Playwright August Wilson. Photo courtesy Broadway Center.

August Wilson is one of the late 20th-century's best playwrights. He was a Seattle resident for the latter part of his life. But are his plays performed in Tacoma? Not much.

Which is why three local arts groups are partnering to present readings of Wilson's 10-play "Pittsburgh Cycle" over the next five years: two plays per year. The first one, "Gem of the Ocean," is on Saturday night.

"He's arguably the finest American playwright in the last 50 years," says Bryan Willis of the Northwest Playwrights Alliance. The NPA is part of the Wilson series partnership: They supply directors and actors, the Washington State History Museum is supplying the theater, and the Broadway Center for Performing Arts is handling marketing and contributing financially to ensure everyone gets paid. The cycle is also produced in special arrangement with Samuel French, Inc. It's a great thing for Tacoma, Willis says.

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For three years now the foreign language department at Pacific Lutheran University has put on its annual film festival featuring short, foreign language films with English subtitles. Formerly called Hong International, it's now the FLaSh Film Festival.

It's free and it's at 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 6 in the Mount Tahoma Auditorium at the Washington State History Museum, 1911 Pacific Ave. in Tacoma.

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May is Arts Education Month, and to honor that the City of Auburn Arts Commission is beginning a series of year-round art classes through the City of Auburn Parks, Arts & Recreation.

From the press release:
"Art with Artists is an opportunity for participants to experience individual artists’ processes, techniques and inspiration while also learning the basic skills of a particular medium. Artist instructors will provide and explain examples of their own work, demonstrate their own creative process and inspiration, and lead participants to create their own artwork."

There are two four-week May classes for youth:
-Beginning Stenciling for ages 11-plus.Participants will create their own set of stencils to compose an original poster while learning about composition, printmaking, negative/positive space and more. 3 – 4:30 p.m. Thursdays, May 7-28. Les Gove Building, Les Gove Park, 11th Street and Auburn Way South, Auburn. $55 resident/$69 non-resident.
-Drawing Fundamentals for ages 7-12.The class will explore shading, space and form using charcoal and graphite alongside artist Danielle Meyers. Tuesdays, May 5 – 26, 5 – 6 pm, Les Gove Building. $45 resident/$57 nonresident.

Upcoming classes and workshops for all ages include Tia Matthies: Encaustic (June), Ellen Ito : Soft Sculpture (July), Susanne Werner: Mixed Media (August) Amy Reeves : Small Scale Metal Sculpture (September), Grace Willard: Textile Manipulation (October).

To register, contact the City of Auburn Parks, Arts & Recreation at 253-931-3043. For more information, visit www.auburnwa.gov/arts.

Ira Glass, host of Public Radio International's "This American Life"

Last Thursday I caught a cinematic presentation of the best radio show on the air, Public Radio International's "This American Life".

The hour and a half live show was broadcast from New York City to 400 theaters around the country including Seattle, Federal Way and Olympia.

Titled "Return To The Scene Of The Crime," it featured a moving performance from The Stranger's Dan Savage on rediscovering (in his own way) religion after his mother's death, cartoons by Chris Ware, hilarious pieces by Mike Birbiglia, Starlee Kind and more.

It was a highly entertaining evening for me, and the others in the sold out downtown Seattle movie theater where I watched it.

Turns out Seattle wasn't the only town that sold out. PRI has just announced that an encore performance will be staged on Thursday, May 7 at 8 p.m.

“The great thing about this is that it lets me and the other performers in the show sneak into movie theaters to see if our jokes get laughs,” said host Ira Glass, in the announcement. “And of course to see what our noses look like 8 feet tall. Also, people who couldn't see the show because so many theaters sold out will now get a second chance.”

Tickets are available at presenting theater box offices and at www.FathomEvents.com. Check the site for the complete list of presenting theater locations and prices.

In the meantime, check out this hilarious interview of Glass by Stephen Colbert.

Okay, here's a confession: I've never, ever danced around a Maypole. I've sung plenty of May songs, yes--several years in a madrigal group will do that for you--and even made daisy chains. But the ribbon-pole-dance thing, no. And it's my outside guess that most of you haven't either.

