Grande Dames of the Ballet Boards – 10 Questions with the Ladies Lumpkin and Harris

By Cynthia Boiter The adage that behind every great man is a great woman has never been truer than when peering over the shoulders of the artistic directors of Columbia’s two top ballet companies, William Starrett of Columbia City Ballet and Radenko Pavlovich of Columbia Classical Ballet. Respectively, Coralee Harris and Lee Lumpkin have served […]

Ernest Lee: A Man and His Chickens

By William Garland The Lorraine Wind pours down the street while Ernest Lee frantically tries to pick up the fallen sheets of painted plywood that are strewn across the lot. The scene is almost comical. Lee has an unkempt look about him. There are flecks of white hair scattered throughout his two-day stubble that stand in […]

Dale Lam

By Bonnie Boiter-Jolley Dale Lam packs a lot of punch in her four feet and ten inch stance. Spending her life fighting to make a career for herself in the entertainment industry has instilled in her a passion and drive she hopes to pass on to her students. Owner and Artistic Director of Columbia City […]

Marina Lomazov

By Cynthia Boiter Tall and elegant, her poise and demeanor reflecting the discipline of the Soviet culture into which she was born, Marina Lomazov takes the stage with all the finesse of the piano diva she is widely recognized to be. Described by reviewers as “a mesmerizing risk-taker” and “one of the most passionate and […]

Women Creating / Creating Women

By Kristine Hartvigsen Three women’s creative cycles will sync up for a new art show coming to Vista Studios Gallery 80808 in April. Titled “Women Creating Women,” the show will bring together the works of painters Kirkland Smith and Bonnie Goldberg with the poetry of Cassie Premo Steele. The title concept, the brainchild of Premo […]

Wearable Art

By Kristine Hartvigsen With this article, Jasper introduces an occasional series on wearable art by Columbia-area artisans. This first in the series focuses on two local women who create hand-crafted art jewelry. The stunning, straight-talking redhead who manages the Museum Shop at the Columbia Museum of Art, Bohumila Augustinova is perhaps best known around local […]

Candace Wiley

By Ed Madden Candace Wiley is just back from Pencil Shout, a small workshop in Kentucky with National Book Award poet Nikky Finney, and later this summer she leaves for Colombia, South America, as the recipient of a Fulbright creative writing fellowship.  Jasper first noticed Wiley at last fall’s Bookin’ It on Main, a celebration […]

Avery Delores Bateman

By Bonnie Boiter-Jolley From the moment Avery Delores Bateman stepped on stage during a high school production of Bye Bye Birdie, she was hooked. “I had to perform,” she quips.   No stranger to performance, Bateman was often given small roles as a child in church plays authored by her mother, Rosalind Russell. “I was the […]

Lindsay Wiggins

The artist Lindsay Wiggins could just as easily be found on Jasper’s Day Jobs page since, in addition to being an artist, she also works full time as a histologist – someone who studies the microscopic anatomy of cells and tissues in plants and animals. And that intimate knowledge of the infinitesimal is clearly evident […]

Lucas Sams

There’s really nothing like young art. Be it raw and edgy, or crisp and clean, fresh art offered by fledgling artists, especially when the work is good, holds the promise of potential; the possibility of even better things to come. Jasper takes notice of new artists on the Columbia arts scene and strives to be […]