Dearest friends and noble frenemies,

The venerable and most worthy Mr. A.H. Hour, depicted here in a famous 1905 portrait by Richard Bergh, does wish to apologize for his absence of the past month from the local happy hour circuit. It could not be helped, as he was away visiting some distant relations in a foreign port.

But, with your leave, he forthwith wishes it be known that the August gathering known as the Art Happy Hour will reconvene anon, and he hopes that you will attend, bringing with you all the most artistically joyous spirits that you can muster, as well with your artsy friends and colleagues for a full and convivial art frolic.

An August Art Happy Hour
Whence?: The Theater of the Bedlam
When?: Wednesday, August 12, 4 pm to 7 pm
Wherefore?: For your gentle pleasure and convenience
Where?: Here

Art Happy Hour: A gathering of local (Twin Cities) arts lovers and an opportunity for art professionals of all sorts to mingle and get to know one another; it takes place every 2nd Wednesday of the month, 4 to 7 pm, at the Bedlam Theatre in Mpls.

Find Art Happy Hour on Twitter: http://twitter.com/arthappyhour
Tumblr: http://arthappyhour.tumblr.com/
Facebook: www.facebook.com/art.happyhour
FB fan page: www.facebook.com/art.happyhour#/pages/Art-Happy-Hour/14636305795

And at the Art Happy Hour @ Bedlam Theatre on the 2nd Weds of the month

Young up-and-comer who really paints the “wall,” Joe Mauer

Stuck in Right Field

By Special Art Happy Field Correspondent, Andy Sturdevant

Dateline: Minneapolis

A bad night at the Metrodome can be so much like a bad night at a gallery opening.

It’s a beautiful evening and you suspect you should be out enjoying it, but you are instead trapped indoors, trapped inside a crowded, noisy sterile white building drinking overpriced beer and watching strutting, arrogant local “professionals” bumble through another lackluster showing, constantly being outdone by their counterparts in New York and Los Angeles; meanwhile, scowling men dressed in dark clothing hover over the action, calling out errors and loudly announcing to all that can hear who’s in and who’s out. A drunken malcontent is telling you “My kid’s twice as good as these bums and he’s just in kindergarten!” You cringe at the thought of what you’ll read in the papers the next day about this dismal performance. How can your local heroes be so well-intentioned and so spirited, and yet so completely incompetent and so seemingly ignorant of the fundamentals?

But on a good night — and there are many of them! — it all comes together beautifully. There’s careful attention to craft, there’s passion and high spiritedness, there’s guts and high-wire risks that would seem impossible to pull off, but that pay off in thrilling ways. You’re constantly amazed that these kids, some of them just out of college or called up from the sticks, are so good at what they do. “These young kids have a future!” you exclaim. “What a great eye! What marvelous control!” It makes you proud to live in Minnesota!

On that note, join mnartists.org and Art Happy Hour at “Stuck in Right Field” — a celebration of art and baseball and whatever intersections there may be between the two.

What: We will meet up to watch your Minnesota Twins take on those hard striving, underachieving kids from Cleveland (boo!) at the Metrodome.

When: Wednesday, June 3. Gametime, 7:10 pm.

How: Artsy sorts are asked meet up at the main Twins Ticket Office — near Gate G — no later than 6:20 pm. (!!!!!) (Be there on time, or miss your chance to sit with the gang!) Everyone will pitch in to buy general admission tickets for themselves (for cheap! — only $8), and we will all enjoy Hormel Dollar Dog night together. And out in the fabulous Right Field Nose Bleeds!

As that experimental atonal Fluxus-inspired art-rock anthem goes, “We’re going to win Twins, give it our all / We’ve got the guys who’ll knock the cover off the ball.”

Ooh la la!

Get Art Trivia hints, advance information about upcoming events, and the latest updates about Art Happy Hour on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ArtHappyHour.

Sample (about 3 hours ago from Tweetie): #May’sArtHappyHour Starting May 1, I will be tweeting daily Art Trivia hints with #arttriviahints tag

Greetings, fine Happy Hourians!

The Administrator of the Art Happy Hour!, for the next few months, is taking a much needed break from this site and from his organizing duties to recharge his jets and retool this event. The idea at present is to hold the next Art Happy Hour! (vers. 5.0) some time shortly after the change of current regime — i.e., after January 20, 2009.

