The second annual Children’s Humanities Festival continues through November 14. Unless otherwise noted, all programs are $5 in advance, $6 (cash only) at the door. Students and educators are admitted free, but reservations are required. Tickets are available by phone at 312-494-9509 or online at www.chfestival.org. Call 312-661-1028 for more information. “Aztec Stories: From Micailhuitl to Dia de los Muertos” See listing for Fri 11/5. Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum. For grades 3 and up....

For decades, Morris Goldner didn’t talk much about his Holocaust experiences. “It was too painful,” says the Rogers Park resident, who grew up in the town of Straszecin, in southwestern Poland. After emigrating to the U.S. in 1947 Goldner settled in Chicago, where he worked in the garment district and helped his wife raise their three daughters. “I was too busy making a living for my family,” he explains. “I didn’t have no time to think about it....

Olivier Messiaen’s 1944 work for solo piano, Vingt regards sur l’enfant-Jesus (“Twenty Gazes at the Infant Jesus”), ranks among the 20th century’s great artistic creations, rivaling the landmark variations of Bach and Brahms and Beethoven’s last sonatas. But it’s more than that–it’s also a grand profession of faith. A devout Catholic, the young Messiaen was imprisoned by the Nazis during World War II, an experience that prompted him to compose the probingly spiritual Quartet for the End of Time; in occupied Paris during the final years of the war, he wrote a visionary trilogy about the redemptive power of faith, the culmination of which was Vingt regards....

The Chicago Public Library may be about to add a nail to the coffin of 16-millimeter film, but library patron Jim Finn is determined there should be no burial without a last hurrah. When rumors reached Finn last May that the Harold Washington Library Center had decided to take its 6,000-title collection of 16-millimeter films out of circulation, he got on the phone. Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Finn’s first reaction was to try, at least with Chicago’s public library collection....

“I ask my husband often, ‘How old would they be if they were alive?’” says Zineta Ibisevic, fingering two small, well-worn identity booklets. “I was watching as the Serbians arrested the older one, Salko. I was in a truck with other women. He had his hands behind his head. There were a lot of paramilitary forces around them. They had him at gunpoint, and the men were walking in lines two by two....

CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN 1/17 & 18, ABBEY PUB The latest addition to the box-set display case at your local megastore (so museumlike, no?) comes courtesy of these 80s indie wise guys. Dismissed as dilettantes then by some shortsighted folks, CVB are now fondly recalled, probably because they were smart enough to quit while they were ahead. (Memo to Butthole Surfers: just stop already.) Front man David Lowery went on to cash in with Cracker (Remember that one song?...

NERVOUS CENTER FESTIVAL OF IMPROVISED MUSIC through 2/4, NERVOUS CENTER Although the Nervous Center–an almost unnaturally comfortable Lincoln Square coffeehouse whose dank basement has hosted a healthy mix of local hopefuls and nationally and internationally known experimental musicians–isn’t closing until February 17, this last-blast-style festival gathers many of the Chicagoans who’ve bounced their sounds (and heads) off the low ceiling over the past several years. Highlights include sets by the Rosenberg Skronktet, whose large-scale works in progress had some wonderful moments at the Empty Bottle a few weeks ago; the promising, industrious Eric Roth Trio; and a quartet with Fred Lonberg-Holm, Josh Abrams, Michael Zerang, and Jeff Parker....

For three years Noel Ashby put her livelihood in the hands of the Federal Express Corporation. The Wicker Park textile designer made a nice living creating abstract and representational patterns out of gouache and odd bits of found materials like fabric, colored paper, wire, and metal washers. After mounting them on bristol board, she sold them for $900 to $1,000 apiece to furniture and fabric manufacturers like Steelcase, F. Schumacher & Co....

Mark Borchardt, the lovable lunk who stars in the documentary American Movie, is one of the more memorable embodiments of the midwestern work ethic to penetrate the media in recent years. In the 1999 cult hit, the barely employed Menomonee Falls native struggles with an ailing and unsupportive crank of an uncle, the unwed mother of his children, a tiny talent pool, and an endearing lack of Hollywood savvy to make a direct-to-video horror flick called Coven, which in turn is supposed to finance the completion of Northwestern, the semiautobiographical feature he’s been working on since high school....

It’s unlikely that grilled black-bear bacon wrapped around asparagus spears and topped with tasazu (sweet vinegar) and glistening spheres of orange salmon roe would have been on a traditional Japanese kaiseki menu. Nor would loin of grilled venison stuffed with cream cheese and bathed in a peppercorn demiglace. But both appear on the version served at Heat. “Our kaiseki menu isn’t far from what you’d find in Tokyo today,” says Kee Chan, who owns the restaurant with his brother Macku....

