Matter

In the decade-plus since the original, six-person lineup of Karate Coyote played its last concert together at Independents Day in 2013, Nic Jados said there have been occasions where he daydreamed about the band reuniting, though he generally dismissed these thoughts as an impossibility.

“It’s just that so much has changed in our lives,” said Jados, who joined fellow Karate Coyote bandmate Sam Corlett for an early June interview ahead of the group’s reunion show at the Columbus Arts Festival, which takes place at the Genoa Park stage at 8 p.m. on Saturday, June 13. (Click here for a full roster of Arts Fest performers and set times.) “When I think back to our music from long ago, a lot of it was about the change we were going through when we were in our early 20s. And now, that’s just compounded with careers and children and families. … And I think that was the biggest hurdle for me, disrupting everybody’s daily lives to do something like this.”

Karate Coyote howls again with reunion show at Columbus Arts Fest – Matter News The band’s original, six-member lineup will share the stage for the first time in 13 years at the Genoa Park stage on Saturday, June 13.

Stacy Schwab had submitted a victim impact statement weeks earlier, but she wasn’t prepared to speak when she entered the courtroom with others who testified about the harms done by Purdue Pharma.

New from Jack Shuler.

‘It was a holy and sacred experience to speak for them’ – Matter News Stacy Schwab had submitted a victim impact statement weeks earlier, but she wasn’t prepared to speak when she entered the courtroom with others who testified about the harms done by Purdue Pharma.

On Tuesday, organizers with the proposed Columbus Metropolitan Library workers union, dubbed CML United, filed an Unfair Labor Practice Charge with the State Employment Relations Board that alleges retaliation in the June 3 termination of a CML worker who served as a member of the union organizing committee.

“The Library’s termination of [the employee] was unlawful and retaliatory and was motivated by [their] involvement in union organizing and protected activity,” reads the filing, a copy of which was obtained by Matter News. “By terminating [the employee] following [their] protected activity, the Library attempted to interfere with, restrain, and coerce employees in the exercise of protected rights.”

This filing follows an earlier Unfair Labor Practice Charge submitted in April, in which members of CML United and the Ohio Federation of Teachers (OFT) accused library management of delays and providing misleading information to staff, along with alleging another retaliatory firing motivated by a second employee’s role as an organizing committee member.

New union busting allegations surface as Columbus Metropolitan Library workers rally ahead of union vote – Matter News The coming vote is set to take place amid what council member Rob Dorans called ‘some of the most egregious union busting’ he has ever witnessed during a weekend rally at Franklin Park Amphitheater.

When Darren Demaree saw the photo “ibid” by Alina Stefanescu, he was immediately taken aback, struck by how the image of a dancing streetlight gave way, swallowed by black, only to reappear briefly on the far side of the frame.

“It elicited something in me just looking at the picture and seeing the point where it vanishes and then reemerges right at the very edge of the picture. And I think there are a lot of outside factors going on in the world that make vanishing sound like a great idea,” said Demaree, who then expounded on these mounting external forces. “It’s [asking], how much do you want to be an American right now? How much do you want to work through the sludge of modernity and AI? … Every election, I end up looking at property on a lake in Canada.”

These escapist fantasies tend to be fleeting for the poet, who like the image of the streetlight continues to return, owing both to the necessity of engaging the moment and the knowledge that he wants his work to be observed. “So, even when there’s a vanishing point on the horizon,” he said, “at the end of it, you’re always going to look back, you’re always going to want to be seen.”

How to disappear temporarily with Darren Demaree – Matter News The Columbus poet will celebrate the release of his new collection, ‘Got There: Poems on Vanishing,’ with a reading at Prologue Bookshop on Wednesday, June 10.

During the first Trump administration’s wave of deportations, a Black Mauritanian named Birane Wane saw the writing on the wall. Despite having lived in Ohio for more than two decades, he knew what his status as a non-citizen would lead to, so he decided to move to Senegal to avoid being sent back to a country rife with apartheid and slavery. “Almost 22 years living all set in one place,” Wane told a reporter at the Ohio Newsroom. “Almost half of your life. I miss a lot of things. Ohio is my second country.”.

This is exactly how Sarr feels about Columbus, describing the city as “home for me.” It’s where his family still lives. It’s the place where he began performing music, first rapping and then singing. “In 2016, that’s when I started singing,” he said. “Really, really, really started singing. That’s when I started my career.”

Here's Jonathan Russell Clark with Salif Sarr ahead of the musician's performance at Arts Fest this weekend.

Salif Sarr finds a second home in Ohio – Matter News The Columbus-based Fulani singer will perform as part of ‘Ohio Is My Second Country,’ taking place at Arts Fest on Saturday, June 13.