So here comes a golden opportunity: the Puget Sound Revels May Day celebration this Friday (of course) in Tollefson Plaza downtown. Apart from shouting a hurrah whenever that desolate piece of urban paving is given a good use, you've got to hand it to the Revels folks for reviving traditions that, while admittedly a bit embarrassing, are good plain fun. And dancing around a Maypole is one of them.

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Summertime...and the festivals are comin'...

Arts festivals, that is. There's Siteworks, Art on the Ave, Urban Art Festival, Showcase Tacoma--and the Glassroots Festival. Low-down and funky, Glassroots has been running every August for three years in the narrow streets near Embellish Salon for three years now. It's featured everything from glassblowing to graffiti. But now it needs help.

A week or so ago, co-organizer Angela Jossy put out this plea on the Tacoma arts listserv:

"As some of you may know...Tacoma Arts Community is no more. The officers of that group were tired and felt that the outpouring of support that they initially had had waned and many of the goals it set out to achieve had been done. But the festival they started called Glassroots may live on. Its kind of up to you."

Why should Glassroots survive? Well, says Jossy, it's the only festival she knows of that doesn't charge artists for vendor space. It also doesn't jury items (apart from making sure they're locally made). It's intended to be inclusive and supportive of artists.

It's hard work putting on something like this. Jossy and crew need more bodies to volunteer, organize and generally cheer the festival on. If you're interested, come along to the planning meeting on Wednesday, April 29th at 6:30 pm at the Tempest Lounge, 913 Martin Luther King Jr Way, Tacoma. The agenda will include picking a non-profit umbrella, setting a date, assigning responsibilities and setting more meeting dates.

Jossy puts it plainly: "If enough of you show up there will be a festival. If not, then we bid you adieu until next year."

I apologize: I got it wrong. I previously listed this reading last week, but of course it's this week: April 30.

What am I doing this Thursday evening? Listening to Bill Kupinse read for the last time as Tacoma's Poet Laureate, and find out who's going to fill his shoes next year.

Kupinse, a professor of English at the University of Puget Sound, has been in the laureate job for one year now--the inaugural Urban Grace Poet Laureate of Tacoma. It's a tough job, involving lots of reading (and, presumably, writing) poetry, leading workshops and raising the standard of poetry in T-town. But it's time for someone else to have all the fun. So after a month of mulling over the entrants for the competitive post, the judges will appoint the Laureate for 2009/2010 at an event at UPS this Thursday.

Beginning at 8 p.m. Kupinse and fellow professor/poet Hans Ostrom will read their work; then Mayor Bill Baarsma will announce the new Poet Laureate. A new book by Tacoma poets and co-edited by Kupinse, "In Tahoma's shadow," will be released as well. Be there or be prosaic.

Location: Rausch Auditorium, McIntyre Hall, UPS, 1500 N. Warner St., Tacoma. www.ups.edu

Author Michael Cunningham. Photo: Richard Phibbs.

Michael Cunningham with Sinfonietta
The Pulitzer-winning author of “The Hours” reads from that novel and new work, with the Northwest Sinfonietta playing the Philip Glass score from the movie plus works that inspire the author. 7:30 p.m. Saturday. $100/$28/$15/$12. Schneebeck Hall, University of Puget Sound, North Union and North 15th Streets, Tacoma. 800-291-7593, www.orchestraexperience.com

Funky in Olympia: ArtsWalk and Procession
Nothing’s quite like it: hundreds of artists and free souls dressing up as all kinds of things for the annual Procession of the Species through Olympia’s downtown. Get there early, and do Arts Walk around the galleries. Arts Walk: 5-10 p.m. Friday, noon-7 p.m. Saturday. Procession 4:30 p.m. Saturday. Free. Locations and participants: 360-570-5858, www.ci.olympia.wa.us/events/parevents/#Arts%20Walk, www.procession.org

TPDC Dances for the Cure
Tacoma Performing Dance Company presents a performance of ballet, jazz, modern and ballroom, with half of proceedings going to the Susan G. Komen foundation. 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday. $22/$18. Stadium High School theater, 111 N. E St., Tacoma. 253-752-8530, joemeryballet.com

Eakins/Dombrosky phantasms appear at Fulcrum
Local artist couple Shannon Eakins (glass) and Marc Dombrosky (paper) create “Phantasm Chasm,” uniting “the failed opportunities, tragic events and myths in Tacoma’s past.” Opening 6-10 p.m. Thursday, then noon-6 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays through May 31. Artist talk 6 p.m. May 10. Free. 1308 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, Tacoma. 253-250-0520, www.fulcrum.oliverdoriss.com, tacomafunmachine.blogspot.com

Pianist Eun Joo Chung. Photo courtesy Tacoma Concert Band.