Friday 7/18 – Thursday 7/24 19 SATURDAY Among the 40,000 or so people currently incarcerated by the state of Illinois, approximately 400 are “C-number” prisoners–the classification for inmates serving open-ended sentences. Most are African-Americans between 50 and 60 years old, and all were sentenced prior to 1978, when determinate-sentencing laws were implemented. In 1978 their parole rate was 57 percent, but these days it hovers between 1 and 4 percent, even though advocates for C-number prisoners say they have the lowest recidivism rate (14 percent) in the system....

Friday 7/6 – Thursday 7/12 7 SATURDAY When he worked at the old Water Tower visitor’s center, Herman Schell was often bombarded with questions about the Chicago Fire. So he researched the topic, brought in some maps, and learned to enthrall visitors with stories about the blaze. Now he manages the state’s visitor information center and hosts the city’s Great Chicago Fire Tour, which covers everything from the site of the O’Leary residence to the most famous survivor of the 1871 conflagration, the Water Tower....

Last fall a producer for the Ricki Lake Show invited Beth Wade to appear on a program about women who marry for money. The producer had seen the northwest-sider’s Bitter Barren Spinster Club Web site–a saucy send-up for confirmed bachelorettes that “lets us know that we are not alone, adrift in a ‘singles-limbo’ full of kitty litter, Diet Pepsi and frozen Lean Cuisine meals”–and wanted her to represent an opposing viewpoint....

CLIENTELE Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » Quizzed last year by the fanzine Chickfactor, guitarist Alasdair Maclean confessed that the harshest catcall ever unleashed on his band the Clientele was a request for “more reverb.” In fact Suburban Light (Merge), the debut album by this psychedelic trio from north London, already sounds like it was recorded at the bottom of a mine shaft; the reverb is so excessive it verges on gimmickry....

The 35 members of the International Contemporary Ensemble are recent Oberlin College graduates who want to infuse the new-music establishment with fresh blood. Flutist Claire Chase, along with composer Huang Ruo, started ICE while at Oberlin; she moved to Chicago last year and has been busy working out the logistics for this festival–three concerts featuring 20 members, or “Icicles.” The half dozen recent pieces and half dozen slightly older ones on their schedule would normally require much bigger forces to organize, not to mention more money–their grassroots fund-raising campaign netted them a $7,000 budget....

There’s something fanciful, even surreal, about the two pieces on this shared program. Lucky Plush, headed by Julia Rhoads, presents Surrelium, a work in six sections inspired by Rhoads’s observation of her three-year-old nephew with a helium balloon. Floating balloon sculptures and a giant inflatable “house” (designed by Joseph Ravens) are only some of the features of this 35-minute piece, which also includes a clown riding a tiny, squeaky tricycle and a skirt (designed by Cat Chow) that unzips and unwinds at once to expose the performer....

Chicago historically hemorrhages talent: at times it seems that any writer, actor, or musician who’s any good at all is destined to leave. Even the post-Vandermark Chicago free-jazz scene–viewed the world over as a model of sustainable self-sufficiency and collaborative spirit–isn’t immune to the curse. In the past year, Chicago Underground drummer Chad Taylor and improviser Jim O’Rourke have both moved to New York. Hustling saxophonist Scott Rosenberg made an impression here quickly, but abruptly left to travel the world–he’s currently in France....

The 14th annual Polish Film Festival in America, produced by the Society for Arts, continues Friday, November 8, through Saturday, November 30. Screenings are at the Copernicus Center, 5216 W. Lawrence (tickets $9) and the Society for Arts, 1112 N. Milwaukee (tickets $7). Passes, available for $40 (five screenings) and $80 (twelve screenings), are good for all programs except the 3:00 screening Sunday, November 10; for more information call 773-486-9612. The schedule for November 8 through 14 follows; a complete schedule through November 30 is available on-line at www....

Talk about your mama’s boy. Harmon, the pathetic subject of Terry Selucky’s new play, has to lull his phobic, delusional mater to sleep each night by telling her stories about winged zebras and Burt Reynolds. His every move is tethered to her whims and fears. Even the saintly Rachel, who loves Harmon against all odds–and good sense–can’t cope with mom’s titanium apron strings. These folks are somehow endearing in their repulsiveness, and Selucky uses their slim hold on reality to create harshly funny fantasy vignettes....

A Ruby Returns Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites » “As we were folding, the whole alt-country thing was unfolding,” says Kessler today. The duo had started out playing subway stops for beer money, but before long they were playing clubs–primarily the eclectic Wrigleyville performance space Lower Links. Although their stripped-down, theatrical take on old-timey music seems to have little connection to the more rock-fueled side of the “insurgent” country scene, they unquestionably helped set the stage for Bloodshot by challenging the assumption that country was purely redneck music....