Paper Darts has invited over twenty-five different organizations, artists, and writers to transform a South Minneapolis storefront into an ace showcase of the Twin Cities’ thriving creative communities. Steel yourselves and clear your calendars for over twenty events in a short six week period.

In partnership with SooLOCAL, a division of the Soo Visual Arts Center, this six-week spectacle will celebrate storytelling by bringing writers, sculptors, publishers, culture and literary mags, illustrators, improvisors, video game experts, comic artists, musicians, poets, GIF artists, and stage actors together in one space to celebrate the sweet-tasting cyclone that results when lit and art collide.

More information soon...

Here’s a plate of what’s hot in the art world lately.

1. Paintings by Erik Thor Sandberg
These paintings are all chaos, all awesomeness, all messing with my emotions.

2. Anya Gallaccio’s 10,000 dying roses
The impact of this art might change depending on when you see it, but 10,000 red roses is a powerful image alive or dead.

3. Laser cut wooden records by Amanda Ghassaei
How much music would a wood record play if a wood record could play music?

4. John Breed’s rainbow legs installation
I always thought the rainbow was made of candy. Turns out it’s just a bunch of legs.

5. The Real Life Models: Photos by Flora Borsi
Photos of fake models standing next to their portraits—I feel like I need to make an inception joke here.

6. Low res wooden frame by Diego Zanella
This pixilated, low-res picture frame is ironically almost too good for your high-res photos.

7. Amy Brener’s light sensitive sculptures
A sculpture that looks different from every angle might be the perfect thing for an indecisive art collector.

8. Harmless weapons made of plants by Sonia Rentsch
Were these weapons made to be harmless or to harm less?

9. A Japanese ad agency reinvents advertising for funeral services
Funerals don’t have to be dark and depressing anymore. In fact, these ads make them look almost…fun.

10. Revealing portraits of everyday foods sliced in half
Food art is my favorite art, but these photos make me think some food is better whole.

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and nephilim

Alyssa Bluhm, Editorial and Marketing Intern and professional procrastinator

Minnesota, we're so close!

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and utterly indifferent to your color preference

Check out what’s been pop-popping in the art world this week.

1. “Protein Lite” mural paintings by Josef Kristofoletti
This classy street art really jumps off the page—er, wall.

2. Unbelievably realistic “painted” fish by Keng Lye
It’s not a fish, but it’s not exactly a painting of a fish either. I don’t know what it is—resin is involved—but it’s lovely.

3. The Gerald Project by Lazerian
It’s like decorating paper plates at little kid birthday parties, but all grown up and fancy.

4. Photographer brings joy to boy with muscular dystrophy
Dangit, who’s chopping onions? These photos by Matej Peljhan are something Make-A-Wish could aspire to.

5. Clare Elasser’s flower-covered portraits
Hiding your face from a picture behind a bouquet of flowers? This trend needs to catch on.

6. Steven Soderbergh is writing a novella on Twitter
What’s more surprising to me than high literature on Twitter is that Sorderberg’s handle is @Bitchuation.

7. Tape paintings by Sun K. Kwak
Not even Pocahontas can paint with all the colors of the tape. Which in this case is just black, but still.

8. Iconic works remade in a reflection on identity
The photographer 2Fik becomes his own subject in these recreations meant to question identity and art.

9. The straw sculptures of Francesca Pasquali
Sticks in a bunch cannot be broken; straws in a bunch cannot get any cooler.

10. D. Laferriere’s sandwich art
This dad made an art project out of packing his kids’ lunches. Yum.

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and OK speller
Alyssa Bluhm, Editorial and Marketing Intern and runny-nosed kid

Wouldn't life be easier if you got to live it in black and white?

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and vaguely dizzy

The fer sher bits are as follows:

We are supremely excited that [PANK] wants to party with us.

There are going to be six readers who are primed to tear down the stage with their brilliant words and ultimate excellenticity. 

Reading for [PANK]

Matt Mauch
Kris Bigalk
Jordan Wiklund

Reading for Paper Darts

Katie Sisneros
John Jodzio
John Brandon

Holly Hansen of Zoo Animal is going to strum up a storm.

But other than those things...sorry dudes, no clue.

Could be like this

Could be like this

Who knows, it could even be like this

But most likely it'll be like this, so don't worry.

 No matter what

01. Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola’s “filmmercial” for Prada
All I can say is, if someone were to break into my apartment, they’d better bring me some cake. 

02. Rap quotes as street signs in New York City
From Busta Rhymes to Jay-Z, hip-hop is invading NYC—again—one street sign at a time. 

03. The extraterrestrial world of whiskey art
You don’t have to wait two hours after eating to explore the tiny alien oceans at the bottoms of these whiskey glasses. 

04. New York Times haikus
Just one more clever/Tumblr to clog your dashboard,/but this one is cool. 

05. Animal portraits by Yago Partal
There’s probably another planet where animals have been dressing like this for over 12,000 years. 

06. Suspended boat made of 8,000 sheets of rice paper
It would sink if you sailed it, but this intricate boat by Zhu Jinshi is still a masterpiece. 

07. Rebecca Ward’s intricate tape installations
I’m impressed by Ward’s ability to use this much tape without it ending up in a giant tape ball. 

08. “Helveticat” print: a font made of cats
Cats + typefaces = instant internet sensation.

09. Artists play with their food
I think there are just two of them that have gone viral lately: Hong Yi and Ida Skivenes. But I can’t keep track.

10. The Ways We Separate Deluxe Art Edition
The case for this vinyl album is made entirely out of sugar. But after I eat it, what’s supposed to hold the record?

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff
Alyssa Bluhm, Editorial and Marketing Intern and book hoarder

I sell used books, and I am an English major.
One of these has taught me lots of useful things about American literature.

Here are some of them:

Old women drive the fiction market.

