Category — Galleries and Museums

There are people who profess to live a spiritual life and who will tell you in chapter and verse about everything that they do to live a spiritual life, and everything that you should do to live a spiritual life.

Then there are people like those in the families featured in Billy Luther’s wonderful film Grab, who never have to say a word, but they wind up touching your heart and soul  so deeply with only the eloquence of the example that they set in the way that they live their lives.

The film gets its title from a 300 year old celebration that is practiced by the Laguna Pueblo, in which families get together to throw food and gifts from the rooftops of their homes to show their appreciation to the community gathered below.

The viewer is invited on to the Laguna Pueblo Reservation to observe three families who will be hosting a Grab Day celebration.  None of those who were being filmed spoke directly to the camera.  Instead, we just watch as, over the course of several months, they make their elaborate preparations.

One family decides to plant a large garden, which will provide a bountiful harvest to be given to the community.  Another family who left the reservation reunites every year ahead of Grab Day, returning to their mother’s home to make their arrangements.  Grab Day giveaways are preceded by enormous feasts which take days to assemble, and the entire community is invited to partake.

A third family goes through similar preparations, and as they do, the mother, Josie, is creating a piece of traditional pottery, which will also be thrown from the roof on Grab Day.  I was mesmerized by the scenes in which Josie, sitting in the middle of a rambling family home full of children, takes this hunk of wet gray clay and gradually transforms it into a work of art.   As the film unfolds, the pot itself becomes an important member of the cast.

I felt that Luther, the cast and the crew did a beautiful job of showing humanity at its best.  It is so effectively captured in this film that during the Q&A which followed the screening, one could feel and hear how uplifted the audience was just to be in the presence of the people in this film.

The film also has its fair share of laughs and heartwarming quirks, from the presentation of a model of the town built out of cereal boxes and cookie boxes and other groceries that are collected on Grab Day, down to Luther’s idea to display still photos as if seen through a View Master toy.

It’s all just beautiful from beginning to end.

I saw the film at the National Museum of the American Indian in New York City, where it will be screening again on Saturday, June 18th at 2:00 p.m. Reservations are suggested.  And again, I have to say that the people who work at NYC’s NMAI  are always so warm, friendly and gracious.

Photographs shot during the making of Grab are on view at NMAI through July 31, 2011.

Still photos by Idris + Tony,  Cybelle Codish.

Tags: Billy Luther, GRAB, National Museum of the American Indian

to link to: Grab – At the Movies – NMAI.
 

I spent last weekend at the 2011 Native American Film + Video Festival at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian in NYC.  I’d planned on seeing one film on Friday evening, but I wound up returning on Saturday and Sunday and viewing at least sixteen works.  I am not a film buff and I’ve never before sat through so many films in the course of one weekend.  But the subject matter of these films and the words spoken by the film makers and their subjects were so compelling.  It was all so beautifully done that I didn’t want to leave.   Beyond that, everyone at the museum was so welcoming and gracious.  It was an absolutely wonderful experience from beginning to end.

The film I’d originally come to see was Shelley Niro’s Kissed by Lightning.  It’s a beautiful story about Mohawk artist Mavis Dogblood, who is grieving for the husband she’s just lost.  The film follows her as she prepares for a trip to New York City to deliver her paintings to a gallery.  At the same time, she is on a journey to find a way to let go and to say good-bye.

Every little detail of this film touched my heart.  The story delivers an emotional wallop with an understated touch.  The characters are fully realized and played to perfection by an amazing cast led by Kateri Walker,  Eric Schweig, Rachelle White Wind Arbez and Michael Greyeyes.  They are the type of characters who drew me so deeply into the story that I didn’t want the film to end.  It is set in deepest winter in the woodlands of Canada, not far from Toronto.  The snowy landscape and the sleeping woodlands almost seemed as if they were characters in the story too.

Throughout the film, Mavis’ ancestors are also present, and the story of Hiawatha and the Great Peace Maker unfolds in words, haunting music and images of Shelley Niro’s magnificent paintings.  There are also many laughs to share.   My heart is overflowing as I remember all the images.   In about a year’s time, the film will be out on DVD and I’m looking forward to seeing it again.

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The festival introduced me to unforgettable people, characters, lands and ideas that, without these films, I might never have known.  I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to see them.  The films were programmed into groups loosely based on their subjects and themes.  At the end of each group, the film makers came forward for a Q&A.

