People to Watch in Denver Arts and Music in 2021

Denver’s arts and music scene is wealthy with proficient, busy folks working to make this metropolis a greater place. They create creativity, a robust sense of social justice, intelligence and a need to serve the group to the whole lot they do. Listed here are 9 of the folks we plan to observe in Denver artwork and music in 2021.

Stephen Brackett
Ambassador of Coolorado
Stephen Brackett is proudly “not cool.” A minimum of that’s what he says — although we beg to disagree, as a result of he manages to get an unbelievable quantity of cool stuff carried out for Colorado. Brackett is in fixed movement, and the place he walks, we’d all be sensible to observe.

A graduate of East Excessive College, he gained fame early as a part of Flobots, the indie-hip-hop act that had successful with “Handlebars” and, somewhat than chase nationwide consideration, centered as a substitute on group and attending to work on the activist causes that the act’s members care about rather more than clout. Collectively they launched a nonprofit that finally turned Youth on Record, Colorado’s main music-education nonprofit.

Unburdened by the necessity to show himself and absolutely prepared to embrace the bizarre, the Flobots MC has spent years combating for his group: fueling radical actions with love and optimism, constructing youth applications, championing racial justice. He’s boned up on social motion idea, spiritual historical past and cultural research, and has put that information to work as each an organizer and a musician.

After years of serving on the board of Youth on Report, in 2020 Brackett joined the employees as director of particular applications, and in March he was appointed by Governor Jared Polis as Colorado’s second music ambassador. By this function — and in collaboration with Colorado Artistic Industries, the state arts company, and Take Word Colorado, the nonprofit based by Governor John Hickenlooper in 2017 with the intention of getting a musical instrument into the fingers of each Ok-12 pupil in Colorado — Brackett has expanded Youth on Report’s music-education efforts throughout Colorado. The mission will make use of working musicians, bridging the too-often-split urban-rural divide and utilizing music to spark crucial conversations.

That might be sufficient. However there’s extra.

Brackett can also be working with Youth on Report to create its personal expertise company, one that can embrace ongoing training, administration and business alternatives for former college students who’ve graduated from the nonprofit and are attempting to make it in an business that too typically siphons intellectual-property rights from artists and exploits them. His hope is that the mission can create a greater mannequin and a greater approach ahead for rising musicians.
And that might be sufficient. However there’s extra.

Brackett’s additionally planning to work with arts organizations all through Denver to deliver performances and cultural alternatives to city. If this concept involves fruition, theater and music teams will carry out brief items on prime of flatbed vehicles that journey by means of neighborhoods and create shocking cultural exchanges — demonstrating that regardless of how socially distant now we have to be, the humanities will probably be there by means of all of it. The trouble follows a mission launched in 2020 by the Athena Mission and Ok Up to date below the #ArtFindsUs banner, and can solely develop from there.

And that might be sufficient. However there’s extra.

Brackett has additionally been busy engaged on a nationwide marketing campaign for fact, reconciliation and reparations, the kind of course of that has helped Rwanda and South Africa heal from racial and cultural violence. The mission is being led by girls of colour from across the nation, together with leaders within the Motion for Black Lives, the Landback motion and different seasoned organizers who use polling knowledge and high-level campaigns to create change.
“If we’re speaking fact and reconciliation, that doesn’t imply some folks,” Brackett explains. “We’re determining learn how to message and attain these of us who’re hostilely towards us.”

The work was occurring lengthy earlier than the racial-justice protests of summer time 2020 and can proceed lengthy after. As Brackett sees it, the motion will create a brand new imaginative and prescient of the American Dream that isn’t simply reserved for cis-gender white males.

Brackett has the spirit, intelligence, resilience and longstanding dedication to group to push this motion ahead. As with all of his tasks, he’s motivated by a radical spirit of affection, inclusion and collaboration — even between individuals who have lengthy seen one another as enemies.

Says Brackett: “Fact and reconciliation is among the greatest methods to handle the long-festering wounds of any society and open the way in which towards a brand new day of liberation and therapeutic.”

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Amber Blais of Rainbow Militia.

Martha Wirth

Amber Blais
Rainbow Connector
In 2021, the sky’s the restrict for Amber Blais, producing director of Rainbow Militia Circus, who says that her dream is to develop wings and fly. We’re shocked she hasn’t already. The circus artist, who has a background in public relations, managed to showcase a few of Denver’s greatest artists in wonderful, surprising performances all through the previous yr. And whereas immersive arts are vulnerable to turning into mainstreamed, Blais has made certain that the impartial spirit is robust on the town.

In March, she’ll be working with the immersive-arts firm Prismajic, Exdo Occasions Heart, the Circus Foundry and the Black Actors Guild to launch Celestial Chaos. “Impressed by Greek Mythology, the story facilities round three gods who know the Earth is coming to an finish, and they also endeavor to attempt to create a brand-new planet,” Blais explains. “They’ve failed a couple of occasions — 345, to be exact, however who’s counting, actually? They’ve introduced a couple of of their godly buddies with them and wish the viewers’s assist to find out if this time they really received it proper.”