“Even though I feel this way, I didn’t want [the mural] to be like, ‘F**k ICE,’” said Hernandez, who also didn't want to shy from making a more pointed political statement. “I feel like my work always has a hidden symbolism, but obviously with everything going on in America right now, I wanted to be a lot more direct. … I don’t know. Sometimes I have these moments where I get discouraged, where I’m like, ‘What’s the point of all this? I’m just painting stupid pictures on a wall. Is it even making a difference?’ But I think it is. And I think showing working people, and specifically minorities and Latin people, I think it’s challenging the normalization of ICE coming in and removing people. It’s letting people know we’re still holding these people in a place of honor in our community.”

Adam Hernandez aims to uplift immigrant workers with his latest mural – Matter News The Columbus artist will be on site at 1014 Parsons Ave. for the public unveiling of ‘We the People/Nosotros la Gente” on Thursday, June 11.

For the better part of a decade, Xenia Shuman rarely picked up a pen to write a song, believing, at times, that she might not return to the craft.

“There were definitely several years in there where I was like, 'I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to do this again,' and I was feeling satisfied playing bass and writing harmonies,” Shuman said of her work in the celebrated Columbus rock band Golomb, where she plays alongside her partner, Mickey Shuman, and her brother Hawken Holm. “But at the same time, I felt like there was something big missing, a true core of myself I was not able to access. And I was scared by that. I didn’t like the idea that I wouldn’t ever be able to write songs again.”

Xenia Shuman enters into a new creative season – Matter News The Golomb bassist recently released the first new songs she has written in nearly a decade.

Williamson recorded Nightmares almost two years ago, and he said revisiting it now can feel like watching a disaster movie where you already know the ending but are powerless to stop what is coming. “You’re just like, God, don’t let the plane crash, but you know it’s going to,” said Williamson, who will host a dual art exhibition and album release listening party at Rehab Tavern beginning at 8 p.m. on Friday, June 5. “It’s very much like looking at your life and wishing you had a time machine.”

The first time Williamson rebuilt his life, he relied heavily on religion as an anchoring point. This time around, that hold has become more slippery, his relationship to the church having shifted in the wake of a larger crisis of faith. “My relationship with it is so different, and a central theme of the record and a lot of the art I’ve been doing is wrestling with God,” said Williamson, who described himself as “a crazy atheist” turned devotee turned believer with more questions than answers. “And in trying to get on my feet now, recovery and faith are still the anchors, but … where the first time I was really gung-ho [about religion], now it’s more contentious. And I would argue that’s what faith is, where if you wrestle long enough and honestly enough with these questions, what you get on the other side is something better and deeper, but it’s less clear.”

Johnny Williamson finds himself on the other side of ‘Nightmares’ – Matter News In the midst of rebuilding his life for the second time, the Columbus artist and musician will host a dual album listening party and exhibition at Rehab Tavern in Franklinton on Friday, June 5.

“With my own work, I’m always willing to destroy something to get it back to a place where I’m happy and excited and it feels fresh. … There’s a boldness, or a willingness to trash a piece in the pursuit of something better,” said Mark, who compared his approach to a gorilla armed with a marker who makes wild, gesticular marks to see what sticks. “And Anne, in my assessment, proceeds a little more cautiously, where she’s looking at nuanced things. … And one of the biggest learning things for me was figuring how to let go of that, and to step back and begin to propose smaller things, like giving a gorilla a smaller crayon.”

Anne, in turn, said she gradually found herself mirroring Mark’s bolder strokes, adding expressive streaks of pink in one painting that trace an arc alongside his turquoise markings. “And I started almost shadowing him in places,” she said. “And even some of the drips. I think you started letting [the paint] drip in places, and then I homed in on that at some point and started using it. And it was interesting, some of that visual language you were laying down, I started speaking myself.”

Mark and Anne Spurgeon embrace their familial bond with ‘Blood Harmonies’ – Matter News The new exhibition from the Spurgeon siblings kicks off at the downtown gallery Blockfort with an opening reception on Friday, June 5.

It’s very easy for property owners to pay low taxes on decaying properties while waiting for somebody else to begin a resurgence. Maybe it shouldn’t be so easy to wait.

Property tax is based on two things: the value of the land and the value of any structures on the land. If you build an addition or make any other improvements, you add value and your tax assessment will increase. A cynic might say you’re being punished for making improvements. Conversely, if you raze a building on your property, or just let the building decay, your property value – and assessment – goes down. And the cynic says you’re being rewarded for creating an eyesore.

The cynic is Henry George, who 150 years ago began to push the “land-value tax” (sometimes called the “single tax”), which assessed the underlying land but not the improvements that generate profits. His 1879 book, “Progress and Poverty,” was a late 1800s best seller. Because landowners would be taxed on the full value of their land, it would be very costly to keep the property vacant. But they would have leeway to generate profits on their use of that land. And while other forms of wealth can flee across the sea to tax havens, land can’t be moved.

New from Brian Williams.

On Development: Progressive tax policy in Ohio?!? Maybe – Matter News It’s very easy for owners to pay low taxes on decaying properties while waiting for somebody else to begin a resurgence. A proposed move to a land tax would make it harder for these squatters to wait.