In the meantime, as is our wont on AHH!, we have a poll for you to take. >>>>>>>>>>
It is to determine what sort of new features you’d like to see at AHH! in the new year and under the new president.

So vote, dammit, and let us know what you’d like to see happen at AHH! And see you soon!

Heydee-hoo, art fans.

I spent the first part of the day with a large group of artists who were not at all happy (and not at all afraid to tell anyone about this). This was not a new experience for me–being around unhappy artists, I mean; after all, I’m an art critic in my after school hours, so I’ve dealt with my share of unhappy artists. Still, I have to admit I’ve never seen quite the amount of concentrated artistic disgruntlement in one place before.

Of course, there’s not much that I, nor just about anyone else, can really do to relieve these artists’ collective dismay. And as artist after artist took this opportunity to stand at the mic and give vent to years (maybe decades) of pent up frustration, I found myself wondering about the nature of happiness: What brings it about in people? Why is it so elusive to grab onto? What are some sorts of people (as opposed to others) so much more prone to go without it?

As it happens, author (and former chair of the National Endowment for the Arts under Bill Clinton) Bill Ivey asked similar questions about happiness in a (not really very happy) book I just finished this past week, Arts Inc.: How Greed and Neglect Have Destroyed Our Cultural Rights. According to his summation of various studies about what makes people happy, there’s an “underlying agreement about what it takes to increase happiness once the basic material needs of society have been satisfied.” This includes factors most people would think are obvious: friendships and families, a sense of accomplishment, security in work. But this also includes something that is less tangible and more difficult to define, variously described (by commentators like Nobel Laureate Robert Fogel) as a “balanced inner life,” “personal growth” (as opposed to consumerism), “a sense of purpose,” or an “education of the spirit.”

Ivey argues that “art unquestionably gives us a way to pursue self-realization without forcing us to deny the materialist and competitive drives that pass for human nature in the West… Art making is spiritual, long-lasting, and (compared to psychotherapy and drug rehab) relatively inexpensive; it contains and even expands many parameters of a well-lived life that have to date mostly been attributed to work, religion, family, and community. In addition, an engagement with art permits us to indulge our drive toward success and self-realization without forcing us to buy into the nastiness of America’s unhappy rat race. It is the yin of individual achievement that complements the yang of heritage, making our expressive life whole. Thus completed, a rounded expressive life can be a reservoir holding the two overarching ingredients of happiness–adventure and security.”

Of course, all you friends of AHH! will recognize that I’ve been arguing such effects for art (of course in much less eloquent terms) for quite some time. The secret to happiness is simple: Art will make you happy. Also, Art Happy Hour! will make you happiest of all!

(And with that I say: Stay tuned for an announcement in the next few days about Art Happy Hour!4: The late summer edition.)

FABS #1: Robert Plant’s Radiohead Rant

News Item: London, Jan 21, 2008, 13:30 GMT

Robert Plant recently demanded that a London bar stop playing music by the band Radiohead, calling it “rhyming crap” and saying it was “ruining his night.”

A source told Britain’s The Sun newspaper: “Robert was drinking with a woman and didn’t like the choice of tunes playing. Radiohead was on and he started complaining.”

When the bar’s staff complied with Plant’s request and put on the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the 59-year-old former lead singer of Led Zeppelin was still not pleased, saying this music was like a “nursery rhyme.”

The Art Happy Hour! is pleased to announce, in advance of the inaugural AHH! on February 13, several new AHH! features (new featAHH!s).

First, there’s the AHH! poll archive, or Poll AHH!rchive, wherein you can see the results of all past AHH! polls. Cherish the memories; relive nail-bitingly close venue votes; wonder what could have been… Visit the Poll AHH!rchive! Today!

Also, there’s the AHH! soundtrack, or SoundtrAHH!ck, which gives AHH! regulars a little smidge of music to get them through the week (or at least until the next Art Happy Hour!). Music selections will be changed on a regular basis, so check back! Often!

And finally, as many of you know, there’s the free AHH! subscription service. Get email updates about the topics that you select, as well as up-to-date happy informational updates from Art Happy Hour! HQ. All delivered to your inbox at no cost to you!

Well! See you on the 13th!

(Information about the inaugural Art Happy Hour! logistics, a.k.a. lAHH!gistics, will be posted in the coming week. Be hAHH!ppy!)