Plenty of people read fiction, and everybody should, so be it from me to generalize. But let me put it this way: I have never seen a young man come in with a 8 ½ x 11 list of titles for his book club, one of which is (always) Gone Girl. Somebody's grandma, on the other hand? Every day. What does this mean or matter? For one thing, women in general read significantly more fiction than men. For another thing, maybe you should start asking your grandma which new hardcover you should buy next. She's probably more in the know than you are. 

National Geographics are heavy, and nobody wants them.

You could build a hospital in Uganda with the sheer volume of National Geographics I throw out in a month. I don't know if anybody's done a study on this, but I suspect NG's subscription rate might have taken a hit around the same time that adolescents worldwide discovered they could just google “nude pigmies.”

Nobody who knows anything about Fifty Shades of Grey actually buys it.

The typical customer who is looking to buy a used copy of this book (“used” in this case hopefully means “pre-owned,” as opposed to the more primitive sense) is not looking for “Fifty Shades of Grey.” They are looking for “Fifteen Grades of Stay” or “The Grey Shades Book” or “Eat, Grey, Love.” All they have are those little phonetic bites from the last time one of their girlfriends mentioned it. It always throws them for a loop when they hear it's in Erotica, but that doesn't stop them from buying it anyway, even if their kids are with them. Eww.

People like to pretend they are addicted to books.

Anybody who enjoys reading is bound to be totally irrational when it comes to buying books. Book-buying is one of those things you can feel good about sinking money into. Which means it is really easy to buy books you will never read. I am no exception. Part of this may have to do with people feeling really good about supporting print, as opposed to e-books (a source of romanticized paranoia for the book fanatic). Another part might be the unspoken, but widespread, belief that an unread book emits some vaporous form of knowledge that can be absorbed through the skin. Once you own a book, why bother reading it? Lots of people are willing buy a leather-bound Easton Press edition of Moby Dick. Not so many are willing to read it. Moral is, just having a full bookshelf doesn't make you well-read. Books don't work like they do in Minecraft.

They printed way too many paperback copies of Middlesex, and way too many hardcovers of Freedom.

Seriously. I could throw a ratty Danielle Steele into the recycling bin and hit a copy of Middlesex or Freedom every time. I understand these are both fantastic books. So what are they doing buried under The Last Song and The Host? One word: Oprah. 

There are seven cookbooks, sixteen children's books, and two novels all written by one Crescent Dragonwagon.

Someone with this name must get book contracts thrown at them. “A Miss Dragonwagon to see you, sir.” “A miss who? First name?” “Crescent.” “Holy Ploughshares, get that woman a contract. And bring up that formatting we use for Patterson all the time, the one with the author's name ten times bigger than the title. Ahh, miss Dragonwagon, sign here please. Now, is that pronounced as in wrench, or do you prefer cresahhnt?” 

Be nice to the people buying Tarot cards and Wiccan spellbooks.

Because you just never know.

I'm not sure if the '90s are back or if the future is here, but I dig it. Let's get shiny.

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent

1. Bubble wrap paintings by Bradley Hart
Okay, so popping this bubble wrap is out of the question, but good on Brad for giving us an alternative way to enjoy it.

2. Epic pictures of a volcano erupting in Japan
These long-exposure photos by Martin Rietze make the spewing lava look like beautiful, red-hot, fiery rain. The lightning is nice, too.

3. Faces emerge from spilled stainless steel
If only something this cool happened every time I knocked over a beverage. Then again, it’d be way harder to get the stain out of the carpet.

4. “Too Much Night, Again” woven art
The writing is on the wall for this one, but it’s also a giant, navigable yarn installation made by Pae White. Don’t tell the cat.

5. Moving light sculptures by Mihoko Ogaki
These sculptures of galaxies shining through holes in dead or dying bodies are by far the prettiest idea of what the afterlife looks like.

6. Tilda Swinton snoozes in a glass box
I so envy all the lucky bastards who get to observe the phenomenon that is Tilda Swinton during The Maybe at MoMA.

7. Paint stacks by Leah Rosenberg
Inspired by layer cake, Leah Rosenberg created these stacks by painstakingly stacking individually dried layers of paint on each other.

8. “Tainted” wood carvings by Aron Demetz
Figures of human beings rise out of tree stumps, showing that humans are the, er, root of nature’s problems, and vice versa.

9. Lush photographs of animals in sacred spaces
It was Ms. Peacock in the teal room with the panes of glass. Beautiful India is the perfect backdrop for Karen Knorr’s photos of equally beautiful animals.

10. Edible cityscape made for Swedish food lab
This model of a city’s infrastructure is entirely edible, because Swedes know the right way to play with food. Take notes, Google Maps.

—

Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and cat's cradle
Alyssa Bluhm, Editorial and Marketing Intern and honorary Spice Girl.

Is it yellow? Is it green? Does it matter?

I'm so pleased neon is still "in" this year.

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and Nail Painter

01. Paint in motion by Fabian Oefner
Throw some acrylics on a metal rod connected to a drill. Ready your camera, turn on the drill, and voilà.

02. Body Scripture
Ronit Bigal meticulously presents excerpts from sacred Biblical texts on the human body.

03. Parker Fitzgerald + Amy Merrick for Kinfolk Magazine
Because I wasn't already desperate enough for spring, this beautiful shoot of "ice cream flower arrangements" just had to surface on my radar.

04. Dita Von Teese models a 3D-printed dress
This 3D-printed garment is made of seventeen individually-printed pieces adorned with 12,000 black Swarovski crystals. God damn.

05. Paintings by Carina Crenshaw
Poof! Glitter out the eyes.

06. Characters from Finnish folklore recreated by seniors
"Eyes as Big as Plates" is an incredible collaboration between Riitta Ikonen and Karoline Hjorth. 

