Nice Work

Indiana Public Media
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  • ARTS
  • UPDATED WEEKLY

Nice Work is a weekly celebration of the arts, culture, and creativity of south central Indiana. From the creators of Earth Eats and Inner States, the show shares stories of artists, musicians, chefs, and dreamers who make our region shine.

  1. Alice Wong Came From the Future

    5D AGO

    Alice Wong Came From the Future

    Alice Wong, who passed away in November of 2025, was a writer, an editor, an organizer, a fan of nerd culture, a foodie, and a self-described disabled oracle.   She founded the Disability Visibility Project with StoryCorps to collect oral histories of disabled people and share them through tweets and podcasts and images and more. She was an advocate for disabled people throughout her life. President Obama appointed her to the National Council on Disability and, in 2024, she was awarded a MacArthur “genius” grant.   She was also from Indianapolis, where she grew up as a close friend Ellen Wu, who is an associate professor of history at IU Bloomington, and the associate director of the College Arts and Humanities Institute – CAHI.   CAHI will be hosting a celebration of life for Alice Wong at Wednesday, March 25, starting at 1pm. Alex Chambers invited Ellen Wu into the studio to talk about Alice and their friendship. The Monroe County History Center Remembers In a town with a disproportionate number of museums, be it art, history, textiles, rare books, etc. it can be easy to overlook a place like the Monroe County History Center – don't do that! The History Center is housed in a regal limestone building on 5th street just west of the public library. The building and the building site are worthy of historical note. It was the location of one of the earlier schools in Monroe County, before becoming home to the first “Colored School” in Bloomington in the late 19th century. That was all before the current building was erected as one of more 1600 Carnegie Libraries that opened across the United States just over 100 years ago.   The Monroe County History Center has several galleries on the top floor, a space of mostly permanent pieces that detail Monroe County’s history through the objects and artifacts, as well as galleries that rotate regularly telling stories about the people, movements, and institutions from both the past and present. The Genealogy and Research Library is a glimpse into documents from county’s past; court records, marriage records, family histories, and a lot more from the history of Monroe County.  IU Theatre's Queer Midsummer Even if you’re not a Shakespeare fan, the comedy in A Midsummer Night’s Dream is hard to knock. Samwell Rose, an MFA directing student, directed IU Theatre’s latest take on the play, and when he heard that it focused on queer liberation - and had a circus theme, too? - Alex Chambers decided he had to go. He wrote a review of the production, for Nice Work. First Friday Fiber Fest Gallery Walk on the first Friday of each month is now a Bloomington tradition. It’s a great way to see what artists in Bloomington are making and get out and meet the folks in this community. Nice Work host Tyler Lake went out on the first Friday on March to see a bit of what was on offer. He found a lot of fiber work, some at Backspace Gallery, John Waldron Arts Center, and The I Fell Gallery and Studios. He spoke with the Curator of the exhibit there this month, David Sloma. The show is called Layered Conversations: Dialogues Between Cloth and Hand. The show is worth a look and will stay up through the end of March.

    51 min
  2. Yet Another Literary Board Game?

    MAR 11

    Yet Another Literary Board Game?

    cross-genre artists Essence London about her new game Yet Another Lit Mag, we turn up the lights on the IU Library’s Moving Image Archive and hit the hard court to hear all about bike polo.

    51 min
  3. Hold It Closer, Tiny Sweater

    MAR 6

    Hold It Closer, Tiny Sweater

    Tyler Lake talks with Althea Crome about knitting tiny sweaters, tinier gloves, and only-slightly-larger sweaters for the 2009 film Coraline. Alicia Kozma gives us the who, what, when, and where of spring at the Cinema. Steve, of Steve’s Book-O-Rama, gives us his shop’s origin story. And Bethany Habegger reflects on nostalgia and painting objects as self-portraits.

