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Freedom from fear: Musician/dancer shares his art of achieving what was thought impossible

Submitted 12-31-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

Shamar Alef Ben-Yasara’El, given name William Griffin III, was born and raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Starting at a young age, his mother enrolled him in summer art classes at Kendall. He was a member of the Grand Rapids Ballet ...

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61Syx Street Dance Academy presents dance battle at Pyramid Scheme

Submitted 12-15-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

Students of the 61Syx Teknique Street Dance Academy have been training and practicing for an age based dance battle, featuring 1 vs 1 dance offs from students as young as four years of age. This Saturday, December 19 from 11 a.m - 3:30 p.m. the...

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Area refugees work to overcome cultural barriers, challenges

Submitted 12-01-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

The West Michigan Education and Cultural Center (WMRECC) in Kentwood (2130 Enterprise Street) serves hundreds of refugees a year in the greater Grand Rapids area. Michigan is often among the top 10 states in the United States to accept...

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"Coming Home" exhibition shared at UICA now through February

Submitted 12-01-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

This season at the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art (UICA), a series called "Coming Home" features a diverse group of Michigan artists focusing on exploratory development, comings and goings, seasonal changes and the importance of...

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Tanglefoot artists throw open studio doors to public for 24th year

Submitted 11-17-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

This year, the long-standing Tanglefoot collective of eight Grand Rapids artists are hosting an open public studio event in the historic Westside building. The oldest event of its kind in Grand Rapids,  Alynn Guerra, Carlos Aceves, ...

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Politics & Pints event to connect public to local politicians over beer

Submitted 11-17-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

The Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce will hold its final Politics and Pints event of 2015 on Nov. 23 at Founders Brewery. Anyone can register to drink beer and chat with local businesspeople, community members and local...

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Placemaking gone digital: Local library assistant turns Eastown into video game

Submitted 11-03-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

Drew Damron is a Grand Rapids history and video game enthusiast. He’s also a local cartoonist, and a library assistant at the Grand Rapids Public Library. This past summer, Damron released a video game, The GRpg, Chapter 1, at the Grand Rapids...

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GRAM brings retrospective of local art hero Reynold Weidenaar to community

Submitted 10-29-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

For many years Reynold Weidenaar was something of a local artist hero. He was a regular downtown feature who could be seen working from his big Chevy, sketch book in hand, with a pair of binoculars and wearing his signature red beret. He has been...

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Local food panel discussion to follow vegan dinner

Submitted 10-20-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

UPDATE: The panel discussion after the dinner service has been cancelled. We received this from Ryan Cappelletti, owner of Bartertown and CVLT, this morning: "The dinner info is all the same: 5-10 p.m. one time menu featuring all fermented...

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Join in viewings of ArtPrize Awards Ceremony

Submitted 10-07-2015 under LOCAL LIFE

Halfway through the last week of ArtPrize Seven, excitement is building to the final Awards Ceremony and the announcement of the winners of both the Juror and Public Vote prize winners. The ceremony will be held on Friday, October 9 at 8 p.m at the...

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