Tag Archives: Central Arkansas Library System

CALS Lights Way at New Library Construction Site

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Photo courtesy of CALS

Just as libraries are places for illuminating minds, lights are shining on the Central Arkansas Library System’s (CALS) Children’s Library Initiative project at 4800 West 10th Street.

A tree on the site was lighted in November, and continues to highlight the work that has progressed. The structural steel is being erected, and roof beams are now being placed. The slab for the lower level has been poured, and the project is on schedule for the upper floor slab to pour very soon. Interior finishes are being selected, with the products and colors chosen for the countertops and the flooring carpet, tile, and cork.

Library staff is currently designing programming with Arkansas Out of School Network (AOSN), Arkansas Children’s Hospital, Central Little Rock Promise Neighborhood (CLRPN), the Clinton School of Public Service, and other organizations in preparation for the opening of the facility in early 2013. The library will offer programming for infants through middle school-aged children, including Storytime, crafts, music, and book clubs. The opening of the children’s library will allow CALS to expand the number and types of programs available for children. Public computers and a computer lab will allow more children to learn how to use and have access to computers and the Internet. Computer safety classes will teach them, and their parents, how to access the Internet safely.

Other planned features of the facility and site include a kitchen, gardens, and a greenhouse that will provide opportunities for enrichment activities for children in a wide variety of areas which cannot be duplicated currently by any other single organization. Located south of I-630 between the Pine/Cedar and Fair Park exits, the new Children’s Library will help anchor the renewal of the 12th Street Corridor Revitalization Project.

Olio Folio – Updates from the Rep, CALS and ASO

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Today we take a look at updates on a variety of previous posts.

First – the Arkansas Repertory Theatre has extended The Wiz through April 8.  It was originally supposed to end on April 1, but an additional week has been added due to overwhelming ticket demand.  Up next at the Rep after The Wiz – the annual ArtWorks auction followed by Next to Normal and A Loss of Roses.

Next up  – March 13 proved to be lucky for the Central Arkansas Library System as voters overwhelmingly approved the ballot initiative for future library expansion.  The vote was 4,548 FOR to 699 Against.  Because interest rates are at historic lows, bonds will be refinanced which will generate an estimated $19 million. Planned projects include:

– adding thousands of books, CDs, DVDs, children’s material, Arkansas history/genealogy materials, online audiobooks, databases, and eBooks to the collection
– adding space to accommodate the growing collections and services provided by the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies
– adding approximately 250 new parking spaces on the Main Library campus
– expanding Internet capacity and adding more computers and other electronic devices
– expanding children and adult spaces at the McMath Library on John Barrow Road
– constructing a 350-seat auditorium on the Main Library campus for expanded programs for children and adults
– making miscellaneous improvements and repairs to various Little Rock branch libraries
– purchasing land in far west Little Rock for a future branch

 

Finally, the audience spoke at the recent Arkansas Symphony Orchestra “People’s Choice” Pops Concert.  The audience chose the following pieces to be performed:

Best Classical Composer
*Beethoven – Symphony No. 5 First Movement

Best Classic Film Score
*Lawrence of Arabia

Best Contemporary Film Score
*Titanic

Best Sci/Fi Soundtrack
*Star Wars

Best Animated TV Show
* “Looney Tunes”

Best TV Show
*“Mission Impossible”

Best Kids’ Pick
*Anastasia

Best Video Game
*The Legend of Zelda

Best Broadway Score
*The Phantom of the Opera

 

Central Arkansas Library System vote this Tuesday (March 13)

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This Tuesday, March 13, Little Rock voters are being asked to vote for an enhancement of the Central Arkansas Library System.  Information is below.

This will not only help CALS but will be a benefit to cultural life in general in Central Arkansas.

Read a Book

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It’s a Monday.

Snow is starting to blanket Central Arkansas, most museums are closed on Mondays, most theatres are dark this day as well.

This is a good evening to read a book either as God intended (holding paper, cloth and cardboard in your hands) or electronically.  Thanks to Central Arkansas Library System participating in Inter-Library Loan, I am currently reading the plays My Three Angels and Scapino!