Tacoma Concert Band are going all out for their final performance for the season this Saturday night at the Pantages. The program is billed as East-meets-West: an American band playing both American and Asian pieces, and featuring young Korean concert pianist Eun Joo Chung.

Chung has made quite a career for herself since her Carnegie Hall debut in 2004, giving recitals in Berlin and Vienna and opening Seattle's Town Hall Virtuoso Piano Series. She's won international competitions like the Viotti, Schubert and World Piano Competitions, and has been called "striking and impressive" by pianist Leon Fleischer (a former teacher) and "a remarkable artist" by the Seattle Symphony's Gerard Schwarz.

This Saturday, Chung will be playing the solo in the concert band version of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," and the “Grande Polonaise Brillante” of Fredric Chopin. The 28-year-old Tacoma Concert Band will play a variety of pieces with Asian themes (Chinese, Korean, and Japanese), as well as a Gershwin medley, Holst’s “Jupiter” from “The Planets,” and Sousa (can you have a concert band show without it?)

The concert begins at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at the Pantages Theater, 901 Broadway, Tacoma. Tickets from $15. 253-591-5894, 800-291-7593, www.broadwaycenter.org

Ariel Lance, Vorece Miller, Grace Chakerian and Faith Stevens dance in MLKBallet Company's "The Funeral." Photo: Grace Sullivan.

MLKBallet's going alternative. The tuition-free Hilltop ballet school and dance company is putting on its next couple of shows in some really funky venues: The Warehouse nightclub and the Robert Daniel art gallery.

This Saturday, the show is part of the MOVE! series of contemporary dance events that MLKBallet has put on for the last few years. They're part fundraiser (to keep the free tuition going for needy kids), part dance concert, part showcase for students--and they're always great to watch. Deciding it was time to move contemporary dance into alternative spaces, the folks at MLKBallet have set this MOVE! up in The Warehouse, collaborating with live musicians like Vicci Martinez, John Walker and the Hitchhikers and Travis Barker. There'll be dance alongside the music from the MLKBallet Company, including their piece "The Funeral" (see the photo,) and refreshments.

"MOVE! Underground: A Night of Music & Dance" begins 8 p.m. on Saturday, April 25 at The Warehouse, 1114 Ct. E, Tacoma. Entry $5.

Then, next Wednesday, the MLKBallet Company will dance again at another fundraiser, this time at the Robert Daniel gallery in the warehouse district. Proceeds go not just to MLKBallet tuition but to company dancer Vorece Miller, who's going to New York this summer for the program at the esteemed Alvin Ailey dance company. (Miller is one of the upside-down dancers in the photo.) There'll be live music, a silent auction and raffle, wine and appetizers.

Says director Kate Monthy: "Vorece is an incredible performers and choreographer and will be performing two or three pieces she has choreographed herself. Also, members from the MLKBallet Company will be performing vignettes from 'The Funeral.'"

"On Her Way to Alvin Ailey" begins 6 p.m. on April 29 at the Robert Daniel Gallery, 2501 S. Fawcett Ave., Tacoma. Entry by donation.

And in other news from MLK: The school has decided to settle at Urban Grace Church on South 9th and Market Streets in downtown Tacoma, rather than the still-being-renovated former Swedish church on South 11th and J Streets on the Hilltop. The whole process was too much for the company, says co-founder Alexa Folsom-Hill, and they decided to "focus on what we wanted to do--education." The school now has 75 students, including a new adult class for parents who dance while their kids are in lessons and a Barefoot Beat class taught by Barefoot Dance Collective member Marla Sims. The school is expanding into the whole third floor at Urban Grace, including a large studio with a newly-installed dance floor.

For more information, call Kate Monthy on 253-906-2190.

