – BEAST Bloggers Camp

“East Bay” is Pig Latin for “beast”, a name that has all the power of bloggers in the SF Bay Area who are the eyes and ears of the East Bay community. In honor of all the East Bay bloggers, Spot.Us, Tech Liminal and A Better Oakland are hosting their first BEAST Bloggers Camp. A BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences — open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants. The day consists of sessions proposed by attendees and the schedule is created on site the morning of the event. BarCamp is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn from each other in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from participants. The camp will be held from 8am-5pm at at TechLiminal, 268 14th Street in downtown Oakland. You can find out more details at A Better Oakland.

Sunday, July 19th – JC Cellars Summer Beach Party

JC Cellars is holding its annual summer beach party this weekend. Pouring over 13 different blends and vineyard designates. Embracing our urban environment with a taco truck (spicy salsa is optional). DJ Brett will be spinning groovy beach beats. A children’s craft table will keep the little ones entertained. Admission costs $20 advanced or $25 at the door and includes plenty of wine, snacks, and fun. Sunglasses and flip flops are encouraged! The event will be held from 1-4pm at JC Cellars Winery 55 4th Street, Oakland. Take BART to Lake Merritt, the ferry to Jack London Square or drive to the winery. Find more details and buy tickets at the JC Cellars website.

July Parties Part 2: Celebrating Fire & Arts

Though I don’t entirely understand it, I realize that Burning Man is not for everyone. Maybe you don’t like the idea of braving extreme weather conditions in the desert, or you don’t have the money to spend, or maybe you’re convinced Burning Man is full of hippies and that scares you away. Well, it’s ok, because in Oakland you can get so many of the benefits of Burning Man without so many of the troubles. Check out the events below this weekend and next to get a taste of the Burning Man arts scene and support Oakland artists.

Saturday, July 11th – Sand by the Ton

Part of an art piece by Dan Das Mann and Karen Cusolito, two of my favorite artists who create their recycled metal based work in Oakland.

Tonight, Big Arts Studio presents Sand by the Ton, a night full of art, music, and what sounds like a spectacular atmosphere. It’s being organized by Karen Kusolito and Dan Das Mann, the artists who helped stop the Uptown parking lot from being built. The night will showcase some of the best Burning Man artists, including the Flaming Lotus Girls, Michael Christian, and Kinetic Steam Works. And then there’s this – “4 live music stages, 4 electronic music stages, full boardwalk carnival midway with rides, 200 tons of sand with 5 swimming pools (swimwear encouraged), a quarter million square feet of space under one roof, thousands of your best friends, more lights blinkin’ than ever blinked… bookoo (6) bars….you thought you knew the drill till you came here.”

Sounds like an incredible night to me. The party will be held Saturday, July 11th from 4pm to “late” at the American Steel Building, 1960 Mandela Parkway. Tickets are  $25 presale, $30 @ door and $125 VIP (check the site for VIP info, includes a 50 ft. yacht suspended from the ceiling). Close to BART~LATE NIGHT BUS SHUTTLE TO SF! and ample secure parking. Find more info @ www.thebigartexperience.com.

Wednesday-Saturday, July 15th-18th – Fire Arts Festival

If Sand by the Ton sounds a bit too adventurous for you, the Crucible’s Fire Arts Festival is what you should check out instead. The past several Fire Arts Festivals have been incredible, more fantastic year after year, but this year’s should be the best yet since they’re moving it to a MUCH larger location. That means more art, more entertainment, and most importantly, more fire! Out of 40 art installations, 35 of them will involve fire. Plus, there will be fire dancers and other fire performances.

If you’re having a hard time picturing what this looks like, there’s some of this:

And this:

And a bit of this:

If you’re still having a hard time visualizing, check out my posts on the 2008 and 2007 festivals.

The festival will be be held Wednesday-Saturday, from 8pm-Midnight at 2020 Engineer Road in West Oakland. There will be a free shuttle from West Oakland BART, which sounds like the most convenient option, since free parking is a couple blocks away from the event. You can find out all the other details and buy tickets at the Crucible’s website.

Fire Arts Festival 2008

This year’s Crucible Fire Arts Festival was my favorite so far. But I’ll let the photos do most of the talking… (Thanks to my awesome girlfriend for taking the vast majority of these pictures!)

On the main stage, there were performers throughout the night, but the highlight was this graceful, incredibly coordinated, strong pair of acrobats – it’s not pictured here, but at one point, one of the women was hanging from the hook by her neck!

And there was certainly a large crowd all night long to watch them and the other performers:

But the stage was not the main attraction for me. The Steampunk Treehouse was where it was at, both outside and inside (and climbing up it, finally!).

But the Kinetic Steam Works crew couldn’t bring just one art installation – they had to bring their steam powered train too:

Once I got my fill of the steam, I could focus on everything else that was around me, like Hydrogen Economy, an interactive piece that allows participants to turn bubbles into fire.

Or another interactive piece by the same artists – False Profit Labs – that hooked up a stethoscope to a participant and then projected his/her heartbeat into fire.

