Tag Archives: Art

Conjunctions

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Pearl and Lou

It was a dark and stormy night. No, I’m waking up in LA. It was another bright and sunny morning. Dave had emailed us in the middle of the night that he had missed his connection in Tokyo. He was returning to LAX from his conference in Hong Kong and his flight to Tokyo was delayed. He wouldn’t be arriving in the morning as planned, but at 5 PM. This threw into disarray our plans for the day. We had arranged to meet Lou and Pearl, Anne’s uncle and aunt and Harry’s older brother. Lou is a nonagenarian. We had planned to entrain the ‘Boyz of Noise’, descend upon their home and then go out to dinner. Lou and Pearl generously agreed to wait for us. This impromptu delay dovetailed nicely for Dan. He had stayed up until dawn and not partying. He told us this when we called him to explain the change of plans. He hung-up with a statement full of dark foreboding, he had a story to tell us.

With our day free until five, Anne and I went to the Getty. Suffice to say, the museum lived up to its hype. We loved it. It is a contemporary architectural masterpiece. Styled on the theme of an Italian village, I found the outside of the museum more impressive than anything on the inside. It is so befitting of tinsel town, where exterior form out ranks interior function. Don’t miss it though, if you have the chance to see it. There will be much more posted on the Getty in the future.

Anne with the LA Skyline Behind Her

Five o’clock rolled around. We picked up Dave and then took a circuitous route back north to Lou and Pearl’s. Google maps had redlined the 405. Some sort of LA car-mageddon was underway Saturday night, under the guise of normal Saturday traffic. Anyway, we made it. Lou is a consummate story-teller, with stories told in school that should be told out of school. Like the Getty, there is much more to be posted. Dan joined us shortly thereafter and our family was reunited for the first time since Christmas. Lou and Pearl treated us at their favorite steakhouse. At dinner Dan told us his story.

CalArts’ commencement celebrations can collect crashers. One of Dan’s classmates disrupted an attempted sexual assault. [IMHO] He got a busted lip for his trouble. The perp then fled. Confronted by campus police, he assaulted two officers, before biting a third. Dan spent the rest of the night at an urgent care center, after driving his wounded classmate there. That’s my boy!

Tomorrow, we four head into the mountains, where internet access is spotty, read non-existent. While postings have been falling like rain, here in the content capital of the world, in the mountains, words could be few and far between. Stay posted.

2012 CalArts Graduation

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Dan graduated from CalArts last night, with a Master of Fine Arts. Years ago, he had declined to attend his BFA commencement at Webster, so this was his first commencement. It was unlike any commencement that I’ve ever gone to. It was quite the party, quite the wild party. I’ve included some random crowd shots to give the feel of the ceremony. Amanda, Dan’s friend, also graduated last night. The rest of the people pictured, just think of supporting cast. The bad boys and girls of the School of Art lived up to their rep. Condemned to walk last, they suffered an interminable three-hour wait. What took so long, was that each graduate was alloted ten seconds of audio sound track as they walked the stage. Most of the grads had music playing and some tracks were embarrassingly popular. Best sounds went to a south Asian man whose audio recording was a well-timed correction of the pronunciation of his alphabet soup name, “No Dean so-and-so, my name is pronounced, …” Anyway, let’s get back to those bad art students. After the last of them had walked, it was announced that a beloved teacher was retiring. Spontaneously, the entire graduating art school rushed the stage and risked its collapse, much to the consternation of security. It all turned out well though and afterwards food and drink was served.

I, Aye, Eye

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Eye by Tony Tasset

This post is a bit of potpourri. It has no central theme, so you could call it scatter-brained, if you like. I prefer the description, eclectic and I hope it pleases.

Based upon a single Facebook comment, we can assume that Dave safely made it to Hong Kong. It is not much to go on, but unless someone has rather cleverly hacked his account we must take this as proof of life. I would like to hear more of how he is doing, but not at the cost of a four-figure cell phone bill. Stay tuned.

I filed a claim with my insurance company for damages from last month’s hail storm. I had already decided to ignore the baker’s dozen dents in the Prius, when our neighbor came to us last weekend. He explained that he and most of our surrounding neighbors have already contacted their insurance companies and arranged for their new roofs. Further, when he asked his adjuster, what does hail damage look like, the adjuster pointed to our roof and pointed out the damaged spots. I called my insurance company on Monday and started the process.

I would like to recommend “lex-i-con VALLEY” with Bob Garfield and Mike Vuolo, a Slate podcast on language. Etymology, the study of historical linguistic change, especially as manifested in individual words, has always been a subject of interest for me. Discussions of words and language, when well done can be both informative and entertaining. However, when it is performed poorly, it can be as dry as dust. “Lex-i-xon” is now in the mist of a multi-episode investigation of gender in language. Come on guys, I can hear your eyeballs rolling back into your heads already. Hear me out.

Their latest podcast is about gendered pronouns, like, he, him, his versus she, her, hers. The fundamental question of this show is what to call people of unknown gender. He, him, his is the default, but in the 1970s a pair of female Harvard divinity students petitioned the university to start using gender neutral pronouns. Faculty pushback was immediate, one dean accused the two of pronoun envy and another labeled the pair, distaff theologians. A word of warning, explicit language is used on the show.

Tony Tasset’s “Eye” supplies the graphic for this post. It is part of the collection at Laumeier Sculpture Park. The following is Laumeier’s description of this work.

Through this gigantic, blue eyeball Tasset creates tension as the sculpture stares, larger than life, across the landscape and back at the viewer. Modeled after Tasset’s own eye, the never-blinking, constantly conscious piece watches over Laumeier day and night. The human eye is simultaneously unique, individual and emblematic. By focusing on a key part of the body, Tasset speaks to a commonality among us. It addresses how we engage and perceive each other while concurrently asserting a prophetic, perhaps even omniscient, presence.

I heard on the radio this morning, a young man’s shout out to his mother, “Mom you are the Bomb.com!” It’s a little late for Mothers Day, but as I say, better late than never.

Laumeier Art Fair

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Laumeier Art Fair

On Sunday, Mothers Day, Anne and I went for a bicycle ride. This is a common Sunday activity for us. We ride on most weekend day. It being Mothers Day, our destination wasn’t all that unusual either. We rode to Laumeier Sculpture Park for the 25th anniversary of the Laumeier Art Fair. Anne has been visiting this art fair for most of its twenty-five years. In the beginning, I would watch the boys and Anne and Joanie would take-off for Laumeier. I feel a little bit guilty for usurping Joanie’s place, but Anne really wanted a ride. Besides, the boys have flown the coop.

This destination was a little bit outside my comfort zone. Not the sculpture park, but its environs. Don’t get me wrong, the park is located in a very tony neighborhood, but the road network that supports it, I found questionably bike friendly. I am frankly more comfortable cycling in the City of Saint Louis. Even with its ‘sketchy’ neighborhoods, it boast a road network that was designed and built for a million people and now supports only a third that number. Consequently, there are plenty of low traffic roads available to us cyclists. On the other hand, the county, in particular West County makes due with a rural road network that has been overgrown with urban sprawl. In the county, there are now fast traffic roads that string together islands of neighborhood bike friendly streets. 

With this backdrop, we sallied forth. Our itinerary included Maplewood, Webster and Kirkwood, all familiar destinations. Leaving Kirkwood, we began a process of navigation by successive approximation. We snaked through the bike friendly neighborhoods and limited our exposure on the fast traffic lanes using our iPhones. We would memorize the next few turns, hop on bikes, ride and repeat. It really was only a few extra miles, but such is my fear and prejudice about riding in the county that it felt like a major victory. We got 25 miles.

In the background above and again below is pictured Alexander Liberman’s “The Way”. It is bright red now, with a new coat of paint. It was constructed from eighteen salvaged steel oil tanks. “The Way” is the signature art work for Laumeier Sculpture Park. Below is the park’s description of this piece:

“The Way” has long stood as an acting symbol for the park, projecting in all directions like the guns of a giant battleship. This monumental work dominates the field; its scale is, in part, and meant to represent the awe-inspiring impact of classical Greek temples and mammoth Gothic-style cathedrals. The massive crumpled cylinders are welded together and placed to resemble a post and lintel architectural system. With numerous points of tension, this sacred pile of weighted geometry possesses shrine-like properties with humorous undertones, familiar to a failed game of Jenga. Discovered along the northeast coast, the eighteen salvaged steel oil tanks are a towering gateway built-in the modernist spirit. Cadmium-red was chosen for its symbolic qualities, representing beauty in Russian culture, and as a luminous abstract mixture that unifies all of the constructed parts of this work. Liberman’s carefully placed industrial columns offer layered symbolism that combines site with compositional elegance and bold enthusiasm of form.

The Laumeier Art Fair is small by some standards, but it boasts an excellent locale. The weather on Sunday was brilliantly perfect, not too hot, not too cold. I keyed on the photographic artists, because my brother, Chris, has begun to sell some of his photos. The stretched canvas framing technique that he has used, was very popular. Another framing technique in vogue was the triptych. A panoramic photograph would be subdivided into thirds, with the twist that the center section could stand on its own and was sold as such. There were no Mark Rothko prices, but close.

The Way, by Alexander Liberman

Art by Day, Magic by Night

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Bob, Nink, Meghan and Andrew arrived in Saint Louis on Friday. All, long time friends and former Saint Louis residents, they blew into town for two reasons. They are attending a wedding in Branson and their son Andrew received an award from his alma Mater, Fontbonne. Nink met Professor Mary, our fellow Team Kaldi’s teammate. Andrew is now a doctoral candidate in Applied Sociology at Yale. Friday night, we all went to Ted Drewes, a Saint Louis tradition. It was a warm and sultry night. In the morning, we sent them on their way to Branson.

Don’t you wish your girlfriend was hot like me? Red in the face and all covered with sweat-ie.

It was actually more like the butt-crack of noon before they departed. By then last night’s sultry had turned to down right surly weather. We rolled the bikes through the climate control airlock and entered the soup that passes for the atmosphere around here. Our modest goal, was Left Bank Books, just across the park from us, in the CWE. While winding down Wydown, I had an epiphany for today’s blog post: Check out the progress on preparations for the Lantern Festival, at the botanical gardens. It opens later this month. We’ll have to wait until then to see the magic.

So, we diverted to the gardens and photographed the new lanterns. These are elaborate outdoor sets crafted mainly of silk and steel. They celebrate Chinese culture through bold color, dazzling light and striking design. At this point it is still a work in progress. The gold dragon at the entrance is finished and I think, illuminated at night. The centerpiece of the show, what I’ve dubbed the Porcelain Dragons, is only half-finished. It is skinned with real porcelain plates, cups and spoons. They are all ornately tied together with string. This fiber artwork is repeated with precision throughout.

The show doesn’t officially open for another two weeks. It will run all summer. It just so happens that Dave departs for Hong Kong in about a week. I look forward to hearing about his trip. This is developing into a China-centric year.

Left Bank Books didn’t have Anne’s book, but she did buy a card. I will buy her books on Amazon tonight. I can hear the hissing from certain quarters, but the bad news is that publishing is dead. The good news though is that the written word is doing fine. [this blog aside] I’ve finally signed up for Amazon Prime, primarily for the online video service, but I also get free shipping. How long will that last?

We next stopped at FroYo, the home of premium frozen yogurt. Oh, come on, it was hot out. The business model is cafeteria style. You create your own frozen yogurt creation and it gets priced by the pound. I mean by the ounce. We ran into Kubie at the Forsyth entrance to the park. It just so happens that she had launched at about the same time that we did. She actually rode all of those four hours, while we played. We got a measly 15 miles, but better than none.

The Allegory for Irresistible Force Confronts the Metaphor of the Immovable Object

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Squirrely Art

“The Allegory for Irresistible Force Confronts the Metaphor of the Immovable Object” is the title of Dan’s thesis art work. Dan describes it as, “a one hundred foot long slice of geometric landscape inhabited by a multitude of tiny adorable squirrels drawn in awe towards an object they can’t fully perceive or understand.” When it was on display, it spanned a room 100′ wide. It is constructed from wood, flocked vinyl, a rock from the beach that was trailered to LA, a nylon strap to hold the rock and 1000 hand-sculpted squirrels. Dan and many of his friends worked many long hours making and paint those squirrels. I picked one close-up of the work to include with this post. More photos are on display on Dan’s website. So what does Dan plan on doing with his 100′ long art work? He plans on cutting it up into one foot sections. Some sections will go as thank you gifts to his army of squirrel painters. The rest he plans on selling. Dan has two or three more art shows scheduled for this summer. This is good news. More good news is that he will be accompanying us on our whirlwind tour of California.