07. Still lifes by Bobby Doherty
Are they photographs, or are they hyperrealistic paintings? (They're photographs.)

08. Wolfgang Stiller's human match sticks
These Matchstickmen depict burnt out humans—ignited, extinguished, and tossed to the ground.

09. Paintings in Petri dishes
Klari Reis is in month three of painting one Petri dish every day for the entirety of 2013.

10. Lifelike "mutant" sculptures by Patricia Piccinini
Objectively, I recognize that these human-animal alien hybrid sculptures are impressive. But they scare the shit out of me and I never want to see them again.

—

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and mild nightmare-haver

There are a lot of reasons why the color green is strongly associated with Ireland. St. Patrick and shamrocks and lush ground cover blah blah blah. But why doesn't orange ever get any play? Was William III really so bad? (Don't answer that.)

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and Wikipedian

01. Windows of New York by Jose Guizar
Every week, Jose Guizar walks the streets of his city and documents, then illustrates, neighborhood windows.

02. Frozen trees on the shores of Lake Ontario
Landscape photographer Timothy Corbin makes me think winter isn't all bad. 

03. A large scale installation made with thousands of plastic bags
Cameroonian artist Pascale Marthine Tayou created for this beast for the MACRO museum in Rome.

04. Photo portraits of a five-year-old girl in the style of classic paintings
Bill Gekas creates elaborate portraits of his five-year old daughter inspired by the old masters.

05. Natalia Stuyk's fashion animations for Kenzo
Mismatched prints and tailored assaults of color mark Natalia Stuyk's fashion videos for Kenzo.

06. "Strange Beauties" by Jen Mann
Jen Mann's new exhibit captures a view of the world through rose-colored glasses.

07. "Lights Edge" by Kevin Cooley
These long-exposure photographs aren’t the result of any digital trickery. Way to be, Kevin Cooley.

08. Wire typography by Dan Hoopert
By recreating the alphabet with virtual wire, Dan Hoopert shows a simple serif typeface in an intricate way.

09. The world's first 3D printing pen lets you draw sculptures
Forget those pesky 3D printers that require software and the knowledge of 3D modeling. Behold the 3Doodler.

10. Editorial work by Kristian Hammerstad
When Kristian Hammerstad decides it's time for a portfolio update, the internet pays attention.  

—

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and lucky charm

When do we get to advance to An Intermediate Guide to Gif Artists, you ask. Not as long as I'm driving this car.

Gordon Magnin

When exploring his website, I noticed Gordon Magnin's bio was filed under "alien farts." At that point, my like for him turned into love. Magnin plays with images of brands and beauty, flipping them from static masterpieces to frantic gifs. Twitching, blinking, vanishing beneath mirrored layers of themselves, Magnin's work infuses his subjects with a needed splash of freaky.

Sophie Alda

Sophie Alda is an illustrator / painter / prop maker based in East London. She's a fan of bold colors, blobby characters, and big noses, and as I write this I'm fighting the urge to call her and propose marriage. Alda's hand-created aesthetic translates over into her gifs, which is something rare and worth celebrating in Gifland. These melty compositions might be better suited to a hot summer day than a chilly winter one, but they're too good to keep filed away.

INSA

INSA makes other gif-makers look lazy. These pieces aren't projections or photo manipulations. No no, these elaborate murals were painted and repainted and photographed in sequence. As gifs, they add a new layer of intrigue to art existing on and off the internet—the permanent murals (gosh, I hope they're permanent) live on in L.A., but their dynamic gif counterparts live online for all the plugged-in world to see.

Skip Hursh

Skip Dolphin Hursh (probably not a real dolphin, but I could be wrong) is one of those midwesterners turned Brooklynites who you would spite for inflicting brain drain on the region if they weren't so delightful. Hursh's vibrant design and animation doesn't dodge bright colors or chunky patterns, so he fits right in with clients like Nickelodeon, Scholastic, and Discover. His "personal explorations into looping animations" have produced gifs like the ones below—dangerously addictive geometric beauties full of implied actions and reactions. Good luck looking away.

Julian Glander 

Julian Glander knows that taking yourself seriously is totally overrated. Why write a complicated artist statement on your bio page when you can quote Carl Sagan and Biggie Smalls? Why have a static portfolio when you can fill your homepage with gifs, regardless of whether the final product was animated? Glander is putting out blazing exuberance full-time, and the world is better for it.

Inky and cold and, better yet, cool. Royal blue just makes so much sense, doesn't it?

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and Imaginary Friend

* I would have expected Vonnegut to be one to pull a quote from one of his novels, because he is famous for so many great epitaph-like lines (ex: “So it goes,” or “Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt”). While his gravesite is apparently a mystery, he mentioned in several interviews in the time leading up to his death that this was his desired epitaph.

* Tolkien’s epitaph comes from The Tale of Beren and Lúthien, and is also one of the most romantic epitaphs a person could write. Long story short: Beren is mortal, and Lúthien is an elf. To marry Lúthien, Beren goes on a quest to retrieve a fancy stone at the demand of her father. Beren dies in the process, and Lúthien later dies out of grief. The Middle-earth equivalent of Haedes, Mandos, takes pity on the couple, and brings them back to life with the added benefit of immortality. Are you crying yet?

* Until recent years, it was a trend among Wilde fans to plant huge lipstick kisses on his tombstone. The Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris put a glass wall around the tomb in 2011 to stop the kisses from eroding the stone, but now the glass is the part of Wilde’s grave that is covered in lipstick. While Wilde would have loved to see his tomb covered in smooches, he would no doubt be less pleased to know that vandals have since relieved the male angel carved into the top portion of it of his genitalia. (Wiki pic.)

* These four words easily sum up the traditional English lifestyle Doyle adhered to. He played pretentious English sports like cricket and golf, freed innocent men from jail with his investigative skills, and wrote pamphlets in support of the government (which led to his being knighted in 1902). If that’s not enough to convince you that he was a stereotypical English gentleman, his middle name is Ignatius—I mean, how much more English can you get?

