More on the railyard proposals

Nicolai Ouroussoff, who appears to have become the Times' new Herbert Muschamp may not be up to the task, as is disclosed in his review of the five proposals for the railyard in today's paper. He wants to use words like urbanism and density in his evaluation of the five proposals, but he wields them simplistically, like a little girl spinning out romantic dialogue for her dolls. He's studied the concepts, but seems never to have really experienced them. He petulantly longs for originality in the proposals but does not suggest what form that might take.

Yesterday, C and I walked down to Grand Central to view the models of the five proposals and had our initial feelings confirmed: Brookfield Properties has made the best of the lot. Here is their articulate and intelligent Director of Development, Kate Collignon, fielding our questions.


While discussing the dismissable Ourossoff review with C, I ridiculed the way he (Ourossoff) wishes that the proposals related more strongly and imaginatively to the railyards that will continue to operate below the surface. I said, "What, does he want the grass replaced with glass?" C looked up from his coffee and said, "That might be nice." Anyway, we both love architectural models which have really evolved in recent years. So much more than balsa, these, lit-from-below models glowed and shimmered like quartz. If not for the fact that I have seen enough such elegant models translated into actual dreary buildings, I would be more easily taken in by their promise.

I suspect Mr. Ourossoff hasn't seen much of this type of development. Has probably never pushed a project through the development process, has probably never built anything of this scale (may have never even replaced a toilet in his apartment). I fear he is an academic, and is to urban architecture what a coffee table book of prints is to painting. Oh well. And for the record, yes, all five of these proposals could have been more imaginative, but the firms that comprised the assembled teams who made these pitches know full well that governments and entities with authority to permit or deny cannot stand too much imagination and originality. If you want the green light for a public project of this size, you need to dumb it down a bit. Here are some shots of the display models, including one that proposes a large outdoor movie screen on which is shown Julie Andrews as Maria (on perpetual loop?).

From our family to yours

Bergdorf Goodman window No.5

The lighting in this window is particularly masterful, making that which is not gold shine like it, and making what are probably poured resin creatures glow like crystal statuary.

susana said...
did you notice the small windows with Duquettes stuff? did you watch Princess Mononoke, the Japanese animation? i am almost sure those characteres were taken from there: Mononoke and the wolf, the woman in charge of the iron melting factory and the horns of the deer (which was the forest god).

Please tell me if i am inventing all this?

susana

Susana, I did look briefly at the small windows but they were cryptic to me. You may have the key to the whole display, and I will be checking on it and will report, as is my duty as Conveyor of the Shallow Shine.

The stars are out @ The TimeWarner

For a third year, I would judge this to be the best holiday decoration in Manhattan. My vid doesn't do it justice, not capturing the color saturation, the richness of the music, the dramatic height of the space or the enormity of the stars, so you'll get your holiday butts into the City and see it for yourself.

The stars are scarily huge over your head as you enter the four story glass-walled atrium of the TimeWarner Center at Columbus Circle (Central Park South) where an escalator also brings you down into the WholeFoods market in the basement. The stars change color in time with the Christmas music and occasionally they burst into a crescendo of white shimmers. When you turn to look through the soaring glass out onto the circle around the statue of Columbus with its corona of fountains and tree lights, you see those reflected stars suspended in the night sky over the passing traffic. I am usually immune to this kind of thing, but this I love and wish they would keep it up all year.

Bergdorf Goodman window No.4

This one has lots of typically Tony Duquette whimsy: sea shells, sunbursts and musical monkeys. Her dancing partner is a "dinosaur" in a tux. I bet he paid for that dress, but she'll be paying for it before the night is over.

Bergdorf Goodman window No.3

In tune with the Duquette vibe, the window dressers have used what I suspect are metallic bisazza mosaic tiles to frame these windows.They are primarily used in bathrooms and kitchens (where they are now almost as passe as avocado appliances or blue pearl granite), and therefore it's Duquettish to weave them into this kind of arrangement. Bad pic, but that's a vintage boxing-ring microphone hanging in front of the mannequin's face. Boxing ring/Boxing Day/Buy it. Am I over-reaching, or do good window dressers really think it through that far?