Three Redneck Tenors rock the Temple
In a white-trash spoof of the Three Tenors gig, three beer-bellied (but operatically trained) boys from Paris, Texas do their Elvis-meets-Puccini thing. 7:30 p.m. tonight. $38/$48. Temple Theater, 47 Saint Helens Ave., Tacoma. 253-591-5894, www.broadwaycenter.org.

Nearly 200 onstage for Tacoma Symphony finale
The final concert of the TSO’s season features soloists, chorus and youth chorus onstage for Bizet’s “Carmen Suite” and Orff’s “Carmina Burana.” 7:30 p.m. tomorrow. $22-$75. Pantages Theater, 901 Broadway, Tacoma. 253-272-7264, www.tacomasymphony.org

Northwest Sinfonietta Jazz at the art museum
Hot club jazz swings the art at Tacoma Art museum as the Northwest Sinfonietta Jazz Quartet plays Django Reinhardt. 7:30 p.m. tomorrow. $28/$23. Tacoma Art Museum, 1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma. 800-291-7593, www.orchestraexperience.com

Songs of lament from The Esoterics
“Memoriam” sets journalism and poetry to a cappella choral music in this concert of lament for those who have died. 3 p.m. Sunday. $18/$15. Christ Church Episcopal, 310 N. K St., Tacoma. 206-935-7779, www.theesoterics.org

Icicle Creek Trio plays Spanish chamber music
Music from Barcelona and Madrid contrast in this Second City Chamber Series Spotlight concert. A tapas party at Vino Aquino follows for $10; reservation needed. 4 p.m. Sunday. $20/$10. First Lutheran Church, 524 S. I St., Tacoma. 253-572-TUNE, www.scchamberseries.org

David Macaulay helps install David Macaulay: The Way He Works, on view at Tacoma Art Museum through June 14, 2009. Photo: Phoebe Keleman.

It's all happening at Tacoma's three big museums on the weekend. Plan now, because there's a busy schedule lined up.

At Tacoma Art Museum on Sunday, illustrator David Macaulay (above) is the big draw at The Big Draw, a free afternoon festival of community drawing (and more.) Macaulay, the author of the famous "The Way Things Work" series of children's books, among other things, will discuss his work at the UWT--said work is currently on exhibition at TAM. Local artists give drawing workshops, dance groups perform.

Here's the list of events:
Noon and 2 p.m.: Break Dance and Urban Arts Demonstration with Fab-5
1 p.m.: Drawing with Silverpoint with The 9th Northwest Biennial Artist Linda Hutchins
1:30 pm..: Winding Roads and Dead Ends: David Macaulay Discusses His Ideas And Process at William W. Philip Hall, University of Washintgon, Tacoma. $10/$5/free for kids
1:30 p.m.: Three-dimensional drawing with artists Ellen Ito and Jeremy Mangan
3 p.m.: Book Signing with David Macaulay
3:30 p.m.: Metro Dance Performs "Creation"
Ongoing: Music with DJ Pana, hands-on art activities, and chalk art on the plaza
1701 Pacific Ave., Tacoma. 253-272-4258, www.tacomaartmuseum.org

Down at the Washington State History Museum, the World Folk Art Festival "With Our Hands" runs Saturday and Sunday. Pacific Northwest artists show off skills in everything from Japanese Kabuki dancing to Hindu temple deity dressing to Latvian embroidery. Festival is free with admission: $8/$7/$6/five and under free. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday April 18, noon-5 p.m. Sunday April 19 at 1911 Pacific Ave., Tacoma. 253-272-3500, www.washingtonhistory.org/wshm

Then walk over the bridge to the Museum of Glass, where Martin Blank's giant installation "Fluent Steps" is being unveiled Saturday. The installation, in the big reflecting pool just outside the museum's entrance, consists of over 300 bits of mostly clear, crinkly-twisty glass arranged horizontally and vertically in a kind of archipelago. The installation is free to watch, obviously, but inside MOG there's plenty to see: Chihuly's Venetian chandelier, Daniel Clayman's huge white minimalism, and of course the Hot Shop. 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday (early closure,) noon-5 p.m. Sunday. $10/$8/$4/under-six free. 1801 Dock St., Tacoma. 866-4MUSEUM, www.museumofglass.org

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"Moon Mask," du'Kwibahl. Photo courtesy SPSCC.