* London’s epitaph is taken from Psalm 118:22, and the full line reads, “The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” While the stone in question is actually a metaphor for Jesus, the out-of-context phrase becomes a clever jab at his own death (lol kidney stones).

* Shelley’s epitaph includes a few lines from Shakespeare’s The Tempest. The mention of “sea-change” in this particular line is a bit of a pun, considering that Shelley’s life ended when he died in a storm at sea at the age of 29. His wife, Mary Shelley, died nearly 30 years later, and was buried with her parents instead of with him.

01. Thilo Frank's mirrored room
An enclosed room with floor-to-ceiling mirrors and a swing. We dig it, Thilo Frank.

02. NYCB partners with street artists
Highbrow meets lowbrow in this FAILE × New York City Ballet collaboration.

03. Bela Borsodi's "Unconscious Affair"
Real-life models fused with hand-illustrated fashion statements. Bela Borsodi never ceases to amaze.

04. Shattered glass animal sculptures by Marta Klonowska
Sculptor Marta Klonowska captures animals' natural poses in colored glass. Cute. Ouchy.

05. "Honky Kong" by Christian Åslund
A Swedish photographer pays homage to 2D platforming games in the streets of Hong Kong.

06. Where Chefs Eat: A Guide to Chefs' Favourite Restaurants
This international restaurant guide with contributions from 400+ badass chefs was designed by Kobi Benezri.

07. Luciana Novo's polar bear
Inspired by animal head trophies, Luciana Novo created this beautiful plasticine-on-wood polar bear sculpture.

08. Colorful buildings by HENSE
HENSE baptized a church into a new beginning and brought a little (a lotta) color to the local neighborhood.

09. Paper sculptures by Li Hongbo
Li Hongbo glues thousands of sheets of paper together to create flexible compositions that look like porcelain.

10. Richard Jackson's bad, bad dog
It's a giant dog installation peeing on the Orange County Museum of Art. What more do you need to know?

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and Nail Painter

We asked our current interns, Alyssa Bluhm and Ethan Marxhausen, to put on pizza slice costumes and wrestle for our amusement, but they said no. We let them interview each other instead.

Alyssa interviews Ethan

1. If you ruled the universe (or at least Earth…or even just America), what would be the first television show you would erase from existence?
New Girl. Any film or TV show that shows Zooey Deschanel in a relationship should be censored for the good of anybody who is not in a relationship with Zooey Deschanel. Or Elementary. If you're gonna rip off a show that's already perfect, only it's from England, you better at least do it well. This is why the world hates us.

2. Are you related to any famous people, or people who did famous things? If yes, how?
My great-uncle was on Letterman once. He invented this thing called the Cosmic Cube, which was a hollow aluminum cube with thickish wires in it. When you turned it around it made a sound like a spaceship from a 60s flick. That's about as close as my family's come to fame, as far as I know.

3. Who were you in a past life?
A tsar. Didn't do so hot. Remember Dr. Zhivago? Got demoted for that.

4. What would be the title of your autobiography?
I Was Told There'd Be Cake.

5. Bill Nye or the Magic School Bus?
Magic School Bus, all the way. Science is boring if there's no threat of death.

6. Do you have a favorite literary device? What is it?
Stream of consciousness. I love the immediacy and the gaps.

7. What would your Animagus be?
Maybe a fly, so I could be on walls and listen to people. But that'd also be risky, because I could get swatted. Maybe a vampire. Could I be a vampire? I wouldn't mind being nocturnal. And then there's all those special powers. Vampire, definitely. But none of that sparkling in the sunlight bullcrap.

8. If you had to spend the day with your 12-year-old self, what would you do together?
I’d tell myself to stop tucking my shirts into my jeans, cuz that looks dumb. Then I'd give myself a list of stocks to invest in. Then I'd say, you know that shirt thing I just told you about? That doesn't mean that if you feel like doing something weird you shouldn't do it. Kid weirdness is directly proportional to adult coolness. Dunno if it's cosmic law, overcompensation, or some other sociological constant, but whatever it is, it's fair. 

Ethan interviews Alyssa

1. Who is your favorite Minnesota-based writer / musician / artist?
Definitely the Andrews Sisters. When I was three years old, their greatest hits was one of the first cassette tapes I ever owned. I don’t know what happened to that tape, but I paid waaay too much for another one on Amazon.com last year. Nostalgia makes me do dumb things.

2. You are suddenly the CEO of Trump Co. What do you do first?
I honestly have no idea what Trump even does, but I would do annoyingly sensible things with my enormous paycheck, like pay off my student loans, and then take my parents out to dinner a million times. Then I would adopt a dog. Actually, several dogs.

3. Which Hollywood actor, living or dead, would you hire as your personal bodyguard?
Daniel Craig! Even though he isn’t actually James Bond, I’m just going to assume he still has the skills. And anyway, he’d be less of a bodyguard and more of a traveling piece of eye candy.

4. How old would a Twinkie have to be before you would refuse to eat it?
I once read something about how Twinkies actually do go bad at a certain point. But considering I’ve never had one (do I default fail at life for that?), I don’t think I’d be too tempted to eat one past its expiration date.

5. What is your favorite punctuation mark?
The interrobang (‽) because, obviously, it has the coolest name.

6. If you could be wildly successful at any professional sport, which would you choose and why?
Competitive napping is a thing, right? (Googles it) Oh, it actually is a thing… Well then, I guess it’s time to go pro!

7. Who wins in a three-way fistfight between Michael Cera, Kristen Stewart, and you?
Michael Cera would chicken out immediately, I know that much. The fight would probably end in a standstill between Kristen Stewart and me, because I think we’re both too apathetic to try to win.