I also have a stack of books I’ve purchased over the year that haven’t been read.  Before this year’s Arkansas Literary Festival I must make headway on this stack or I’ll be on a self-imposed book-purchase ban.

Poets and Publishing – A casual, informative discussion

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Borland

Poets Roundtable
Saturday, February 11
10:00 AM – 12:00
Main Library
100 Rock Street
Little Rock, AR 72201
West Room
Little Rock, AR

Featuring a discussion led by Bryan Borland, publisher of Sibling Rivalry Press, on the publishing business (getting published, self-publishing, eBooks, marketing). It’s casual, fun, free, and all are welcome.

Bryan Borland is a multi-time Pushcart-nominated poet from Little Rock, Arkansas, and the owner of Sibling Rivalry Press, LLC, a young publishing house whose goal is to develop, promote, and market underground artistic talent – those who don’t quite fit into the mainstream. As a poet, Bryan writes primarily narrative poems that create portraits of moments through words. Whether chronicling old friends and lovers in his “Book of” series (“The Book of David,” The Book of Cody,” “The Book of Dmitri,” etc.) or inviting us into his family through poems like “Sons of Abraham” and “Supper,” Bryan seeks to poetically etch tally marks into the walls of life; to, in essence, prove he’s been here.

His first collection of poetry, My Life as Adam, is a potent cocktail of family life, religion, and sexuality, the three pillars of Southern life. It was one of only five books of poetry selected by the American Library Association for their first annual “Over the Rainbow” list of noteworthy LGBT-themed publications.

Through Sibling Rivalry Press, Borland has also worn the editor’s hat, putting together Ganymede Unfinished, a tribute to the late John Stahle and his beautiful journal Ganymede that features the work of poets Jee Leong Koh, Jeff Mann, Matthew Hittinger, writers Charlie Vázquez, Perry Brass, and Scott Hess, artist Seth Ruggles Hiler, and photographer Eric Davis, among others. The success of Ganymede Unfinished led Bryan to create Assaracus, the world’s only quarterly print journal dedicated exclusively to gay male poets. Assaracus has exploded onto the poetry scene and has featured the work of Antler, Gavin Dillard, Raymond Luczak, and Emanuel Xavier.

CALS Launches Music Festival

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Earlier this month, the Central Arkansas Library System announced plans to create an annual music festival featuring Arkansas music and Arkansas artists. The tentative launch for the festival, which would last a couple of days, would be in the fall of 2012.

This would be a project of the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies.  CALS has started advertising for someone to be the coordinator.  The intention is that the music festival would eventually be self-sufficient, though CALS would make a loan for start-up money.

CALS Executive Director Bobby Roberts told Arkansas Business, “If I were going to pick some area where Arkansas has excelled it is in music,” Roberts said. “It’s just a great heritage.” He cited musicians and composers such as Johnny Cash, Conway Twitty and William Grant Still. “I’d like to see us do all kinds of music,” Roberts said, from classical to country to rock to gospel.

 

As this develops, the LR Culture Vulture will be sure to follow this exciting news.

Sculpture Vulture: FUSION

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For 23 years, Vernon C. Johnson, Sr., worked as a security guard at the Central Arkansas Library System’s main branch.  Following his 2006 death, his friends and colleagues at CALS commissioned a sculpture as a memorial to him.

Michael Warrick’s Fusion is a limestone orb atop a pedestal.  Etched into the orb are handprints of various sizes as well as scallops and ridges.  As a befitting memorial to a man who helped everyone with whom he came into contact, the handprints are of various sizes representing both children and adults.

Sitting at the corner of 2nd and River Market (formerly Commerce) Streets, Fusion anchors the southeastern corner of the CALS campus downtown.  Tucked away into a landscaped area, it greets visitors on foot as well as in cars waiting at the nearby stop sign.  In so doing, it quietly interacts with visitors in the same way that Johnson did for over two decades at CALS.