It's taken me a while to figure out the object-of-sale in these windows, but I think they are highlighting their beaded dresses and accessories. Here's a detail of the dress shown above. I bet it's heavy, and I wonder how many 110 lb Upper East Side "social x-rays" (thnx Tom Wolfe) could walk to their limos in it without breaking a sweat.

Bergdorf Goodman - next window

Much Better than a Football Stadium

The competition is on for the development rights to 26 acres of priceless midtown Manhattan over the railyards that ride 11th Avenue between 30th and 33rd Streets. Any of these five proposals is preferable to the Mayor's failed efforts to place a football stadium/convention center on this site.

Although I have not yet seen the models on display next to Grand Central (open for public comment through Dec 3rd), at first glance, I like this one because of its "Jetsons" landscaping while feeling uneasy about how closely clustered the towers seem to be.


But this is my favorite for a few reasons. I like the way the greenspace approaches the water. I like the idea of the running-track-in-the-sky. I like the fact that they propose the restoration of the street grid. And, I trust Diller Scofidio to do right by the last section of the High Line that is part of this plot.


Sorry, Robert Stern. I hate to say it, but your proposal is the least appealing.

We raced.

More than 5,000 completed the course with registered times. Many thousands more attended this event, some cheering and some walking. Once we were engulfed by the crowd, we barely noticed the cold wet weather. At the start of the race, we took our place in the section marked for those who anticipate running nine-to-ten minute miles. Up until that moment, this had been a bit of a lark for a worthy cause. Suddenly, I was among some serious runners doing their stretches and warm-ups. These are the very focused faces of the runners lined up behind us:


Here are those ahead of us who had anticipated a faster pace for themselves (including the race winners who were doing five-to-six minute miles!):


When we got up to the starting line, the high spirited Joan "Can we walk?" Rivers was there to greet us, turning the race into great fun. She ran some of the course herself and then welcomed everyone at the finish line.


Running with camera. C who is fleet of foot could have gone much faster but kept with me, playing paparazzo.


Paul at the Finish Line:



Afterwards, we adjourned to brunch at Cassis with David and Stash and Paul who is working his way up to doing a marathon. My thanks again to all who made donations. Next year. Again.

Style is Substance

J'adore Tony Duquette who is posthumously enjoying, I hope, yet another fawning resurrection (and he's only left the building a few years ago). The New York Times rightly counsels us to emulate the way TD followed his gloriously messy instincts. Meanwhile, the gorgeous holiday windows of Bergdorf Goodman (and there really is no Christmas beyond their ten foot high glass) are this year an homage to that same overletop decorator. I wish the pics were better. These arrangements are packed with intricate dazzle that even the click-to-magnify won't entirely disclose. in this one, we find TD's signature polyps of coral surrounding a floating elephant carrying a laconic princesse de vitrine. I don't know what they are selling but who cares?

Race to Deliver

We each finished the four miles in less than 10 minutes per mile. (My time 38:12).

More after we've recovered. Thanks David and Stash for cheering us on.

Change of Season In New York City

Here's a bridge in Central Park looking very Fallular. A few steps away, the Wollman Rink was already full of skaters. A few steps beyond that, the fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel was waterless and stuffed with Christmas trees. And, here is a detail from the fabulous holiday windows at Bergdorf Goodman, just a few steps beyond the Plaza. All of these taken today, the seventeenth day of November, 2007, and the postcard quality and the "David Davidson" coloration is intentional. (We returned in the evening and photographed each of the windows of Bergdorf Goodman. The relections in daylight make them impossible to capture.) I think I'll post one of those a day and we can all be done with the festive stuff even before Thanksgiving. (Click to feel it.)

Zealous Townhouse

My opinion about the propriety of plastering the façade of one’s townhouse with bible verses is neatly expressed in the face of the neighbor’s jack-o-lantern. (Click on the pic for your personal salvation.)