The South Puget Sound Community College will hold its first Native American Heritage Day this Saturday from 11 a.m.-5 p.m. at the Minnaert Center for the Arts. The Gallery will display Native American visual arts (through April 30), local artists will lead workshops in carving, beading, basket weaving and kids activities, and the Canoe Families will perform with traditional storytelling and dance. There'll be food vendors, craft for sale and more.

Artists involved include Andy Wilbur-Peterson (Skokomish (Twana) Nation), Shelton; Bill White (Chickasaw), Lacey; Cindy Arnold (Navaho), Olympia; Fred Lauth (Haida/Tlingit), Seattle; Lois Chichinoff Thadei (Sealaska/Aleut born into a Tlingit/Haida community), Olympia; Lori Boess (Cherokee), Olympia; Malynn Wilbur-Foster (Squaxin/Skokomish), Shelton; Marie Griswold (Chehalis), Chehalis; Bret Christianson (Tsimshian), Olympia.

The festival is all-ages and free. The Minnaert Center for the Arts is located at 2011 Mottman Rd SW, Olympia. More information: 360-596-5501, www.spscc.ctc.edu

Pianist Leon Fleischer. Photo courtesy Tacoma Philharmonic.

This Sunday, one of the world's greatest pianists will play the Pantages, courtesy of the Tacoma Philharmonic. Not only that, but he'll play with what for him is a relatively recent phenomenon--using both hands.

It's Leon Fleischer, of course, that child prodigy of two Jewish immigrants who began playing at four just by listening to his brother's piano lessons. Soon after, he studied with piano great Artur Schnabel, debuting with the New York Philharmonic at 16 and launching into an international career. Until, at 37, it all fell apart: Fleischer suddenly began to suffer from a neurological disorder called focal dystonia, which removed all sensation and control from two fingers in his right hand. His career was cut short, his family fell apart and he considered suicide, before deciding to devote himself to teaching, conducting and learning left-hand piano repertoire (of which there's actually a lot.)

Just five years ago, though, Fleischer's story had an unbelievably happy ending: Rolfing and botox injections restored function in his fingers, and his comeback in 2004 with the CD "Two Hands" is well-known.

On Sunday, Fleischer will play Bach, Debussy, Albeniz and Chopin--with two hands--in a Tacoma recital as part of his 80th birthday tour. The concert will begin with a screening of the 17-minute, Academy Award-nominated documentary on his life, "Two Hands," by Nathaniel Kahn.

Fleischer isn't just a heart-warming success story. He's a phenomenal pianist, being the first living musician to be inducted into the Classical Music Hall of Fame in 2000 and winning a Kennedy Center Honor in 2007, among many other awards around the globe. Don't miss this chance to hear him play.

Concert 3 p.m., pre-concert talk 2 p.m. Sunday April 19 at the Pantages Theater, 901 Broadway, Tacoma. Tickets $32.50-$62.50. 253-591-5894, www.tacomaphilharmonic.org

Tibetan Monks make sand mandala at UPS
Monks from Tibet’s Drepung Loseling Monastery will create a 10-foot-wide floor mandala out of sand on the Reading Room floor of the Collins Library. The painting, which takes three days, will culminate in a Dance for World Healing tomorrow night, featuring masks, costumes, horns, percussion and multiphonic singing. Mandala making today and tomorrow, performance 8 p.m. tomorrow ($11/$6). Mandala at Collins Library, performance at Kilworth Chapel, University of Puget Sound, North 15th and North Warner Streets, Tacoma. www.ups.edu

Frost Park chalk challenge is back
The weekly sidewalk chalking competition at Frost Park downtown is back after the rainy winter: Join in or watch local artists create chalk art for prizes, and vote online afterward. Noon-1 p.m. today. Free. Larry Frost Memorial Park, South 9th and Commerce Streets, Tacoma. www.holisticforgeworks.com/chalk

Traver Gallery shows emerging glass artists and mentors
“Inspired By” features the work of 16 emerging glass artists paired with that of the established artists who inspired them: Pairs include Ethan Stern with Jun Kaneko, Jeremy Lepisto with Daniel Clayman and Kirstie Rea. Opening 4-7 p.m. tomorrow, then 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays and noon-5 p.m. Sundays through May 10. Free. 1821 E. Dock St. #100, Tacoma. 253-383-3685, www.travergallery.com

ArtWalk next Thursday
It’s Third Thursday next week: Highlights of ArtWalk this month include Gretchen Bennett, Jenny Heishman and more in “Second Peoples” at The Helm, the last weekend of Lance Kagey at Fulcrum, sneak preview of outdoor installation Fluent Steps by Martin Blank at the Museum of Glass, and more. 5-8 p.m. Thursday. See our listings for venues. www.artwalktacoma.com

Arturo Garcia Bustos, "The Charge." Image courtesy Kittredge Gallery.