    51 min
  4. Artist Carrie Hott slows down the internet

    FEB 27

    Artist Carrie Hott slows down the internet

    Carrie Hott likes to tinker. She takes apart electronics and tries to figure out how they work. She once did a residency at the UC Davis Center for Spaceflight Research. A recent project involves a pocket-sized, solar-powered internet server that hosts a website that she coded herself.   Researching Carrie Hott’s work got me wondering, what is it that artists do? How is their inquiry different from—or the same as—scientific or technological inquiry? We touch on those questions and more in our conversation.  Carrie Hott is an artist, designer and educator. She is Assistant Professor of graphic design in the studio art department  in the Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture and Design at Indiana University, Bloomington.   Her current project, How to Slow Internet, focuses on, “collaborative experimentation with small scale communication technology in order to better consider the large scale communications infrastructure on which we increasingly depend.”  You can explore past projects (including Lamps That Sense Us, and Our Shiver) on her website.   Kayte recommends watching a series of videos from a project called Room of Edges, here. Raising the roof at an underground bar The Blockhouse Bar is tucked under another staple of the Bloomington arts scene; The Back Door. Like the best kind of joints that live under other good spots, it’s not the most easily found place. But once you find it, there’s pretty much always something going on. The number of record release events for local bands that have taken place at the Blockhouse somehow averages out to be far higher than the actual number of albums releases in that same amount of time. Nobody knows how they do it.   They also keep a regular calendar of nice and predictable events notched between comedy shows, touring bands, benefit shows, and all the other kinds of things that go down at the Blockhouse. We spoke with Kaiya Grundmann, the Booking & Promotions Manager about all the ways they stay busy over at The Blockhouse Bar.  An underwater world made of yarn Over at the Sydney and Lois Eskenazi of Art a new show by one artist has taken over the entire Featured Exhibitions Gallery. It’s a magical textilescape of knitted and crocheted coral reefs and other sea creatures, both real and imagined. The artist, Mulyana uses recycled yarn, and shredded plastic bags to depict the sea floor in different stages of life. Bright and colorful coral in the bloom of life occupies one corner of the gallery, while coral that has been bleached white sits in limbo between all that color and similar seascapes darkened into shades of gray and black. The show is called Mulyana: Vital Ecosystems, and it features dozens of intricate knitted and crocheted scenes, thousands of yellow fiber fish that hang from ceiling and an unavoidable environmental message. As you move through the space you see the effect of environmental damage, colorful coral fades to bleach white and finally to black and grays that seem to signal death and decay. The show up now through Sunday, June 28, 2026.  CREDITS  This episode was produced and edited by Kayte Young. We get production help from Danny William, Holly Wilkerson, Karl Templeton, Leo Paes, Jillian Blackburn and Jonah Ballard.    Our theme music was composed and performed by Alan Davis. Additional music from Universal Production Music. The executive producer is Eric Bolstridge

    51 min

  5. FEB 20

    What We Can Control and What We Can't

    On Nice Work, we take a second look at how we remember with poet Daniel Lassell and his new book of poetry, “Frame inside a Frame.” We go contra dancing with the Bloomington Old Time Music and Dance Group, paint a picture of artists Jack Owens, and preview an upcoming experimental music event called Overtuned Fest.

    51 min

  6. FEB 13

    The 1999 World Trade Center Protests on Film

    The directors of a new documentary, WTO/99, on how they laid out a chronology of the events. Producer Mary Forrest asks an important question about love. It's time to start thinking about summer (arts!) camp. And Alex Chambers reviews Constellation’s new show, Séance: The Board Awakens.

    51 min
  7. A day in the life of The Runcible Spoon

    FEB 6

    A day in the life of The Runcible Spoon

    On Friday November 7, 2025, six student producers descended on a beloved local restaurant, mics in hand, to record a day in the life of the place. The fact that the Runcible Spoon would be celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2026 hadn’t occurred to the students in Alex Chambers’ podcasting class, but it was the locally beloved nature of the restaurant that brought them there.  Over the course of twelve hours, from the morning shift until closing, they talked with the workers, the owners, and the customers. They heard teary goodbyes, near-death experiences, jokes, and the history and lore of the Spoon itself. In a project inspired by This American Life’s classic 24 Hours at the Golden Apple and Brave Little State’s Twelve hours at the Richmond park and ride, we bring you a day in the life of the Runcible Spoon.  This story was produced by the students in Alex Chambers Fall 2025 Advanced Audio Storytelling class: Lily Marks, Owen Koehler, Ben Burns, Audrey Ouillette, Clara Licklider, and Joe Ringer. Thanks to Regan O’Neill, co-owner of the Runcible Spoon, for helping to coordinate this and welcoming us in, and thanks to everyone who shared their stories.  University Collections at Indiana University started back in 2018. Then President Michael McRobbie wanted to bring what turned out to be hundreds of disparate collections of objects, document, artwork, sculpture and more, under one umbrella. It's a vast and varied collection of collections, and there is a dedicated gallery space, spaces actually, to exhibit pieces from not only the collection but pieces from all over the world.  In a new and recurring segment called, check ‘em out, if you want, hosts Kayte Young, Alex Chambers, and Tyler Lake recommend some things for you to check out, if you want.  This installment features Alex telling us about The Secret Commonwealth, book two in Philip Pullman’s three book series collectively called The Book of Dust.   Kayte buys into the hype around the AMC series Mad Men. A slick and thoughtful serial about ad execs on Madison Avenue in the 60’s. It examines masculine fragility in ways that feel just as relevant now as they did back in 2007 when it debuted.   Tyler goes rummaging through the Army Surplus store to find a recent series of the podcast Articles of Interest. In the series called “Gear,” host Avery Trufelman goes back to the 19th century to look at the long and interwoven relationship between outdoor outfitters and the United States military that is still as strong (and now more breathable!) as ever.

    51 min
  8. A Folk Hero, Some Fibers, And Few Frets

    JAN 30

    A Folk Hero, Some Fibers, And Few Frets

    This week on Nice Work, Bloomington journalist and author Steve Higgs tells the story of environmental activist Andy Mahler’s extraordinary life. We spin a yarn about White Violet Center for Eco-Justice in Terra Haute, and we hear from Gabriel Jenks and the New Music Ensemble.

    51 min
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Ratings & Reviews

5
out of 5
6 Ratings

About

Nice Work is a weekly celebration of the arts, culture, and creativity of south central Indiana. From the creators of Earth Eats and Inner States, the show shares stories of artists, musicians, chefs, and dreamers who make our region shine.

Information

  • Creator
    Indiana Public Media
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    25
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © The Trustees of Indiana University
  • Show Website
    Nice Work

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