Cultures collide in the work of Julio Cesar Morales, an artist offering hisinterpretation of a post-apocalyptic city based on his experiences growingup on the border of California and Mexico. Morales's exhibit "There's Gonna Be Sorrow" was also influenced by the first album he ever purchased, David Bowie's "Diamond Dogs." Bowie's album, which was influenced by George Orwell's dystopian novel, "1984." Spark catches up with Morales to chat about his installation at Galería de la Raza.

From Uzbekistan to India, Turkey to Afghanistan, the Ballet Afsaneh Art and Culture Society brings to the stage the vibrant sights and sounds of the ancient route through Asia known as the Silk Road. Spark sits in as they rehearse Sharlyn Sawyer's "Song of Generations," a multi-generational collaboration with the Nejad World Music Daf Ensemble that celebrates Persian culture and history.

When Shotgun Players was looking for a playwright from the Bay Area to write a play about South Berkeley, it was Marcus Gardley who got the gig. The result being "Love is a Dream House in Lorin," which was community theater in the truest of senses -- the cast of 30 people ranged in age from 9 to 69, consisted of professional actors and residents of the neighborhood. Although Gardley lives in New York, he continues to work on projects about the Bay Area community. Spark catches up with the...

Living in an age of information overload, Scott Kildall sees a cultural shift moving towards a media information economy. He also perceives the artist as a gatherer, so to create an original media object, Kildall often repurposes materials to give them a whole new meaning. Spark accompanies Kildall as he works on his ongoing video project called "Something to Remind Me." Being a multi-media artist, Kidall's talents include welding, editing video, programming microcontrollers, building...

"When I do a project, I never know where it's going to lead me. It all has to do with what kind of junk I'll find," Amiot tells Spark as he goes to work on a sculpture for Sebastopol's annual Apple Blossom Parade.

June Schwarcz did not set out to become a legend. In fact, the enamel artist first encountered the medium for which she would become famous on a lark. She was introduced to it by some friends who were taking enameling classes at the Denver Art Museum in 1954.

A once-empty space in a downtown parking garage shows the work of 60 local artists and holds a monthly reception for featured artists during the city's ongoing South First Fridays Gallery Walk. This provides artists in and around San Jose with an opportunity to exhibit and sell their work close to home. Spark visits with two of these artists while they prepare for an exhibit at Kaleid.

After 25 years of running Berkeley Ballet Theater, there is no sign of Sally Streets slowing down. Five days a week, you can find the Oakland native teaching and testing her newest choreography on her students. Acting as co-founder, director, choreographer and teacher, Sally Streets aims at making her dances fun so that her students don't realize all of the hard work that is going into it. One of her favorite groups to teach is advanced teenagers because they are so eager to learn. Spark...

As a successful blues man, Mike Henderson has performed widely and released several albums. As a painter, Henderson's work has been exhibited across the country. And as if that weren't impressive enough, he's also an accomplished filmmaker. Spark visits Henderson in his San Leandro home studio as he jams on the guitar and creates a new series of paintings for the Haines Gallery.

Michele Kappel aka Tippy Canoe was a drummer in the rock band The Kirby Grips when she picked up the ukulele and fell in love. She then started writing her own songs for the instrument combining jazz, pop, old time, and girl group music mixed with post-punk influences such as Squeeze and Blondie. After a few years of performing on her own, Kappel formed her own back up band, The Paddlemen with Rick Quisol on drums, Mikie Lee Prasad on guitar and Chris "T.G." Green on bass. Spark catches one...

"The work I make is showing this messed-up system that's perpetuated by the media that makes girls want to conform and buy into this cuteness," Aoki explains when Spark visits her Santa Clara studio while she prepares for a solo exhibition at the LMAN gallery in Los Angeles. And although her message is a bold one, Aoki's use of anime-inspired images and candy colors yields results that are more likely to provoke conversation than arguments.

Despite his sudden rise to international fame, Michael Belmont, aka M dot Strange, advocates that life is simply better with ice cream. His feature-length film "We Are the Strange" is about two outcasts who risk going to the evil city to get ice cream. Among many things, they encounter monster ambushes, giant robot attacks, and explosions. What started as a project in Belmont's bedroom, "We Are the Strange" premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2007 after the movie trailer's...

Since its founding in 2001, the San Francisco-based Janice Garrett & Dancers has rapidly become one of the most respected small modern dance troupes in the Bay Area. Garrett's choreography is notable as much for its craftsmanship as for its dazzling speed, musical clarity and wit. Spark follows Garrett and her dancers on the road to their sixth San Francisco season and reveals why all the hard work and sacrifices are worth it.

