Target Free Thursday Nights in April: Get Inspired. Get in Free.
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Target Free Thursday Nights in April: Get Inspired. Get in Free.

Walker Art Center gallery admission is free from 5-9 pm every Thursday night. April special events feature a Gather by D’Amico Chef-in-Residence event with Stephan Hesse. (Thursday, April 2); a screening of Abderrahmane Sissako’s Life on Earth. (Thursday, April 2); a literary mixer in celebration of Rain Taxi Review of Books‘ 20th anniversary. (Thursday, April 9); a Sound Horizon in-gallery music performance by Holly Herndon. (Thursday, April 16); Teen Takeover: a youth-curated event hosted by the Walker Art Center Teen Art Council. (Thursday, April 23); and a screening of the documentary film Robert Moran: Looks of a Lot. (Thursday, April 30).

THURSDAY, APRIL 2

Guest Chef at Gather: Stephan Hesse

Gather by D’amico, 5-9 pm

Top talents from Twin Cities restaurants create limited-edition small plates exclusively for this ongoing series—meet them on the first Thursday of every month for a tasting.

In April, meet Stephan Hesse, chef de cuisine at Libertine, who will share samples from his featured menu. A Minnesota native whose wide-ranging experience reflects the breadth of his talents, Hesse is still in his mid-thirties but boasts a 20-year history in the business, beginning at the restaurant his mother owned. He’s also a long-time collaborator with Tim McKee, first at Masu Sushi & Robata, where he served as corporate chef, later at Uptown Cafeteria as executive chef, and now leading the kitchen at Libertine.

Film Screening: Life on Earth

Walker Cinema, 7 pm FREE

In the late 1990s, Arte French television created a series on the millennium with films shot all over the world, and Abderrahmane Sissako’s entry—Life on Earth—featured Africa. Starting from the packaged excess of European consumption in a basement department store in Paris, the film ascends into the light of Sokolo, a rice-growing village in Mali and home to Sissako’s father. This gorgeous essay about the connections and disconnects between Africa and Europe shows the village’s genuine beauty and contemporaneity without sentimentalizing poverty and suffering, as the boundary between fiction and documentary seems to disappear. 1998, 35mm, in French and Bambara with English subtitles, 61 minutes.

After a decade of film school in Russia, Mauritanian director Sissako brought his first feature, October, directly to the Cannes Film Festival. An African student must leave the Soviet Union and say goodbye to his Russian girlfriend, who must deal with the serious questions he has left behind. 1993, video, in Russian with English subtitles, 37 minutes.

Meet the Filmmaker

This screening is introduced by Abderrahmane Sissako. Join the director for a post-screening discussion led by Linda Mokdad of St. Olaf College.

This screening is a part of the Walker’s film series Abderrahmane Sissako: Africa’s Visual Poet. For additional program information, click.

THURSDAY, APRIL 9

Rain Taxi @ 20

Walker Art Center, 6:30-11 pm

Rain Taxi Review of Books celebrates its 20th year with a bounty of bookish riches. Join us for a literary mixer filled with readings, short films, book-signings, cocktails, and conversation.

Program Schedule:

Events are free, unless otherwise noted.

5–9 pm: Screenings of Basil King: Mirage

Lecture Room

5:30 pm: Book-signing with Basil King

Bazinet Garden Lobby

6:30 pm: Minnesota Expats Poetry Reading

Walker Cinema

8 pm: “Greatest Hits” Poetry Reading

Walker Cinema, $10 ($8 Walker members)

9 pm: Reception

Cargill Lounge

THURSDAY, APRIL 16

Sound Horizon: Holly Herndon

Perlman Gallery, 6,7, & 8 pm

Exploring the interstitial spaces between live sound and visual art, the in-gallery music series Sound Horizon returns with three of the country’s most respected composers and sonic adventurers. Intended for both close listening and moments of happenstance for gallery-goers, this free, aurally eclectic series features three short sets by each artist.

Join us in the galleries of the exhibitions Art at the Center: 75 Years of Walker Collections and International Pop for Sound Horizon’s fifth sparkling season.

To listen to a single from Holly Herndon’s upcoming album Platfrom click here.

THURSDAY, APRIL 23

Teen Takeover: Double Take

Walker Art Center, 5-9 pm

Join us for the spring Teen Takeover: Double Take, an evening of youth curated performances, hands-on-art-making, music, food, and museum activation inspired by the human instinct to seek, find, and understand. You’ll be surprised by what you might discover! Presented by the Walker Art Center Teen Arts Council (WACTAC). Teen Takeover is Thursday, April 23, 5-9 pm at the Walker Art Center. Events and gallery admission are free.

Click here to view the whole program.

THURSDAY, APRIL 30

Jason Maron: Looks of a Lot

Walker Cinema, 8 pm FREE

This documentary film follows jazz pianist/composer Jason Moran as he prepares his new multimedia project Looks of a Lot, performed at the Symphony Center in Chicago in May 2014, with Bandwagon (drummer Nasheet Waits and bassist Tarus Mateen), Chicago sculptor Theaster Gates, reedist Ken Vandermark, Katie Ernst, and the Kenwood Academy High School Jazz Band. The film offers an insider’s view of the artists’ collaboration and their process as Moran’s improvised blues compositions play off of Gates’s inventive stage sets built from salvaged materials. 2014,DCP, 61 minutes. Presented in conjunction with the Walker’s US-exclusive performance on May 2, featuring Moran and Robert Glasper, two of today’s most influential and virtuosic contemporary jazz pianists who are changing the face of American jazz in the 21st century.

TARGET FREE THURSDAY NIGHTS SPECIAL IN THE WALKER SHOP

The Walker Shop offers a discount on selected items during Target Free Thursday Nights. The special for April is buy-one-get-one-free Kikkerland Flasher Bike Lights for $4. Limit one per customer. Offer valid in-store only and not combinable with other discounts.