Community

Over 500 people showed up for songs, dances, and storytelling during the Ohlone Basket Welcoming Celebration held in the gardens of the Oakland Museum of California on Saturday. The museum offered free admission all day for the event honoring Ohlone artist and scholar Linda Yamane for her crafting a ceremonial Ohlone basket, the first of its kind to be made in almost 250 years.

In preparation for the city’s annual Art & Soul festival, the city has announced several road closures that will affect downtown streets. All roads will be re-opened by the morning of Monday, August 6.

In a group show at the Compound Gallery & Studios titled “The Artist as Storyteller,” artist and curator Alison O.K. Frost has assembled a collection of works that tell viewers stories, leaving them to interpret what the artists mean to say. Multi-paneled pieces marry words and images in a way that is simultaneously familiar and abstract.

Hundreds of Oakland residents woke up Saturday morning to put on a surgical mask, lace up their boots and get their hands dirty during the second annual “Throw Down for the Town,” a service festival that gave Oakland residents 34 options to transform their neighborhoods.

Oakland has a long and fascinating history. Come along with Oakland North as we explore some of the city’s most interesting old stories in text and photos.

On Saturday, animals at the Oakland Zoo will suspend their diet plans and indulge in what could easily be this year’s largest animal party, feasting on servings of produce donated by Oakland residents, many of whom will come and watch the animals eat their hearts out between 8 am and 6 pm.

The sound of jazz—a melody, harmony, rhythm, or timbre—hadn’t filled the lobby of the California Hotel, just off San Pablo Avenue, for more than a decade. And as over a hundred people filled into the hotel on Wednesday—Billy Strayhorn numbers setting the mood—for a groundbreaking marking the city’s decision to revitalize the historic hotel, passersby, many of them with iPods, didn’t know the hotel was a venue for the most preeminent figures on their playlists: James Brown, Ray Charles, Billie Holiday, Sly Stone, Aretha Franklin and Big Mama Thornton.

Every Wednesday between 10 a.m and 2 p.m., an organic farmer’s market appears, tucked between the Cathedral of Christ the Light and the Kaiser Permanente offices near Lake Merritt. Operating since May, the Ordway Organic Farmer’s Market, a petite selection of just over a half dozen booths selling fruits, veggies, plants and other fare, is the new kid on the block on an array of farmer’s markets that dot Oakland. However, it is unique because it is among the few that take place midweek, mid-day and and are all-organic.

Every week, Oakland North will publish a photo submitted by one of our readers. This week’s photo is by Kelly Patrick Dugan.