Category: Arts & Entertainment

Samhain and Ancestor Altars

Last week we asked readers to send in photos of their Samhain or Ancestor altars. We hope you enjoy looking at these meaningful and creative altars as much as we have.

Photo Adrian Hawkins - In honor of my Elder, First Priestess and most importantly my mother on her birthday - Lady Galadriel, Matriarch of the Unicorn Tradition and Grove of the Unicorn.

Photo by Carol & John Stiteler: The house altar is "Seasonal House Altar at WhiteWing Cottage" with symbols of Life, Death, and Re-birth including skull, antlers, bones, seasonal fruits and both fresh and dried flowers.

More photos after the cut:

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Book Review: Christian Day’s The Witches’ Book of the Dead

By Star Foster, Pagan Portal Manager of Patheos.com

I don’t generally bother to review books I don’t think I’ll care for, especially with a stack of books I actually want to read waiting on me. Not being Christian Day’s biggest fan, I was reluctant to read The Witches’ Book of the Dead but I was intrigued by some of the reviews as much as I was repelled by others. So I read it, and here’s my opinion of it. Make of it what you will.

The Witches’ Book of the Dead
Christian Day
Weiser Book
$14.96
288 pages
.
.

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MMR records song in support of Occupy Wall Street, performs live tonight

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A local Pagan band with mainstream appeal, Murphey’s Midnight Rounders, just finished recording a song in support of the Occupy Wall Street movement. The band performs the song, “Hard Times, Come Again No More,” for the first time live tonight at 5pm for the OccupyMN demonstration at Government Plaza in downtown Minneapolis.  The song was written by Stephen Foster in 1854.

Paul Ferrise, studio producer for MMR, said the band is busy recording for their new CD release coming up this spring, but wanted to support the Occupy movement, “So far we have recorded 11 songs towards the new Twin CD release. [Monday], MMR came into the studio wanting to record, edit, master and publish a song in honor of OccupyMN and all the Occupy organizations across the country.”

Bonnie Hanna-Powers, Teresa Frank, and Brad Murphy

Teresa Frank, vocals and percussion for the band, encourages others to get involved in the Occupy movement, “The revolution has started and we need you at the government center.” MMR has a history of supporting political, religious rights, and social justice movements.  They most recently marched in the Hemp Fest Walk for Freedom, assisted several Pagan groups in fundraising, and joined the pro-union protests in Wisconsin.

Hard Times, Come Again No More  was written by Stephen Foster in 1854, but feels relevant today as Americans endure the difficult economic times sparked by the recession began in 2007.  A recession that may technically be over, but is still felt in the high unemployment numbers and high food and gas prices. It has a depression-era sound and the word choices in the lyrics, especially in the chorus,  likewise give a strong nod to that time period.

It’s the song, it’s the sigh of the weary
Hard times, hard times come again no more
Many days you have lingered around my cabin door
Hard times come again no more

The song is available for free download along with samples of other songs from their upcoming CDs.

*Editor’s note:  The original version of this article incorrectly stated that the song was written by Murphey’s Midnight Rounders.

“God Factory” Art Show Opens Saturday

Roger Williamson with Painting

Roger Williamson of Magus Books and Herbs has a one person art show of his paintings entitled, “God Factory” , Mystery IS Energy… but what does that mean? opening this weekend at The Nicollet.  Comets-ov-Cupid and Jealous Jester will offer live music for the opening reception 7pm Saturday, October 8.  The Nicollet is a spacious relaxed space with fine coffee and food at the NE corner of Franklin and Nicollet Avenues in Minneapolis.  I talked to Roger about his art.

How long have you been painting?

I used to paint way back in school in Coventry, England. Later my father was helping to get me back on the straight, and signed me up for art school in the town we lived. He dropped me there the first day. I wasn’t very impressed with it. For the next six weeks he dropped me there each morning. I would walk in the front door, down the corridor and walk out the side door. He finally got a letter asking where I was… and he asked me where the Hell I had been. I really was in love with rock and roll, so I had spent my time in the south railroad coffee bar. It was the first time I had heard Bo Diddley, and I can still remember that experience. In those days you could go to college free in England. At that time I was totally preoccupied with music, and that continued until my thirties.

I was writing a book and I needed an image of the Lovers tarot card. I had never been happy with the images that were available. My art started from there. I was working in pastels then and did a series on the Enochian workings on the Earth Tablet. I did some automatic drawings about these experiences. It was like this floodgate opened, I couldn’t stop just churning out these pictures. It was almost like an exorcism. This started about thirteen years ago when I really started. It was such a shock when I would get one of these pastels framed, it was so expensive. I switched to oil so when I got one done I could just pound a nail in the wall and hang it up. I transferred my pastel technique to oil and then worked from there.

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