SEPTEMBER HAPPENINGS

3rd First Friday Downtown 7-9 pm on the square
Uncensored Launch Party 7-10 pm at Scribner’s Gallery

4th Enid Farmers Market 8-11 am on the corner of Garriott and Grand

8th Garfield County Fair at the Garfield County Fairgrounds

9th Garfield County Fair at the Garfield County Fairgrounds

10th The Gaslight Theatre presents “Blythe Spirit”
Garfield County Fair at the Garfield County Fairgrounds
Trevor Project Day at the Enid GLBTQA Community center

11th The Gaslight Theatre presents “Blythe Spirit”
Enid Farmers Market “Hometown Heroes” Event from 8-11 am
on the corner of Garriott and Grand
Garfield County Fair at the Garfield County Fairgrounds

12th Garfield County Fair at the Garfield County Fairgrounds

15th LGBT Center Awareness Day at the Enid GLBTQA Community center

16th Cherokee Strip Celebration, Downtown Enid

17th Cherokee Strip Celebration, Downtown Enid
The Gaslight Theatre presents “Blythe Spirit”

18th Cherokee Strip Celebration, Downtown Enid
The Gaslight Theatre presents “Blythe Spirit”
Enid Farmers Market 8-11 am on the corner of Garriott and Grand
Continental Resources Great Land Run 6am Downtown Enid

19th MS Walk - Enid Champlin Park 1:30pm registration, 2:00 pm walk begins.

25th Walk 4RKids 2010- Registration 9:30 AM at DAMB
A Fling at the Springs Music Festival September 25, 2010 8am - 10pm.
Enid Farmers Market 8-11 am on the corner of Garriott and Grand

To find out about events for non-publication months, check us out on facebook!

Enid Musicians

Story and Photos by Sean Farmer, No One Famous Studios

Although Enid is typically seen as small industrial city, the artistic genius has found residence in spite of industry. This is probably best noted in the booming music scene in Enid, which has seen the rise of several bands and musicians that have made a strong name for themselves. Out of the wide range of talented musicians and bands, two stand near the forefront of the Enid music scene: Jordan Herrera and The Acorns.

Jordan Herrera

Jordan Herrera is one of Enid’s premier musicians. His notoriety does not stop with Enid and the surrounding areas, however. Herrera started his music career in Lawton, OK, but has since played venues and become known all across the Midwest, for his Indie Alternative Rock music, especially through his solo project: The Notes We Speak.

Herrera started playing violin when he was only three years old. When he was thirteen he tried to play the Red Hot Chili Peppers song “Otherside” on the violin to little avail. Eventually, he tried on his friend’s guitar, and has been playing guitar ever since. Herrera went on to play his first show at the mall in Lawton at a local art show. Soon after, Herrera started a band called Mourning Star.

Herrera originally moved to Enid to join a band named The City and The Skyway, but has spent the last four years focusing on his solo project. While playing at “First Fridays”, a local show put on by The Felt Bird, Herrera met Riley, the owner of The Felt Bird. Riley is helping Herrera record and produce his next record, an eight track full length album.

Even though he books his own shows and has no record label backing him, Herrera has played several venues, not only in Oklahoma, but several other states as well using mostly only social networking sites and flyers as promotion. Herrera is trying to finish a total of twenty-four shows this year, including shows in Tulsa, Lawton, Oklahoma City, and Dallas. With potential tour plans in the works, Herrera wants to try to tour in Oklahoma, Texas, and along the east coast. This is only another addition to Herrera’s extensive list of accomplishments as a musician, including two separate records on both iTunes and Amazon.

All of these accomplishments are not only extraordinary as an unsigned musician, but also for the fact that Herrera is managing a music career while attending Northern Oklahoma College and working full time. Herrera is in the process of receiving his degree in Music Composition.

The Acorns

“We’re trying to blow up Enid, like DigDug.” Is how one of the members from a relatively new band, called The Acorns, described their rapid success over the last few months. Blowing up Enid is a good way to describe the band that was formed out of another of Enid’s popular bands, A Girl Named Max. Since the band was formed they have released an EP with the help of The Felt Bird owner Riley, and are working on a feature length album.

