October 2009

[click "Play" to hear Victoria Hoffman speaking with Susan]

St. Barths 355 Tim-padmasana Telluride's primary Ashtanga teacher, Victoria Hoffman, arrived in town with husband Todd and son Max in 1999. Victoria, a former dancer and model, began practicing yoga as a teenager. She was first exposed to the Ashtanga lineage in 1995, when her teacher was Wayne Kraffner. Since then, Guruji, as Patabhi Jois was known in life, Annie Pace and Tim Miller have been her primary Ashtanga instructors. Miller, the first American certified to teach by Pattabhi Jois at the Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute in Mysore, India, is coming to town for a weekend intensive for all levels of practitioners.


Tim_miller_flyer This weekend, the Telluride Yoga Center welcomes yoga instructor Tim Miller to town for a weekend immersion in his lineage, Ashtanga Yoga, including pranayama or controlled breathing techniques, and kirtan, group chanting.

Tim Miller is first among equals. His studio in Encinitas holds the distinction of being the birthplace in America of Ashtanga Yoga.

The practice of Ashtanga Yoga is an ancient and powerful discipline for cultivating physical, mental and spiritual health. Progressive techniques of breath, posture and movement, cleanse, stretch and strengthen the body as well as focus and calm the mind. A steady, focused practice holds the potential for profound personal transformation.

Fame_smallteaser Theinventionoflying_smallposter The Nugget Theatre in beautiful downtown Telluride is showing two films this week, October 23-29, with a bonus matinee on Saturday, "No Impact Man," which tells the story of a man who decides to make no environmental impact for one year, without taking into consideration that his wife would rather go shopping.

"Fame" is a remake of the 1980 movie, and follows the lives of young people with the aim of dancing, singing, playing, acting their way to FAME.

Imagine a world in which no one lies for any reason, until one man finds that he can get what he wants (maybe) by not being so truthful. That's the premise of "The Invention of Lying" and the result should be interesting.

For reviews and trailers, check out the Nugget website. See below for schedules. Note that the 8:30 movie on Wednesday, October 28 has been cancelled.

[click "Play" to hear Walter Wright speaking about the 350.org celebration in Telluride]

350eblast Environmentalist/writer Bill McKibben came to Telluride in May for Telluride Mountainfilm, hair on fire about the number 350. That's the maximum CO2 parts per million the Earth's atmosphere can handle without a catastrophic meltdown. And we are already above that safe zone at 390 ppm and rising by about 2 parts per million annually. The number is higher than any time in recorded history of our planet and we are already witnessing the consequences: glaciers, the source of drinking water for hundreds of millions, are melting and disappearing; drought is becoming more common; sea levels are rising; mosquitoes, which like the warming, are spreading disease like malaria.

Bill McKibben's first book, "The End of Nature, published in 1989 by Random House, was one of the first, if not the first to explain climate change to a wide audience. ("The End of Nature" was published in 20 languages and reprinted as recently as 2006.) McKibben's 350.org turns his words into deeds.

[click "Play" to hear Laren Metzger talk about "Spooktacular]

Spook_poster The trick: Carving out the time on one of the busiest days of Fall for family fun.
The treat: A Spooktacular day at Telluride's Ah Haa School for the Arts.
The event takes place October 24, in conjunction with the 350.org celebrations.

Halloween, the annual holiday celebrated one week later on October 31, has its roots in the Celtic pagan festival of Samhain, marking the end of the summer season and harvest, and the Christian holy day of All Saints, honoring all those who have attained the beatific vision in heaven.

In anticipation of Halloween, Ah Haa opens its doors from 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. for parents and kids work together to create creepy crafts and temptations to decorate the ultimate spooky home.

[click "Play" to listen to Roz Savage speaking with Susan]

Roz_Savage_Enhanced Many of them are regulars and veterans of Telluride Mountainfilm: climbers Conrad Anker, David Breashears, Lynn Hill, and Jim Whittaker, as well as ocean rower Roz Savage. They are among the elite and professional athletes, 350.org.Athletes team, who have pledged their support through actions, words, and general celebrity to back the global initiative spearheaded by author/environmentalist Bill McKibben.

Bill McKibben is a man with a plan: Move the world back to 350 ppm –  the maximum carbon dioxide parts per million Planet Earth can handle without coming unhinged. Experts have clocked us in at 390 parts per million now and climbing, an unhappy fact of life triggering a meltdown in Mother Nature.

IMGP0672 On the road, Telluride Inside... and Out, especially on family visits to big cities on both coasts, tends to build our days around friends and museums and our evenings around theatre, music, or dance. Now and again, food is the main event.

Kjerstin Viebrock Klein, TIO's partner in charge of social networking and optimization, lives in Pittsburgh with her family, husband Greg Klein, entrepreneur and owner of Willi's ski shops, and their two children/our grandchildren Dylan and Anna. On our weeklong visit, Kjerstin and Greg suggested an evening out at their favorite Italian restaurant.
IMG_0454 Cold, snow and wind are pre-empting fall in Telluride and elsewhere in America. Telluride Inside...and Out is in Pittsburgh, where rain washed out plans for grandkids' soccer games. On Friday, however, we visited the extraordinary Carnegie Museum, whose must-see permanent collection – two Van Goghs in one of the Impressionist galleries are worth the price of entry, not to mention one of the best of Monet's waterlilies series – includes a new Alex Katz, given star billing in the lobby. The Alex Katz depicts trees in fall, irresistible given TIO's ongoing coverage of the colors of a season fast coming to a close.

When it comes to the arts, Telluride puts its money where its mouth is, lending support in substantive ways such as an artists' cooperative known as the Stronghouse Studios. Pittsburgh has the Mattress Factory, an artists' co-op and museum featuring installation art in room-sized...

10-19 TFF The Telluride Film Festival Cinematheque is a program of free films, food and discussion produced in conjunction with Telluride's Wilkinson Public Library for cinephiles in the greater Telluride community who want to enjoy the art of filmmaking all year 'round, not just  Film Festival weekend. The event is programmed by Telluride Film Festival co-director Gary Meyer. The next program is Monday, October 19.

Last season, the theme was French New Wave. This second season, the subject is film noir, a genre that emerged post WWII in the late 1940s when the mood in the country was dark. Post war malaise is the result of the atrocities of war and deeper understanding of the human nature's dark underbelly.

A defining characteristic of film noir is fatalism, one small step that leads to doom: an "ordinary Joe" protagonist, a predatory femme fatale.