TOP PICKS FOR THE WEEK
Where else would you be able to watch baristas from across the region compete in coffee origin taste tests, obstacle course races and creating the best coffee “mocktail”?
Iconik Coffee is hosting its first “Southwest Barista Olympics” on Saturday as a grand opening for its newest cafe, Iconik Lupe, at 314 S. Guadalupe St. Along with the competitions, spectators can enjoy burgers and brats, ice cream, beer from Boxing Bear Brewing Company, live music by local groups, and prizes from sponsors like El Rey Court and Ten Thousand Waves. The “Barista Olympics” festivities are from 5-9 p.m.
FOCUS ON NUCLEAR THREAT:
Declassified photos from Los Alamos National Laboratory and archived images of atomic tests placed in the background of scenes featuring serene vacationers come together for photoeye’s “Atomic Playground” exhibition. The show, on view starting today, showcases Santa Fe artist Greg Mac Gregor and Los Angeles-based Clay Lipsky.
Mac Gregor’s work colorizes official images from LANL’s photo archive, from the Nevada Test Site in the 1950s, when the U.S. Army put mannequins within the radius of nuclear test explosions to see what would happen to them. Lipsky’s “Atomic Overlook” series is described as a way to keep the concept of nuclear threat “contemporary and omnipresent.” His scenes with tourists watching massive explosions is designed to be an imagining of a time when people could gather watch the tests as spectators. “Atomic Playground” will be on display today until Oct. 20 at photoeye’s Bookstore and Project Space, 1300 Rufina Circle, Suite A3. The opening celebration and artist reception is next Saturday, Sept. 8, from 5-7 p.m.
ALTERNATIVE COMEDY:
Known for its absurdist television work on Adult Swim and Comedy Central, the alternative comedy collective the Baltimore-based Wham City Comedy, comprising performers Alan Resnick, Robby Rackleff, Ben O’Brien and Cricket Arrison, will stop in Santa Fe as part of its tour. Among their work are popular short films for Adult Swim’s “Infomercials” series — often blending humor and horror — with titles like “Unedited Footage of a Bear,” “This House Has People In It” and “Live Forever as You Are Now with Alan Resnick.” Wham City Comedy will be at Meow Wolf, 1352 Rufina Circle, Saturday from 8-10 p.m. Tickets are $15 — $18 if you buy them the day of the show — and can be purchased at meowwolf.com.
MORE THAN ONE MOMADAY:
Author and Pulitzer Prize-winner N. Scott Momaday and his granddaughter, poet and filmmaker Natachee Momaday Gray, will debut new works as they read together for the first time at Collected Works Tuesday. Momaday, a Santa Fe resident, won the 1969 Pulitzer for his book “House Made of Dawn” and was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 2007. Momaday Gray, also a writer/ poet, is credited as a producer for the locally made documentary about the controversy surrounding Santa Fe’s Entrada pageant, “Veiled Lightning/ Native Voltage.” The reading at Collected Works, 202 Galisteo Street, will start at 6:30 p.m.