And everywhere I turned, there was fire.

Or a flaming head…

Or flaming cacti…

Dan Das Mann & Karen Cusolito were back with two of their figures from Crude Awakening, which were also on fire for most of the night.

And of course, there were some Burning Man reminders.

If you didn’t make it to the festival this year, no need to be jealous. It happens every year, and it really does seem to get better and better every time. Though it’s a bit pricey, I found out something neat from one of the festival staffers – the Crucible gives out free tickets to everyone who lives within a three block radius!

And though the above photos focus on the fire and arts, one of the best parts of the festival for me was seeing such a wide range of Oakland and Bay Area residents enjoying fire arts together. Young, old, people of every color, experienced Burners, people who would never dream of spending a week in the desert – and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves thoroughly. Thanks to the Crucible for producing such uniquely Oakland events and for drawing thousands of people into our beautiful city to celebrate fire!

(By the way – could anyone else hear the festival from across the city? I fell asleep on Friday night in my apartment in North Oakland to the sounds of deep rumblings and explosions – though I live far away, I can’t imagine what else the sounds could have been.)

Forget 4th of July – the real fun happens in Oakland next week

I’m sure there are lots of 4th of July festivities going on this weekend. Sure, fireworks and parades are nice, but they get old. Luckily, there are some more exciting events happening next week so I recommend saving some of your energy.

The Crucible Fire Arts Festival – Wednesday, July 9-Saturday, July 12

Last year’s Fire Arts Festival was incredible. And though this annual event seems to get a bit more pricey every year, it also gets bigger and more spectacular. This year, they’re featuring some of my favorite Burning Man fire artists. I’m really excited to get to climb in the Steampunk Tree House, which was always too crowded at BM to deal with:

And my two all time favorite Burning Man artists, Dan Das Mann and Karen Cusolito will be back this year, I’m guessing with Leaping Giants:

There are five of these figures in total, and though they may not be as exciting as Das Mann’s and Cusolito’s 2007 project – Crude Awakening – they’re phenomenal in their size, precision, and creativity (they’re also environmentally friendly, since they’re created from scrap metal).

In addition to all of these amazing art installations will be dozens of fire performers. So come check it out. And even if you can’t afford a ticket, I recommend coming down and walking around the perimeter, as you’ll be able to check out some of the larger installations from outside the fence.

Here’s the pricing info and the rest of the details:

Day	Advanced	At Door
Wednesday, July 9	$35	$40
Thursday, July 10	$40	$45
Friday, July 11	$45	$50
Saturday, July 12	$50	$55

Visit the Crucible’s website for more details.

July 9-12, 2008
8PM – 12AM
The Crucible’s Fire Arts Arena
Kirkham Street and 5th Street
Oakland, CA 94607
2 Blocks from West Oakland BART

From West Oakland BART Station
Exit the station onto 5th Street, turn right and walk 2 blocks east to Union (at the 2nd light). The entrance to the Arena is on 5th street between Kirkham and Union.

Local Buses/AC Tansit
Take either #19 bus or #62 bus to 7th Street at Union

Mix It Up East Bay – Thursday, July 10

Last month’s Mix It Up East Bay didn’t really happen because the bar was full of people watching a basketball game and it was too loud and crowded for any of the speakers to present. So they’ve bumped those speakers to this month – reps from Oaklandish, Art and Soul Festival, Oakland Art Murmur, and Old Oakland Outdoor Movies. So come grab a drink, learn about Oakland arts, and meet some cool people.

Thursday, June 12th
6-9pm
Arsimona’s Bar and Lounge
561 11th St.
Old Oakland (above Le Cheval)
Join the Mix It Up East Bay Facebook Group

Best of the East Bay Party – Friday, July 11

Next Friday, celebrate the Best of the East Bay at the Oakland Museum of California. And before or after you stop by, make sure to check out some of the open art galleries as part of Oakland’s art murmur. Here are the details via the Oakland Museum’s website:

5:00pm – Midnight

FFAF blues and jazz summer series continues with Billy Dunn and the Ladies Choice Band in the cafe. At 7 p.m. the East Bay Express rolls in with their rockin’ Best of the East Bay Party. Live music and performances throughout the museum until midnight. The amazing lineup of the East Bay’s best talent includes The Uptones, Flipper, Detstroyer-KISS cover band, Dyloot of DeepVoices, HOTTUB, Kev Choice Ensemble, DJ Malachi, Amoeba artist Brandi Shearer, The Whoreshoes, Mike Glendinning, Monarchs, + more music from Amoeba Music; performances by Splash Circus and Savage Jazz Dance Company; screenings of the Express 24-Hour Digital Film Festival; your favorite food and drink vendors; and a Kids Party Zone sponsored by Chabot Space and Science Center. And this year’s party is going Green: come on a bike and get a free tune-up and valet parking. Flash a public transportation pass for a tote bag of goodies. Free!

Oakland Museum of California
1000 Oak Street@ 10th St.
Oakland, California 94607

Transit:
Just a couple blocks from the Lake Merritt BART station or the 1 bus line.