As we continued our walk through the Fort Green section of Brooklyn, I was thinking about some people’s need to proclaim their faith. To proselytize. To convert. To save. I have often been irked when hearing the eulogistic phrase “He was zealous for souls.” Why is that so admirable? I think real conversions take place because someone sees something in another person that is irresistibly attractive, and wants it in his own life. If you have to “get out there and sell it”, how good can it really be? Just another phone service, but this one promising a line to God.

I guess I never felt the premise that is necessary for the business of pro-active converting: that all men need to be exposed to the “Good News” so that they can join God’s family. And, that if we don’t get out there and spread the faith, others will somehow be deprived of God. He’s God, for God’s sake. If he wants to be known to all men, he can do the canvasing a lot better than I can. He does not need a yenta to make his introductions. Also foreign to me is the adjacent concept that those people who don’t have the gospel preached to them will be in some way deprived of the presence of God. Honestly, does that make any sense at all?

Anyway, I’m lumping this townhouse in with this one, and I am guessing that their occupants would hate having each other as neighbors.

I'd like mine rare, please

You gotta love English.

Lose - Lost
Hose - Hosed
Toss - Toasted

God's Love We deliver (Update)

The sly Tater has made a second donation bringing me to within one penny of my established goal.

Anyone with a spare penny can get me to my goal by donating it here.
UPDATE: Mike just put me over the top! What a guy!

On Saturday, I ran some of the course in Central Park. Did two miles in just under 16 minutes. Rather respectable.
Today, on an indoor track, I did 4 miles in 38:15. No sweat, but left knee complained for awhile.

I must admit to feeling really pleased about having used this self-indulgent little jewelbox of a blog to do some good, and I am in awe of all the fine folks (listed below) who donated. I sure hope I didn't miss anyone. And to the person who wondered whether that was a photo of my calves, I assure you it is, and you may view the proof this coming Sunday (or any day, sub umbra nocte, in other less "plein airy" venues of the city).


(Entering its fourteenth year, the Race to Deliver is God’s Love We Deliver’s largest annual fundraiser. Since its inception, over 55,000 New Yorkers have come to Central Park to raise nearly $8 million, providing more than three million meals for men, women and children living with HIV/AIDS, cancer and other serious illnesses.

Last November, the Race to Deliver was not just another walk in the park for the 6,000 participants. It brought over 1,800 supporters of God’s Love We Deliver to Central Park. The event was hosted by the ever-topical Joan Rivers. Sponsored by their friends and families, participants walked or ran for the benefit of God’s Love We Deliver.)

UPDATE: Ted, whoever you are and wherever you are, thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: David, it starts at 10AM. That should get you on stage on time, and thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: Tater, third time is the charm, and so are you. Thanks for your generous donation. (TWICE!!)
UPDATE:SuperDaddy, I'll do an extra lap forya. Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:evilganome, Come on down and bring your running shoes. Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Lynette, send me that bread recipe. I'm gonna need to carbo-load next Saturday. Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: David B, wherever you are and whoever you are, thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Tommy, Tommy, Tommy, please start blogging again, and thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Stash, see ya Sunday, and thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Blithering Knitiot, a high fiber blogger! Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: Mike Missya. Will you be home for Christmas? Thanks for your generous donation.

Two white buildings in Manhattan

These two very white buildings have not much in common other than the color of their skin, and therefore, are illustrative of the fact that not all whites or blacks look alike.

The IAC building is new and situated in a sunny open area of Chelsea on the dry side of the Westside Highway where it meets 18th Street. You pass it on foot or on skates or bike and you feel its respiration: that of a jelly fish washed up onto sand at the beach, perhaps already dead but still glistening and inflated and quivering at high noon. You want to kick it. You want to tap it with a spoon as you would a molded Jello. The people inside it seem motionless, suspended in aspic.*




The Condict building is old and sandwiched between dour neighbors in the grimey shade of the jumble below Astor Place. You turn a corner at just the right time of day, and for a few brief minutes, the sun lights up its façade and you feel as if you have come across the corpse of a bride kidnapped at altar and thrown away between dumpsters in an alley. The elaborate finery has outlived its creator. Outlived its occupant. Outlived its celebration. You feel what you feel when you pass a Christmas tree tossed out on the curb in January with shivering tinsel still clinging to the branches.**







What is it that a building is supposed to do for us? At the very least, it should contain us with convenience. Both of these do that. At their best, buildings should tickle us, and should make convivial those places that had been nothing but the space between destinations. Both of these do that as well. I always anticipate seeing them as I approach their addresses.