8. You die and get to come back as two animals combined, griffin-style. Which two do you choose?
A bear and a dog. A dear? A bog? Whatever, I’d be so dang cuddly.

01. One-eyed weirdos by Anton Marrast
Russian illustrator Anton Marrast (AKA Grape Frogg) adds another dimension to what he sees.

02. Gravity Defying Photography by Cerise Doucede
You can see the strings in Cerise Doucede's unique photography, but that makes it that much cooler.

03. "Points of Contention" by Jonathan Latiano
Jonathan Latiano knows a thing or two about "explosive" installations. 

04. Eric Standley’s laser cut "stained glass" windows
Eric Standley works with hundreds of layers of colored paper creating intricate laser cut stain glass windows.

05. Thomas Barbéy's old fashioned photo manips
Barbéy brings back a classic surreal quality through carefully planned film-based photographs and selection of negatives.

06. Sculptures by Michael Johansson
The hyper-organized, color-coordinated, Tetris-like sculptures by Michael Johansson are a hit.

07. The Tiebele house decorations of Burkina Faso, Africa
Suddenly, painting your house one solid color just isn't enough.

08. "Trace Heavens" by James Nizam
Holes + sunlight + mirrors + a large format camera = way cool light sculptures by James Nizam.

09. Smart editorial illustrations by John Holcroft
In John Holcroft's work, metaphor abounds and humorous juxtaposition is rampant.

10. Organized Fruits and Vegetables Photographed by Florent Tanet
Florent Tanet plays with food—and with color, scale, and shape—in "A Colorful Winter."

by Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and sleepy bear

Future Cities—which features short pieces of fiction by local literati Becky Lang, Jay Gabler, Heidi Schatz, John Jodzio, and more (like not-so-local-Portable.tv’s Kat George)—is a collection of little glimpses into possibilities for the future. Each piece is unique to itself, but each fits well smooshed together under the giant umbrella of Future Cities without screaming at you “THE FUTURE IS NOW.”  

The future does seem to feel a lot like now, however. There are break ups, there are new-agey penitentiaries, there are time capsules, jello, hashtags. Trivial Pursuit, Kohl’s, and Funyuns still exist, which is good. Crispin Best’s piece “I Woke Up and it Was the Future. Hi. Things Seem the Same.” does an excellent job of conveying just how similar and different things are between the present we readers know and the futures depicted throughout the collection.

Regular readers of The Tangential will notice a lack of lists, how-to’s, and much of the snark found on the site. This collection moves more into the thought-provoking types of pieces they’ve published lately (like this). That’s not to say this will disappoint the site’s wide range of fans. In fact, Gabler’s piece feels like a nice compromise between the two.

Of course the biggest difference is that this is collection is a fiction compilation, whereas the website is mainly nonfiction. This book proves that these writers can hold their own in both literary realms. The characters are relatable, and none of the prose reads awkward or seems forced. Not one writer seems to be thinly veiling themselves in their characters.

Without reading a byline, each story is pretty easy to attach to the correct author, as the writers all have their unique voice and subject matters. This makes sense, as shorter pieces get more hits online and help satisfy our general internet ADD, whereas a book allows the writers to slow it down and really come into their own with more poignant pieces and deeper themes than you might find on the interwebs.

A quick read, this book gives me hope for the future of The Tangential and what else they’ve got up their publishing or partying sleeves—if you haven’t been to one of their more recent events, I suggest you go to whatever they plan next. Worthwhile.

Guys! The Twin Cities has so much goodness going on in the literary realm that it only feels right to start off 2013 with something so well done. Pick up your very own copy of Future Cities by clicking here. You won’t be disappointed.

Recently, while sobbing over the beautiful, though only moderately satisfying final issue of Sweet Tooth—my illustrated steady since November 2009—I realized that finishing a work of serialized media that you've been actively following from the start is so much more hardcore an experience than almost anything else (besides finishing a 100-hour video game). I didn't go to business school, but I still know that a good payoff requires a good investment.

For books—especially good books—I used to feel this surging emptiness when they were over. The characters I had just spent the last week with were no longer around to keep me company. How was I supposed to exist without his wry insight into a situation I'd never be involved in, or her witty banter with a character I so would have tried to date if he were real? More importantly, how was I supposed to determine the next good book to invest a week in?

Now, while I guess I still feel some of those things to a certain extent—especially with really really good books—what I really feel is more along the lines of, "Well, I enjoyed our time together and this was really lovely, but it was just a brief (and wild) fling, so I'm off to the bookstore to find one to take your place. Ta!" And with movies, it's the same way. 

Look, I feel a little ashamed about my love-em-and-leave-em approach to books and movies these days, but what's a week or a couple of hours in the face of two years (sometimes much longer for other comic fans)? Two years spent pining for that one Wednesday per month when the next part of Lemire's grand arc would be available to me? Two years spent re-reading issues trying to pick up the story where it left off. TWO YEARS spent accidentally buying the same issues over and over again because I couldn't quite remember if I already had that one at home. Two years spent hating then loving then hating then loving and loving and loving Mr. Jeppard. Two years developing a weird crush on Bobby the beaver hybrid. Two years spent trying to figure out who Sweet Tooth would become and why the sickness was really killing everyone. That's a lot of history, guys.

When I think about how crushed and unprepared I felt when I saw that final "THE END" written in issue 40 (even though I knew it was coming), it becomes all the more clear to me why binging on TV shows via Netflix or powering through an old serialized comic in the course of a weekend is so sickly satisfying—you're skipping the joy and pain of real attachment and subsequent loss. 

There are three pains greater, though: good things get cancelled, writers get busy (I'm looking at you, Warren Ellis, and you, David Lapham), or the story starts out great but degenerates into a terrible mess (I'm looking at you, Garth Ennis). It's hard to want to get invested in something when these three things threaten to swoop in and poop all over your good time.