Cry Rock by Banchi Hanuse documented the people, stories, history and culture of the Nuxalk of British Columbia’s Bella Coola Valley through live action and stunning watercolor animations.   Throughout the film, there is talk about the drive to keep the nation’s stories and language alive.  (I think that at one point it was said that there were only 15 people left who were fluent in the language.)  One young man is seen sitting with two elders and cataloging the language with them.

All of this in and of itself would have made for a substantial film, but the film maker took things one step further.

The narrator is feeling the need to learn her grandmother’s stories.  At the same time, she feels reluctance about asking her grandmother to tell her stories to the camera.  She feels that the stories would somehow become compromised if they were recorded, rather than told directly and repeated the way they’d been for millennia before electronics became so widely available.

When this topic was being discussed during the Q&A, someone said something which absolutely gave me the chills.  It was  suggested that the stories themselves are living entities, each imbued with a spirit of its own, which is much more palpable when the story is told directly, from one person to the next.  This is a concept that I’d never heard before, but the minute that the words were said it made such perfect sense to me.

It’s true that books, recordings and film have gone a long way toward replacing the act of oral storytelling.  But at the same time, I am so grateful when I get the chance to  experience stories from peoples of different cultures, stories that could never have come my way without the mediums of writing and recording.

I guess that a real balancing act will be required  regarding the preservation of these stories going forward.   For my people, the die was cast long ago and our Indigenous ways are just a blood memory.  Still  I could definitely empathize with the narrator’s reluctance to film her grandmother telling her stories.

Along these lines, one of the other film makers talked about the importance of cooking from scratch and working with one’s hands in the kitchen rather than getting their food from a box or a can, because the hands give energy and vitality and a life force and spirit to the food.

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In the short titled Jack, a Lakota man who served in Viet Nam is faced with the realization that his unit, the 7th Calvary, is the same one that carried out the massacre at Wounded Knee.  I was really affected by the man’s candor and his story about how he managed to come to grips with this understanding.  I was inspired by his decision to overcome the conflict that he felt.  So much is said in the course of 4 short minutes.  You can view the film on line here.

Sally Kewayosh said of her short film Cousins, that she’d grown up on John Hughes films, and wanted to create her own coming of age story with a Native cast.  Cousins is a sweet light hearted film that captures the awkwardness of high school years without sparing the laughs.  Contemporary setting.  Terrific characters.  Really good acting.  Very entertaining.

I was deeply moved by Dustinn Craig’s A Snapshot in Time, which documents the life of his great grandfather, his relocation to Oklahoma and his return to the White Mountain Apache Reservation where he was born.  Craig also had a hand in several other films in the festival.

Amalia Cordova contributed a short film which profiled Tiokasin Ghosthorse and First Voices, the WBAI radio program that is dear to my heart.  First Voices has  introduced me to so many discussions, thoughts and guests that I’d never have heard otherwise, so it was great to get a glimpse behind the scenes of the program.

The Migration, written by Cody Harjo, was another short film that really got to me.  It demonstrated the very sad shape of America’s dying empire and what it could look like forty years from now if we continue along this course.  Relocation endures because our society has so badly damaged the land and made it uninhabitable for humans.  But even as matters worsen, it becomes evident that the only thing that will get humanity beyond this collision course is to keep faith with Indigenous ways.

In the Footsteps of Yellow Woman was created by Camille Manybeads Tso when she was in 8th grade.  In black and white sequences shot in the beautiful Navajo landscape, along with historic still photos, she imagines the life of her great great great great grandmother, who suffered relocation and internment in the 1860s.

Raquel Chapa’s Open Season addressed violence against Native women, the desperation that they experience and the lack of options that are available to them as they try to escape.  The film employed interviews woven together with arresting artistic images which are so powerful.

Siriono was set and filmed in Bolivia.  It’s a fictional story that involves a case of mistaken identity and though the delivery is light hearted throughout, all the while it’s dealing with the heavy issues of the rights of an Indigenous nation to speak its language and maintain its culture, even as their people work to learn Spanish so that they can represent themselves amongst the larger nation.

I’m sorry that I don’t have the names of the men who represented Siriono at the Q&A, because they said such interesting things.  They did not use a script for this film.   They stressed the concept of the collective in all things involved in the film, including the directing.  One of the men talked about Bolivia now representing itself as being “plurinational” (respecting the position of Indigenous peoples within the country) versus the tepid label “multi-cultural”.

