Twin Cities Daily Planet (https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/author/paul-schmelzer/page/3/)
Two years after they collaborated on a mural at Shuga Records, Twin Cities artists Broken Crow (Mike FitzSimmons and John Grider) and Brooklyn-based Over Under (Erik Burke) again team up for a piece in North Continue Reading
11th Ave., St. Paul MN, above
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This welded plaque on Mississippi railroad bridge in Northeast Minneapolis — probably a piece by this writer — is a good book-end to the Continue Reading
Guo Gai, Chinese Jesus Tryptich (detail)
Ai Weiwei isn’t the only artist who’s been detained by Chinese authorities: The Soap Factory notes on Facebook that artist Guo Gai has been in police custody since being detained in Beijing on Mar. 24. Continue Reading
More figures in art and government are speaking out about the arrest and detention without official charge of China’s most famous artist, Ai Weiwei. Continue Reading
Rep. Keith Ellison is known for his impassioned speeches, especially when it comes to religion. At last summer’s General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association in Minneapolis, his fiery speech about Christianity touched on themes of unity and love. But today he testified not with bravado but through tears at New York Republican Rep. Peter King’s controversial Homeland Security Committee hearings on Muslim-American “radicalization.” Ellison, Congress’ first Muslim member, broke down while telling the story of 23-year-old Muslim American paramedic Mohammad Salman Hamdani, who died in the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center. Ellison started out his lengthy testimony by stating that he disagrees with “the premise of this hearing,” before getting to his main point: “Ascribing the evil acts of a few individuals to an entire community is wrong; it is ineffective; and it risks making our country less secure.” Continue Reading
For four winters now, Roger Hanson of Big Lake has been making remarkable sculptures in his yard using a computer-directed sprayer that disperses water from his geo-thermal heating system. This year’s piece (above) is — so far — 65 feet tall and 85 feet wide. Continue Reading
Sixty-nine years ago, Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the executive order that led to the internment of Japanese Americans, forced migrations — later referred to by Congress as “fundamental violations of the basic civil liberties and constitutional rights of these individuals” — commemorated through today’s Day of Remembrance. Continue Reading