But you know what? When it lasts, it's so, so, so worth it, and you're going to fucking feel that ending like a punch in the gut.

Wow. We're still pretty speechless after our Story Adventure extravaganza at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts for last week's Third Thursday event. Pretty much the only words we can find are "thank you, thank you, thank you!" Thanks to the 60+ volunteers, the MIA, our sponsor Allegra Printing, our amazing writers (Ed Bok Lee, John Jodzio, Maggie Ryan Sandford, and Katie Heaney), Jennifer Davis, Allen Brewer, the folks at the Theater of Public Policy, Kill the Vultures, and most importantly the 2,465 (!) adventurers that braved a night of art + lit.

It might have seemed like a novel concept, but for Paper Darts, visual art has long been an integral part of the local literary publication. — vita.mn

For those who couldn't make it (or for those who want to relive it), here's a taste of what it looked like to have PD take over the MIA:

Photos

More photos:

• City Pages: Third Thursday: Art + Lit with Paper Darts
• Minneapolis Institue of Arts' photos

Hidden Highlights

Adventures in Poetry

Participants had four stories to choose from, each very different. Ed Bok Lee's story required participants to write phrases on their adventure cards and at the end of their journey, they were instructed to combine all the phrases on the back of the cards, resulting in a finished poem. Here was one of our favorites:

Empty House of My Body
Cole Sarar + Charles Borchert

Fuck “know thyself,” the dictum I live
by is “Kill the Silence.”

I am water mixed with dreams on fire.

As a child I once thought I’d die
from extra, faulty organs.

If every house had just one book,
the world would be the story of
lots of visiting strangers.

People in glass houses should throw
more parties.

When the revolution comes, there
will be no television; there will only
be historical reenactments.

Sometimes, I’m nostalgic for a time
when I didn’t know my whiskers
could hurt anyone.

Improv Elevator

Taking the 30-second ride in MIA's vintage Otis Elevator meant participating in an improv story creation experiment. Each rider contributed one word to the tale, round-robin style. The sentence-long stories were live tweeted by an account created for the night: @ImprovElevator.

Tweets by @ImprovElevator

Arty Party with Allen Brewer

Just past Kill the Vultures but before the Improv Elevator, local amazing artist Allen Brewer was snuggled in a classroom working on his VERBATIM project, which seeks to make new art based on descriptions of existing art. Third Thursday participants were invited to make their own art based on provided descriptions of five pieces of art from the museum or write their own descriptions for Brewer to use in his project. He received 55 descriptions for his project over the course of the night! Here are some pieces of art that our talented TTers created:

Big Thanks from All of us at Paper Darts!

Due in part to people tossing iTunes gift cards in with some gifts last year, I've been spending a bit more time on my iPhone. These are three of the games that sucked me in in the past few months.

Endless Road

Endless Road takes the runner craze and plunges it in minimalism, resulting in an experience that can be as stunning as it can be frustrating. But for $0, what do you have to lose?

The aforementioned “endless road” simultaneously folds out in front of and collapses behind the player’s car. To avoid falling behind (and off the edge of the road), you have to keep up your speed by hitting power-ups and swerving around obstacles.

Outrunning the collapsing road delivers you to new environments, full of new simple shapes and new carefully placed flecks of color. The map has multiple paths selected randomly for each race, meaning that world one / stage four could be one of eight different terrains.

The game is not without its frustrations, of course. It’s not easy. And once you find yourself doing really well, you may get so far ahead onscreen that you’re unable to see what the road has in store. Grabbing coins earns you helpful powerups, but you’ll have to play for a real long time (or spend real life coin) to make significant upgrades. I know you can’t really fault a free to play game for including microtransactions…but I just did it anyway.

Endless Road shows that when it comes to gaming on a small screen, less is more. It’s basically the IKEA of racing games, and it’s totally worth a shot.

Endless Road » Free on iOS 
 

Writer Rumble

I’ll come right out and say it—while not an overly pretty game, Writer Rumble is a good fit for our readership. Y’see, it’s a literary fighting game. For 99¢ you can pit legendary writers against monsters…or against each other.

[Un]fortunately it’s not much of a blood bath, which I suppose makes sense. The cartoony Jane Austen, Edgar Allan Poe, H. P. Lovecraft, Agatha Christie, and friends fight with the magical power of words. As a player, you search for words from the board of scrambled letters below the action. Make a new word and your writer of choice sends some high impact letters at his or her foe.

You can choose between surviving against waves of monsters solo or facing off against other players, locally or online. I wasn’t confident in my skills at first and turned down a few match invites while wading through the instructions. After experimenting with different authors/fighters and their special powers, I took to the online sphere and was repeatedly rejected by strangers. So I may not be able to report on the full experience, but I did enjoy taking down monsters in that seriously haunted library. I imagine fighting against other players—or watching two famed authors fighting each other—would be a ton of fun. Maybe one day. Maybe one day.

Anyway, give it a try and coo at the cute Cthulhu.

Writer Rumble » 99¢ on iOS (Coming to Android "Early 2013")
 

Gunman Clive

Gunman Clive is gorgeous. Gorgeous and punishing.

This mobile title puts you in the boots of rough and tumble hero Gunman Clive as he charges through a dusky, pencil sketched Old West to save the mayor’s daughter. The graphics are smooth and the music is incredible and it’s all fun and games (hah) until you encounter your…third enemy, maybe?

If you’re a fan of NES-era platformers, Gunman Clive is your jam. It wants to kick your ass, and it probably will. It’s not that the level design is particularly gruesome (though the checkpoints aren’t very forgiving)—it’s the controls. A directional pad on a touch screen is not an easy thing to perfect, so I’d find myself turned in the wrong direction when trying to duck and shoot an enemy, because without being able to actually feel the d-pad, it was hard to know which button I was pressing before it was too late.

