The Cleveland Play House has announced the line-up for its 2010/2011 season, the final season at its current location. True to form, they have put together an interesting and exciting mixture of classic and innovative drama. Included are:

• "The 39 Steps," a classic mystery tale
• "The Kite Runner," based on the novel by Khaled Hosseini
• "This Wonderful Life," a holiday classic based on the film, "Its a Wonderful Life"
• "Backwards in Heels: The Ginger Musical," about the life and career of Ginger Rogers
• "The Trip to Bountiful," by Pulitzer Prize-winner Horton Foote
• "My Name is Asher Lev," based on the novel by Chaim Potek
• "Legacy of Light," by Karen Zacarias

Subscription tickets are on sale now via the Play House Web site. Individual tickets will go on sale this summer.

^{(photo courtesy of the Cleveland Play House)}

by regular contributor, Ken Gradomski:

Visual Art was afire in the beginning of the 20th Century! Theorists, movements, schools and styles were sparking and clashing together with incendiary force after the invention of photography and the Impressionist and Expressionist events...

Artists like Aleksandra Exter were fearlessly plying their trades, pioneering dynamic new works. The Art Historian, Andrei Nikov wrote of her, "The energetic themes and devices of Futurism led to the blossoming of a constructed non-objective art based on the dynamic interaction of colours." Cubism informed her work as well and that is evident in the recent acquisition of her "Landscape with Houses and Trees" (pictured above) by the Cleveland Museum of Art.

Cubism was created in 1907 by Pablo Picasso, a personal friend of Exeter's, and Georges Braque. The Cubist Movement was about the deconstruction and reconstruction of images using planes of color. Futurism was created by Thomaso Marinetti, also her acquaintance, in 1911 and incorporated visual elements of "force lines," speed, heights and the idea of "dynamism." So much (and so much more!) from Europe and Russia in the early years of the past century. Further on in time, in the late 1930's and during the 1940's in the United States, while Jazz was being created and "Social Realism" was fading, the New York School birthed the Abstract Expressionist Movement.

Influenced by the subconscious spontaneity of Surrealism these painters ventured into the land of feeling. On the one hand, "action painting" was part and parcel of these creations. On the other, "field painting" was more contemplative. Art Critics like Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg championed the efforts of these painters and made Abstract Expressionism household words in the minds of the American public and soon after the entire world.



Lee Krasner was married to Jackson Pollock, one of the founders of Abstract Expressionism and after his tragic death continued developing her own artistic narrative. Her work, "Celebration," (above) is currently on display at the Cleveland Museum of Art and it is simply massive and magnificent. In the information placard alongside, the words, "diary" and "personal journal" appear. Passion, action, calligraphic brush strokes and her lyrical lines reach across a half-century to viscerally touch the viewer. The new acquisition of "Landscape with Houses and Trees" by Aleksandra Exter and the relatively recent display of Lee Krasner's "Celebration" are reasons enough to begin to experience the vast treasure that is the Cleveland Museum of Art.

See images of other Cleveland Museum of Art acquisitions in recent years.

<sup>Image credits: Aleksandra Exter (Russian-Ukrainian, 1882-1949) Landscape with Houses and Trees, (oil on canvas, ca.1914-15) John L. Severance Fund

Lee Krasner (American, 1908-1984). Celebration,, 1960. Oil on canvas, 234.3 x 468.6 cm. The Cleveland Museum of Art. Purchase from the J.H. Wad Fund, 2003.227 © 2009 The Pollock-Krasner Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York</sup>

In case you haven't heard, northern Ohio has a serious contender in this year's American Idol competition. Crystal Bowersox, a 24-year-old single mother from Toledo is, according to Simon Cowell, "the one to beat this year." The bluesy singer with the blonde dreadlocks sang fellow northern Ohioan, Tracy Chapman's "Give Me One Reason" last night to rave reviews. Take a look:

The Cleveland Orchestra has announced its summer schedule for Blossom Music Center in Cuyahoga Falls. The line-up includes the traditional fourth of July concerts with fireworks and Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" as well as programs of music by the Gershwin brothers and Broadway standards.

Individual tickets for the concerts go on sale June 1.

^{(photo © R. Mastroianni/courtesy of the Cleveland Orchestra)}