Really, they have a lot in common. I love them equally, if that is possible.

*This is the headquarters of IAC, the holding company for Barry Diller’s internet ventures. It is the first freestanding structure to be designed and built in Manhattan by the architect Frank Gehry. While Diller did not get his wish to be able to view the Statue of Liberty from his desk, Gehry was able to provide him with that view from the private roof terrace accessed from Diller’s office. Unlike other well-known works by Gehry, it is not clad with metal scales, but with air-brushed milky glass. At night it is an entirely different spectacle.

**The Condict Building, a confection of lofts, was later called the Bayard Building. It is located at 65 Bleecker Street between Broadway and Bowery. It was built in 1897-99. Louis Sullivan was its architect.

From the AIA Guide to New York City :

“This was a radical building in its time, a direct confrontation with the architectural establishment that had embraced American Renaissance architecture after the Columbian Exposition (Chicago World’s Fair) of 1893. Sullivan, the principal philosopher and leading designer of the Chicago School (the antithesis of the American Renaissance), was the employer and teacher of Frank Lloyd Wright (who referred to him romantically as lieber Meister). The sextet of angels supporting the cornice was added at the request of his client, Silas Alden Condict. The building had little influence in New York for, as architectural historian Carl Condit wondered, ‘Who would expect an aesthetic experience on Bleecker Street?’”

Star Child

Our friend John in Salt Lake thinks to have identified galactic debris as the forensic reason for why I am how I am.

True enough, those grapefruit-sized things were everywhere in my hometown. Our lawn looked like a bocce court. It made autumnal leaf raking impossible.

One crashed into the kitchen and splashed down in the large pot in which my mother was always boiling spinach for me and my brothers. (No lightly wilted leaves for her. She'd boil a mess of it right out of the can until it had lost all color, and then serve it doused with white vinegar.) "Leave it in! Leave it in!" we screamed.

Never ending source of amazement

To whomever got to my blog earlier today by googling "purple shirt guy surrendering to jesus over a bridge", I've really tried hard to imagine what you were looking for, but I can't come up with anything. I hope you found it.

On the other hand, you who googled "boardwalk bar lauderdale 'private dances'"? I know exactly what you are looking for, and watch out. Those guys are fond of slipping things into the drinks that are intended to make you open your wallet. In my case, I simply got sick and ended up discreetly vomiting.

And you who googled "gay dog own tie "? What, are we having a full moon?

"Let us show you the light at the end of the tunnel"

That's the best ad line I've heard in ages. I've lifted this text from a regular email that arrives from "HX Insider". Here's the full ad and the picture:

Face to Face NYC

For the guy with a 'dark side,' Anal bleaching is all the rage!

Try our new Anal Bleach Treatment. This Chelsea day spa is tucked away in an unassuming office building providing super discretion. If you decide to bleach, wax or enlist in the Betty Ford Body Treatment, your privacy will always be respected.

Still in the dark? Let us show you the light at the end of the tunnel:

face to face nyc - day spa 20 west 20th street

suite 603 new york city, ny 10011

212.633.0404 info@facetofacenyc.com

Not Always A Bridesmaid

Although the results are not yet official, I'm going to declare that congratulations are in order.
He's the 2007 Weblog Award Winner - Best LGBT Blog

Early Thanksgiving

For many years, our families have adjusted the celebration of holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas to allow for the fact that we are never around at those times. This is incredibly kind of them and it turns inside out what could have been an ideal opportunity for them not to have the discomfort of "gay" at their table or by the festive tree.

This year, I decided to be helpful, given my domestic loungesse, and announced that I would bake the bread for our Friday early Thanksgiving at the home of C's mother.

If it was bread for us, I'd have been more exotic and spicy in my choice of what to make, but when baking for a variety of tastes, ages and teeth, I take the hand of culinary caution as I enter the kitchen.

