>> The one and only Chaka Khan is at H2O tonight as a pre-party of sorts to the kick off of Howard Homecoming festivities, which officially start tomorrow. Doors at 5 p.m., show begins at 7. >> Operation Filmmaker is documentary of sorts that follows the strange story of Iraqi film student Muthana Mohmed. Mohmed was given an opportunity to work as a production assistant in Prague on the set of Liev Schreiber's 2005......

Written by DCist Contributor Amy Cavenaugh Baltimore-bred artist Morris Louis, who lived in Washington in the 1950s, is the subject of a 28-work retrospective on display at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden through January 6. Morris Louis Now: An American Master Revisited, curated by Jeffrey Grove of the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, is the first such consideration of Louis’ work in two decades — the previous retrospective was also at the Hirshhorn,......

Olga Viso, who has served as director of the Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden for two years, announced today she'll be stepping down at the end of the year. Viso will be taking her experience and successes in running the Hirshhorn to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. The expert on contemporary Latin American art began as an assistant curator at the museum 12 years ago, and quickly climbed the ladder as her skill......

Don’t let the threat of Polonium poisoning crush your dreams of becoming a spy or the inevitable prison sentence keep you from robbing a bank. We understand your desire to solve ancient religious conspiracies shrouded in mystery and international intrigue, but perhaps you don’t want to get your hands dirty. Joshua Czarda, the brains behind Ravenchase Adventures, has a solution. He and his crack team of writers and actors want you to step inside a......

Flickr user xtol7 makes his own art at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. The extreme overexposure puts all the focus on the cylindrical door, making it look like mysterious portal in the middle of nowhere. EXIF.......

FRIDAY: >> Comets on Fire bring their detailed, funky prog sound to D.C., with openers Benjy Ferree(***) and (The Sounds of) Kaleidoscope at Black Cat. I (heart) music tells us that if you love Deep Purple, you'll like Comets on Fire. Listen to a few tracks over at Hype Machine to test the waters. $12, 9:30 p.m. >> Looking for a straight-up chance to dance? Venezuela's Los Amigos Invisibles always deliver, with DJ Afro at......

To those readers who missed their Classical Music Agenda last week, apologies are in order. Your faithful chronicler was in Paris for the week and experiencing a general lack of Internet connectivity. Now I am back, and there a lot of concerts to tell you about. We may not emphasize this enough, but "classical music" does not mean only music that is old. In fact, living composers are still writing works that continue and modify......

The Agenda's a little late this week, and we're awfully sorry to leave you hangin'. We've been expanding our regular visual arts coverage (hope you noticed), but in so doing got behind on our long-standing duties. Luckily, there's a slew of events this weekend to point out, so hopefully you'll forgive our tardiness and not throw any drinks in our faces when we see you at openings over the next few days. White wine may......

Always looking for the D.C. slant to a story, DCist found a loose District tie, albeit a strong mid-Atlantic one, to all the Olympic action on the ice in Turin, Italy. Sixteen-year-old figure skater Kimmie Meissner hails from Bel Air, Maryland, about 21 miles outside of Baltimore. It isn't inside the Beltway, but it's far closer than, say, California. Meissner, who trains at the University of Delaware in Newark, will be skating her long program......

This post was written by DCist contributor Heather Goss. How can an artist capture the passage of time in a still photograph? That's one of the questions acclaimed Japanese photographer Hiroshi Sugimoto has been pursuing throughout his thirty-year career. Sugimoto, whose retrospective exhibition at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden opened last week, uses a minimalist technique in his photographs to highlight the perspective from which they are taken. His well-known "Theaters" series is a......

The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is one of the great treasures of Washington's arts scene, a federal museum with the guts to undertake strange and current exhibitions, along with adventurous musical programs to accompany them. So it should be no surprise that DCist was at the Hirshhorn yesterday to hear what was sure to be an excellent and interesting concert by the Norwegian pianist Håkon Austbø. With a name spelled like that, how could......

Synesthesia was a pretty big topic with arts bloggers a few months ago. For the record, it's a clinical condition that involves the confusion of stimuli between different senses. Most importantly for our post today, some composers—Messiaen and Scriabin, to name two—have had this condition and perceived colors visually along with sounds that they heard (and, we presume, vice versa). This was the theme of a free concert that we suggested earlier this week in......

If you can make it through the 4-5 inches of snow that are sure to shut down our fair city this weekend, we've got some picks to round out your weekend of snowball fights and hot chocolate. FRIDAY: >> Velvet Lounge celebrates its sixth birthday this weekend with a Friday lineup of Meredith Bragg and the Terminals, The Small Shouts (featuring Olivia from Washington Social Club), Debutants, and Greenline. >> On-the-rise female rapper Jean Grae......

With the holiday season upon us, DCist is bracing for the usual phalanx of seasonal activities. There's a number of events around the mall of interest. Now that we've answered all your questions about the National Christmas Tree, you can head down to the Ellipse tonight to see it lit. To the right is a photo of Lynn Cheney putting the finishing touches on it last week. If the idea of a family-friendly Pagent of......

A few goodies to make your week go by just a little bit faster... >> It may be 60 degrees on this fine November day, but that's not going to stop the folks over at the National Gallery of Art's Sculpture Garden from opening their annual skating rink. Go on over and have a twirl. 10 a.m.-11 p.m.; $7 for adults. >> Damon Gough (aka Badly Drawn Boy), plays the 9:30 Club this evening. Famous......