The Acorns is made up by Nathan Guidry on drums, John Patton on lead guitar, Ty Stroble on rhythm guitar, Sterling Cashwell on bass, and Josh Chick with vocals. After A Girl Named Max broke up, Guidry, Patton, and Chick invited Stroble and Cashwell, who left East Side Yacht Club, to help form The Acrons. The band’s name was decided on while the band was throwing out names for the band, one of the members decided that a statue in the room looked like an acorn. The rest of the members liked the name and it stuck, “One day we’ll be big, like oak trees.”

“I think we were aiming for Zeppelin, but what band wasn’t.” Guirdry said as the band described their writing and recording process as a series of improvising, coming from a single blues lick that evolved into the unique sound that truly defines the band.

Since then the band has played several shows, including First Friday at The Felt Bird, Davinci’s Coffee House, Matt Goodman’s, and even Tristate. Promoting the shows through mostly social networking sites, posters, and word of mouth The Acorns have amassed a strong following of fans. The band plans to enlarge their fan base and notoriety with the release of their four track EP titled “1986 Tax Returns,” featuring tracks such as “Ignorance o’ Bliss” and “Bradford Buds”.

With the release of their EP, and a full album in production, The Acorns are looking to play just about any show they can. “We’re down for any show anywhere.”

Rage in the Cage

By Megan Sutton

Professional mixed martial arts (MMA) came to Scooters in Enid on June 24th, but MMA style fighting has been alive and well in Northwest Oklahoma for years. The local boys of Northwest Oklahoma had a great showing at the Rage Cage MMA event that night, and I became an instant fan of MMA fighting.

Having never been to any type of professional fighting event (unless you count midget wrestling, which I recently had the pleasure of attending), I had no idea what to expect when I walked into the venue. I learned right away that there is no single group of people that enjoy MMA fights; there were people of every age from every walk of life. I suppose I had expected a bunch of tough guys and I found out that MMA is a lot more far reaching in its popularity than one might think. It’s true, there were hardcore MMA fans wearing either Affliction or Tapout brand clothing, but there were also people like me who were just interested in seeing what the whole MMA thing was about. Even though there was palpable tension in the venue, it was an excited tension and everyone was people watching and discussing the fights. I even saw some of those hardcore fans attempting to explain the proceedings to the less knowledgeable folks. I didn’t expect it, but overall there was a spirit of cooperation in the crowd. The fans almost always went for whoever would be considered part of the home team. The fighters of Hardknocks Gym in Enid and Powerhouse MMA were out in full force that night, and the widespread support they received from the crowd confirmed their status as hometown favorites throughout the night. There were also many other amateur and professional fighters from around the area including Oklahoma City, Tulsa, El Reno, Ringwood, and Wichita, Kansas.

From my initial conversations with fans, I learned that the “card” (the name given to the list of fights taking place at an event) would consist of seven amateur matches ending with a professional match. The amateur fights were to consist of three rounds at two minutes each, and the professional match would be three rounds at five minutes each.

Not knowing what I was getting into as the first fighters made their way out to the ring, I grabbed an adult beverage and my friends and I found a good spot at a table near the entrance to the cage. Enid resident and Hardknocks member Bobby Perryman was to fight William Burton of Oklahoma City. Perryman was the overwhelming crowd favorite, and before I knew it, the music had stopped and the fight had begun! My initial reaction was that six minutes of fighting seemed very short for the amount of money the magazine spent on getting me a press pass, but I was sorely mistaken. For the whole of the first round, it looked like Burton would win out over the local favorite. Then, in a split second, Perry rounded on Burton and had him in a chokehold, effectively ending the fight after Burton was forced to submit and tap out. “I turned my back and left myself named and he [Perryman] made an excellent move,” said Burton of the fight. How did he get into MMA fighting? “I saw my cousins in MMA fights and that’s how I got started.” In that respect William was like many others fighting here tonight, he is a freelance fighter that doesn’t make any money off of the fights, he practices MMA for fun. If someone had asked me how long that fight lasted I would have said at least five minutes, when in reality it lasted for only one minute and thirty-four seconds! Despite the short match, the fighters were completely exhausted and covered in sweat. It’s hard to imagine that amount physical demand placed on the body in such a short amount of time; each fighter ended the fight looking like he had just ran a marathon.
El Reno amateur fighter Eric Tucker also saw success as a crowd favorite, easily dispatching Nathanial Alvarez of Wichita, Kansas by TKO in the second round. The heavyweight amateur match saw Enid’s Johnie Burton up against Jonathan Chandler of Tulsa. Although the statistics from the fight put them at within five pounds of each other, it looked as though Chandler had much more weight to throw around during the match and he used that to his advantage in his win over Burton in the first round.