After that?

“Who is aware of?” Blais responds. “I do know that now we have phenomenal artists and people round us, so I’m additionally taking a look at dealing with no matter alternatives and challenges come our approach — collectively.”

Alicia Cardenas
Making a Mark
When you’ve been within the Denver tattoo or piercing scene for any of the previous 25 years, you realize the work of Alicia Cardenas. In 1994, on the age of sixteen, she apprenticed at Certain by Design; she began piercing professionally at seventeen. In her early twenties, she co-opened Twisted Sol, a piercing and tattoo studio, after which in 2008, she began Sol Tribe on Broadway.

Whereas different retailers supply high-quality tattooing and piercing, Cardenas brings a religious, ritualistic focus to her work, rooted in her research of cultural anthropology and her indigenous heritage. Within the years she has been in enterprise, she’s made waves within the body-modification world, by means of scarring, branding, suspension and extra, and has pushed the tattooing and piercing industries to be extra culturally responsive and respectful of their indigenous roots, that are too typically ignored.

Nevertheless it’s not simply Cardenas’s body-modification work we’re trying ahead to watching in 2021; she’s additionally change into a rising presence in Denver’s street-art scene, portray one-of-a-kind murals that tackle up to date cultural struggles by means of historical, indigenous iconography and geometric design. The scene, which has change into embroiled in fights over gentrification, patriarchy, cultural appropriation and extra, and is simply too typically caught in predictable aesthetics, is due for some contemporary vitality, kinds and politics. Cardenas, who’s new to that world but seasoned as an artist, will probably be one of many folks pushing for innovation and cultural respect.

Juan Fuentes is constructing consciousness of Previous Denver.

Miguel DeLeon

Juan Fuentes
Good Shot
Born in Chihuahua, Mexico, Juan Fuentes got here to Denver together with his household when he was one, and has been calling this place dwelling ever since. Fuentes first dabbled as a DJ and producer within the underground hip-hop and techno scenes; extra just lately, he constructed a profession as a photographer and artist. By this work, he’s made his mark within the metropolis, beginning the picture archive Previous Denver and documenting communities which can be being displaced by means of fast gentrification.

This previous fall, Fuentes labored with the nonprofit D3 Arts on a street-art mission honoring longstanding Westwood neighbors and constructing group energy and pleasure as half of a bigger response to a summer time affected by violence. Within the yr to come back, he’s main workshops with college students from the American Indian Academy, engaged on documenting Solar Valley with the Latino Cultural Arts Heart; co-creating a e book with Colorado Poet Laureate Bobby LeFebre, with assist from the humanities group Heat Cookies of the Revolution; and dealing with D3 on constructing a skate park in Westwood. He additionally has exhibitions of his photographs within the works on the Colorado Photographic Arts Heart and Alto Gallery.

“In 2020, there was an awakening that was wanted,” says Fuentes, as folks addressed social justice points, race and gentrification. In 2021, he hopes that results in extra crucial considering and concrete change. “Watch me, however don’t watch too fastidiously,” he warns. “I don’t know what to anticipate after this previous yr.”

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Miranda Lash is the brand new senior curator on the Museum of Up to date Artwork Denver.

Gary Barragan

Miranda Lash
Up to date Visions
After longtime senior curator Nora Burnett Abrams moved as much as head the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, she had to herald a brand new curator, and she or he picked Miranda Lash, contemporary-art curator on the Velocity Artwork Museum in Louisville, Kentucky. As a newcomer, Lash introduced vitality, a dedication to forward-thinking curating, and a eager eye for cutting-edge and revolutionary artwork. With COVID-19 crimping the museum’s operations, although, she’s had an odd first few months.

In 2021, we’re able to see Lash shine. “The primary half of 2021 will probably be all about planning for the longer term and laying the groundwork for tasks we’ll be presenting at MCA Denver over the following few years,” Lash says. “We’re engaged on making a program that features a huge breadth of creative views and a clear-eyed take a look at a number of the most urgent points dealing with our society right now. We additionally wish to rejoice what is exclusive about Colorado, so keep tuned for some enjoyable infusions of Colorado taste within the combine. I’ll be doing a lot of digital studio visits with artists and researching as a lot as I can. Then, as soon as vaccines are broadly accessible, I intend to enthusiastically plunge again into seeing artwork in particular person, touring, and attending to know the feel and really feel of the town.”

And the town is trying ahead to attending to know her.

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Louise Martorano of RedLine Up to date is boning up on bureaucratic contracts.

Louise Martorano

Louise Martorano
On the Line
Whether or not you’re speaking to a DIY venue operator, a avenue artist, a basis head or a authorities official, all of them categorical enthusiasm for Louise Martorano, the pinnacle of RedLine Contemporary. Partially, that’s as a result of Martorano has an issue: She’s useful. Too useful. Ask her for a favor, and she or he’ll do no matter you want, regardless of what number of hoops she has to leap by means of, regardless of what number of telephone calls she has to make.

