Tomorrow night at the St Catherine’s College Hall in Kilbirnie, the WCC is holding a public meeting to gauge community opinion on the fate of the Maranui Surf Lifesaving Club and the adjacent three waterfront buildings, and to discuss the options.

The Maranui club house is a listed heritage building, damaged by fire on 1 August. 

A call has been put out (see today’s Capital Times article) for Wellington’s creative types to come and show their support and with people being encouraged to come along in their speedos it’s going to be an entertaining night! 

Who says public meetings can’t be fun!? 

If you’re out of town, you can sign the online petition here to restore the building to its former glory. 

Among the opening exhibitions at the brand spanking new City Gallery is Regan Gentry’s installation Make Way. Along with much of Gentry’s work, it provokes questions about the contemporary city, and in this spirit the Gallery is hosting a panel discussion on "Humanising the City". It’s on Wednesday 4 November at 12.30pm (which is one of the Gallery’s popular free Wednesdays) in the Adam Auditorium.

I will chair the discussion, which will be around questions such as "How do planning and urban design in Wellington respond to human needs? What is the role of urban design in making our cities liveable, lively, and community-focused places? How do we create public space which balances environmental sustainability with infrastructure sensitive to the needs of its inhabitants?" The other participants are Associate Professor Penny Allan (Programme Director, Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Architecture & Design, Victoria University of Wellington), Professor Philippa Howden-Chapman (Director, NZ Centre for Sustainable Cities), Philip Belesky (Wellington freelance designer, Eye of the Fish blogger), and Mike Mellor (Vice President, Living Streets Aotearoa).

As Robyn has rightly pointed out, tonight is Pecha Kucha at Downstage at 7.30 (get there early if you are going).

Tonight is also the opening of Roger Morris’s new show "See Nothing".  Once again things are getting political, this time with a show based around "WHAT IF"? 9/11/2001.  Roger uses oil, print, graphite, monopoly boards, jigsaw pieces and repurposed generic landscapes to explore the theme.

Everything kicks off at 5.30 at Thistle Hall on Cuba Street.  Take a look at some of the works on the Facebook invite, if you are lucky you may be able to fit in Pecha Kucha afterwards.

It’s time for another Pecha Kucha Night, where creative people of Wellington will each give a short talk – with 20 slides each at 20 seconds per slide.

It’s TONIGHT – Monday 19 October, at the lovely Downstage Theatre. Doors open at 6.30pm, with the event starting at 7.30. It’s $9 admission – cash only.

Tonight’s line-up:

Ralph Johns – landscape architect
Meena Kadri – design lecturer/communications strategist/researcher
Philippe Campays – architect/artist
Sarah Maxey – graphic designer/artist
Andy Irving – artist/designer
Hilary Beaton – Downstage Theatre
Troy Donovan – facade designer
James M. Maddock
Margaret Austin
Craig Nicholson – interculturalist
Sheba Williams – artist
George Hajian – graphic designer
Meighan Ellis – artist
James Everett – game designer
Alison Wong – novelist/poet

Tomorrow eve, come to the Film Archive and witness the unveiling of The Blue Room, a group show including (lucky number) 13 artists who were asked to respond ‘in a psychic way’ to an idea, site or place. Some of the results are quite startling.

Curated by Pippa Sanderson the show features Wellingtonians Bek Pilcher, Johanna Sanders and Pippa Sanderson, with Elle Loui August, Bekah Carran, Louise Clifton, Andrea du Chatenier, Violet Faigan, Lonnie Hutchinson, Saskia Leek, Louise Menzies, Dane Mitchell and Stuart Shepherd.

Some are believers, some skeptics, but all raise questions about the fascination with the psychic that haunts us now – the television programmes, the internet sites devoted to spells and spectres, the touring psychics…

All welcome at the opening, 5:30pm tomorrow, plus there’s an Artist Talk at the Archive 12:15pm, Tuesday 27 October.

The exhibition runs until Saturday 21 November 2009. 

This Sunday’s Soundstage @ Downstage is a goody – Rhian Sheehan plays his album Standing in Silence from start to finish with accompanying filmic elements by Gareth Moon (Nektar).

Guaranteed to be like nothing you have seen at Downstage before, Rhian’s sound as described by him is “like floating through space in a warm bath”.

Described by reviewers as “spine tingling…a tsunami of sound” (Tom Cardy, Dominion Post), Standing in Silence at Downstage features a full complement of live musicians playing alongside Rhian including key collaborator Jeff Boyle, two percussionists, a string section, Raashi Sheehan (Rhombus), Jeramiah Ross (aka Module) and Woolshed Sessions members Jess Chambers, Andy Hummel and Peter Hill.

For those who like to join in, custom made music boxes will be onsale before the show, which you can play in particular tracks.

The luscious Rhian Sheehan: Standing in Silence this Sunday 18 Oct @ Downstage Theatre.  It starts promptly at the sensible hour of 7pm.

For more info check out Simon Sweetman’s blog , and you can purchase tickets at Downstage.

LATE UPDATE: Only 16 tickets left!

A lot of people don’t know that Wellington has quite a sizable Brazilian expatriate community. A bunch of them and their Kiwi friends have been working hard to put together the Live Brazil 2009 Festival this weekend.

The festival will comprise music, dance, capoeira, and cooking and drink workshops. It starts on Friday night with a perfomance featuring Tambolelê (from Minas Gerais) at the Memorial Theatre on the Vic campus, with most other events taking place at the Southern Cross.

Full details at this chaotic but information-rich site or in summary form here.

This particular Wellingtonista will be lurking in Carmen Miranda’s band on Saturday night — come and demonstrate your fruit-laden costume and we can have a caipirinha.

Spotted near the Mt Vic lookout.

I dunno about the Greater Wellington guys, but I reckon the Wellingtonista could have put all this information on one sign – the only differnce between the two is the name of the poison, and the colour of the pellet.