By the time the fourth fight of the night rolled around, I thought that I was well on my way to understanding how MMA matches are fought and won. I was, of course, sorely mistaken. The first split decision of the night came in the exciting local battle between Colby Vandiver of Enid’s Hardknocks Team and Enid resident Steve Inman of Powerhouse MMA Team. It seemed as though the crowd had high hopes for this match and the anticipation of a good fight became intoxicating, with everyone in my group taking verbal bets on which local fighter would win. I was personally rooting for Vandiver, if only because I am partial to gingers. The first round came and went with both fighters trading punches pretty evenly, although Inman managed to get in a well placed and powerful punch right before the bell rang. Many in the crowd felt that if the round had been allowed to go on a second longer, Vandiver may have lost. The second round saw a resurgence by Vandiver, and by the end of that round both fighters were very tired. The third round turned into a battle against exhaustion, and although Inman had the upper hand for part of the fight, Vandiver had a small comeback towards the end of the match. This was the first fight to go through all the way to the end of the three rounds, so the crowd was anxious to hear from the match judges as they tallied up their scores. The first and third rounds went to Inman and the second round went to Vandiver, making Inman the winner by a split decision. The judges determining the winner instead of the referee ending the fight was a new dynamic that I really enjoyed. It added a level of anticipation and mystery to the fights that made them that much more exciting, especially when ending in such a spectacular fashion such as this local battle.

At the intermission, I finally caught a glimpse of the night’s so called “dirty little secret”: a midget wrestling match during the halftime! Allow me to dish a little about the midget wrestling event I attended a few months before. It was unlike anything I expected, and I am so happy I got dragged there by my friends. It was less of a series of fights and more like an action filled performance, but no one seemed to mind that many of the fights seemed overly rehearsed. This intermission fight did not disappoint and we were treated to a bout of verbal and physical sparring between “Rampage”, who was playing a good guy, and “The Beast”, who relished insulting the crowd and inciting them against him. I caught up with “The Beast” aka Tim after his performance, and it turns out there is a softer side to this wrestler. Tim is a nice guy, new to the midget wrestling scene, and is working towards making midget wrestling his full time career. “It’s a great show and a great team,” says Tim, “I enjoy giving the fans a hard time just as much as I enjoy them cheering us on.” Look for The Beast at the next midget wrestling event near you, and don’t let on that you know about his tame side!

After the break Levi Smith of Enid’s Hardknocks Gym took on Jobey Sellers of Tulsa. This was an interesting fight for our group of friends to discuss. For the people in our group that were familiar with martial arts and especially jujitsu moves, this fight was full of action while each fighter worked to gain the advantage using different grips and maneuvers. For an untrained fan like myself, it seemed to me like this fight lacked the high intensity factor that was present in the other matches. Said Smith of the style of fighting displayed in his match, “You have to be smart, choose your spots. Once you see an opening you have to go for it.” Even though there was less kicking and punching in this fight, it was still interesting to watch and for the first two rounds it was an evenly matched battle. In the third round, local favorite Smith ended up connecting a well-aimed kick to the face of Sellers, and the match ended shortly after that. Smith ended up winning by a unanimous decision of the judges. Smith graduated in 2001 from Chisholm High School in Enid and got his start in boxing and after three years decided to try out MMA for fun. Amazingly, Smith had only been practicing MMA for eight months before winning his fight tonight. Smith credits his win to his strict training regimen, which includes many “up and down” exercises similar to those used by football players as well as running and strength training. His most interesting workout routine? Levi uses heavy old truck and tractor tires as well as a sledgehammer to create some homegrown exercises that build stamina and strength.

