Making it Home festival organizers met in Madison

Program coordinators from Baraboo, Dodgeville, Milwaukee, and the Chequamegon Bay met last Friday in Madison to start planning for the Making it Home film festival tour next spring!

The first of the Making it Home film festivals will be during Aldo Leopold days in Baraboo, hosted by UW Baraboo/Sauk County (March 4-7). Liz Nevers (pictured in the center) represented that organizing group at the workshop and is excited to be premiering "Greenfire," a new documentary film about Aldo Leopold.

Dodgeville will host the second Making it Home film festival (March 12-14), with a selection of unique films in addition to "Greenfire." The festival is being organized by the Dodgeville Chamber of Commerce, as well as the Military Ridge Prairie Heritage Area Land Conservancy (Katie Abbott pictured front left) and Capture Media (Eli Wieczorek picrtured second from left back row).

Milwaukee Film and the Urban Ecology Center have partnered to host the third Making it Home film festival (April 16-18), marrying both groups missions by using great films to create events that will draw people from all over Milwaukee together for interesting and timely conversation. (T. J. Fackelman from Milwaukee film pictured on the left in the back row; Beth Fetterley and Jamie Ferschinger, both from the Urban Ecology Center, pictured back row far right and front row far right respectively).

On Earth Day, 2010, the Making it Home film festival will be up in the Chequamegon Bay! Hosted and housed primarily at the Great Lakes Northern Visitor Center, with help from a large number of community partners, including the Big Water Film Festival, the festival will draw inspiration from the region's long-standing tradition of care and stewardship for Wisconsin's Northwoods. (Ruth Oppedahl from the Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center is pictured back row second from the right).

Each Making it Home film festival will be unique, designed and produced by the people who live there. Weekend film and event schedules will be posted on the WHC's www.makingwisconsinhome.org site. Check back often for updates!

It's all part of our history!

One historical and notably American act I’ve always thought seemed sensible is the Civilian Conservation Corps. After a performance by the Milwaukee Public Theatre called “Camp We-Kan-Tak-It” about life in a CCC camp I attended last week, the audience was asked “Would this work today?”

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Have you ever been to a poetry slam?

Check out a short film about the national movement to make space in schools, on stage, and at festivals such as the Wisconsin Book Festival for the talents of young people,and the oral tradition of poetry. And then get out and listen: there are poetry and spoken word events throughout the five days of the festival. See the full schedule, and read more...

The first day of events at the Wisconsin Book Festival offers some really interesting finds. I just discovered the artist Mary Nohl, thanks to Barbara Manger and Janine Smith's book "Mary Nohl Inside and Out." The authors will be presenting at the Chazen Museum of Art. Read more...

The Wisconsin Humanities Council brought Will Allen to Madison last week as a pre-event for the Wisconsin Book Festival (October 7-11 in Madison). By the end of his talk, Will had everyone happily yelling "SOIL!" when he asked, "What is the key to feeding everyone healthy food?"

What do soil and farming have to do with the Wisconsin Humanities Council? Read more here...

The Arachnologist Delivers

I don't care that much about spiders, but I'm not arachnophobe, either. When I stopped to look at the eight-legged critter, I wanted to know more about it. Specifically, I wanted to know what kind of spider it was. That's just the way I am. So I was intrigued when he said he believed it was related to a tarantula.

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Countdown to Wendell Berry and the Wisconsin Book Festival

Seventy three days from today, Wendell Berry will be appearing at the Wisconsin Book Festival in Madison. Berry’s name catches people’s attention: he is well-loved as an outspoken farmer, prolific writer (he’s written 40+ books), and fierce advocate for the importance of connections between people and place.

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