By Kevin Lee Associate Editor

Arts stew for the slow season

Summer is customarily a torpid time in these parts but that doesn’t mean news stops flowing into the mailbox. Just a look through the virtual mailbag reveals all sorts of nuggets for the cultural inquisitive.

Fairhope’s Page & Palette bookstore is celebrating their 40th anniversary this year. The cozy nook on the Eastern Shore claims Rick Bragg, Winston Groom and Fannie Flagg as regular visitors and now the store has its own in-house VIP.

Owner Karin Wilson has assumed the role of president of the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance (SUBA) and the timing couldn’t be better. Mobile will serve as host city for the SIBA Annual Trade Show scheduled for Sept. 26 – 28. One of the largest literary events in the region, it hopes to bring in close to 2,000 booksellers, publishers and authors.

Congrats go to Karin and the Azalea City on all counts.

As of Oct. 1, Alabama Public Television will discontinue its funding to the University of Alabama to maintain their Mobile bureau, located in downtown. Employees are desperately seeking alternative avenues of funding, but it appears as if the money won’t be available, given the state’s present funding squeeze.

Public broadcasting is an integral aspect of the state’s cultural livelihood. Not only does it supply news and information untainted by the agendas of the private sector, but it is often the single avenue to expose our citizens and the world of the richness of Alabama’s cultural backdrop. Many a local artist has gained exposure through APT who would have otherwise been marginalized.

As we all know, cultural programming and education are normally the first to come under the axe, and if thin wallets are closing news bureaus, it certainly brings pause for the future of arts coverage via those channels.

The Mobile Museum of Art has some new names on its roster.

Harvard grad Darby Ulery is developing an adult education program.

Pennsylvania native Howard McPhail has been hired as a new curator.

Rachel Young, a University of South Alabama graduate who previously worked in London, is filling a registrar’s position.

The museum has also shuffled some familiar names.

In the last few months, Charlene Patterson has moved from the public information department to fulfill similar duties for the Eastern Shore Art Center.

Her slot has been filled by Eric Gallichant, public information officer for the Mobile Police Department for close to a dozen years.

Concurrent with Gallichant’s arrival, museum attendees need not be worried by the new fingerprinting and mug shots required for entrance to the Langan Park facility. The database is only regional, not national.

We kid, we kid…

The Gulf Coast Exploreum is raking in the honors of late.

First, the downtown facility was named the 2008 Attraction of the Year by the Alabama Tourism Department. Their recent string of blockbuster exhibits featuring everything from Dead Sea Scrolls to mummies to ancient Roman disasters to preserved cadavers have produced record numbers of visitors and an estimated $8.7 million in economic impact.

Second, Parents magazine has ranked the Exploreum one of the best science centers in the nation, placing it at 14 in a field of more than 150. The Mobile institution, celebrating its tenth anniversary next year, finished above similar facilities in Chicago, New York state and Seattle.

Director Michael Sullivan and his entire staff deserve kudos for maintaining such a wonderful benefit to Mobile life and weathering not only the recent downturns in the national economic picture, but also more literal meteorological misfortune in a locale vulnerable to the Gulf’s seasonal disasters.

On a final note, it’s encouraging to see Margaret Brown’s “The Order of Myths” has at least begun some semblance of dialogue on Mardi Gras’ role in Mobile life and what it says about our community. There is nothing more noble to which a work of art can aspire.

Sadly, a lot of the reaction to the film has been of the knee-jerk variety, the typical things brought forth by any critique.

Here’s a clue for locals: if you want to make Mobile attractive to badly needed transplants, stop brandishing the sentiment, “If you’re not a native, you’ll never understand.” It’s a roundabout way of telling someone, “You’ll never belong here.”

Mardi Gras is certainly intertwined with our arts world. For decades, commissioned analyses of the Mobile area by outside agencies have cited Carnival as having a dramatic impact on such.

It is sometimes noted as a hindrance of sorts, a way for resources to be diverted from more widely beneficial artistic pursuits.

On the other hand, the celebrations help area artists and artisans in some ways, providing flexible sources of income for those who help construct floats, clothing and the multi-layered background of the balls. It can prove a creative outlet that helps finance an artist’s more serious pursuits.

Rarely is anything completely bad or good. We just have to decide what works best and move forward from there.

Kevin Lee is Lagniappe associate editor. Contact him at klee@lagniappemobile.com.

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