A Photography Contest to coincide with the opening of the play

“If We Are Women”

"We are soliciting photographs depicting women in families: good times and bad, alienation and coming together, joy and grief.  The makeup of 'family' can be varied: two women together, daughters caring for family members, extended family, or a woman and her dog...

Prizes will be awarded for professional and amateur/student categories.  Display of finalists will be concurrent with the production of the play If We Are Women during the month of June of 2008 at the Columbia Center for the Arts.  Grand prize winning photo will be featured on the program cover for If We Are Women.

Virginia Woolf was quoted in the play,

“We think back through our mothers, if we are women.”

In a beautifully crafted work, the playwright has filled her story with great humor, warmth, tears, confrontation, emotional blackmail, and everything else that goes on in families.

Submitted photo must have at least one dimension of ten inches and be in a 16” x 20” white window mat and ready for hanging.  To be considered for the program cover you must also submit CD with a high resolution image (300 dpi) jpeg of your photo.  Submission deadline is April 30, 2008.  Contest questions should be directed to Kate: (541)386-3850.

 Deliver matted photo Tuesday though Sunday to:

 Columbia Center for the Arts,

 215 Cascade Ave. Hood River, OR  97031  (541) 387-8877

From April 1 though April 30, 2008

Winners will be announced at First Friday, June 6^th at the Columbia Center for the Arts.

 Photos will be available for pickup no later than June 30^th at Columbia Center for the Arts.

Entrance Form: Photo Contest (Limit 3 Entries)

Complete and attach securely to back of photo(s) with CD

I hereby certify that the photo I am submitting is my original work, that I am the sole copyright owner.  I am entering this photo as an honest effort of my personal work and I understand that it may be published as the program cover.

 " The Princess and the Warrior "

May  28^th  at 7:30pm,  Wednesday — FREE / $5 suggested donation 

German director Tom Tykwer reunites with Run Lola Run star Franka Potente in a darkly skewed heist movie with obsession at its core. Sissi (Potente) is a nurse in a mental ward who gets run over in the street by a truck.  Quick-thinking Bodo (Benno Furmann), a bank robber by trade, saves her life -- not knowing that, in gratitude, Sissi would haunt his every move like a lovesick puppy!    ( 2000 )      

Rated  R -  Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian

If We Are Women by Joanna McClelland Glass directed by Judie Hanel. 

June 12,13,14, 19,20,21 at 7:30pm.  Some mature language and content 

Columbia Arts, Soroptimist International and Judie Hanel present this amazing award winning play by Canadian playwright Joanna McClelland Glass.  IF WE ARE WOMEN traces the relationship between a young woman writer, her illiterate mother from Saskatchewan, her intellectually sophisticated ex-mother-in-law, and her rebellious teenage daughter, who is determined to forgo her education at Yale for a relationship. Glass delivers enough humor, compassion and hope to touch everyone who sees it.  Winner of the 1994 Governor General's Award for Literary Merit.

"Kafka Comes to America"

Book Reading —  sponsored by Waucoma Books

June 18^th  at 7:30pm ,  Wednesday

FREE/ Donations appreciated

Through the gripping inside-stories of two of the most highly publicized terrorism cases of the 21st century, author Steven T. Wax shines a spotlight on one of the most critical issues faced by Americans today.  Kafka Comes To America : Fighting for Justice in the War on Terror  is the saga of one public defender's struggle to rescue two innocent men from the Kafkaesque practices of our judicial system - a system now tainted by the loss of our civil liberties in the name of the war on terror.

The book tells the well-known true story of Brandon Mayfield, an American-born lawyer and family man living in Oregon, who was mistakenly arrested as a suspected terrorist in the Madrid bombings because of an incorrectly identified fingerprint.  You may have seen the coverage of an Oregon judge's ruling to overturn sections of the Patriot Act late last year-the ruling arose from a civil suit against the government by Brandon Mayfield in response to his wrongful arrest.

Less known, although currently growing in media attention thanks to Wax's efforts, is Adel Hamad, a Sudanese hospital administrator who was taken from his apartment in Pakistan and flown in chains to Guantanamo as part of an anti-Arab sweep intended to satisfy the American government's new security initiatives.  Weaving together the stories of Brandon, the citizen, Adel, the alien, and the work of Wax's defense teams, Kafka Comes to America makes clear that the rights in jeopardy in the war on terror belong to all of us.