The last film that I saw at the festival was Sande Zeig’s Apache 8, about a group of Apache women fire fighters.   I was so inspired by the actions, the dedication, the discipline, the words and the stories of these women.  Working as a firefighter is heroic enough, but these women each have such a strong work ethic and commitment that their outfit rose to the top of the profession.  Throughout the summer, they are called to put out wildfires all up and down the west coast.

As each woman is profiled, we learn that their accomplishments do not begin and end with fire fighting.  Most of them are mothers and several have been through heartrending hardship and loss.  Some went on to second careers and have risen through the post graduate ranks in formal education.  Several are in their 40s and 50s but maintain a very high level of fitness and focus.

It was just the most uplifting film.  I love a film that can show the possibilities that most people never consider.  I was so affected by having “met”  the women in this film.

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At every Q&A session, no matter what the subject of the films, there was this urgency felt among those in the audience that these films have got to reach a larger audience.   Native voices are few and far between in American mass media and popular culture.  It’s a pity that so many predictable generic films dominate the theaters and television when there were so many films of such high quality screened at this festival that could have such wide appeal.  They are deserving of a very large audience.

Big thanks to the NMAI for hosting this event so graciously.

Tags: 2011 Native American Film + Video Festival, Apache 8, Cry Rock, Kissed by Lightning, National Museum of the American Indian, Siriono

to link to: 2011 Native American Film + Video Festival.
 

Nikolaj Hübbe and the Royal Danish Ballet

Guggenheim Works and Process

Live Web Stream
Sunday, March 20, 2011

This is my second experience with watching a simulcast provided by the Guggenheim’s Works & Process Series. Not only is the series a wonderful concept, in which an Artistic Director can offer insight into dances moments before they are presented on stage. But having the opportunity to watch the presentation on a video stream while reading the scrolling chat in an adjacent window on my computer screen, and being in the “virtual” company of knowledgeable fans and one of my favorite ballerinas — Ashley Bouder — throughout the evening is the icing on the cake.

In this edition of Works & Process, John Meehan, Professor of Dance at Vassar College, interviewed Nikolaj Hübbe, Artistic Director of the Royal Danish Ballet and former principal dancer of New York City Ballet. RDB presented a program which combined the new — an excerpt from a work by Jorma Elo – with the old, a ballet called Napoli, choreographed in 1842 by August Bournonville. From the 1830s through the 1870′s, Bournonville choreographed over 50 ballets for RDB, creating a unique style that became the company’s signature.

The evening opened with Hübbe speaking about the way that Bournonville structured class. After his death, his students codified his teachings with steps or combinations titled for the days of the week. The first dance of the evening, an excerpt from Bournonville Variations, paid homage to his system. Five men dressed in gray, some wearing jackets which made reference to characters from classic ballets, performed an assortment of these combinations. Most of what we saw was petite and middle allegro work, sometimes performed with unusual port de bras, including one sequence where the men danced with their arms folded across their chests. The sequences moved along lines or on the diagonal, as they would in class. As a ballet student, all I could think of was how challenging all that footwork must have been. It seemed as if it never let up. The men performed it so beautifully, and their footwork was so quick and clean.

During the break, Meehan interviewed Hübbe about his training. Hübbe had it in his mind at an early age that he wanted to be a ballet dancer. His parents originally discouraged him, placing a higher value on his academic education. But by the age of 9 he’d managed to convince them to let him audition at the Royal Ballet School. He said that during his student years in Denmark, male ballet dancers were considered to be “men of craft”, on par with intellectuals and artists, and that there was no stigma involved in being a dancer.

Before I heard this interview, I never realized that Balanchine had served as Artistic Director of the RDB right after he left the Ballet Russes. He set Apollo on the RDB, and Peter Martins’ uncle became the first Danish Apollo.

The first piece in the next dance section was an excerpt from Jorma Elo’s Lost on Slow. Then came Bournonville’s Jockey Dance, a tip of the hat to the English love of horse racing. Hübbe described the theme of this ballet as being, “Anything you can do, I can do better.” I was taken by the fleet footedness of the dancers, veteran Thomas Lund and newcomer Alban Lendorf. Ashley Bouder said that one would rarely see footwork like this anywhere else. Even the hips become involved, as the dancers turn in and out at breakneck speed, each one trying to outdo the other. This piece was followed by an excerpt from Bournonville’s A Folktale. The costumes used in all the dances throughout the evening were absolutely beautiful, but the crimson red dresses worn by the ballerinas in A Folktale were just extraordinary.