Or maybe that’s just me. It wouldn’t be the first time I straight up sucked at a game.

For $1.99, it’s well worth the frustration. Even without the retries, it’s a fairly long game, and the quirky characters and environments and powerups will keep you coming back even after you’ve become numb to how beautiful the game is.

Gunman Clive » $1.99 on iOS and Android

I'm going to get to the fun promo preview about tomorrow's Third Thursday event with Paper Darts at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, but I've got to make a confession first.

I am one-hundred-percent scream-at-the-top-of-my-lungs, butt-clenchingly excited about this project. Paper Darts getting asked by the MIA to participate in an event of this magnitude was like that time the hottest hunk in town kissed me. Luckily we're all adults that learn from mistakes, so we played it cool, and just said "yes," instead of "omigodwetotallyloveyouandwantyourbabies." Planning this event—despite setbacks (like faces getting crunched on the ice during a more metaphorical crunch time), and anxiety about the breadth of the project or our ability to pull it off (don't worry dudes, we totally will)—has been an amazing experience.  

What really rings my bell here is that while the notion of an interactive story game came up in a rather frantic and random way, the concept means something bigger for organizations like us. Just last week I was worried that the project wasn't going to come together—that it had too many moving parts and that it was going to flop. But I see now how unfounded that fear was. Organizations like Paper Darts, that are dedicated because we love what we do, are MADE to take the big risks and to make things challenging for themselves. That's why we exist. We work for the thrill of it (if the word "thrill" is still here when you read it that means I meant to put in something less cheesy and must've forgot to). Anyway, every day that we do this represents a choosing. Every day we say "yes." And sometimes "oh shit." But that's okay.

In the end, after all that needless frettin', thanks to the hard work and dedication of everyone at Paper Darts, the Third Thursday team at the MIA, the participating authors, and all of the volunteers we have amassed like a snowball of YES, it looks like the event is going to be pretty cool after all. And you know what? Fucking of course it is. 

All right, so what do you have to look forward to (besides Thursday night and all the subsequent days of your life)?

Here are the special things we and the MIA will have ready for you tomorrow night, in no order of excellentness because each thing going to reign supreme in its ultimate greatness:

1: Exquisite Corpe with Jennifer Davis

If you're familiar with Paper Darts then you know how much we love art, especially the art of Jennifer Davis. If you aren't familiar with PD then consider this your schooling—we LOVE art. The fantastic Jennifer Davis has created a beautiful beast that has been sliced up into pieces for you to color and put in position. She'll be there too, working her colorful magic on the creation's head. 

2: Adventure stories by Ed Bok Lee, John Jodzio, Katie Heaney, and Maggie Ryan Sandford

If you're familiar with Paper Darts then you also know we're pretty into writing, especially surreal, irreverent writing that pumps us up. If you aren't familiar with PD then consider this your schooling—we LOVE, surreal, irrevernt writing that pumps us up. These four authors have written four stories (each with multiple paths and endings) that will wind you through the galleries at the MIA. It's going to be bomb...or whatever you want to call something that's going to be off the hook, or totally righteous, or...ahh...did I already say bomb?

3: Kill the Vultures

The MIA team always picks killer bands to go along with their Third Thursday events, and this one is no different. Read our interview with hip-hop duo Kill the Vultures and get hyped.

4: Arty Party with Allen Brewer

Remember what I said about PD loving art? Remember what I said about PD loving words? Well, Allen Brewer's got our number with his upcoming "Verbatim" exhibit at the MIA's MAEP gallery. Tomorrow he'll be asking folks for detailed descriptions of art from the museum. From those descriptions, he'll be making new works of art. He'll even be hanging out making some during the evening. You'll also have a chance to make some art using descriptions we've cooked up of pieces from the museum. Check out this feature we did on Allen and his lovely art.

5: Jerry Belich and his Choosatron Deluxe Adventure Matrix

Mr. Belich represents a brain that just won't quit. He is the mastermind behind the Choosatron Deluxe Adventure Matrix—a world in a cardboard box, an adventure at the touch of a button. He'll even provide the quarters! Read our interview with the amazing Jerry Belich and gasp in wonder.

6: The Theater of Public Policy

If you're familiar with life, then you know improv comedy is awesome. If you aren't familiar with life, then you're probably a baby and can't read this anyway. Lucky for us T2P2 has agreed to come hang with us for Third Thursday. Not only will they be helping y'all craft single-word stories in that amazing Otis elevator that the MIA has (look for them at @ImprovElevator #ThirdThursMIA), but they'll be stationed at two of the story endings to help make your adventure come to life.

Okay, okay. I've rambled about this event (which'll likely be the event of 2013, guys, and it's only January) long enough.

Are you gonna come or what?!

01. Hikari Shimoda
They may have a candy-colored palette, but the themes in Hikari Shimoda's paintings are in no way sweet.

02. 3D Fashion Photography by Matjaž Tančič 
In a series titled "Mimicry," Matjaž Tančič has added a fun twist to fashion photography with anaglyphs.

03. Animations Made with Ink, Wite-Out, and Coffee
Don't miss Jake Fried's latest psychedelic animation, The Deep End.

04. Rainbow Igloo Made of Milk Cartons
Daniel Gray takes winter fun to the next level. (And you can too.)

05. A Smart Expedia Campaign by Oglivy
Using airport IATA codes to spell traveling sentiments: simple and brilliant.

06. Wild Animals Roaming the Grocery Store
Photographer and master Photoshopper Agan Harahap has an interesting new project called Garden Fresh. 

07. David Sedaris Reads Fifty Shades of Grey
Sedaris is asked to read a passage of the erotic novel aloud, and he totally commits to it. 

