{"data":{"id":"28dfd8ca-09cf-473a-9469-991a00352ae2","originKind":"SYNDICATED","title":"Fun things to do: Alberta Ballet's Notre-Dame, OddBird fair and Rae Spoon","summary":"Notre-Dame de Paris: Alberta Ballet ends a seriously spectacular season with a high-contrast, red-tinged take on Victor Hugo’s tale of bell-ringer Quasimodo and free-spirited Esmeralda in a love story that’s been interpreted in film countless times, but rarely so beautiful and raw as a Akira Kurosawa fever dream as this.\n\nWith music by Maurice Jarre and costumes by Yves Saint Laurent inspired by Notre Dame’s stained glass, choreographer Roland Petit’s mob-filled take on this story of class struggle and sacrifice is sure to be a breathtaking finale to a terrific year under artistic director Francesco Ventriglia.\n\nDetails: 7:30 p.m. Friday/Saturday, 2 p.m. Saturday at Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium (11455 87 Ave.), $76.01 and up at albertaballet.com\n\nOddBird Art & Craft Fair: Squishing together Edmonton’s coolest indie craftspeople and wee-scale artists, OddBird is back for its group hug spring sale where your favourite thing you never knew you needed is just waiting for you, be it a locally published book, an adorable plush creature or a piece of art that’ll remind you of how you found joy in these crazy times years from now.\n\nEleven new vendors include Stacy Burney of Hard Wets wearable re-creations of terrifying ’50s jello desserts, digital collage artist Quinton Hylton and scratchboard artist and printmaker Amy Pretorius.\n\nPlus the Art-O-Matic vending machine! Please preview all the vendors at oddbirdfair.ca.\n\nAlways a fun place to mingle and see everyone’s drooly new babies, catch you there!\n\nDetails: 5 p.m.-9 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday at OSPAC (8426 Gateway Blvd.), $5 admission\n\nAbstract Art @ 120: Two shows open Friday at Harcourt House, including one celebrating abstract art’s supercentarian status, Abstraction Now: Harcourt’s Practitioners of Abstract Art + Guest Artists.\n\nCurated by the gallery’s executive director Jacek Malec, its painters include Scott Cumberland, Daren Kooyman, Carla Lam, Sheila Luck, Mitchel Smith and Wiz Wensel, as well as well-established senior luminaries Catherine Burgess, Peter Hide and Seka Owen.\n\nThis is an amazing collection of work worth an in-person visit to its 7 p.m. Friday opening, where Timothy Grieco’s acrylic exhibition Not Solid is also opening in the adjacent, incubating Haakonson Family Gallery.\n\nDetails: through June 20 at Harcourt House (10215 112 St.), no charge\n\nWhen Spring Replaced the Winter: Steve Driscoll’s electric new show of urethane-on-panel paintings focuses on exactly what we’re happily enduring right now, the long-awaited actual spring taking hold. Not even going to knock on wood.\n\nA hiker and camper, Peter Robertson Gallery’s prolific art star does an amazing thing using almost radioactive colours to accentuate the familiar shapes of nature, all glistening with his wet-on-wet brush style.\n\nThis luminous show has not one but two opening receptions, 6 p.m.-8 p.m. Friday and 1 p.m.-3 p.m. Saturday, so come meet this innovative Ontario artist.\n\nDetails: Through May 30 at Peter Robertson Gallery (10332 124 St.), no charge\n\nRae Spoon: With the new and amazingly-titled Assigned Country Singer at Birth album in tow, musician, author and all-around bullcrap survivor is here for a show of their new and road-tested music.\n\nLocal rockers Cassia Hardy and Pink Snail Matineé get the delightfully queer party going, and because it’s a Sunday matinee, no worries about showing up to work with gravel marks pressed into your face the next morning, unless that’s your kink!\n\nDetails: 2 p.m. Sunday at the Aviary (9314 111 Ave.), $20/ the-aviary.net, $25 at the door\n\nfgriwkowsky@postmedia.com\n\n@fisheyefoto.bsky.social\n\nBookmark our website and support our journalism: Don’t miss the news you need to know — add EdmontonJournal.com and EdmontonSun.com to your bookmarks and sign up for our newsletters here.\n\nYou can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber. Subscribers gain unlimited access to The Edmonton Journal, Edmonton Sun, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Edmonton Journal | The Edmonton Sun.","url":"https://edmontonjournal.com/entertainment/fun-things-to-do-alberta-ballets-notre-dame-oddbird-fair-and-rae-spoon","imageUrl":"https://smartcdn.gprod.postmedia.digital/edmontonjournal/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/0508-t5-notre.jpg","publishedAt":"2026-05-08T11:15:17.000Z","sourceLabel":"Edmonton Journal Music","tags":["Entertainment","Local Arts","Music","Theatre"],"authorName":"Fish Griwkowsky","contentHtml":"\"Alberta

