Cross your fingers for cool temperatures as the carvers start working on sculptures for this year's Crystal Gallery of Ice. One-thousand-pound blocks will be set up in Town Square for the artists to start working at 9 a.m. Friday, Jan. 15. The public is invited to watch their progress through 4 p.m. Sunday, by which point the sculptures are supposed to be completed.
Sponsored by the Anchorage Downtown Partnership, this weekend's carvings will be followed by six more pieces displayed around the city. The Crystal Gallery Walk of Ice will have sculptures on display at Kaladi Brothers, Visit Anchorage, the Anchorage Concert Association, TBA Theater, Snow City Cafe and the Oomingmak Musk Ox Producers Co-operative.
If the weather cooperates, the ice sculptures will remain up through Fur Rendezvous. If not, well, they'll be on view until they melt. More information is at anchoragedowntown.org.
Adams' music featured in 'Revenant'
Music by John Luther Adams, who was based out of Fairbanks for many years, is included in the soundtrack of the new movie "The Revenant." Adams' contributions include pieces of "Qilyuan," "The Place Where You Go to Listen" and his recent Pulitzer Prize-winning work, "Become Ocean."
Other composers whose music is heard in the film include Carsten Nicolai, Olivier Messiaen, Alva Noto and Ryuichi Sakamoto, who also did the soundtrack for the 1983 David Bowie film "Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence," in which he also played the role of Captain Yanoi.
"The Revenant," a historical drama about why bears are bad, received three Golden Globe awards on Sunday. Sakamoto and Noto were nominated for best score, but that prize went to Ennio Morricone for "The Hateful Eight," a historical drama about why people are bad.
Greenlanders hope for their treasures
Welcome news came this week that the Rasmuson Foundation would give $12 million to the Anchorage Museum for a major expansion. The grant, the largest in the history of the foundation, will be matched by contributions from members of the Rasmuson family.
Though paid for with private funds, the planned Rasmuson wing gives us pause to reflect on how lucky Alaskan antiquarians have been in recent years. No reasonable person expects the public budget to pay for much in the way of culture in the foreseeable future. But we can be grateful that, while the money was good, some was spent to expand and upgrade the University of Alaska Museum of the North, to build a new Alaska State Museum and Archive facility, to double the space at the Anchorage Museum and build the Smithsonian section to accommodate Alaska items long stored out of state.
Contrast that with the plight of Greenland. Space is so tight at the country's national museum, Nunatta Katersugaasivia Allagaateqarfialu in Nuuk (Godthab), that an exhibit of fossils found on the island in 2012 cannot be displayed at home.
Museum director Daniel Thorleifsen told reporter Kurt Kristiansen, writing for the Native-language newspaper Sermitsiaq, that the agreement with the sponsors of the expedition that found the fossils specified that they all must be returned to Greenland in 10 years. But if they did, Thorleifsen said, there would be no way he could accommodate it. The fossil hunters retrieved 5 tons of material, the present exhibit in Denmark occupies about 2,200 square feet and seems crowded at that.
In fact, most of the historic and artistic treasures of Greenland are kept in Denmark. They include artifacts, photographs and even mummified humans. (The Europeans are less touchy about displaying people as museum exhibits; they look at the American aversion to such exhibitions for moral or cultural reasons about the same way they look at our gun laws.) Greenlanders would like to have all of it back, but there are several impediments.
The first, already noted, is space. The museum in Nuuk is at its capacity, if not beyond, in a warehouse built in 1936.
The second is preservation. Nunatta Katersugaasivia Allagaateqarfialu has no climate-controlled storage or much in the way of other technology to keep old items from decaying.
The biggest hurdle is money. Thorleifsen said plans for a new, larger and more technically advanced facility have been around since 2011. At that time the Greenlandic government began the process that would lead to completing such a building. However, a new government was elected in 2014 and since then no money has been forthcoming to continue the project.
"Greenland's history remains safe, albeit outside of the country," wrote Kristiansen. "But, as things are, scientists that want to study Greenland's history have to go to Copenhagen."
Nuuk is 200 miles closer to Washington, D.C., than it is to Copenhagen.
Winning railroad photo picked
On Monday, the Alaska Railroad announced that their "Catch the Train" photo contest has been won by Michael W. Sullivan, a photographer from North Arlington, New Jersey.
Eighteen finalists were selected on the basis of artistic merit and put online in December. Viewers were asked to choose their favorites. More than 16,000 voters submitted their picks. Sullivan's picture received 6,000 votes. The finalists' work will be featured in the railroad's 2016-17 calendar with Sullivan's picture on the cover. Sullivan also receives a cash award of $1,500 and, along with the other finalists, a round-trip journey for four anywhere along the rail belt.
Loussac closes Jan. 18-25
If you need a book from Loussac Library, check it out now. The library will be closed Monday for Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The closure will continue Tuesday, Jan. 19, as prep work starts on a reconstructed entryway, part of a larger remodel that has already begun. Branch libraries will remain open on their regular schedules. And the Loussac book drops will also be accessible, although the nice librarians will extend due dates for an extra week during the period.
There'll be a ceremonial "last walk" down the perilous main steps at 9 a.m. Monday, Jan. 25, led by the mayor, we hear. Then they'll be permanently blocked off and removed. Those who show up for the Monday promenade will have a chance to take a mini-tour of the new temporary entrance and a sneak peek at what the second-floor layout will look like. The library will reopen, with that temporary entrance, on Tuesday, Jan. 26.
The construction will continue well into next year. During this period some Loussac programs will be held at The Mall at Sears. You can get details at anchoragelibrary.org.
Dunlap-Shohl signing on Saturday
When we wrote about Peter Dunlap-Shohl's entertaining graphic novel about Parkinson's disease in December, the book, "My Degeneration: A Journey Through Parkinson's," had just been released and could only be found in Anchorage at Blue.Hollomon Gallery and Bosco's Comics (one of the more intriguing sources for reading matter in town, if you haven't checked it out).
Since then, distribution has expanded to more familiar outlets. Dunlap-Shohl will sign copies 1-3 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 16, at Barnes & Noble. He will also talk about the book at 1 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 23, at the UAA/APU Consortium Library, Room 307.
The former ADN editorial cartoonist now runs a blog called "Off & On, the Alaska PD Rag" at offandonakpdrag.blogspot.com.
Sexton at Poetry Parley
Speaking of matters literary, the January Poetry Parley will take place at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 20, at Blue.Hollomon Gallery, 36th Avenue and Arctic Boulevard. Former Alaska Poet Laureate Tom Sexton will be the featured poet, reading his own work, we should think. Maybe even some of his new and yet-to-be published writings. Sexton was asked to select the "marquee poet" for the event and he picked Philip Larkin, whose poetry will be recited by other readers in attendance. The event is free and happens at various venues around town each month. You can find out more by emailing poetryparley@gmail.com.