Welcome to this year’s freshman class… Brown, RISD, J & W… everyone.  You will find Providence is a wondrous but sometimes mystifying place.  If you are reading this then you have already discovered that the Providence Daily Dose is the go-to blog for ‘what to do’ and how to think.  We try to keep you posted on what bands are playing in what clubs, how to watch television, where to buy vegetables, who to vote for, and all things Muppet.

Tonight from 6:30 to 8:30 don’t miss the opening of “Beyond the Birds and the Bees” - a public exhibit revealing the history of sex education in America over the last 100 years produced by the Public Humanities grad students at Brown. By looking at the military, schools and the ways that parents have explained the whole mess of intercourse perhaps we can better understand the state of our youth today. I wonder if there will be anything on rainbow parties … John Nicholas Brown Center, 357 Benefit St.

The new exhibition at the RISD Museum is called Evolution/Revolution:The Arts and Crafts in Contemporary Fashion and Textiles — just rolls off the tongue don’t it. Pictured here is… I don’t really know what the hell this is. opens Thursday/5:30 - 9:00PM/224 Benefit Street

If you’ve got a box of men under your bed, or you like history, or you like anything, you should stop in and see the toy soldiers at the John Hay Library, Brown University. Formally the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection, it’s all about the toy soldiers for me — over 5,000 of them, some with the original boxes. Everything from Crusaders and Huns, to Samurai and the British Raj (and my personal favorite, Napoleon’s Dromedary Corps, because camels are awesome) the sheer scale of this collection, as well as the detail and vivid colors, will make your head spin. Made all the more cool by the fact that this collection was put together by a female lady, and she started it on her honeymoon. She must have been interesting.

Just walk in the front door and inquire at the desk. They have always accommodated me (but they do recommend that you call ahead). 863-2414/20 Prospect Street

I am normally pretty suspicious of music collectives (it’s usually code for ‘overly-earnest hippies with weird instruments’). But tonight is Music Friday at the RISD Museum and the music is being provided by the Cozy Collective and these guys are great! Comprising Tim O’Keefe, Tony Teixeira, Umberto Crenca and Cliff Wood, Cozy Collective will be doing their DJ-remixed/jazz and electronica thang, with shows at 6PM and 8PM.

$5 for members, all others $8/21 and over/cash bar/tasting menu/party runs 5:30 - 9:00/224 Benefit Street/don’t touch the stuff on the walls

… it might look something like this.

‘Cut Folded Dyed & Glued‘ and totally mental! The new show at the Bell Gallery, Brown University, features the abstract and insanely labor-intensive sculptures of Jae Ko and Imi Hwangbo. What is the deal with these Korean artists and detailing? (See: Do-Ho Suh’s 2003 Bell Gallery show.) Are they paid by the hour?

Ko creates her works (’untitled’ above) by layering and bending and folding and twisting ink-soaked paper. Her blacker-than-black wall reliefs are velvety and weird.

Hwangbo constructs her pieces by cutting several layers of mylar by hand to create wall sculptures so exquisitely pretty that you might walk past without paying proper attention. I don’t know if the museum was bothered by my behavior — no one said anything — but you really must put your cheek to the wall and check out the construction from the side. Then come back around to the front, and remind yourself, she cuts these things by hand!

The Bell Gallery keeps mounting great shows — props to curator Jo-Ann Conklin for this one — runs through March 5.

Paddy Johnson over at Art Fag City just came out with her annual Best and Worst of the Web lists. The Best list included a lot of the stuff you might expect, like that Snoop Dogg video, as well as some things you might not know about, like this amazingly weird mating ritual that might be slightly NSFW if you work in a convent, say, or maybe a daycare.

Her worst list, on the other hand, is comprised mostly of easy (though deserving) targets like the Whitney and Saatchi websites. So it doesn’t come as any great surprise that RISD made #3 on the list. Because that site is so very awful in so many different ways. Aside from the fact that there’s a quote from the creator of Family Guy on the front page (tacky!), the navigation is counterintuitive and also scrolls by horizontally kind of quickly for no reason whatsoever. One commenter compared the site to a duck gallery, but that’s just the front page. It gets worse once you actually click on anything. And God forbid you might actually want to find an event to go to.

It’s Free-For-All Saturday at the RISD Museum.

So you can’t afford real jewelry — in fact, you can’t even afford to pay to get into a museum, then today is your day. Every last Saturday of the month, the RISD Museum of Art is free! Go see the show ‘Fabulous Fakes: Jewelry of Kenneth Jay Lane’ and look at costume jewelry (that you also can not even afford). You will never look at Nana’s brooches the same way again (one display in the exhibition will tell you exactly what ‘marks’ to look for, if you can just get the damn thing away from Nana.) Exhibit ends January 27.

There’s still that thing at the RISD Museum tonight,  I think.  I’d like to be there.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 14

Music Friday
5:30pm
The second Friday of every month the Museum’s Main Gallery transforms into a funky lounge for an after-work alternative that features cocktails, hors d’oeuvres, art and music. Socialize with old friends and meet new ones. Enjoy special signature cocktails and door prizes. Museum members: $5; non-members: $8. Age 21 and over. PWCVB members and RISD|CE students receive the Museum member rate.

Local favorite Carlos de Leon performs Latin Jazz and Temple Restaurant will provide the tasting menu. To receive e-announcements about Music Fridays, send a request to member@risd.edu. Music Fridays are supported by the Providence Tourism Council. Media sponsor: Providence Phoenix. For more information, call Matt Montgomery, 401 454-6793 or e-mail mmontgom@risd.edu.

The excellent exhibit, A New Perspective on Mars: Detailed Views of Mars in 3-D, at the Natural History Museum and Planetarium finishes up this week, ending with the “Farewell to Mars Weekend”:

Saturday, November 10 – Monday, November 12, 2007
Planetarium show offerings are Our Place in Space on Saturday, and Sky Views on Sunday, and Monday at 2:00pm. Last chance to see Mars in 3-D during this Farewell to Mars weekend filled with stellar activities and demonstrations featuring the Red Planet. Special Event: A New Perspective on Mars: Detailed Views of Mars in 3-D, images from the European Space Agency’s recent Mars Express Mission viewed with 3-D glasses. Exhibit runs through November 12, 2007.