Notre-Dame de Paris : Alberta Ballet ends a seriously spectacular season with a high-contrast, red-tinged take on Victor Hugo’s tale of bell-ringer Quasimodo and free-spirited Esmeralda in a love story that’s been interpreted in film countless times, but rarely so beautiful and raw as a Akira Kurosawa fever dream as this.

With music by Maurice Jarre and costumes by Yves Saint Laurent inspired by Notre Dame’s stained glass, choreographer Roland Petit’s mob-filled take on this story of class struggle and sacrifice is sure to be a breathtaking finale to a terrific year under artistic director Francesco Ventriglia.

Details : 7:30 p.m. Friday/Saturday, 2 p.m. Saturday at Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium (11455 87 Ave.), $76.01 and up at albertaballet.com

OddBird Art & Craft Fair : Squishing together Edmonton’s coolest indie craftspeople and wee-scale artists, OddBird is back for its group hug spring sale where your favourite thing you never knew you needed is just waiting for you, be it a locally published book, an adorable plush creature or a piece of art that’ll remind you of how you found joy in these crazy times years from now.

Eleven new vendors include Stacy Burney of Hard Wets wearable re-creations of terrifying ’50s jello desserts, digital collage artist Quinton Hylton and scratchboard artist and printmaker Amy Pretorius.

Plus the Art-O-Matic vending machine! Please preview all the vendors at oddbirdfair.ca .

Always a fun place to mingle and see everyone’s drooly new babies, catch you there!

\"

Details : 5 p.m.-9 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday at OSPAC (8426 Gateway Blvd.), $5 admission

Abstract Art @ 120 : Two shows open Friday at Harcourt House, including one celebrating abstract art’s supercentarian status, Abstraction Now: Harcourt’s Practitioners of Abstract Art + Guest Artists.

Curated by the gallery’s executive director Jacek Malec, its painters include Scott Cumberland, Daren Kooyman, Carla Lam, Sheila Luck, Mitchel Smith and Wiz Wensel, as well as well-established senior luminaries Catherine Burgess, Peter Hide and Seka Owen.

This is an amazing collection of work worth an in-person visit to its 7 p.m. Friday opening, where Timothy Grieco’s acrylic exhibition Not Solid is also opening in the adjacent, incubating Haakonson Family Gallery.

\"

Details : through June 20 at Harcourt House (10215 112 St.), no charge

When Spring Replaced the Winter : Steve Driscoll’s electric new show of urethane-on-panel paintings focuses on exactly what we’re happily enduring right now, the long-awaited actual spring taking hold. Not even going to knock on wood.

A hiker and camper, Peter Robertson Gallery’s prolific art star does an amazing thing using almost radioactive colours to accentuate the familiar shapes of nature, all glistening with his wet-on-wet brush style.

This luminous show has not one but two opening receptions, 6 p.m.-8 p.m. Friday and 1 p.m.-3 p.m. Saturday, so come meet this innovative Ontario artist.

\"

Details : Through May 30 at Peter Robertson Gallery (10332 124 St.), no charge

Rae Spoon : With the new and amazingly-titled Assigned Country Singer at Birth album in tow, musician, author and all-around bullcrap survivor is here for a show of their new and road-tested music.

Local rockers Cassia Hardy and Pink Snail Matineé get the delightfully queer party going, and because it’s a Sunday matinee, no worries about showing up to work with gravel marks pressed into your face the next morning, unless that’s your kink!

Details : 2 p.m. Sunday at the Aviary (9314 111 Ave.), $20/ the-aviary.net , $25 at the door

fgriwkowsky@postmedia.com

@fisheyefoto.bsky.social

Bookmark our website and support our journalism: Don’t miss the news you need to know — add EdmontonJournal.com and EdmontonSun.com to your bookmarks and sign up for our newsletters here.

You can also support our journalism by becoming a digital subscriber. Subscribers gain unlimited access to The Edmonton Journal, Edmonton Sun, National Post and 13 other Canadian news sites. Support us by subscribing today: The Edmonton Journal | The Edmonton Sun.

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