It’s that time of year to look back and reflect on where we’ve come and what we’ve accomplished.
As for the arts and entertainment section of the paper, we’ve covered a variety of topics this year, from artist features to new attractions to of-the-moment highlights to issues-based reporting.
Now, we’re looking back on 30 of those memorable stories from 2022, listed in order of publishing date.
Join us for the ride? And then, let’s look forward to what we might experience and imagine in 2023.
For centuries, South Carolina Gullah-Geechee stories have been woven into the fabric of the Lowcountry. Lately, there has been an increased effort to broadcast the many stories that shine a light on how integral the Gullah-Geechee culture is to the American experience, including some local film projects.
A Charleston-based textile enterprise with a flagship store on King Street collaborates with over 100 women’s groups of artisans in 40 countries, as a way to uplift women by disrupting poverty and bringing about change through their own artistry. Among them is Rangina Hamidi from Afghanistan, who they highlighted on International Women’s Day despite Taliban takeover of the country.
Over pints of Cosmic Debris green tea IPAs and, later, celebratory glasses of prosecco, eight women discussed what it’s like working in the male-dominated music industry and having to fight the “boys’ clubs” that have taken root. They’re part of a group called Sisters in Song.
Earlier this year, Charleston’s Band of Horses was featured on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” and “CBS Saturday Morning” as a musical guest. I tagged along in person for the experience.
Handcrafted cigar box guitars are the main attraction of Southpaw Cigarbox Guitars, Anthony Walker’s business in Blythewood. Its name references the left hand he favors while demo-ing his one-of-a-kind string instruments.
When you walk beneath the flashing marquee and across the gold, green and maroon marble tiles of the Riviera Theater, you’re stepping past a forgotten entertainment landmark. A movie theater in the 1940s, the Riviera has now reopened to the public for concerts and comedy shows.
Audience members were treated to a master class with members of the Mark Morris Dance Group on the lawn of the Charleston Gaillard Center. Under new leadership, the local nonprofit arts organization has sought this year to engage the community more frequently. File/Edward Brantley/Special to The Post and Courier
For Lissa Frenkel, the next step for the center is the level of programming that can simultaneously keep the books balanced and the community engaged, and those are two of the main reasons she was picked for the job.
One evening, arts critic Maura Hogan caught women and men outfitted in black tie or tartan, or both, as well as a bevy of all-business bagpipe players, marching in a parade of sorts downtown. She investigated and discovered this society had been founded in 1949, hatched by a few Charleston men returning from active duty in World War II.
This year, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra announced the appointment of 29-year-old conductor Jonathon Heyward, who grew up in Charleston. His appointment represents the first time in the organization’s 106-year history that the position would be held by a person of color.
A group of around 100 bathing suit-clad contest winners held onto pool floats resembling tortilla chips and ate free Moe’s Southwest Grill queso before wading into the 870-foot-long lazy river at Whirlin’ Waters this summer. The feat made one Charleston man’s far-fetched dream come true.
Tragedy struck this July when “Outer Banks” actor Alexander “AJ” Jennings was struck by two different vehicles while walking on Sol Legare Road near Crozet Drive on James Island. He died at Medical University of South Carolina.
“Beyond Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience” brought to Charleston more than 300 of its namesake troubled yet genius artist’s paintings to life in video format spanning 30,000 square feet, taking more than 40 projectors to cast the artwork.
For a short stint this year, the local DIY music scene arose in glorious splendor in a downtown dive bar that serves picklebacks, Jell-O shots and $1 mystery beers, Cutty’s.
Dorchester County earlier this year denied the necessary special event permits to two upcoming concerts at the Woodlands Nature Reserve, leaving promoters scrambling to rearrange plans last-minute and fans left high and dry.
Before Charleston’s most notorious hurricane blew through and shredded the place to bits, The Windjammer was a one-story brick block sports bar that served up cold Budweisers and cheeseburgers to island locals as early as 1972. I looked back on the iconic Isle of Palms venue’s history for its 50th anniversary.
Two decades and more than 7,000 shows under its belt, one of Charleston’s most celebrated music venues commemorated its 20th anniversary this year.
Yet another anniversary took place in 2022. It marked 25 years since independent film house Terrace Theater first dazzled the neighborhood with its artful roster of first-run films.
“You’re the Only One I’ve Told: The Voices Behind Abortion” is a new theatrical experience that dramatizes true accounts around one of America’s most pressing political issues, abortion.
A legendary local band that hit its heyday in the late ’90s and early 2000s, split up in 2005 and then reunited a decade later is officially calling it quits. But not before one final album and tour that wraps up in Charleston.
The night Hurricane Ian swept the Lowcountry, locals gathered at the restaurants and bars that remained open to party in the middle of the storm.
Through November, master dyer and environmental artist Mary Edna Fraser presented “Flight,” an exhibition of visual art and poetry that together told stories of the flight of enslaved men and women.
Nate Shoemaker has been crafting demented dreamlands since he was a teenager, always drawn to horror movies and Halloween haunts. This year he created the Charleston area’s newest haunted house this October, Southern Screams.
Shannon Vogt noticed the spotlight in the Charleston theater scene less frequently shines down on women, minority and LGTBQ+ actors. So she founded a company, The Void, with the goal to do just that.
The digital and physical art worlds are converging, and it’s happening right here in Charleston. Off Clements Ferry Road in a 50,000-square-foot industrial warehouse, one of the world’s top digital artists, Beeple, is breaking down the barriers between two very different artistic realms — one grounded in the cornerstones of history and tradition, another floating in the possibilities of technological progress.
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This content was originally published here.