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera aren't dead yet. Their spirit lives on in two artistic successors, Mexican printmakers and painters Arturo Garcia Bustos and Rina Lazo, whose work (including Kahlo and Rivera portraits) is on the walls now at Kittredge. The artists will also be there today for a printmaking party.

Garcia Bustos and Lazo worked with Kahlo and Rivera respectively from the mid-'40s until their deaths. Married since the late '40s, the pair work in both painting (murals and freestanding works) and prints, channeling the tempestuous, worker-oriented politics of 20th-century Mexico in every work. Now in their 70s, the artists are still very active, and--as is obvious from the recent work at Kittredge--still highly deserving of all the accolades they've won.

Bustos' work is, like that of Rivera, strong, challenging, defiant. In woodcuts, lithographs, lino prints and etchings from 1947 to last year, he mixes iconographical subjects with fine textures and dramatic shading. "The Charge Against the People," a lament for those trampled in the student massacres of 1968, looks dizzyingly upward, Dali-style, into the hoofs and muscled thighs of a crazed horse, the sword of his rider slicing down from heaven. The shadowed guitarist in "Who will light my Chesterfield?" sings a lament against injust politics and trade from the U.S., surely one of the works that got him banned from U.S. entry during the 1950s. Technically, his prints are a marvel: the sweeping brush of Diego Rivera's portrait, or the three-dimensionality of the the Precolumbian god in "Life Emerging from Death Itself," the paper pushed out from being printed while wet.

Lazo, on the other hand, is political but not strident. Her prints are painterly, whether the dramatic ochre and charcoal of her lithograph cave paintings, or the subtle downstrokes of women's hair in her prints made while incarcerated during the student movement of 1968.

It's not often that this caliber of artist mixes with such a sweeping range of history, here in Tacoma. See it while you can.

"Arturo Garcia Bustos and Rina Lazo: Sixty Years of Political Printmaking in Mexico" is up through April 17 at Kittredge Gallery, University of Puget Sound, North Lawrence and North 15th Streets, Tacoma. Reception and printmaking 5 p.m. tonight, April 8; then 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Mondays-Fridays, noon-5 p.m. Saturdays. Jeffry Mitchell's mixed-media light sculptures "Some Things and Their Shadows" shows in the main gallery area.

William Turner, "The Valley--Paved." Photo courtesy of the artist.

If you haven't yet seen the excellent show of William Turner landscapes at the Tacoma Public Library's main branch, get in there quickly before it closes on Saturday. Hung in the Handforth Gallery (go left and up the stairs after the check-out desk,) this series of small-to-medium oils is definitely worth a visit.

Turner's a long-time Tacoma artist, teaching at Pratt Fine Arts Center, Tacoma Community College and Centrum in Port Townsend. His work has a strong flavor of Jacob Lawrence, with whom he studied at the University of Washington, yet hits a thoughtful point between abstract and figurative that makes you think of the geometry of Klee and Braque as much as anything. But above all, here is an artist who obviously loves paint, and isn't afraid to sink his teeth into the medium.

Up at the library is Turner's recently-painted Valley series, inspired by a stretch of the Kent valley farmland that he sees from I-5 on his commute. Turner says the series is an "meditation on our intimate relation with the land and our dependance on it," and his views of this valley are indeed intimate, their closeness riding the horizon line up and out of the picture plane and turning the landscape into a semi-abstract pattern of color fields that plays games with our perspective. Turner's hues are Lawrence-like: saturated, complex and intense, a little melancholy. Peachy purples, indigos, cornflower blues, bottle greens and a sweeping sand dance and talk like scales in a jazz piece, riffing on emotions. The figurative morphs and blurs: Trees fade into blobs, fields become mere squares.