Another split decision came in the fight between Enid’s own Devin Harris of Powerhouse MMA Team and Jason Gunnars of Tulsa. Harris displayed better technique during the fight, but was slightly outmatched in the second round. He finished the third round strong and ended up with the win after the judges awarded him the first and third rounds. After his fight, Devin talked about his fighting style, “It’s about both stamina and technique. You have to stay calm if they get the upper hand.” Devin considers himself a freestyle fighter. He had been boxing and wrestling for thirteen years before starting to train in MMA styles one year ago. Since that time Devin has made himself a popular fighter; during our short interview he had many fans come up to him and congratulate him on the close victory. However, he hasn’t let his local favorite status go to his head, “It doesn’t matter to me if it’s a home crowd,” says Devin. He has this to say to anyone trying to get started in MMA, “It takes a lot of hard work and determination, and you can’t let yourself give up. You have to keep your mind clear of distractions.” At 21, Devin has a bright future in MMA fighting, and he hopes to make a career out of fighting.

The two professional fights rounding out the night provided a glimpse of what you could expect at a large scale MMA match. These fights consisted of three five-minute rounds instead of three two-minute rounds, so stamina was going to play a larger factor in these fights. The first fight was Mike Schatz of Enid’s Hardkocks Gym against Kyle Sjafiroeddin of Oklahoma. After two rounds of intense grappling and holds, Schatz won by TKO near the end of the second round. The final match of the night pit Grady Briley of Ringwood against Ruben Zamarron of Oklahoma City. Briley had the upper hand for the entirety of the first round, but in the second round Zamarron was able to pick up Briley and slam him to the ground twice in a row, resulting in a TKO three minutes into the second round.

The amount of technique and skill that MMA fighters have to possess in order to be successful is astonishing; this is much more than a plain wrestling or boxing match. MMA requires stamina and strength as well as the determination to work out every day in multiple areas of physical training. The guys of Northwest Oklahoma that have chosen this path are fascinating to talk to and serious about their trade. I was surprised at the depth of their knowledge and their commitment to their families, friends, and fans. I am forever a fan of mixed martial arts fighting, and I can’t wait until the next match comes to town!

Sara & Shane Scribner

By Jamie Hildabrand

Selecting pieces of art to discuss at Scribner’s Gallery & Studio is a gratifying task sobered only by the fact that despite this magazine’s name, paintings depicting any kind of nudity will be censored. This doesn’t come as an immense surprise to the artists, Shane and Sara Scribner, since censorship of their nude paintings was once self-imposed.
“I was afraid to show them when we first opened,” Sara said. “For a long time we kept them in the back.”

Public interest in their work has since debunked their hesitance to display all of their work in the front part of the gallery.

“People started asking to see them,” Sara said. “After a while we felt safer about it.”

Censorship of their work is “a non-issue now,” Shane explained. “People are very accepting of figurative art.”

“Why should it be dirty or wrong?” he asked. “It is beautiful expression.”

Shane and Sara’s goal as artists is to preserve the merit of figurative art in a world dominated by abstract art.

“We have a built-in library of reading each other,” Shane said. “We’re trained to look at people to see if they’re upset, happy…”

Therein lies the reason to “tell the story through the figure, without having a bunch of props.”

Abstract art often needs “an essay to explain what it means,” the artists both elaborated.

“Art has its own language,” Sara said. “You should be able to show a tribesman in Papua New Guinea a piece of art, and they should be able to know what it means.”

“No matter where in the planet you’re from, you understand these principles,” Shane said. “Everyone knows what it looks like to be mad, or happy…”

Shane’s aim is met and manifested in his method of emoting: nudes. After all, what is more recognizable and elemental than the human form?

Working within the confines of what kinds of images we are able to feature proved to be difficult considering nudity is a strong motif in Shane’s art. The nudity in his work isn’t implemented for the sake of being sensational. Shane finds it, instead, to be essential in expressing the basic human condition.

“I just think there’s a purity that happens… a truth that it conveys,” Shane said. “It takes it back to the core emotion.”

This is certainly true of “Ophelia,” a modern take of John Everett Millais’ painting by the same name. It features the tragic character from Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, drowning in a brook "incapable of her own distress.”

Shane is drawn by “pieces that have a lot of reflectivity,” he said. “It shows the conscious and unconscious.”

He shot the framework in a frog pond with gold fish swimming around, he said. “She’s laying beautiful amongst the flowers and her dress,” which has been gently tugged by the water.