08. Sean Lewis
Sean Lewis is a Canadian whose handsome illustrations are inspired by American history. Weird/awesome.

09. OakOak
OakOak converts worn street fixtures and other signs of urban decay into humorous street art. 

10. Haroshi
Haroshi has made an impression on the art world for his bright recycled skateboard sculptures. 

—

By Holly Harrison, Marketing Director and rainbow maker.

Maggie Ryan Sandford is a sassy lady with looks and brains to spare. She's a writer, science journalist, performer, and producer whose work has appeared in Slate, Mental_Floss, McSweeney's Book of Politics and Musicals, at ComedyCentral.com, the Walker Art Center, the Seattle Art Museum, the Guthrie Theatre, the People's Improv Theater, the Upright Citizen's Brigade Theatre NYC, and on Minnesota Public Radio and Twin Cities Public Television. Originally from Seattle, she now resides in St. Paul, and is fiercely proud of it. 

Wouldn't you like to know what an adventurous evening would be like with her? Wouldn't you like to get to know her first, before committing to a date night like that?

Paper Darts: Which Spice Girl did you most identify with when growing up?

MS: I admit I wasn't a huge fan of their music and was wary of their boobtacular approach to feminism, but when Kaileen and I stood on her bed and zig-a-zig-uhhed in our underwear, I was channelling Scary, only and always.

PD: If your five-year-old self met you, do you think she’d like you?

MS: Considering that I basically still am my five-year-old self, I am 100 percent sure we'd high-ten, wear ourselves out improvising a victory dance that touched upon every facet of the emotional spectrum, then watch bugs. While eating cream cheese with celery. She'd give me a talking-to about not drawing enough lately, though.

PD: If you could eradicate one food from the collective memory, what would it be and why?

MS: I'd like to just take everything that the American food industry has bastardized to the point of unrecognition back to the butcher board. Other than that, I don't know—I'm kind of one of those people who'll eat anything. Your body doesn't know what to do with Velveeta, but guess what it does know what to do with? Grasshoppers. 

PD: Where did you go on your first date?

MS: Okay I'm going to count my first real date as the one where I had my first real kiss: back row at a movie multiplex, Seattle. We went to see The Avengers—not the Marvel guys, the remake of the 1960s TV show (starring Ralph Fiennes as John Steed and Uma Thurman as Emma Peel), because I was way into that show and The Prisoner at the time. The movie was terrible. My date told me beautiful lies. I beat him at Mortal Kombat in the arcade.

PD: If you had the chance to sit down with Honey Boo Boo, what would you want to talk about?

MS: Existentialism.

PD: If you could be an extra in any movie or TV show, which would you choose?

MS: Only one? Okay. I can do this. Seriously, you can't just casually ask this question to a film-obsessed daughter of actors who herself used to act, man, this is bringing up all kinds of feelings for me—okay. Considering…I'd obviously want to star in my favorite movies (and if you want to talk about what those are, I'm so down it's crazy). Let's saaayyy Dead Alive. Lots of sweet-ass costume, make up, and brain-gouging direction required.

PD: What is the recipe for a perfect adventure?

MS: There is no recipe for a perfect adventure. That's what makes it an adventure. 

PD: What's your favorite flavor of jelly bean?

MS: Classic: Orange. Fancy: "Juicy Pear."

PD: How often do you think you check your Twitter feed in a day?

MS: Depends on if I'm at home or in the field for some reason. I'd like to say I only check it for science updates, but I also check it when I should be writing fiction and it's easy to justify staring into it than into my own personal abyss. So, 0–25, to varying degrees of shame.

So now you know all about the inner workings of Maggie's brain. See how she uses her brain to make a glorious adventure for your choosing. Follow Maggie Ryan Sandford on Twitter @Mandford and on her website, too. And make sure to join us on January 17 at the Minneapolis Institute of Art to experience Maggie’s original tale throughout the halls of the museum. 

Last Sunday, Paper Darts supplied me with one box of Pizza Rolls and one bottle of RumChata and locked me in padded room to read fifty submissions from their slush pile. Here are some of the thoughts I had as I read through the stories.

1.

This first story is okay, but how come the writer doesn’t know that whenever you have a tornado in your story you need to make sure there’s a dead Shetland pony in a tree when the storm clears? That’s a total amateur mistake.

2. 

I don’t want to join the chorus of editors who harp on writers to actually read some content in the magazine/journal they are submitting to, but this story about a cyborg hooker detective who plays tenor sax in a New Orleans jazz band probably would be a better fit at some place like Ploughshares, wouldn’t it?

3.

I haven’t liked most of the submissions so far. Is this RumChata making me extra catty? It’s certainly making my Skoal Bandit taste way less minty.

4.

I know I need to pick my battles here, but for the life of me I’ll never understand why writers don’t think eating an ice cream sandwich can be just as sensual as eating a popsicle!

5.

Maybe it’s the Pizza Rolls talking, but these sexy tollbooth operator poems are way better than those sexy soup poems I read twenty minutes ago. 

6.

Pro tip: If your character needs to find evidence that they’re being cheated on, you should always have them find a half-eaten chicken quesadilla in their lover’s garbage can and that chicken quesadilla should have some frosted lipstick on the edges of the tortilla and the jilted lover should be lactose intolerant and named Glynnis. 

7.

The more drunk I get the more I want to make this recipe for RumChata Bananas Foster that’s on the side of this RumChata bottle.

8.

In the death bed scene in the story called “The Drug Dealers in My Town Love to Go Foam Dancing,” the character pulls a feeding tube from his neck and liquid carrots shoot across the room. While that scene was well-written, can we see if the author would switch it to liquid beets? I just think liquid beets would be more poignant there, don’t you?

John Jodzio is not only Paper Darts’ very first guest editor—he is also one of four writers contributing a Choose Your Own Adventure story to our upcoming Third Thursday at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. There will be music, drinking, a giant game of exquisite corpse, improv actors, and so much more. Be there, January 17.

All rights reserved to John Jodzio.