The interview continued with talk of the Royal Danish Ballet itself. The company is 250 years old, and was described as being “notoriously difficult to direct” because of some of the archaic rules involved. In America, private enterprise runs the dance world. But with the Danes, it is all subsidized by the state, and with this come rules that can not be violated. One of the rules requires that dancers have to retire at the age of 40, so freelancers have be hired to play roles like the parents in La Sylphide. The Artistic Director has to maintain the balance in keeping tradition alive while keeping current with the times.

Hübbe also said that, as a young dancer, he wanted to come to America and dance with New York City Ballet because he wanted the opportunity to “step out of the story” and to prove that he could “dance without a liberetto”. So it was amusing that when he came to NYCB, the first ballet in which he was cast was Donizetti Variations, which has a libretto.

The next dance was an excerpt from Bournonville’s La Sylphide. I wish that I could credit the ballerina who played this role, because she was so lovely. Her port des bras especially was so expressive. She really embodied the look and the movement of a fairy from the forest. I would love to see RDB’s full length ballet.

The evening closed with a celebratory tarantella from Act III of Napoli, full of exuberant dancing and lovely colorful costumes.

The Royal Danish Ballet is about to embark on an American tour which will bring them to the Koch Theater at Lincoln Center, among other places. They will not be able to perform the full length La Sylphide here in New York City because the theater doesn’t have a deep back stage area and can’t accommodate the sets. Ashley Bouder added that behind the stage of the Koch Theater, all that they have is a cross over. I had to wonder why Lincoln Kirstein and Philip Johnson would have chosen to have the theater designed this way.

For hours before the performance started, Ashley Bouder was tweeting her reports from the rehearsals. She mentioned that the dancers were concerned that the floor was very slippery. Hübbe, who had been nothing but charming and charismatic and completely natural throughout the entire evening, ended the performance by thanking the dancers and expressing his relief that no one had fallen during the show!

The program is archived here.

Tags: Ashley Bouder, August Bournonville, Guggenheim Museum Works and Process, John Meehan, Nikolaj Hübbe, Royal Danish Ballet, The Jockey Dance

to link to: Royal Danish Ballet – Works & Process at the Guggenheim.
 

Some cool things that have crossed my path recently:

I saw this piece by artist and designer Dorothy Hafner at the Brooklyn Museum.  (I apologize for the poor quality of the photo!)  Take a look at the good photos of her work that appear on her website, and here and here.

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A terrific film is airing on PBS World this week called Who Does She Think She Is? It profiles five women artists who are also mothers and the choices that they had to make to stay in balance in both roles.  It is such an inspiring film which drove me to tears at the end.  I identified so strongly with these women and I could have listened to them speak all night long.  I was especially touched by the stories and work of two of the visual artists in the film:  Maye Torres and Mayumi Oda.

I was captivated by the words of drummer Layne Redmond who spoke of the legends of the goddesses who pre-dated Judaism.  I had been exploring this on my own, wanting to know how my people lived before monotheism and the dogma of religion arrived.  I had read what I could find about Astarte, a goddess of the earth who was revered in the Middle East, and Redmond mentioned her name, saying that she too had been a drummer and that there had been many goddesses depicted in “pre-historic” art as being strong women who carried a drum!

I also fell in love with the paintings of Edith Vonnegut, whose work I’d never seen before.  Visit her web site and take a look around.  She creates stunning paintings of beautiful women as super heroes within the family and as activists around the world.  These aren’t the type of super heroes who wear capes.  These women are full figured nudes and angels.  Any mother could recognize them!

The film is directed by Pamela Tanner Boll and co-directed by Nancy C. Kennedy.

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Another film that I highly recommend is Garbage Warrior, which I recently saw on Sundance.  The film is about Taos architect Michael Reynolds who builds beautiful houses called Earthships out of natural materials and discarded tires, plastic and glass bottles, and soda cans.  The film chronicles his career, along with his fight for the right to experiment with design.   It also takes us to the Andaman Islands of  India, where in the course of two weeks, Reynolds and his crew build a dwelling (again out of natural materials and garbage) in a town destroyed by the 2004 tsunami.  As he’s building it, he is teaching his methods to the other engineers, architects and builders from the town.  He’s a very inspiring figure  fighting a crucial battle that could well move us along toward a sustainable way of life.

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This photo stopped me in my tracks the first time I saw it.  The look on this girl’s face really fired my imagination. I saw it as a mixture of innocence and knowing, and I absolutely loved the shape and the movement of the wisp of her hair which the wind is blowing across her cheek.

