Tornadoes, fires and rabbits

There's a lot of terror hiding behind the superficial beauty in Undertow, an exhibition opening tonight at 5 p.m. at Maison de la culture Marie-Uguay (6052 Monk).

Adria Collins and Lauren Nurse, both recent Concordia graduates, show prints that attempt to address our often-uncomfortable relationship with the natural world. Nurse presents silkscreens and lithographs of tornadoes, fires, hearts and rabbits. "My recent prints portray the world in a state of both rhapsody and fright," she writes, "shuddering with occurrences, which verge on the catastrophic."

Collins' digitally manipulated landscapes combine text culled from traumatic events covered in local newspapers, photographs of regional scenery and drawings of non-recognizable yet veritable maps. Partially inspired by 19th-century sublime landscape paintings, these digital prints are designed to evoke, says Collins, "the idea of pain and danger without actually being in such circumstances." Undertow runs until Feb. 29, 872-2044. » Christine Redfern

Moving pictures
of movement

Though watching dance on film may fall a distant second to the power of live performance for many, it's always an interesting experience to see different ways the artform can be translated through another medium. Reel Dance on the Road, a touring compilation of the best selections from Toronto's Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film and Video stops into town this week at the Cinémathèque québécoise (335 de Maisonneuve E.) and sticks around until Feb. 1.

Tonight's screening (Jan. 22) is an ode to Canadian dance featuring a slew of shorts, including works by Montreal choreographers Victor Quijada, and Manon Oligny. More shorts show on Friday night, Jan. 23, under the theme "Global Moves," with selections on hand from England, Finland and Italy. The closing night lineup features the festival's most experimental works.

Admission for each screening is $6, or you buy a series pass for $40 at 842-9768. See www.cinematheque.qc.ca for the full schedule. » Marites Carino

Flamenco fire-up

This week the mercury will rise at Club Soda (1225 St-Laurent) when the Ballet Flamenco Arte de España kick off their fiery flamenco performance. Their work, Recuerdos Flamencos, spotlights singers Joé Lumbreras (El Chele) and Marcos Marin, along with a quartet of musicians and dancers, including Danielle Plamondon, Julie Lafontaine, Laura Lynne McGee and José-Luis Pérez

Lina Moros, the artistic director of this Québécois dance company will be taking the stage herself in this production, which plays with the energy and vitality of youth and mixes it with the solemn wisdom that comes with maturity.

If you've never seen this company stamp up a storm, they're worth seeing tonight, Jan. 22, at 8 p.m., 908-9090. » Marites Carino

Sapphic pulp

Ottawa scribe and Capital Xtra columnist Suki Lee found inspiration for her new short story collection, Sapphic Traffic, in the sultry lesbian heroines invented by (mostly) male pulp writers back in the '50s. "It's 20 short stories told from a lesbian perspective," Lee explains. "I wanted these women to speak, so the stories are all from the first person, all confessionals."

While the stories aren't written in typical hardboiled pulp lingo, the protagonists are certainly colourful. "They are sort of pulp characters," says Lee. "There's a drug dealer in it, a stalker. There's the wayward daughter, the young woman returning home, the fool." Lee launches Sapphic Traffic this Saturday, Jan. 24, 7:30 p.m., at Café Esperanza (5490 St-Laurent), as part of the inaugural Sappho's Salon, organized by Montreal writer Nairne Holtz. There'll be readings by Lee, Holtz, Angel Beyde, Johanne Cadorette and Andrea Zanin. $2, non-smoking. » Vincent Tinguely

Is it Art?

CERAMIC ELECTRON CATCHWORDS: A common tactic of e-mail spammers in the great arms race against filtering software is to include a string of random words in the message. With red flags like "erection" and "Prince of Nigeria" omitted and enough obscure words around, the text often tricks programs into thinking the correspondence is personal. The following is an example taken from an e-mail offering affordable penis enlargement to the Mirror that may or may not be considered poetic.

"beefy lard liqueur flashback amidst city deign bullyboy dramatic numerische airframe radiotelegraph costello coupe vertigo alter add catastrophe nostradamus pungent trump zoology josephine ductwork austere perk attendant description sponsor figural litigious downfall cove eligible drawl consistent margarine stationary bohemia grillwork command savonarola arabic alias demolish disrupt chlorinate cruise handcuff dialogue frictional ceramic electron catchword."

ArtsHole

JOURNEY TO NOWHERE: Over the past six months, 70 random Montrealers received letters and postcards from artists Ève Dorais and Edouard Pretty, who were pretending to travel the world. Their exhibition, Voyage stationnaire, at DARE-DARE (460 Ste-Catherine W., #505) reveals the structure behind the project and puts an end to the hoax. Runs until Feb. 14. • POETIC PARTNERSHIP: Gallery Dazibao (4001 Berri, #202) kicks off every year with a show based on a theme chosen by two artists who have never worked together before. This year's invitees, mixed-media artists Sorel Cohen and Barbara Todd, found common interest in the texts of Paul Celan, a Jewish poet who wrote in German about the Holocaust. Celan, their collaborative exhibition, runs until Feb. 21.

ARTISTAT: Current position of Louis Riel, the hit graphic novel by displaced Montrealer Chester Brown, on Quill & Quire's list of non-fiction bestsellers in Canada (hot on the tail of Michael Moore's first-place Dude, Where's My Country?): 7

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