InLiquid Gallery’s “Brownin’” exhibition has curator Zindzi Harley showcasing five Philly-based artists with visually stunning studies redefining the meaning of beauty; mediums range from multimedia to photography, all celebrating facets of the Black identity.

The exhibition features artwork by Caff Adeus (@caffadeus), Marcus Branch (@marcus22.branch), Mikel Elam (@mikelartist), Akria Gordon (@okayakiii), and Yannick Lowery (@severe.paper).

“‘Brownin’' invites Black viewers to encounter themselves through their own eyes, while offering those outside of this experience the opportunity to witness and listen to the languages of admiration, care, and aesthetic possibility that circulate within Black communities themselves,” Harley said in an artistic statement.

Walking through the exhibit is an exercise in slowing down. Each artist’s work makes you pause, stand still, and think deeper.

Take Lowery’s collage and cyanotype on fabric titled Till Evermore, referencing a Haitian spirit Ezili Danter, known as fierce protector of women and children. He uses the spirit to explore parallels with Emmett Till’s life and the artist’s. Caff Adeus’ series of ink on archival prints of Black commercial ads has one recurring statement: “This race of people do not present an increased risk of harm compared to other races.”

No matter where you start, the exhibition will lead you in a full circle of work.

Brownin’ runs through May 23 at InLiquid Gallery, 1400 N American St. inliquid.org

— Hira Qureshi

The next time you go grocery shopping, walk down the bread aisle and ask yourself, “How would a loaf of bread fare after 3,500 years?” That question brought me to the Penn Museum.

At the “Ancient Egypt in Watercolors: Paintings and Artifacts from Dra Abu el-Naga” exhibit, I saw limestone statuettes, detailed ceramics, and rich paintings found inside ornate burial chambers at Dra Abu el-Naga, located in the West Bank of the Nile at Thebes. The sacred site, first founded by 18th Dynasty rulers King Amenhotep I and his mother, Queen Ahmose-Nefertari, became a favored burial ground among affluent families and New Kingdom royals.

Between 1921-1923, Penn Museum archaeologist Clarence Fisher excavated at South Aby el-Naga, unearthing thousands of artifacts and paintings with ornate scenes that needed to be documented.

Before the advent of color photography, painting was the only way to record the colors of excavated artifacts, monuments, and artworks. Fisher, needing an artist capable of reproducing such works, enlisted Ahmed Yousef to document the scenes from Theban tombs. The young artist’s reproductions are sometimes the only evidence of the existence of some tombs.

By the time I reached the end of the exhibition, I found my answer to my growing suspicion about the barley and wheat-made bread loaves. They weren’t fossilized bricks, or blackened slabs covered in layered mold spores. They looked more like half-baked mud muffins. But considering these loaves were made between 1,300-1069 BCE to sustain the spirit of the deceased in the afterlife, a balled up baked good laden with holes is perhaps the best afterlife treat one could hope for.

The Ancient Egypt in Watercolors exhibition runs through November 2026. Penn Museum, 3260 South St., penn.museum

— Earl Hopkins

Every once in a while a performer plays a passage in a way that makes it impossible to hear it the same way again. When it happens in music as well established as Beethoven’s, it’s as if you suddenly have the answer to a question you never knew you had.

Pianist Jonathan Biss hits on several such moments with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra led by Malin Broman in the final release of his Beethoven/5 series pairing a Beethoven concerto with a contemporary work (Orchid Classics). He comes out of the first-movement cadenza of the Concerto No. 3 in C Minor so gradually, so gingerly, that when the orchestra re-enters with its hushed music against his fast, ghostly arpeggios it takes your breath away.

Biss — a frequent Philadelphia Chamber Music Society performer — is the big Beethoven thinker of our time, and here he puts a stamp on the music both personal and authoritative.

But what if Beethoven weren’t ensconced in our ears so inevitably? Caroline Shaw imagines the possibilities in Watermark, a 2019 piano concerto in which substantial patches and fleeting wisps of Beethoven’s C Minor Concerto are woven throughout. Composers have used this technique often — think of Stravinsky’s Tchaikovsky-tinged The Fairy’s Kiss — and here Shaw does it with great skill.

The way she transcends Beethoven’s soundscape in the meditative second movement is particularly individualistic. She moves the soundscape from its progenitor Beethoven through a fascinating variety of realms — a few twists more dissonant one moment, and warmly Brucknerian the next.

“Beethoven/5 Vol. 5″ is available to download, stream, purchase at prestomusic.com

— Peter Dobrin

Given the concentration of James Ijames plays showing in Philadelphia this season, it’s not too surprising that I’m writing about a second production of his work that resonated with me for this column (the first being The Most Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington).

It’s always exciting when a world premiere lands in the city, and I felt particularly close to this story because it focuses on the bonds between cousins. Ijames previously told me he was inspired after learning that fewer people have cousins nowadays because family sizes are shrinking, and cousin relationships are often underexplored. I come from a large family with a lot of cousins and I really cherish those connections, so I loved getting to see them onstage.