It is part of the exhibition titled GRAB which will be showing at the National Museum of the American Indian, George Gustav Heye Center in New York City through April 17th. 

From the NMAI web site:
This exhibition presents photographs by Idris Rheubottom, Tony Craig, and Cybelle Codish, of the little-documented Grab Day. An annual tradition in the villages of the Laguna Pueblo [ . . . ] The photographers worked under the direction of filmmaker Billy Luther (Navajo/Hopi/Laguna Pueblo), whose current documentary Grab follows families preparing for this important tradition. Grab is an official selection of the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.

Tags: Architect Michael Reynolds, Brooklyn Museum, Dorothy Hafner, Edith Vonnegut, Garbage Warrior, GRAB, Layne Redmond, Maye Torres, Mayumi Oda, National Museum of the American Indian, Oliver Hodge, Who Does She Think She Is

to link to: Cool Things – 11.03.18.
 

“The balopticon is an evil, inartistic, habit-forming, lazy and vicious machine! It also is a useful, time-saving, practical and helpful one. I use one often—and am thoroughly ashamed of it. I hide it whenever I hear people coming.”

Eventually photography became so integral to his process that he wrote,  “I challenge anybody to show me when I started to use photographs.  I’ve always been knows as “The Kid With The Camera Eye’.

Norman Rockwell was born in New York City.  He dropped out of High School to attend the Art Students League.  By the age of 17 he’d become the Art Director of Boys Life Magazine.  He was 22 when he did his first illustration for the Saturday Evening Post.  The association between the publication and the artist lasted 47 years.

Some of his Saturday Evening Post cover illustrations have become a iconic images of American culture.  Most people of a certain age are familiar with them.   But it wasn’t until I saw the photos in this exhibit that I could even begin to imagine the amount of careful thought and attention to detail that went in to each illustration.

Not only was Rockwell drawing and painting these images, but more than anything, he was directing the models (mostly family and friends) to pose in the photos from which he’d work.  Then he’d cobble the images together into the strong narrative in his paintings.

The exhibit reminded me of how clever and witty the narratives were.   The words quoted above are the absolute truth.  The photos and over head projector may have helped him become more prolific, but there’s no way that anyone other than a master of drawing and painting could have turned out these works.

The photos show us that when Rockwell wanted to depict his subjects in motion, he’d have someone off camera holding up the edges of the fabrics of their clothing, or holding up the ends of a girl’s long hair to give the effect.  He even got down on the ground and helped to pose the dogs who appear in his paintings.

 

A Day In The Life of A Little Girl – Photo shows 4th image in top row
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His enthusiasm for his subjects and their stories all but bubbles off the page.  Of the photo session for the iconic painting Girl With A Black Eye (below), it was said, “By the time he finally achieved the perfect expression (on the girl’s face) he was on the floor laughing and pounding his fists.”

I got a great laugh from his 1946 painting titled Maternity Waiting Room.  Back in those days, men were not invited into the Delivery Room when their children were being born, but instead were relegated to a Waiting Room.  In this painting, Rockwell illustrates the way different men cope with the pressure and excitement of this milestone in their lives.  We’re shown the Frightened Novice (far left), the Chain Smoker (smoking in the hospital, just as it was done in the old days), and the Tragedian (whose face is buried in the sofa cushion).  But my favorites were the Father of Eight, who has fallen asleep on the couch, and the Hearty Salesman, who sees this as a moment to do his pitch and maybe close a deal or two before his baby is born.

The facial expressions that Rockwell was able to achieve are just sublime.  They can tell an entire story in a moment’s time.

The Gossips

The Soda Jerk

 

The Dugout

Of the painting below, originally made for The Saturday Evening Post but never published, it was said to be “a fitting metaphor for the artist’s own struggles with The Post as he weighed the end of their 47 year association.”

With a move to Look Magazine, Rockwell’s work traded away a bit of its cheeriness and humor and turned toward tackling the subjects of the day: Equal Rights, The War In Viet Nam, and Man’s Landing on the Moon.   Below is Rockwell’s 1967 painting New Kids In The Neighborhood and the photos from which he worked.

The painting below, titled The Problem We All Live With, seemed much more grittier when I saw it “in person”.  Though the images aren’t available,  the museum showed photo studies of the fisted hands of the Federal Marshalls, as well as studies of the tomato that had been thrown at the wall.

