I’ll be moving to Duluth this summer to take a job at UMD, and I’m seeking advice about finding apartments to rent. I’m looking for a nice and well-kept one- or two-bedroom place, pet friendly. Any tips about which rental companies to avoid, which are reliable, average prices and what you get for it, neighborhoods, how to avoid bad apartments that look good online, or tips about good places coming available? Thanks!
New video by Mary Bue from her recent album, Holy Bones.
Charlie Danielson, untitled
In an age of dire news the term “permaculture” may seem optimistic. Still, what might have been the province of raving hair-shirts not long ago now looks to be among our sanest alternatives to hegemony. Permaculture is an organizing principle of practices that assert systemic, creative approaches to the reuse of natural resources to sustain both people and native animals on a local scale. The Arrowhead is fortunate to have a concentration of people at the forefront of this movement, and the attached links are well-worth following.
Poking around the Duluth Public Library website and found this new Fine Forgiveness program. It’s a coupon worth up to 5 bucks off accrued fines. Get your library card out of hock!
MPR News is running a series this week featuring photos by St. Paul native John Vachon, who worked for the Farm Service Administration and Office of War Information. From 1938 to 1943 he documented American life and how relief programs were helping those struggling through the Great Depression.
The image above is the only Duluth photo featured by MPR, but there are a few Iron Range and Beltrami County gems.
A look at Bunyan territory in 1939
Minneapolis’ milling history through John Vachon’s lens
Twin Cities streets at the end of the Depression
John Vachon captures Minnesota at work, 1939-1941
John Vachon captures Minnesota farm life at Depression’s end
Hey! A little late here with the news, but The Duluth Grill Cookbook has been picked up by Barnes & Noble in all Minnesota and Wisconsin stores. This is fun. My favorite news appearance was in Madison, not the least because they told me right at the last minute they’d love to see a cooking demo. I was not prepared for a cooking demo.
The day before yesterday I pedaled 60 miles roundtrip to make an appearance in a Kickstarter video for the Food Farm CSA. An image I’ll leave you with is spandex and rubber boots.
Read more about this fascinating place here.
Illinois native Jill Petracek has dark brown eyes, brown hair and strange feet. She graduated from UMD last week.
I recently saw the the work of Duluthian Shannon Hickok Cousino, including this piece.
My first thought is that I am drawn to it because it reminds me of other, iconic imagery — like the paintings of Ophelia (paintings by Millais and Waterhouse, below). These are the “tragic woman” of literature rendered as a beautiful tragedy. Almost so beautiful they are hard to imagine as tragic. Without a doubt, we have aestheticized the suffering of Ophelia, of women, repeatedly.
“Now we Float” makes no attempt to aestheticize the tragedy (at least, if by that, we mean erase suffering and replace it with flowers and outstretched hands).
Even as she floats, the figure in “Now we Float” does not break the surface. The surface weighs upon her. A friend of mine called it “weight of insurmountable pressure” — the kinds of pressures that crush someone, inside or out. I am remembering here the Pipher books about Ophelia that were so powerful in the 1990s.
But is the woman in Cousino’s work tragic? “Now we Float,” as a title, speaks to a kind of agency, even in death. As opposed to the scene captured on film (perhaps a scene of floundering, struggling, drowning, beneath those pressures), now, we float. Now, we simply rise to the surface. There is a simple clarity in that title, one that both underscores and undermines the tragedy, I think. No longer struggling, she floats. No longer struggling, though, she fails, still, to break the surface.
Mile Road Productions of St. Paul takes a trip along the north shore of Lake Superior with Robert Frost.
Manhattan-based photographer Charles Eshelman takes his bathtub to Duluth to capture video confessions. Guests in the tub are Vicki Fingalson & Jeff Madison, Linda Wick, Badger Colish, Mark Swenson, Zach Chase and Calland Metts & Sarah Lawrence.
Ah, the stereograph — a nineteenth-century wonder in which almost identical photographs, side by side, can be viewed with a stereoscope and appear three-dimensional. On a website they just appear silly and pointless, but in this case there’s some fairly fancy historical scenes to browse.
By far the number one thing people contact the PDD Help Dept. about is uploading an image to a post. It’s actually a pretty simple thing, but there are just enough tricks to screw up a newbie. Since it’s much easier to learn with a visual aid, PDD Intern Kelsey Marier put together this video.