A patriotic American and a firm believer in upholding the judicial system he has come to know and respect, Wax has served twenty-nine years as a public defender.  From Guantanamo to the Supreme Court, Wax has been there, and he is well positioned to present a sharp, trenchant picture of both how we've come to lose our civil liberties and how we must all fight for our constitutional rights.  He is located in Portland, Oregon

 " Belle de Jour "

June 25^th  at 7:30pm,  Wednesday — FREE / $5 suggested donation 

Severine (Catherine Deneuve) is a wealthy young newlywed who's eager to live life to the fullest. Although she loves her husband, Severine can't bring herself to be intimate with him. To sate her physical desires, she indulges in erotic daydreams, often blurring the line between reality and fantasy. When that's not enough, she begins frequenting a classy Parisian brothel, working as a prostitute while remaining celibate within her marriage.  ( 1967 )     Directed by Luis Buñuel     

Rated  R -  Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian

"One Act Musical Plays"

July 11^th  –  20^th   :  8 Performances  — 

Thursday evening at 7:30pm :   July 13^th

Friday & Saturday evenings at 7:30pm :   July 11^th  & 12^th ,  18^th & 19^th ,  &  25^th  & 26^th

Sunday matinee at 2pm :    July 20^th

$15 general / $10 students & seniors

"MY BUTTERFLY"   is a one act musical of escalating absurdity that accidentally touches on subjects as diverse as the environment, political correctness, and following one's dream.  The cast of oddball characters includes a bumbling grad student and his native spirit guide, a troupe of lost scouts, an eco-warrior and a famous television zoologist.  Part farce, part sing-a-long hootenanny, MY BUTTERFLY is forty minutes of surreal fun.  

Book, Music & Lyrics by Mark Steighner ;    Directed by Richard Parker

"JUNK"   is a short musical romantic comedy that explores a couple's missed connections and botched opportunities for romantic redemption.  A divorcing couple looks back on their younger selves for clues and insights into where and why their marriage failed. 

Book by Madeline Gobbo ;   Music, Lyrics, and Arrangements by Madeline Gobbo, Eryn Bryan and Mark Steighner ;   & Directed by Mark Steighner

"ZEN BOYFRIEND"   is about the travails of a young woman who has a tendency to date men who use various flavors of New Age spirituality to mask their inability to connect and commit.  Although the musical pokes gentle fun at the "spiritual marketplace," it is about the larger issue of finding a soul.

Book, Music & Lyrics by Mark Steighner ;     Directed by John Bryan

Wild & Scenic

July 30th , films begin at  ??pm ,  Wednesday

& August  2nd , films begin at  8 pm , reception at  7 pm,   Saturday

Check Back for More Details

The Hood River event will follow a “mountain to river” theme, which ties well with interests in the local community, yet the event will draw upon an international and global focus in its films. A variety of films will be screened on each night, ranging from a documentary on the impacts of climate change on mountain life and skiing, to several humorous film shorts, to a documentary on paddling through remote areas of Africa. The event will include a fitting introduction from Ralph Bloemers, Staff Attorney for the Crag Law Center, and will benefit the Crag Law Center’s work with local community conservation groups in Hood River.

The Wild & Scenic Film Festival is the Largest Environmental Film Festival in North America, & is sponsored by Patagonia, Whole Foods, and others.

Crag is a client-focused non-profit law center that supports community efforts to protect and sustain the Pacific Northwest's natural legacy.  Crag has been working with local residents and conservation groups in Hood River to preserve wildlife, wildlands and watersheds on Mt. Hood and in the Hood River Valley below since 2001.  Crag balances the scales of justice by providing professional legal services to local community groups for free or as close to free as possible.

Please contact Megan at 503. 525. 2724 for more information.

Craig Carothers

D.C. Anderson – Singer/Songwriter

August  25^th  at 7:30pm,  Monday

All Seats :  $20

D.C. Anderson is a Bistro Award ( Singer/Songwriter ) and Matson Award ( Singer/Songwriter/Recording Artist ) winner with 8 CD recordings currently available.  His newest is the critically acclaimed  OUR STORY  on the LML Music label.
He is also an actor and will be performing at Keller Auditorium in Portland during the month of August as 'Andre' in THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA.