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temporary beer garden near the Downtown Stage and the interior of Container Park on Sixth Street. RM Seafood's Rick Moonen, Hard Rock Hotel's Culinary Dropout, Origin India, Palm Restaurant, Red Rock Resort's T-Bones Chophouse, and Fleur by Hubert Keller are among the participating vendors. Onstage presenta- tions at Container Park by such star chefs as Marc, Bryan, and Larry Forgione; Keller; Jet Tila; Eric and Bruce Bromberg of Blue Ribbon fame; Scott Conant; and Spike Mendelsohn are scheduled throughout the festival. Life Is Learning This year's lineup of guest speakers is highlighted by Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, members of the Russian punk band Pussy Riot, the anti-Putin activists imprisoned for more than a year after being arrested for hooliganism at a protest in Moscow. The two will be featured in a 90 -minute session titled "Truth," joined by former Las Vegas mayor Oscar Goodman. Designed to uplift, each 90 -minute learning session will feature three to four speakers, says Erin Booth, the festival's head of speaker relations, with a wide range of backgrounds, educations, and professions. David Peterson, who created the language used in HBO's Game of Thrones, will be part of the series. Also signed on are Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, one of the individuals most responsible for Downtown's redevelopment; Ed and Sekena Gavagan, storytellers on the radio show The Moth; and Amelia Rose Earhart, granddaugh- ter of legendary pilot Amelia Earhart. "Similar to the music and cuisine, we want the learning series to be a real destination," Booth says. "These sessions will be a highlight experience unto themselves." Life Is A rt Returning as curator of the Life Is Beautiful art installation is renowned Las Vegas collector Patrick Duffy, who will take over space at the Western Hotel with 15 artists. A total of 47 artists submitted work to Duffy, who chose a variety— from longtime Las Vegas landscape artist Jerry Misko to students at Las Vegas Academy. Eric Tillinghast, famous for his aquatic installations and the creator of a massive fountain at the Town Lodge at last year's festival, is also returning. In addition, wall-size murals and various smaller pieces will be shown throughout the festival. Charlotte Dutoit, who heads an interior design company in Puerto Rico, is back as curator of the Life Is Beautiful street art program. And Choudhry says you can expect random acts of performance art, such as an oversize tricycle leading a conga line from venue to venue. It's called the Lionel Express, in honor of Lionel Richie, and conducts attendees from one end of the festival to the other. "We want people to have to make a difficult choice about joining this line of people, all dancing to 'All Night Long,'" Choudhry says, smiling. "We want them to ask, 'Do we have time to conga?'" At Life Is Beautiful, the answer has to be yes, if you plan ahead. October 24–26; lifeisbeautiful.com V "IT's fOr peOple we call 'experIence enThusIasTs,' and ThaT Includes jusT abOuT everyOne." —rehan choudhry clockwise from left: An aerial shot of the crowd watching Capital Cities' performance on the Ambassador Stage at last year's two-day inaugural Life Is Beautiful; festival founder Rehan Choudhry; singer ZZ Ward got cooking with chef Scott Conant at last year's fest. vegasmagazine.com  53

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