This exhibit, which runs through April 10th, begins as an inspiring example of one artist’s work.  But by the time you’ve walked through it, you’ve also traveled through half a century of American life, its wars, its politics, its new technology, and the drama and beauty of daily scenes and items which have long ago faded into history.

Here are some of the headlines seen on some of the Saturday Evening Post tear sheets:

September 4, 1943 – We Skip Bomb The Japs

November 27, 1943 – A Gay Short Story

August 16, 1947 – LICENSE TO KILL – The Truth About The Shocking Official Negligence Behind The Growing Death Rate On Our Highways

May 23, 1953 – Humphrey – The Man Ike Trusts With The Cash and Case History of a Maniac Who Was TURNED LOOSE TO KILL.

June 11, 1955 – How Communists Blackmail Refugees

May 25, 1957 – How Will America behave if H-BOMBS FALL

 

I recommend this exhibit very highly.  Even if commercial illustration isn’t your thing, it is fascinating in and of itself just to see how the iconic paintings were composed and how they came to life.

There is so much going on at the Brooklyn Museum right now.  Later in the week I hope to find time to write about the Lorna Simpson exhibit and the Tipi exhibit.  (I also caught a glimpse of the “reOrder” exhibit, currently under construction, which promises to be amazing.)

 

Brooklyn Museum

Norman Rockwell: Behind the Camera
Through April 10, 2011
Robert E. Blum Gallery, 1st Floor

Norman Rockwell Museum

Norman Rockwell Behind The Camera from Norman Rockwell Museum site

Balopticon, a precursor to the overhead projector, used extensively by Rockwell

 

All photos courtesy of The Brooklyn Museum except for

Girl With A Black Eye – taken from here

Marriage Counselor – taken from the Norman Rockwell Museum

Maternity Waiting Room – taken from here

Tags: A Day In The Life Of A Little Girl, Brooklyn Museum, Girl With A Black Eye, Maternity Waiting Room, New Kids In The Neighborhood, Norman Rockwell Behind The Camera, The Dugout, The Gossips, The Marriage Counselor, The Problem We All Live With, The Soda Jerk

to link to: Norman Rockwell Behind The Camera at The Brooklyn Museum.
 

Guggenheim Works and Process – Live Web Stream
Pacific Northwest Ballet’s presents Giselle Revisited
Sunday, January 9, 2011

On Sunday night, I had the opportunity to view a live web stream of the Guggenheim Museum’s Works and Process from the comfort of my home.  The Pacific Northwest Ballet (PNB)  presented Giselle Revisited.

Before last night I had very little knowledge of the company.  I’d seen their Nutcracker on television and that was about it.  So it was wonderful to have a chance to see them in this setting.  Beyond that, I have never before had the opportunity to see a ballet deconstructed to the extent that the presenters (Doug Fullington, Marian Smith and choreographer Peter Boal) did for Giselle.  I was impressed by the extent of their research and the fascinating details that they unearthed and shared with the audience.

They opened by speaking of the history of Giselle and their work in reconstructing the ballet through the use of primary sources.  The audience had the opportunity to view images of the original music scores, which had been written in the dance studio, along with pages of Stepanov notation, which had been done for the entire ballet.  I’ve spent a fair amount of time in ballet classes and theaters, and I’ve worked behind the scenes with a small ballet company, but before I saw this presentation, I never truly understood the intricacies that were involved in this classic ballet.

The presenters also pointed out voices in the music and what they were meant to say, to accompany the mime and action in the ballet.  Mention was made too of this ballet’s influence on Balanchine.  He never created a Giselle of his own, but one of the presenters pointed out distinct  references to Giselle in Serenade and Baiser de la Fee.  I’ve seen both ballets several times, but before now I never understood the connection.

The dancers, Carrie Imler, Carla Korbes, Seth Orza and James Moore, were just amazing.  Technically, they handled complex and speedy footwork with apparent ease.  Artistically, they really became the characters whom they were playing, even during these short little excerpts from the ballet.  I was especially taken by the port des bras on the women.  Their movement filled the music so beautifully.

This presentation left me with a new appreciation for Giselle.  I can’t wait to see it again, and now I’m so curious about all the hundreds of little details and references that must go in to the creation of every ballet.  I’ll also be sure to see PNB when they come back to New York City.

I am so grateful to PNB for putting together this presentation and to the Guggenheim Museum’s Works and Progress for streaming it over the web.  I feel that it’s presentations like these that will keep ballet alive and keep the audience engaged.  I also really enjoyed the chat that went on alongside the webstream, which was populated with some of my favorite bloggers and other knowledgeable ballet fans.

