9/10- 9/17 2014 Weekly Arts and Urbanism Roundup

Cleveland 

The Cleveland Museum of Art celebrates 25th chalk Art festival. (Cleveland.com)

The link between Northeast Ohio's flooding and its sprawl. (Streetsblog)

Akron

New loft apartments and Brew Pub planned for old Tire factory.

Other Ohio Arts and Urbanism News

Columbus Dispatch Writer cycling and blogging across Ohio.

Pittsburgh 

Pittsburgh poet, Terrance Hayes named MacArthur fellow. (Pittsburgh Post Gazette)

Pittsburgh's Lawrenceville neighborhood celebrates 200 years!  (Essential Pittsburgh)

Does the city's high self-esteem create new problems?  (Essential Pittsburgh)

Pittsburgh cyclists concerned about redesign of Schenley Drive in Oakland (Pittsburgh Post Gazette)

Artists from Mattress Factory discuss making it in Pittsburgh. (Pitt News)

Kurt Shaw reviews 2014 Pittsburgh Society of Sculptors annual @ Panza Gallery. (Tribune Review)

Pennsylvania DEP estimates there are 40 active underground coal fires burning across the state- including one under Pittsburgh Airport. (PA Independent)

West Virginia

Five free things to do in West Virginia in the fall. (Houston Chronicle)

Other Arts and Urbanism News 

Indiana campus police acquire massive amounts of surplus military gear (JC online)

The Bronx is booming with boutique and luxury hotels (New York Daily News) 

The new donut - decline of the inner ring suburbs. (Urbanophile)

"We can't have density there because there's not enough transit." (Human Transit)

How Germany's ban on Uber hurts the poor. (Business Week)

Others see Toronto as a success. Why don't we?  (The Toronto Star)

Europe's big airlines no longer want to fly in Europe. (Business Week)

Wisconsin's famous Amish and Mennonite, Kolona, cheese "factory" closes due to government regulations.

8/21- 8/27 2014 Weekly Arts & Urbanism Roundup

Pittsburgh 

Essential Pittsburgh Radio looks at the 110 year old soda pop tradition at the Natrona Bottling Company

Toonseum and Pittsburgh's Holocaust museum bring true stories of 5 Pittsburgh Holocaust survivors into comic form. Story on Essential Pittsburgh

980 Liberty Partners rebuts Heinz Endowment opposition to August Wilson Center Hotel

Essential Pittsburgh looks at recent metro walkability rankings

Pittsburgh area schools being outfitted with prison design features.

Brian O'Neall in Post Gazette: Militarization of police has its hidden costs.

Pittsburgh included in National Geographic article: "Nine Cities that Love Their Trees".

Mass Mob aims to boost attendance at Pittsburgh area Catholic churches.


Cleveland

Planners consider making center of St. Clair Avenue into a Bicycle Expressway!

Cleveland is making progress in attracting highly skilled young people.

Western Reserve Historical Society hosts exhibit of last Cleveland Browns world championship- 50 years ago.

Downtown Willoughby, Ohio hosts first Pig and Whiskey festival this weekend.

The Cleveland Blues Society is looking for a few good bands. (Deadline)

8/31 Deadline for Cleveland International Film Festival entries

Akron 

Akron's new downtown cinema showing hard to find films and Akron-centric concessions.

Columbus

What Columbus is doing to try to control sprawl. (Seriously, the city now has a lot of infill development)

Architecture and Urbanism

Nine of the most beautiful buildings we ever tore down on Gizmodo: Including Pittsburgh's Wabash Terminal.

Seven excellent examples of repurposed bike infrastructure- Including Atlanta's Belt Line.

Is it time to get rid off parking minimums?

Real Clear Politics: Left behind in rural northwest Ohio.

Toll Roads once common in Northeast Pennsylvania

Nashville's lack of sidewalks sparks campaign

California state senator arrested for drunk driving hours after voting for bill limiting Uber car service.

Premier Of "25 Hill" Lifts Hopes For Akron's Soap Box Derby

The movie, largely shot in the Akron area about The Soap Box Derby is finally out, opening to a big crowd.

OK, I am gonna have to say it looks like they laid it on thick. Kid, who's dad was killed in Afghanistan hooks up with bitter old man who's son died in the World Trade Center--and after a long.....barf. I guess, I just can't quite buy that this is a great movie.

Still, I can't help feeling that The Derby itself, is a great event which taps into a very deep American love of fun, invention and can do spirit. The film is also the product of lots of local North East Ohio backers who believed in the project and it's potential to draw more support and attention to a struggling Akron tradition.

IMHO, this is still a greatly under leveraged brand which fits so closely with the recent revival of Do It Yourself culture.

The Herbert & Dorothy Vogel Collection: 50 Works For Ohio @ The Akron Art Museum

50 Works For Ohio

By now, you may have heard of Herbert and Dorothy Vogel, the postal worker and librarian who managed mostly through sheer dedication, sacrifice and sincere enthusiasm managed to amass one of the country's most important collections of Contemporary art.

The remarkable story of Dorothy and Herbert Vogel has become the stuff of lore. He a postal clerk, she a reference librarian at the Brooklyn Public Library, who decided shortly after they married in 1962, to live on Dorothy's salary and to devote Herb's to purchasing art. Together they purchased thousands of artworks, cramming their one-bedroom Manhattan apartment floor to ceiling with art.

Though the couple’s initial exposure to many artists was through gallery shows, they rarely purchased art from dealers. Instead, when they became interested in an artist’s work, they visited the artist studio and bought directly from him. They typically only purchased objects they could take with them on the spot.

The Vogel Collection has been characterized as unique among collections of contemporary art, both for the character and breadth of the objects and for the individuals who created it. When the Vogels began collecting in the early 1960s, their focus on drawing was an unusual one, suggesting another aspect of their foresight. Many drawings in the collection represent an artist’s initial form of an idea and others act as plans to be followed by a collaborator in the making of a work of art.

Part of the trick behind their collecting was that they rarely had to pay full gallery prices for anything--because they often bought from artist's whose work was being ignored or under appreciated. It's actually hard to know just how little the Vogels had to pay for anything since many artists just won't say. Quite often they were just given things for showing any interest at all.

Another "trick" was that both artists and galleries wanted them to own works, since they never sold them-even as they became so valuable.

Now, a large part of their collection has been distributed to museums across the country through an agreement with The National Gallery which gave one institution in each of the 50 states, 50 works from the collection.

The Herbert & Dorothy Vogel Collection: 50 Works For Ohio
June 18, 2011 - October 16, 2011

The Akron Museum Of Art