We're happy to welcome the National Center for Creative Aging to BlogNet, CAN's network of Weblogs from all over our community. NCAC's blog, Creativity and Aging, keeps track of breaking news in that fast-growing field. Recent posts take note of the Time to Move Conference in England, July 9-10, 2009, to celebrate older people dancing, sponsored by, Take Art, is the Arts Development Agency for Somerset; NCAC's own recent intergenerational programs symposium in San Francisco, with the MetLife Foundation; a poetry competition called "Celebrating Poets over 70" (deadline: November 15); and essays on the creative side of the recession, collecting art in older years and what happens when creative success comes later in life. Catch up with Creativity and Aging on CAN's front page or the BlogNet home page.

In Place of War will launch a new international network of theater practitioners and academics at a reception at The Martin Harris Centre, University of Manchester, England, July 24, 2009. The In Place of War Network is a collaborative initiative for academic and practice-based research into the role, function and impact of theater and performance in places of armed conflict. Practitioners from Kosovo, Gaza, Sudan, D.R. Congo, Sri Lanka, Northern Ireland and the U.K. will be at the launch, talking about theater in refugee camps, in war-affected villages, in towns under curfew, in cities under occupation, in refugee communities in foreign/host countries -- and about why, in times of disruption, individuals and communities have turned to performance? The project also has an online resources, including a database and a social network. A new book, "Performance in Place of War," is due in September.

Five middle school bands in California's San Fernando Valley squared off in June during the first Battle of the Bands Family Music Festival to raise funds to save their music programs. Proposed state budget cuts threaten to strip schools of much-needed cash, says Esmeralda Bermudez in the L.A. Times (6/7/09). The battle took place at Sutter Middle School in Canoga Park. "The prize was a big one, considering that some schools might receive as little as $200 in spending cash next year," writes Bermudez. Competitors hailed from Sutter, Columbus, Pacoima, Gaspar de Portola and Patrick Henry middle schools. Portola's orchestra and chamber ensemble tied for first prize ($2,500) and its band took second ($750) to buy instruments, sheet music and supplies. Portola's sole music teacher, Susan Treworgy juggles the choir, orchestra, chamber ensemble and band on her own. (Thanks, ArtsEdMail.)

TechSoup.org has won Carnegie Mellon University's ArtsTech Award for enabling arts organizations to save over $100 million in expenses to date. TechSoup makes software donations to nonprofits and libraries from 35 major technology providers, and its Refurbished Computer Initiative gives nonprofits a chance to get low-cost, high-quality computers with a new operating system and up-to-date software. The San Francisco-based organization's Web site has a number of resources for the arts, including a case study on how a New Mexico dance company made use of TechSoup to improve its outreach, management and fundraising and saved $17,000. The site's Learning Center offers tutorials on tools like Google Online Mapping, and there's an archive of Webinars on such topics as the successful use of Facebook, YouTube and Webanalytics. Other online aids include Green Tech tips, a blog and a Tech Beginner's Guide.

"LAND/ART," a massive six-month environmental art project involving more than 25 presenting organizations in New Mexico, opened last weekend with a symposium. Coordinated by 516 ARTS, events began June 27 with a guided bus tour by The Center for Land Use Interpretation through dramatic built landscapes. Continuing through December 2009, "LAND/ART" explores relationships of land, art and community through dozens of new exhibitions, community-based projects, site-specific art works, speakers series, performances, tours, excursions and a culminating book. "Historically," says the organizers, "New Mexico has been a place where the intersection of nature and culture is at issue. In the 1960s and ‘70s, the American Southwest was the location of the first generation of Land Art or Earthworks," including The Lightning Field, the Star Axis, Spiral Jetty, the Sun Tunnels and Roden Crater. Details are online.

"Concrete Steel & Paint," a new documentary featuring the work of the Mural Arts Program at Graterford prison, debuts July 23, 2009, in Philadelphia. Filmmakers Cindy Burstein and Tony Heriza describe the film: "When men in a prison art class agree to collaborate with victims of crime to design a mural about healing, their views on punishment, remorse, and forgiveness collide. At times the divide seems too wide to bridge. But as the participants begin to work together, mistrust gives way to genuine moments of human contact and common purpose. Their struggle and their insights are reflected in the art they produce." "Concrete Steel & Paint" will premiere at International House, followed by a discussion with the filmmakers, project participants and restorative-justice pioneer Howard Zehr.

Today CAN brings you an essay about an international collaboration that began in Israel when two art students organized an "urgent conference" during the 2009 Gaza war. Artist Moran Been-noon writes about Cannons and Muses, a project aimed at enabling artists around the world to collaborate and create art in the context of real-time crisis. In January 2009, writes Been-noon, two dance-theater students at the Kibbutzim Seminar art school, Premshay Hermon and Danielle Natalie Kind, decided to organize a conference at their school, while the war was still 'live,' to review and examine the role of art in real-time crisis. Been-noon (born in Israel, now studying in Dublin) relates the exchanges at the conference and describes new developments as the project has spread around the globe, with upcoming activities planned by cells in Israel, Ireland, Japan, Germany and Iceland. The story is accompanied by a call for local participation by groups all over the world.

The Social and Public Arts Resource Center (SPARC) celebrates several significant public art works with an upcoming event at its Venice, California, headquarters. The celebration, 2-5 p.m., June 28, 2009, closes “Current Public Art Productions of the UCLA/SPARC Cesar Chavez Digital Mural Lab,” an exhibition featuring artwork by Judy Baca including the Cesar E. Chavez Monument: The Arch of Dignity, Equality and Justice at San Jose State University and the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial at the RFK Learning Center in Los Angeles. The event includes an open house at the Digital Mural Lab's SPARC facilities. During the reception, there will also be a performance by The Lefteous Sisters who wrote a song for the Save LA Murals campaign initiated by Baca to bring attention to the deteriorating condition of hundreds of L.A. murals.