The best part of all was that when it was over, I didn’t have to trudge to the subway and look forward to an hour plus trip back home to Brooklyn!

The webcast is archived here.

All photos by Jesson Mata.

Tags: Giselle, Guggenheim Museum Works and Process, Pacific Northwest Ballet

to link to: Big Thanks To Works and Process and Pacific Northwest Ballet.
 

For ages, I’ve wanted to visit the Tabla Rasa Gallery in Sunset Park.  I’d never been there before and I’d been so excited when I first found out that there was a gallery here in southwest Brooklyn, about 30 blocks from my house.  Beyond that, they had an exhibit of paintings by Danny Simmons, whose work I adore.  So I decided to hop the R train and take a little trip to Sunset.

I was so glad that I went .  It was just what the doctor ordered.

The gallery is tucked away in Sunset’s industrial district, near the waterfront.  On a Saturday afternoon, the streets are quiet and empty.

I was met at the door by one of the gallery’s directors, Audrey Anastasi, and she made me feel very welcome.  She showed me around the two current exhibits and was even kind enough to show me her own studio and beautiful paintings in the back of the building, along with pieces submitted by artists for their BACKROOM ART SALE – AFFORDABLE WORKS BY GALLERY ARTISTS, (link will open a .pdf) in which no piece will be priced above $400.

The current exhibits are well worth seeing.  The first is DEAR KNIGHTS AND DARK HORSES, photogravures by Thomas Roma, which contrast haunting photos of vulnerable young soldiers about to be deployed overseas to war, and a series of rider-less ponies from the type of kiddie rides that are  found on  sidewalks outside of stores in Brooklyn.  The second exhibit, which just took my breath away, is WHEELS WITHIN WHEELS, recent paintings by Danny Simmons.  His bold use of color and ever changing direction of brush strokes is really festive.  I could have looked at these paintings all afternoon long.

If all this wasn’t nice enough, Audrey told me that no one leaves the gallery without receiving a piece of chocolate.

What a lovely gallery with a wonderful director and how cool it is to have this right here in southwest Brooklyn.  Art collectors would do well to pay them a visit.  In addition to selling original artwork, their Backroom Sale will include signed artists books.  The gallery also presents lectures and screen films.

Tabla Rasa Gallery

Audrey Anastasi

Danny Simmons

Thomas Roma

Beatrice Coron (whose work will be exhibited at the Back Room sale)

Wag Mag – Brooklyn’s Art Guide.  The November 2010 issue features Tabla Rasa as Critic’s Pic

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In the “wish I had a better camera” department, this is a shot that I took from 4th Avenue looking west before I got back on the train to come home.  There’s a ship passing through the bay in the background.

Tags: Audrey Anastasi, Sunset Park, Tabla Rasa Gallery

to link to: Tabla Rasa Gallery in Sunset Park.
 

One of the first pieces in the exhibit, whose name I’ve forgotten, is a panoramic view of constellations.  And the stars are labeled.  On the left side, each star is labeled for a species that’s become extinct.  On the right side, each star is labeled for a rock band whose concerts Fred Tomaselli has attended.

Wow.

This piece really hit home with me.   I am close in age to Tomaselli and like most of those of my generation, my teen/early adult life was hedonistic.  In younger days, my top priority in life was knowing which band was coming to town next and making sure that I had a ticket to see them.   It’s only recently that I’ve begun to reflect on how my own life long indifference to Natural Law along with my pleasure seeking ways have contributed to the damage.   I felt that this piece of artwork made for a brilliant juxtaposition of themes.

In Russell Mean’s most recent video update at Republic of Lakotah, he speaks about the fact that when we lose one species, all the rest of life pays the price.  But if we were to lose the human beings, the rest of the species would flourish.

I thought of Tomaselli’s constellation as I listened to Means’ words this morning.  The constellations really shook me up without being the least bit preachy or cloying or new agey.  It was just stars, constellations and text on a black background and it hit really hard.

(It’s not my intention to disparage rock bands or to blame them for what human beings have done to the earth and its inhabitants.   The musicians whom I listened to when I was in high school and college brought more truth my way than anyone or anything else I’d experienced up until then.  Nor would I ever want to trade the experiences that I had at those concerts in 1970s and 80s.  I so loved being part of that circus.