“Clothes can kind of lead you in different directions,” Shane said. “It can take away from the pure message.”

He has stated that figurative work is “a subject that we can depict without gilding the lily, without unnecessary decoration and distraction.”

Sara’s work, however, demonstrates similar universally identifiable emotions and images by indulging in the outlandish and fantastical.

“I really want to add something whimsical to portraits,” she said. “Something more playful and fun.”

She accomplishes this feat by painting portraits with something “unusual” happening in the background, as is evident in a portrait of a girl with a frog on her shoulder. The use of the frog is peculiar, but not arbitrary.

“Frogs area symbol of safe passage in Japan,” Sara said.

Symbolism remains a theme throughout Sara’s work. “Birdsong Interrupted,” a part of her ‘Double’ series, depicts the same person manifested twice. The idea behind this painting is that “we’re our worst enemies,” she said. “In a lot of ways, we self-sabotage.”

On the right side of the image, the girl is “completely oblivious” and looking away. The robin, which represents creativity, flutters away due to her negligence. On the left side of the piece, the same girl is portrayed more mischievously, and the bird is dead in her hands. The motion of events moves from one side of the painting to the other, showing this girl working against herself unknowingly. This surreal rendering of fleeting creativity utilizes whimsy as décor, in juxtaposition to Shane’s more basic portrayal of raw emotion.

This difference in approach peaked their interest for their next project: a collaboration. Shane and Sara are working together with a writer on a series of emotions and states of being that they both will interpret and display alongside a written prose in a showing entitled “As Seen by Three.” This presentation will feature Loss, Whimsy, Fear, Anger, Lust, Joy, Hope, and Love.

When comparing Shane and Sara’s interpretations of Loss and Whimsy, it becomes evident that their paintings are as disparate in presentation as the emotions themselves.

Shane’s “Loss” shows a woman curled into the fetal position, seemingly covered in white paint.

“A picture of a snowstorm kept popping in my head,” he said of conceiving the piece. “The white gives it that blown out kind of feeling.”

Sara noted that the subject herself is lost within the picture. “Her skin bleeds into the paint, and the white paint bleeds into the white background,” she said.

“It ‘s more minimalist than I normally paint,” Shane elaborated.

Sara’s take on “Loss” portraits a woman grasping at her clothes “anticipating something coming, like drastic change,” Sara explained.

Shane described loss as “such a black and white emotion.” Placing the subject in a colorless environment underlines that the mood is “so bleak.”

“I gave her bright highlights in her eyes to make them look watery,” Sara said.

The woman’s festively floral dress is a notable choice for the artist.

“Loss comes so quickly,” Sara said. “She’s dressed to go somewhere, and something happens… It helps the anticipation factor.”

For his interpretation of whimsy, Shane creates a quirky gathering entitled “The Tea Party.”

“Whimsy, for me, is kind of play—goofiness,” he said. “I thought it’d be cool to have these pop culture icon pin-up girls… clown, Goth, nerd girl.”

This painting doesn’t capture a singular moment or state of being, however. It is not typical of his other work because of its inherent whimsy.

“They [the subjects] are interacting with the viewer, and inviting you to play; as opposed to interacting with each other,” Shane said.

Sara explores the same emotion through fantasy.

“For me, when I think of whimsy, I think of something unreal and magical,” she said. “I asked myself, ‘what’s playful?’, and that’s when I thought of birds. “

In the painting a girl is seen blissfully floating mid-air, playing with a bird, amongst the bubbles flying around her.

“I want it to feel like an ultra playful, child-like moment… like fantasy,” Sara said. “So unreal, making that emotion feel so intense.”

Sara explained that images like this capture a person’s imagination because “humans really like fairytales, the unreal and unnatural.”

Although Sara and Shane are steadfast to their respective approaches to art, the “As Seen by Three” project forced a departure from their usual methods.

“These paintings pushed us out of our comfort zones,” Shane said. “They have spurred on these fresh projects and new ways to look out there and do it.”

The showing for these pieces is tentatively slated for March 2011 at Scribner’s Gallery & Studio in downtown Enid. Eight emotions, three perspectives, one night.

Check out more paintings at www.scribnersgallery.com