TOP PICKS FOR THE WEEK
World-renowned taiko drummer Tiffany Tamaribuchi and her all-female ensemble are the headliners for this year’s Japan Cultural Festival in Santa Fe. The festival, now in its 14th year and organized by Santa Fe’s Japan Intercultural Network, features a day of performers, craft vendors, food and activities that speak to the country’s historic and modern traditions and cultures.
Tamaribuchi, currently based in Sacramento, where she founded and teaches taiko ensembles whose members include both children and adults, will take the stage Saturday around 1 p.m. with her group Jodaiko, which she founded in the 1980s. Other performers will include Japanese archers, fencers and hip-hop dancers, along with karate demonstrations. The Japanese Culture Festival will take place from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the courtyard of the Community Convention Center, 201 W. Marcy St. Tickets are $5 for adults; free for children 12 and under at eventbrite.com.
VISUAL LANGUAGES:
Though they’ve been partners for years, Santa Fe-based artists Walter Robinson and Jamie Brunson have created vastly different “visual languages” through their art. Those languages, one more politically charged and the other described as colorful and meditative, will be on display in a new exhibition at the Turner Carroll Gallery starting tonight. The two have both worked in the Bay Area and have shown their art around the world. Robinson, a sculptor whose father was a Cold War-era cryptographer, is also known to hide messages in his work. His “Tumbril” is an empty wooden cart with product logos on what looks like the roof of a covered wagon, meant to represent product placement, consumerism and how citizens can blindly endorse a company’s beliefs or ideologies. Brunson has historically focused on the sensory experiences that occur in meditation practice. “Coded Languages” will be up until June 6 at Turner Carroll Gallery, 725 Canyon Rd. The opening reception is tonight from 5-7 p.m. The exhibition is in conjunction with the showing of Robinson’s “21st Century Cyphers” at Albuquerque’s 516 ARTS.
MAGICAL REALISM:
A solo storytelling performance from an award-winning Colombian poet at Teatro Paraguas this weekend will range in style from “political and social justice to rustic folktales to magical realism.” “Violence and Love in Latin America: Stories and Poems” will include about 20 works from Abelardo Cabal Escobar, born in Colombia and now based in Santa Fe. The show will also include works from famed writers like Greek poet Constantine Cavafy and the Cuban poet José Marti. Cabal Escobar’s show will be in Spanish with English translations projected. “Violence and Love in Latin America: Stories and Poems” is Sunday at 5:30 p.m. at Teatro Paraguas, 3205 Calle Marie. Admission is free, but donations will be accepted. Reservations: 505-424-1601.
INSET: Tiffany Tamaribuchi