Notes from the edge

Studio 303's Edgy Women festival is back and bigger than ever. Watch a showdown between the Pussy Packers and the Ass Alley Anglers in Dayna McLeod's satirical how-to instructional video, Pleasure Zone. McLeod's porn-plays, based on basketball, football and rugby moves are designed to improve your coaching skills in the hard-hitting game of pornography.

Experience penguin envy and the cool world of Minneapolis-based Karen Sherman in her dance-performance "Cold Comfort" set in Antarctica. Plumb the psyche of Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth with two separate solos by choreographers/performers Claudia Moore and Deborah Dunn.

Revisit the sentiment and politics of '70s feminist performance art through the feminine hygiene advertising of the period with the Mirror's own Sasha Van Bon Bon. Have a good cry when Nathalie Claude presents her Sadness Trilogy, composed of three dance/theatre solos created during very sad moments in her life. Take in the Halluzination concert by the Swiss-feminist-anarchist-performance pioneers Les Reines Prochaines.

All these acts and more are at the Sala Rossa (4848 St-Laurent), in shows that start at 8 p.m. nightly. Festival passes are available for $30 at Casa del Popolo, and individual tickets at the door are $12. For the full schedule, visit www.studio303.ca or call 393-3771. » Christine Redfern

Ring of fire

It was during an artist's residency on a rural Swedish island - living with abundant daylight and no running water - that Allison Katz began her series of drawings now showing in the group exhibition Hot Touch. Spurred by a collection of images from newspapers and magazines, her 41 collage and ink-on-paper pieces are intimate, almost pastoral portraits made bold by the vivid colours that carry them - "the burn of being in the world," as she describes it.

Jason Baerg plays with heat too, more directly though, with the hot iron he uses to fuse together his beeswax-coated paintings and drawings. In them, you'll find ducks, feathers, skyscrapers, arrows and apples en masse - his take on the way big cities condition human interaction. Chicago-based artist Keer Tanchak rounds out the group with oil-on-metal works that mix rococo imagery with big strokes and splashes.

Though the three artists now live in different cities, they were all students at Concordia together in the late '90s and early '00s. "I think we were part of a good wave," says Katz. "Even Goldie, who owns the gallery, was there at the same time, and there's a natural connection."

Hot Touch opens at Galerie Sandra Goldie (1360 Greene) today, March 17, 5:30–7:30 p.m., and runs until March 26. » Matthew Woodley

Queer gab

Why not melt those winter blahs away for good with a couple of hot, transgressive shows? On Sunday, Words and Music at the Casa (4873 St-Laurent) welcomes touring West Coast queer spoken wordist Lisa B. What to expect? "I make lots of eye contact with audience members, I sing sometimes, and I'm very, very happy to be doing what I was born to do," says the intense Ms. B. It's March 20 at 9 p.m., $5.

On Wednesday, the In-Transit Cabaret at the MAI (3680 Jeanne-Mance) looks at love, homelessness, motherhood, survival, war, racism, punk and pop culture and, yes, sexual identity. Featuring performance art by Trish Salah, Mohawk transformed woman Aiyyana Maracle, and Atif Siddiqi as Tranie Tronic, plus screenings of work by Mirha-Soleil Ross, Tobaron Waxman and more. March 23, 7 p.m., $12. » Vincent Tinguely

Brides and ballet

Progressive questions and social commentary are at the core of Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal's newest evening of entertainment, Of Weddings and Stages. In it, Dutch choreographer Didy Veldman whisks us away to a circus-like world where quirky hairdos, comedic undulating movements and a pseudo ringmaster equipped with a megaphone directs uncooperative dancers. Performers circulate throughout a clever set while poking fun at societal complacency in a tongue-in-cheek choreography called TooT.

Choreographer Stijn Celis opens the second half of the evening with his 2002 work Noces. The intense, impressive piece confronts the institution of marriage, moving men against women, all set to the haunting powerful "Les Noces" by Russian composer Igor Stravinsky. Performances continue until March 19 at Place des Arts, 842-2122 for tix. » Marites Carino

Is it Art?

MODERN MATH: In 1946, John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert unveiled a revolutionary computer called ENIAC that filled three 50-foot walls and could perform 5,000 additions per second. These days, in one backpack you can tote a laptop that performs up to 3,000,000,000 additions per second, an iPod with 10,000 songs, a digital camera with all your friends on it, a Swiss Army knife with a saw, toothpick and fork, a cell phone, and still have room for lunch. If your cell takes photos, you can subtract the digicam and add your travel coffee mug. And if caffeine gives you the shakes or you don't have any arms, throw in a Cellpod. What's that? It's a tripod made especially for phone cameras - compact and convenient of course. Get in the picture for $24.99 (U.S.) at www.joyinnovations.com.

ArtsHole

CIVIL WAR SAGA: The first-hand stories of two exiled Lebanese citizens, their routes to Canada and vastly different fates are presented in local writer Dimitri Nasrallah's new novel, Blackbodying, which he launches this Wednesday, March 23, 7:30 p.m., at the Casa del Popolo (4873 St-Laurent) along with poetry by Steve Luxton and drama by Don Druick, free. • ASPHALT CALLING: Mont-Royal's massive street painting celebration, Nuit Blanche Sur Tableau Noir is looking for contributors for the upcoming edition, running from June 9–12. Interested artists, body painters, poets and musicians can get the full details at www.tableaunoir.com.

ARTISTAT: Number of Co-Op cabs outfitted with an interactive touch screen displaying multimedia artwork triggered by an onboard GPS system, which changes the display depending on the location in the city - the essence of Dare-Dare's Teletaxi, which rides on till June 21: 1

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