It’s just that lately I’ve been thinking more in terms of the balance and moderation (or lack of balance and moderation)  in American life.  I was also struck by the fact that Tomaselli’s piece appeared to be balanced — it seemed to have as many stars labeled for extinct species as it did for rock bands.)

It’s funny that this was the piece that stayed with me days after I’d been to the museum, because it was a bit different, especially in scale, than most of the other pieces.  I found something to love in every single piece that I saw in this exhibit and I’ll definitely be back to see it again.

For those who are unfamiliar with Fred Tomaselli, you can see some of his work on line and in books, but it does nothing to prepare you for being in the same room with the pieces.  For the most part, they are gigantic collages, the assembly and attention to detail of which is painstaking.  Tomaselli uses images meticulously trimmed from catalogs, pressed leaves, paint and pills to create his compositions.  The pills are used almost like  beads, often appearing to be strung together in the same fashion, but sometimes the pills just dot the image here and there, along with painted mandalas.  When viewed up close, you can see that the outlines of the central figures in the pieces tend to have tiny painted flames leaping from them.  Every square inch of every piece is so deeply laden with detail that there’s no way to take all of it in in one visit.

In the back room of the gallery, there was a series of front pages of The New York Times, in which the artist had painted over the images.  One showed (my beloved) Nick Swisher standing at home plate waiting to high five Curtis Granderson on what was probably Opening Day of this season.  Tomaselli painted a sort of twisted chain link fence over the image, making it look as if both Granderson and Swisher had their hands wrapped around the chains.

The entire exhibit was just amazing and wonderful.  I know that I end every one of my reviews by saying “Don’t miss it”, but there’s no other way to say it.  If you’re in New York City and you like Tomaselli’s work, get thee to the Brooklyn Museum as soon as possible.

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The Brooklyn Museum

Fred Tomaselli at The Brooklyn Museum

A great video of the artist at work in his studio.

Tags: Brooklyn Museum, Fred Tomaselli

to link to: Fred Tomaselli at The Brooklyn Museum.
 

People take pictures of each other in front of Warhol art at the Brooklyn Museum.  Seems appropriate.  Below are a few scenes from Andy Warhol: The Last Decade.

Disclaimer: It’s a poor artist who blames her tools, but my camera is old and outdated even by digital point and shoot standards.  Still, the photos do absolutely NO justice to the originals, all of which were so beautiful.  If you’re in Brooklyn, go and see for yourself.  The exhibit runs through September 12th.

The piece above was my favorite  in the exhibit.  It’s called Oxidation Painting [in 12 parts], made in 1978.  Believe it or not,  the materials are acrylic paint and urine on linen.  I love the metallic greens and golds and the textures.  These were among the first abstract paintings that Warhol did.  From the description of the painting:  “By urinating on the canvas he succeeded in creating the ‘physical presence’ to which he aspired in the act of painting, and simultaneously parodied the act of painting.”   Statements like these  made Warhol so beloved and make him so sorely missed.

The exhibit also includes Warhol’s films, a television series, and a wall full of covers of Interview magazine in addition to many more paintings, including his religious paintings.

Black and White Ads above

Elsewhere in the museum . . .

I’ve had a soft spot for Josef and Anni Albers ever since I saw an exhibit of their work at the Cooper Hewitt ages ago.   These pieces are called Homage to the  Square; they are from 1957.  I worked in an architect’s office in the early 1980s where we would turn out page after page of parodies of this type of work.  But I don’t love it any less.

I fell in love with this little vessel by ceramicist Rick Dillingham, whom I’d never heard of before.   On the plaque beneath this piece, I read that the artist was a contemporary of mine who’d already passed away, which broke my heart right on the spot.

My only complaint about my visit to the museum was that First Nations artists from the so-called “Americas” were barely represented.  It could be that I just didn’t know where to look for them and didn’t have the time to visit the entire museum.  But amongst one of the American painting collections I found a room which had a few pieces made by Native artists, like the piece above.

Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party is one of the most stunning works of art I’ve ever seen.  The degree of detail is amazing.  This is just one little detail that appeared on one of the runners for one of the place settings.

Stained glass from one of the 4th floor galleries [above].

I closed out the visit by seeing works by two of my all time favorites . . .

Diego

and

Georgia.

Tags: Andy Warhol, Brooklyn Museum, Diego Rivera, Georgia O'Keefe, Josef Albers, Judy Chicago, Oxidation Painting, Rick Dillingham

to link to: The Channels Switch But It’s All Television.