Arts & Culture

The history of the swimsuit is really the history of the women’s movement. Early suits with bloomers and caps were made of wool even though they got heavy — and smelly — when wet. The 1920s bathing beauties, armed with the right to vote, donned clingy numbers that revealed —…

The saccharine songs and contrived choruses of musicals can certainly make you cringe. Thankfully, Flamenco Gipsy Fusion is no Rodgers & Hammerstein. Vocalist and guitarist Chico Castillo, one of the founders of the Gipsy-Oriental style of music, has a more cosmopolitan take on the musical in his latest show, and…

Woe are the parents with children who are filmmaking prodigies. At least if Junior is playing soccer, the most he could possibly ask you to shell out for is a pair of new Copa Mundial cleats. But if he’s a budding Scorsese? “Hey, Mom, I need a new Panavision, an…

As Noah Lennox and his Animal Collective cohorts have proven, ’50s harmonizing is back. But, hey, for those who lived them, those soulful tunes never went out of style, did they? The musical comedy Forever Plaid takes that theme and runs with it, imagining a foursome of clean-cut boys —…

The first time you heard John Legend’s voice, it was simply in the background acting as the icing on the already-entertaining cakes of artists such as Kanye West, Jay-Z, and Dilated Peoples. But in late 2004, when he dropped “Used to Love U,” Legend slid into his own groove —…

A potent brew of hoofers and hoodoo simmers under the stars at Miami Art Museum as part of MAM Summer Nights. Each second Thursday of the month, the museum organizes a harmonic convergence of the visual and performing arts in order to spice up its programming with sensory magic and…

Alonzo Mourning is to Miami what athleticism is to basketball — what achievement is to schooling or what inspiration is to art. So give thanks that Zo is also a leader and that his former running mate, D-Wade, recognizes a good thing when he sees it. A straight-up tradition at…

Concha Buika, performing this Thursday at the Gusman Center for the Performing Arts, is not your average flamenco diva. Born in Mallorca to parents who were refugees from Equatorial Guinea, she was originally influenced by R&B and jazz divas such as Whitney Houston, Sarah Vaughan, and Tina Turner; she even…

Don Chambers will play sans his band Goat, along with Viva Le Vox, at Propaganda July 11. Chambers is an Athens, Georga-based singer-songwriter in the Tom Waits/Nick Cave mold whose latest album, Zebulon, was produced by Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers. Chambers’s music is thick with banjo, steel guitar, and…

South Florida of late seems to be a haven for jam bands. Hot new acts such as the Heavy Pets are making their mark, the Jam Cruise announced its biggest lineup yet, and when Langerado dropped the jam, the festival folded. The Perpetual Groove people are coming to cash in…

Best known for writing the theme song for One Tree Hill, singer/songwriter Gavin DeGraw is hitting the road to support his new album “Free”. Collective Soul, best known for a slew of similar sounding songs in the 1990s, will be joining DeGraw on this particular show as well. This tour…

If you ever thought that muscly, veiny pecs were anything less than beautiful, visit Museum of Art | Fort Lauderdale’s Horvitz Auditorium and outdoor Sculpture Terrace in the heart of downtown Fort Lauderdale for “The Muscular Body as Living Art.” This exhibition is what happens when Nova Southeastern University and…

With 1980s playlists all the rage these days, you don’t have to be of a certain age to appreciate the tuneful joy of Naked Eyes’ 1983 “(There’s) Always Something There to Remind Me.” But it helps. If only for the fact that you can count yourself among those who were…

With 30 years under her belt as a singer and an actress, Paloma San Basilio is something of a Spanish icon. She’s starred in such theatrical revivals in Madrid as The Man of La Mancha, My Fair Lady, Victor/Victoria and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita and she’s released close to 30…

Local underground all ages venue Goo is branching out into more art and film related events. This week several fixtures on the Miami scene are putting together an art show at the fledgling venue. There will be the requisite food and beverages served up as well as some music of…

Another Pickledelic house music soirée is on this Saturday night with Sunshine Jones and Pete Herbert booked to spin DJ sets. San Francisco-based DJ/producer Pete Jones was originally one half of live electronica duo Dubtribe Sound System in ’90s. Now he produces and tours under his own name, releasing on…

No, this has pretty much nothing to do with the martyred gay San Francisco city supervisor. The quattet Harvey Milk may have, in its name, nodded in tribute to that man, but that’s where any political notions end for this band. Rather, this sludgy, experimental noise-rock-type act spews forth the…

Turns out it’s gonna be a full house on Friday night at the Electric Pickle with Benno Blome booked to play the upstairs room while Sunshine Jones and Pete Herbert play downstairs. Berlin-based DJ/producer and Sender label owner Blome is a veteran of that city’s underground scene and a highly-regarded…

Fuerza is a plotless little effusion of the avant-garde playing inside a loading bay at the Arsht Center. It doesn’t contain enough good ideas, but the ideas it offers are brilliant. For its first hour, Fuerza is shocking, unpredictable, and weird — you spend the whole show standing up, and…

Magic City Kitty: An Officer and a Lothario

Mined Lives, 10 Years Through July 31. Spanish Cultural Center, 800 Douglas Rd., Ste. 107, Coral Gables; 305-448-9677; ccemiami.org. Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Since the late ’80s, photographer Gervasio Sanchez has covered the war-ravaged regions of Cambodia, Bosnia, Mozambique, Angola, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Colombia, Iraq, and…