Choreographer Jess Curtis founded Jess Curtis/Gravity in 2000. He's had a hand in creating bodies of work with companies such as San Francisco's Contraband and the Franco-American Circus project Cie Cahin Caha, Cirque Batard. Along the way he has been commissioned to make works across Europe and has won numerous awards. Spark visits with Curtis as he premieres a work called "Under the Radar" at San Francisco's counterPULSE. "Under the Radar" is a cabaret piece focusing on the issues of...

Without ponies and parties, textile artist Adela Akers would not be able to produce the intricately woven wall hangings she has become known for over the last decade. She weaves horsehair imported from China and hundreds of recycled metal foil strips made from the tops of wine bottles into her painstakingly detailed pieces. Spark visits Akers in Sonoma County in a converted apple warehouse that she uses as a studio.

ased in San Francisco, the Del Sol String Quartet is asserting itself as a leader in Bay Area new-music performance. This ensemble commissions new music from composers and showcases those and other new works in relevant, responsive and deeply passionate performances. Spark listens to the Del Sol String Quartet rehearse and is there when the quartet debuts the work of three composers -- New Zealand native Jack Body, Iranian-American composer Reza Vali and Los Angeles-based Eric Lindsay.

Dancer Manuelito Biag is the artistic director of SHIFT>>>. Spark visits with Biag as they work on "The Shape of Poison," which was inspired by the Tibetan Buddhist teachings of Klesha, the emotional obstacles to enlightenment. The three main Kleshas are passion, ignorance, and anger. The members of SHIFT>>> Physical Theater share an equal involvement in the development of choreography, narrative and structure for each project. Their work is generated out of the...

Crown Point Press publishes the prints of five or six artists a year who are invited to complete artistic residencies that range from two weeks to six months. For this program, Brown enjoys inviting the participation of established artists in addition to those whose specialty is outside the printing sphere, such as photographer John Chiara. Spark visits with William T. Wiley, one of the leaders of the Bay Area's figurative movement, during his Crown Point Press residency in 2006. The Marin...

Spark visits with Ikeda in his studio and at a "noborigama" in Napa County, which is a 30-foot wood-burning kiln that is kept burning for seven days straight. Such kilns have been used in Japan since the 17th century. The noborigama's wood-firing technique produces a unique natural ash glaze. Like most ceramicists, Ikeda has developed his own distinctive styles of glazing, formulating personal recipes such as the refined "sei shya," or blue rust, which he uses on his dappled, woven baskets....

Spark visited with Gatti as he explained his intent behind "ONE: An Earth Installation," which ironically happens to be composed without using a single living organism except for a small grouping of cattails. His inspiration for this exhibit came from his reverence for nature and admiration of Native American culture. Although Gatti has spent years building a name for himself within the San Francisco social scene, "ONE" marks his first public exhibition. However, Gatti is no stranger to the...

The upright bass is often viewed primarily as a supporting instrument, but local jazz musician Walter Savage has won a reputation for bringing it to the spotlight. Whether he's playing a gig at a renowned Bay Area jazz institution like Yoshi's or entertaining the masses at Enrico's in North Beach, Savage lets the bass shine through as a leading force.

Founded by Pete Douglas in 1964, the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society is a non-profit organization presenting live concerts of principally jazz, classical and world music.

In a West Oakland lot at 2205 Magnolia, just off West Grand, sculpture artist John Abduljaami lets the wood be his guide. He's there almost every day working from 9am to 5pm. Sometimes he sees a bird. Other times it's a dog, a cowboy on horseback, a rat or a walrus. "Then I start drawing with the chainsaw," Abduljaami tells Spark. A prolific artist who dreams of building a legacy through the wood sculptures he leaves behind, Abduljaami estimates he has produced 500 pieces thus far. If he had...

Iranian-born painter, installation and conceptual artist Taraneh Hemami has two homes -- and she also has none. When Hemami came to the United States in 1978 to attend the University of Oregon at Eugene, she had little idea of what the future held. Within a year of her arrival in this country, the Iranian Revolution had changed her homeland forever and prevented her from visiting for more than a decade. Spark follows Hemami as she gathers footage, photographs and stories from a Castro Valley...

Rebar members Matthew Passmore and John Bela wanted to preserve the cultural integrity of the 32-year-old Southern Exposure gallery; not through photographs or a painting, but by drilling out a chunk of the gallery's wall and canning it. Yes, canning it. This may sound a bit strange but their intentions are quite clever. The two got the idea by looking into the history of the gallery. Before SoEx's existence, the building was a can manufactory called the American Can Company. The process of...