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Item World: Adele, 'Stillwater' and a stadium yarn-bombing lead our 2016 wish list

December 31, 2015 at 5:36PM

The Tangiers in the North Loop — er, NOLA — neighborhood of Minneapolis. (The Minnesota Star Tribune)

I.W.'s 2016 wish list

A few of our hopes and dreams for the new year:

• Since Adele is opening her U.S. tour in St. Paul on July 5 and 6, she thanks America for buying more than 6 million copies of her "25" album — one-fourth of them sold by Minneapolis-based Target alone — by performing a free concert in the Twin Cities on July 4.

• Inspired by the resurrection of the Mary Richards statue on Nicollet Mall, St. Olaf Township in northern Minnesota unveils a tribute to its favorite TV daughter, Rose Nylund of "Golden Girls." Betty White leads a parade through downtown.

• Viva NOLO! Now that fashionistas, foodies and art lovers are once again flocking to Minneapolis' North Loop, it's time to revive the neighborhood's natural moniker. The NOLO name was first used in 1979 when the area was a hive of artists lofts, galleries and pioneering restaurants. That was before stadiums, sports bars and freeways hacked through the neighborhood. Time to rebrand.

• "Fargo" producers announce that the Emmy-winning series' third season will be filmed in Minnesota, where it belongs. The news prompts Jesse Ventura to return to acting.

• Go 96.3 settles on a new format: all local music, all the time.

• After announcing a new morning-show team, 89.3 the Current makes it through the entire year without any changes in on-air personalities.

• The entire student body of MCAD yarn-bombs the new Vikings stadium from top to bottom to make it look more soft and cuddly, and less like a giant "Star Wars" ship.

• HBO signs off on the proposed series "Stillwater," jacking up tourism in that Minnesota river city by 300 percent. Lines outside Nelson's Ice Cream extend past the city limits.

Bye-bye Franklin

Franklin Art Works "has now officially dissolved," board chair Taylor Acosta recently announced. The scrappy Minneapolis avant-garde showplace for paintings, photos and film went dark 17 months ago for want of financial support after 13 years and 140 exhibitions. The board sold its building on E. Franklin Avenue in January 2014, paid off all creditors and divided the remaining money between Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Institute of Art. Each got $216,087, Acosta said. Walker plans to use the money for future exhibits while the institute put $216,000 into a new Minnesota Artist Fund to buy local art for its collection.

Mary Abbe

Film in the cities

Cinema Lounge, IFP Minnesota's longtime monthly Bryant-Lake Bowl screening party for Twin Cities filmmakers and their fans, is about to go statewide thanks to a $10,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. "We want to connect people throughout the state because there are all these little pockets of great movies being made and it helps the artists not feel so isolated," said IFP director Andrew Peterson. The grant will allow IFP to bring events to St. Cloud, Duluth and Moorhead beginning in April.

Kristin Tillotson

Home at the Plains

North Dakota native Andrew Maus will take over as director of the Plains Art Museum in Fargo starting Jan. 25. Maus, 36, who has been executive director of the Minnesota Marine Art Museum in Winona for the past five years, first worked at the Plains while attending Minnesota State University, Moorhead, then was on staff from 2006-10 in various posts. "This is a dream opportunity for me to lead the organization that inspired my love of museums," Maus told I.W. "It's also an opportunity to return to the community that I consider home." He replaces Colleen Sheehy, the Twin Cities native who after a seven-year run in Fargo now leads the nonprofit group Public Art St. Paul.

M.A.

Hurtful 'Eight'?

According to the show business weekly Variety, more than a few technical glitches have troubled the Ultra Panavision 70 "roadshow" of "The Hateful Eight" by Quentin Tarantino. "Where do you think they got the 70mm projector? Craigslist?" Dave Wagner, a tech writer from New Brighton, griped to I.W. Maurice Scroggins, a retired airline pilot from Minneapolis, called it a far cry from the sharp presentation of widescreen classics like "Ben Hur." He found himself pondering "if the scratches and pops on the image had been digitally entered. Or if the jumping of the image had been digitally produced. Or if the fuzzy bottom of the image was intentional." Never fear, a digital version opens in wide release this weekend.

Colin Covert

Andrew Maus will become director of the Plains Art Museum in Fargo. (The Minnesota Star Tribune)

White (The Minnesota Star Tribune)

Ventura (The Minnesota Star Tribune)