A new microbrewery named Borderlands Brewing Company is going in at 119 E. Toole Ave. It will have a tasting room, but will not dabble in the bar business like the other local microbreweries.

What’s especially fascinating is the video below where David Aguirre, executive director of Dinnerware Artspace, and Myles Stone, co-founder of the microbrewery, talk about the collaborations they’ve come up with. Apparently the brewery will share the space with a community art center that will host all sorts of classes, lectures and events.

Short version: Yoga, beer, screen-printing, galleries and food trucks working in tandem.

Shorter version: F’in awesome.

Jamara Knight, a local preschool teacher and photographer, currently has a photo in second place in the National Geographic Photo Contest.

Read the full press release by Carol Bradsen:

UNIVERSITY EMPLOYEE FINALIST IN NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC PHOTO CONTEST

TUCSON — A University of Arizona employee is one of six finalists in a National Geographic photography contest. The photo, Dust Dance, captures the joy of children dancing in Mwanza, Tanzania. The photo was part of an exhibit displayed at the University of Arizona in the Kachina Lounge in 2010. Jamara Sky Knight, took the photo while volunteering at the Hands of Mercy orphanage in Mwanza in fall 2008.

Many of the children at the orphanage, and in the picture, lost their parents in the HIV/AIDS epidemic, Knight said. “The photograph represents lives not lined with sadness and despair, but brimming with hope, playfulness, and joy,” she said. Knight works with toddlers at the Wings on Words preschool in the Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences Department at the University of Arizona. Wings on Words provides early intervention services to children with speech/language disorders.

Etcetera, the late-night theater series over at Live Theatre Workshop, has released its 2011-2012 season.

For my money, Etcetera does some of Tucson's best theater, hands-down, and the new season looks rather intriguing.

Here are the deets.

The Book of Liz
by the Talent Family, Amy Sedaris & David Sedaris
June 30-July 16, 2011
Directed by Christopher Johnson
Opening night: Thursday, June 30, 2011 at 7:30 PM
All other shows play Friday and Saturday nights at 10:30 PM
Produced by Special Arrangement with Dramatists Play Service

Sister Elizabeth Donderstock is Squeamish (a loose relation to Pennsylvanian Dutch), has been her whole life. She makes cheese balls (traditional and smoky) that sustain the existence of her entire religious community, Clusterhaven. However, she feels unappreciated among her Squeamish brethren and decides to try her luck in the outside world. Along the way, she meets a Cockney-speaking Ukrainian immigrant couple who find her a job waiting tables at Plymouth Crock, a family restaurant run almost entirely by gay recovering alcoholics. The alcoholics love her. The customers love her. Her Danderfrock fits right in. Things are going great for Liz, until she's offered a promotion to manager. Unfortunately, Liz has a sweating problem, and to get the job, she'll have to fix it. Meanwhile, back at Clusterhaven, Liz's compatriots just can't seem to duplicate her cheese ball recipe, and it's going to cost them their quaint, cloistered lifestyle. They are panic-stricken and desperate, and sure she sabotaged the recipe. Does Liz go through with the operation? Can the Squeamish be saved? Will the cheese balls ever taste good again? The answers to these and so many other questions can be found in the new comedy from the Talent Family, David and Amy Sedaris.

“...a delightfully off-key, off-color hymn to clichés we all live by, whether we know it or not."
-The New York Times

“…may well be the world's first Amish picaresque…hilarious…”
-The Village Voice

“…acidic laughs…linguistic delight…”
-Variety

• Keith Hickman-Perfetti

Performers at "The Sexy Love Show" at the Urban Tribe space put on various skits about sexuality and love. Skits ranged from aerial rope dance, to fire dancing, to an audience sing-a-long.

The Urban Tribe rents out their warehouse space to various local Tucson artists for events, and also offers classes in capoeira, yoga and aerial silk dancing.

• Teenagers opened the parade down the south side.

PHOTOGRAPHS BY SAMANTHA SAIS

The 86th Annual La Fiesta De Los Vaqueros officially started today with the parade on the south side of Tucson. Thousands of Tucsonans lined the streets to partake and participate in the old Tucson tradition.

(more after the jump)

• Members of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' office were honored at the rodeo parade.

Photographs by Samantha Sais

In what seems like already a lifetime ago, a deranged gunman killed six people and injured 18 more in a shooting spree one quiet Saturday morning in January.

What followed was a month-long display of community solidarity and support for the heroism that was displayed on a Safeway parking lot that fateful morning.

Today, La Fiesta de los Vaqueros celebrated their 86th annual event, starting with a tribute to those who died and the heroes from that morning.

Here is just a glimpse of some of the scenes at today's Rodeo Parade.

• Christina Taylor-Green is remembered on one of the tribute horses at the parade.

(more after the jump)

I had a dream like this once, and now artist Brian Stuckey has made it real with "The Last Breakfast":

While it looks like the Oscars won't let Banksy wear a mask on stage if he wins the Best Documentary award on Sunday (which he should, because as I've mentioned before, Exit Through the Gift Shop is great), the upside is that he still came to Los Angeles and seems to be painting his way across town.

[Banksy]

I know that every time I've been in a funeral home I've thought: "This place is such a design drag." Thankfully, a funeral home in Spain is bringing high concept design (an entirely white chapel with benches!) to the mortuary game.

From Co. Design:

The Funeral Home and Garden in Pinoso, by COR architects, is audaciously modern, a low-slung boxy thing tucked into a hillside, with a shiny black edifice that’d look terribly morose if not broken up by courtyards and generous stretches of glass.

Indoors, the funeral home is bright white and sparsely decorated with the sort of furniture you might find in the cafe of a modern-art museum. Even the chapel — the nerve center for mourners — manages to look light and airy with an all-white paint job and lots of clerestories.

A chic funeral parlor may seem a bit... misguided. After all, who thinks about architecture after losing a loved one? But that’s precisely what makes this design great: You don’t think about it. It’s so minimal and non-oppressive, it takes a back seat to your bereavement, at least that's the idea.

[HT: Fast Company]

"Kalashnikov," 2008, from "Stop the Violence" by Francois Robert, is part of Flesh, Bone, Spirit, continuing at Etherton Gallery, 135 S. Sixth Ave., through March 26.