Directed by Philadelphia Theatre Company coartistic director Taibi Magar, Wilderness Generation gathers four cousins to help their grandmother pack up her home, but they each have their own baggage to work through. The entire ensemble delivered stellar performances, especially Jessica Johnson, who brought emotional depth on top of irresistible radiance, and Lindsay Smiling, who crouched his body to transform for this role so effectively, I almost didn’t recognize him.

What really stuck with me were the gossipy scenes when they dished all the family drama across generational lines. Their conversations mirrored exact ones I’ve had within my own family: Is that what really happened? Which uncle did what? Wait, that aunt is gay? It felt just like home.

‘Wilderness Generation’ runs through May 3 at Philadelphia Theatre Company, 480 S Broad St.,
Philadelphia, 215-985-0420
or philadelphiatheatrecompany.org.

— Rosa Cartagena

I was walking along Kelly Drive listening to former Ebony, Honey, and Teen People editor-in-chief turned fiction writer Amy DuBois Barnett’s juicy debut novel, If I Ruled the World, when I was pleasantly surprised by a local connection.

It’s 2000 and protagonist Nickki Rose, a fashion editor turned fledgling editor of a hip-op magazine, was shopping for a killer crimson outfit for an industry party hosted by the volatile, fictional rapper Red Hot. She steps into Kirna Zabête, which was then a brand new women’s boutique with just one location in Soho, owned by Chadds Ford’s own Beth Buccini.

Nickki buys a sexy red mini skirt and wears it to the party. What happens then is exactly the kind of drama that would only pop off during late 90s and early 2000s hip-hop’s blinged-out heyday.

The nod to Kirna Zabête is Barnett’s little wink at her readers. Those of us in the know, know Buccini’s boutique was in the mix even back then and was just about to to blow up in popularity.

And while I’m still listening and enjoying If I Ruled the World — no doubt named after Nas’ chart-topping 1996 single of the same name — I hope Nickki grabs hip-hop by its misogynoir-ed horns, grows up, and becomes the kind of magazine editor she wants to be.

Today, Buccini is a mom of four. And Kirna Zabête is a favorite shopping haunt of celebrities from Gwyneth Paltrow and Cameron Diaz, to Lori Harvey and Tayana Taylor. Buccini went on to open seven stores including one in Bryn Mawr in what was once a SEPTA bus terminal garage. It is now a glittery fashion destination that carries dresses by Dries van Notten, bags by Bottega Veneta, and shoes by Saint Laurent.

Variety reported on Jan. 23, four days before If I Ruled the World — that Hulu acquired the rights to turn the novel into an hourlong drama series.

Fingers crossed, Buccini gets a cameo.

“If I Ruled the World” is now available in all bookstores

— Elizabeth Wellington

Lenny Kaye is one of rock and roll’s great multi-taskers.

Since their very first gig in New York in 1971, he has been Patti Smith’s steadfast guitarist and collaborator. With the 1972 Nuggets anthology, he curated and codified an entire genre of psychedelic garage-rock.

And he’s written several music books, including a Waylon Jennings autobiography, the rock and roll history Lightning Striking that includes a chapter on Philadelphia’s American Bandstand era, and You Call It Madness: The Sensuous Song of the Croon that centers on South Philly balladeer Russ Columbo.

One thing that Kaye has never done before, though, is put out a solo album. That will change with Goin’ Local, a collection of the singer-guitarist’s songs to be released July 17. The album will include “Solstice” a song co-written with Smith and contributions by jazz pianist Matthew Shipp and multi-instrumentalist David Mansfield. (Full disclosure: Kaye did release a 1984 LP under the name Lenny Kaye Connection, but that was a band effort rather than solo album.)

This week, Kaye — who lives in East Stroudsburg, Pa. near the Delaware Water Gap — let loose the album’s hard charging title track which rides a killer guitar riff and celebrates friendship and life affirming experiences awaiting outside your door with winning joie de vivre.

“I’ve always loved the local, its intimacy and camaraderie, the you-are-there and then taken somewhere,” Kaye said in news release. “I’ve learned how to be myself, to be at one with my instrument, with my creative spirit, and I guess the truest Goin’ Local is the privilege to go inside my own head, and hear how I sound to me.”

Lately, Kaye has been goin’ local around the Philadelphia area, opening for Television’s Richard Lloyd at Nikki Lopez on South Street and dropping on Alejandro Escovedo in Sellersville. On Thursday, he’ll be local on the Main Line, playing a solo show opening for Dave Alvin & Jimmie Dale Gilmore at Ardmore Music Hall. 8 p.m., Ardmore Music Hall, 23 East Lancaster Ave., Ardmore, ardmoremusicalhall.com

— Dan DeLuca