Weekend ahead: looking for love

It's Valentine's Day Sunday, for those of you who have somehow missed the onslaught of V-Day sales pitches coming from all directions. Here are a couple of possibilities of the arts lovin' kind which may help your weekend.

At the 318 Cafe in Excelsior poets Todd Boss and Terri Ford will join Mother Banjo and and Chad Elliot for an evening of words and music, accompanied by a three course Valentine's meal. Boss has become one of local poetry's most outspoken advocates, and has developed "Motionpoems," animated versions of the work of several renowned poets, (including the example of his own work above.) There are two shows at 6 and 8.15 pm. Reservations are strongly recommended as last years events sold out.

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At the Guthrie in Minneapolis, you can catch the new theatrical adaptation of Noel Coward's "Brief Encounter." The show, about the illicit affair is based on a one act play Coward wrote in the 1930s, and then adapted to an award winning movie in the waning days of World War II.

Director Emma Rice of the British Kneehigh Theatre company, says it's a show everyone can relate to, as she believes there's hardly anyone out there who hasn't fallen in love with someone they shouldn't, or been in love with someone who has fallen for someone else. She's also developed a huge appreciation for Coward and the depth of his work.

"This was a gay man in the 1930s," she says. "He knew what it was like to feel love that he wasn't allowed to feel. And yet the generosity of putting those words into two heterosexual people's mouths and genuinely charting the pain, the simple pain, of what was impossible. I mean, I've got goosebumps even thinking about it."

"Brief Encounter" is now in previews and opens Saturday.

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And finally, you can't help but feel the love at the new retrospective of Wing Young Huie's work which is now open at the Janet Wallace Fine Arts Gallery at Macalester College. Huie has documented the people around him in the Twin Cities for three decades, creating an impressive body of work, usually displayed in series such as "Frogtown" and "Lake Street USA." The Mac show is a sampler, taking selections from Huie's work over the years, including the University Avenue Project which will be displayed along its namesake street later this summer.

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