BCR's Daily Fishwrap Report for June 19, 2009

Our favorite story in today's fishwraps comes not from Durham but Raleigh, where the now-unmasked creator of the Barrel Monster (among other creative outlets) has been charged by Raleigh's finest for property damage all the while gaining rave reviews from citizens who've loved the creativity the monster shows. Even the company that owns the barrels doesn't want to press charges -- it just wants one of the monsters for itself to use at its corporate HQ or a work site.

Our suggestion to Joseph Carnevale, the twentysomething NC State student at the center of this and other public displays of creativity (more of which are being evaluated by the RPD): what the heck are you doing in the City of Oaks? Durham'd welcome you with open arms to do public art hear. Just don't try climbing the Lucky Strike tower, 'kay?

(Update: According to the comments at Carnevale web site nopromiseofsafety.com, the owners of Tech Shop Durham have offered the artist a six month membership at their RTP site.)

• A response by Blue Devil Partners' Christian Laettner and Brian Davis to a lawsuit filed by Chevron over the Chesterfield building in West Village claims that the $1.5 million from Chevron was a capital contribution to the project in exchange for tax credits, and alleges that the repositioning of the investment as a loan by a new manager at Chevron last year delayed the project's construction closing. Laettner emphasized the fully-leased Phase 2 of West Village and noted that the suit was assigned to mediation; he still believes work can begin this fall if the lawsuits are resolved. (H-S)
• The American Dance Festival kicked off its 76th season with a performance by the Shen Wei Dance Theater -- the first ADF event held in downtown's new Durham Performing Arts Center. A site-based dance installation by Mark Dendy took over the lobby and public spaces of the DPAC for an hour before showtime; the H-S has a nice review.
• Durham's fifth-annual Juneteenth celebration -- which marks the day in 1865 when slavery was finally abolished in its final holdout of Galveston, Texas -- takes place Saturday at 11am, with participants marching from Mt. Vernon Baptist to festivities at Forest Hills Park. This year's celebration has a local flavor with the USPS honoring Raleigh native Anna Julia Haywood, a pioneering education and the fourth African-American woman to earn a doctorate, who's the subject of the latest in the postal service's series of Black Heritage stamps. (H-S)

Comments

[Barbara Lau]

I think it is Anna Julia Cooper who has been honored with the postage stamp.

[Patrick Morrison]

can you imagine a good ole fashion jail-break ala Dukes of Hazard style barely crossing the wake/durham county line in form with the General Lee poetically "barreling" through a blockade of .... well.....orange work barrels

[TSQ75]

I dont think Durham would charge him, that thing would likely be immortalized! He should make one for us!

[Todd P]

Free the Barrel Monster... and put Christian Laettner in jail!

[fletchfoto]

I initially had nothing respect for barrel artist guy. Then I read the post below barrel monster on his blog, which described how much fun it it was to throw snowballs at moving vehicles from rooftops, including an ambulance. That post has mysteriously disappeared.

[John Schelp]

Kevin, nice interview today...

Bull City Gets Its Due
State of Things with Frank Stasio, 19 June 2009

Durhamites have known for years that their city is a great place to live. Now, U.S. News and World Report has made it official by naming Durham one of the top 10 places to live in the country. Kevin Davis, author of the blog bullcityrising.com, and Jim Wise, longtime Durham resident and columnist for The Durham News, join host Frank Stasio for a conversation about Durham's image, from inside and out.

Listen here (12 mins)...

http://wunc.org/tsot/archive/sot0619a09.mp3/view

[Frank Hyman]

Speaking of Durham being a great place to live....

If folks who grew up in Durham, can be described as "old Durham"

and if folks who've moved here in the last 5-10 years that Durham has been considered a 'cool' place across the nation can be described as 'new Durham',

then what would we call the people who moved here in the last 30 or so years, when Durham was generally considered dangerous and undesirable (which were really just racist code words for "too many black people for my white bread self") even tho we could tell what a great place it was even then?

Frank Hyman

[moe rivera]

"then what would we call the people who moved here in the last 30 or so years?"

hmm Crazy Durham?

You have old durham, crazy durham, and new durham.....
yes
i think we have a winner!

[Ellen C]

Did anyone else hear the interview with the Barrel Monster's creator, Joseph Carnevale, on NPR? In it he said that if he is convicted of this offense he will likely go to prison for 6 months because he is currently on parole for a previous offense (theft of a boat). He suggested a compromise of 1000 hours of community service. That's 125 8-hour days. Much better than spending our tax dollars on 6 months of incarceration, which likely will not curb Mr. Carnevale's artistic bent.

It was a curious interview, I thought: the reporter was trying very hard but Mr. Carnevale sounded almost bored during the whole thing. "Flat affect" would be a good way to put it. Too bad, because likely would have generated more public support if he had shown any animation about his art at all. We'll see how it all shakes out.

[TSQ75]

I've since found out that Mr Carnevale has a penchant for spectacles that never really hurt anyone, but that he's always just gotten away with--now Raleigh is saying enough and pushing for charges

[Ellen C]

I assume that the "spectacles" he has a penchant for are NOT eyeglasses!

[Lee L]

"I assume that the "spectacles" he has a penchant for are NOT eyeglasses! "

Definitely not. Ifyou read his blog, in addition to making barrel art projects, he likes to do all kinds of things that some (especially those in authority) would condsider crazy, like climb up the cables of the Brooklyn Bridge, go up in pretty much every under construction building in Raleigh and Charlotte, including climbing out on the booms of cranes, hunting around various city owned abandoned buildings as well as paint graffiti (though very little of that and it is pretty artistic), and then post the photo evidence on his blog.

I think it may have been smarter to have taken some of that down once he had his latest run in, but I guess you have ot admire his commitment to his art.

[TSQ75]

not terribly different than the "Man on Wire" though...but he did get banned from the US for life...lol