Discovering cash and help for artists was her mission by means of all of 2020, one she plans to proceed within the new yr. And she or he’s placing cash the place her mouth is: On New 12 months’s Eve, Martorano was at RedLine, nonetheless handing out checks from a number of the greater than $9.6 million in reduction that her group has administered by means of 2020.

Her purpose for 2021 “sounds somewhat boring, however I’ve determined that I’m not going to be afraid of intensive, wordy and bureaucratic contracts if it may possibly additional entry to sources and reduction for artists and communities,” she says. (Thank God somebody’s prepared to learn them.) “I owe my profession to artists and folk on this business and group, and wish to do any and the whole lot in my attain to assist facilitate extra financial help for a sector whose very objective is to deliver folks collectively and has been unable to take action since March.”

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The story’s simply starting for Kwame Spearman, Tattered Cowl’s new CEO.

Yumi Matsuo, supplied by Tattered Cowl

Kwame Spearman
New Chapter
In late 2020, East Excessive College graduate and businessman Kwame Spearman took over as CEO and majority proprietor in a thirteen-member investor group that bought the legendary Tattered Cover after the impartial chain’s topsy-turvy yr. He steps into his new place with a noble purpose for 2021: discovering the proper e book for each Denver resident.

With new management and the backing of flush traders, Tattered Cowl staff are hoping for a much-needed pay increase and elevated advantages, which Spearman says he’s prepared to contemplate. Whereas folks have been lamenting the financial destiny of bookstores for years, Spearman sees not simply the cultural worth of the Tattered Cowl, which is about to show fifty, but in addition profitable prospects as an investor. “I believe folks could also be shocked by my unfettered optimism in regards to the potential success in brick-and-mortar retail, given some vital evolutions after all,” he says.

Partially, that’s as a result of Spearman believes in-person experiences are extra necessary than ever. And the bookstore — scented by the aroma of books and occasional, full of couches the place you may cozy up and skim, and stocked with limitless literature to peruse — presents a tactile expertise like no different. After the pandemic is over, “bookstores will change into a gathering place the place we are able to lastly reunite as a society,” he predicts. “I’m a believer that the night time is darkest earlier than daybreak. Nonetheless, in 2021, we should be protected, caring and respectful of each other whereas we beat this virus. After which let’s get again to rebuilding our group.”

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BookBar proprietor Nicole Sullivan’s story retains getting higher.

Nicole Sullivan

Nicole Sullivan
Bar None
When Nicole Sullivan opened BookBar in 2013, marrying her pursuits in literature and booze, no person may have predicted what a cultural juggernaut her Tennyson Avenue store would change into, and what a power within the metropolis’s literary scene she can be.

This previous spring, she began the nonprofit BookGive, which has donated greater than 30,000 books to seventy Denver nonprofits. Within the early winter, she launched BookBar Press, an impartial publishing home centered on native authors. She additionally operates a author’s retreat, and regardless of COVID-19 restrictions hampering some elements of her enterprise, her retailer has been busy.

This spring, Sullivan will break floor on an occasion area at forty third and Tennyson, with plans to open in fall. And that spot will assist her fulfill her final objectives for the town in 2021. “I hope that we discover extra methods to be collectively that break down our earlier obstacles of worry, intolerance or easy hesitance,” she explains. “I hope we’re all capable of meet one another in a brand new approach that comes from a spot of realizing that we’ve all simply been by means of a collective political and public-health hell, and that we are going to make area for one another with persistence and acceptance. With so many burdens starting to be lightened, I sit up for a complete lot of silliness, artwork for artwork’s sake, absurdity ’trigger we are able to, and socializing as a result of we wish. I hope the scene will really feel like a collective sigh of reduction.”

Chris Zacher is able to get again to the music.

Chris Zacher

Chris Zacher
Music Man
Chris Zacher led the cost on constructing and opening Levitt Pavilion, one of many metropolis’s greatest outside music venues, which began internet hosting live shows in 2017. When the live-music business got here to a standstill after the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Zacher took it upon himself to succeed in out to Colorado’s music venues, with help from Denver Arts & Venues, and be taught crucial points that membership homeowners have been dealing with, whether or not they may make it by means of the shutdown, and how much advocacy they would want.

In consequence, Zacher spent the previous yr in coverage conferences, becoming a member of forces with a thousand-plus venue homeowners and expertise patrons throughout the nation by means of the National Independent Venue Association; he additionally helped type the Colorado Impartial Venue Affiliation, constructing energy between impartial golf equipment which have lengthy been rivals. Though the federal reduction he pushed for handed on the very finish of the yr, the lasting results of uniting impartial venues has but to be seen. Nonetheless, it has the potential to problem the dominance of AEG Presents Rocky Mountains and Reside Nation, whom Zacher companions with at Levitt, and be certain that the Denver market stays numerous.

“As soon as we all know after we’re going to be allowed to reopen and what that appears like, all of my vitality will probably be on producing a tremendous yr of live shows,” Zacher guarantees. “The yr 2021 goes to be actually busy for me, however then once more, yearly is busier than the final on this business.”

Who’re you excited to observe in 2021? Tell us at [email protected]