Down the corridor past the gallery are seven smaller works. Crammed with visual thought, they're the valley in miniature, and quite lovely in this scale.

William Turner's "Valley Series" is up in the Handforth Gallery through April 11. 9 a.m.-9 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays. Free. Tacoma Public Library main branch, 1102 Tacoma Ave. S., Tacoma. 253-591-5666, www.tacomapubliclibrary.org, www.williamturnerart.com

Seven Muses, a downtown Tacoma art and contemporary craft gallery, will be closing doors on May 31, due to economic constraints. The gallery, which has sold whimsical indoor/outdoor art and craft, including from recycled materials, had been struggling for the last year, said co-owners Tom and Leslie Michael, who opened the space on Broadway in July 2004. The Michaels will close at the termination of their current lease at the end of May; throughout April they'll be selling non-consignment merchandise at 50 percent discount, and selling certain furniture items.

The gallery/shop is the second one in the Broadway neighborhood to close recently: Art Concepts on Broadway closed late last year. Times are hard for art sales.

"With the economy in the dumpster and absolutely no indication that it might even begin to recover for at least another three years or more, we have decided it is time to move in a new direction," said Tom Michael. "My own work has been the top seller since we opened so I plan to do craft fairs from now on."

Seven Muses is located at 1127 Broadway #101, Tacoma, and is open 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Mondays-Saturdays through May 31. 253-572-9998, www.thesevenmuses.com

Pacific Northwest Ballet corps de ballet dancers Kara Zimmerman and Leanne Duge, soloists Rachel Foster and Chalnessa Eames in Kent Stowell's Swan Lake. Photo: Angela Sterling

Pacific Northwest Ballet does “Swan Lake”
For all you romantics, this is the ballet for you: dying lovers, misty ghosts, enchantment, and lots of white tutus. 7:30 p.m. April 9-11 and 16-18, 1 p.m. April 11, 18, 19; 7 p.m. April 19. $25-$160. McCaw Hall, 321 Mercer St., Seattle Center, Seattle. 206-441-2424, www.pnb.org

Altar Boyz gets the Pantages some holy rock
Award-winning musical spoof about a fictitious Christian boy-band that starts to ask hard questions. Family-friendly. 7:30 p.m. April 7. $39-$72. Pantages Theater, 901 Broadway, Tacoma. 253-591-5894, www.broadwaycenter.org

Tacoma’s secrets explored in letterpress collaboration
Letterpress artist Jessica Spring created an art book out of glass negatives discovered in her attic; librarian Brian Kamens identified the images in them. Together, they tell the stories at the University of Puget Sound’s library. 2 p.m. April 5. Free. Room 202, Collins Memorial Library, North 17th and North Warner Streets, Tacoma. www.ups.edu

William Turner at the library
The Northwest landscape artist shows a current series of vivid semi-abstracts in the Handforth Gallery. 9 a.m.-9 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays, through April 11. Free. Tacoma Public Library main branch, 1102 Tacoma Ave. S., Tacoma. 253-591-5666, www.tacomapubliclibrary.org, www.williamturnerart.com

Bellevue Arts Museum is adjusting its opening hours, opening every day of the week but beginning later in the day. And to kick things off, the museum will offer a 50% discount on admission on all four Mondays during the month of April.

Seriously, folks. It ain't no April Fool thang.
The new hours of operation are 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Fridays and noon-5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays.

According to the press release, by adjusting the hours of operation the museum will "be able to make the most efficient use of its resources for admissions, retail and security."

Free First Friday will continue to be held the first Friday of every month with free admission to the museum’s galleries all day in addition to lectures, artist demonstrations and other activities.

Museum admission will remain the same ($9 adults, $7 seniors/ students, free for children under 6, free for members) except on those half-price April Mondays.

So what's on view at Bellevue? Some really good stuff.

"The Book Borrowers: Contemporary Artists Transforming the Book" (through June 16); "American Quilt Classics, 1800 – 1980: The Bresler Collection" (through May 31), "Intertwined: Contemporary Baskets from the Sara and David Lieberman Collection" (through March 22) and "Etsuko Ichikawa: Traces of the Molten State" (through May 3). On April 9, a new exhibition by renowned Northwest wood sculptor Michael Peterson will open to the public.