After consulting a number of my dusty cookbooks and searching the web for multi-grain recipes, I was tipped off that Hodgson Mill puts out a fine boxed bread mix that doesn't really save you any time but guarantees a savory while broadly tested and acclaimed flavor. I chose their nine grain mix and also their European cheese and herb mix.

I still had to proof the yeast, which, like riding a bike, came back to me after all these store-bought years. I had almost forgotten what "luke warm" water from the faucet should really feel like on the fingers. Suddenly, I saw myself remembering to heat the bowl with hot water before pouring the water, pinch of sugar and yeast into it. I watched it foam up like alchemist's gold. I cut the butter into the flour mixture with a fork just like my grandmother used to do (while muttering about how none of her twelve children cared enough about her).



And then, that sense of elasticity in the dough as you knead it, adding some of the conserved flour mix to keep it from sticking to your hands. Letting it rise covered with a damp dish towel next to a mug of hot water in the warming drawer under the oven. Punching it down and letting it rise again before the baking.

C's family is fond of dinner rolls so I made sure to produce some. They look OK. I suppose I ought to try one to make sure they're done. I tapped the loaf on the bottom. It sounds right. Hope they like it.

God's Love We Deliver

Having trained these calves by moonlight in the Central Park Ramble, I am putting them to good use by participating in the 14th annual "Race to Deliver", on Sunday November 18th in Central Park. If you're in town and want to join us, let me know.

You can help me reach my goal by donating here.

(Entering its fourteenth year, the Race to Deliver is God’s Love We Deliver’s largest annual fundraiser. Since its inception, over 55,000 New Yorkers have come to Central Park to raise nearly $8 million, providing more than three million meals for men, women and children living with HIV/AIDS, cancer and other serious illnesses.

Last November, the Race to Deliver was not just another walk in the park for the 6,000 participants. It brought over 1,800 supporters of God’s Love We Deliver to Central Park. The event was hosted by the ever-topical Joan Rivers. Sponsored by their friends and families, participants walked or ran for the benefit of God’s Love We Deliver.)

UPDATE: Ted, whoever you are and wherever you are, thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: David, it starts at 10AM. That should get you on stage on time, and thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: Tater, third time is the charm, and so are you. Thanks for your generous donation. (TWICE!!)
UPDATE:SuperDaddy, I'll do an extra lap forya. Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:evilganome, Come on down and bring your running shoes. Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Lynette, send me that bread recipe. I'm gonna need to carbo-load next Saturday. Thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE: David B, wherever you are and whoever you are, thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Tommy, Tommy, Tommy, please start blogging again, and thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:StashSee ya Sunday, and thanks for your generous donation.
UPDATE:Blithering Knitiot, whoever and wherever you are, thanks for your generous donation.

A Boston Less-on

This is Boston:



And therefore, I am quite certain that the neighbors on Dwight Street object to this display:



I'm conflicted about the lesson to be learned here.

Half of me says that people should fall in line with and celebrate the "melody" of their street, reining in (as inappropriate) any desire to turn "inside out" the bubbling creative spirit of one's own personality. This is the half of me that agrees with a friend's mother who once counseled "Dress to please others. Eat to please yourself."

Half of me says that gloriously "gaudy" and childlike free expression is the central ingredient to visual richness, and that conformity breeds death. This is the half of me that will always choose whole wheat over white. Chocolate over vanilla.

Sometimes when driving through the historic town centers of Connecticut in which clusters of historic homes are all painted pale variations of white, you find a house saturated with festive lime green or vivid acqua, and research tells you about acrimonious town meetings in which neighbors band together to pass ordinances forcing such a one to repaint according to "the look" of the district. Pink flamingos may be fine for South Beach, but...

When one first begins painting, or taking pictures (or blogging?), one has a tendency to use all the colors in the box, and to depict and to say as much about everything as time and personal appetite allow. After awhile, a more calm sense of direction prevails, and we each edit our expressions to that which has, through fire, become most truly our own voice.

Is this a good thing, or is it just a sign of age? If they are both "stages of development" through which we all pass, is there room for both on the same street, or, oughtn't they be clustered separately?

The Boston Round-Up

Here with us are the evilganome and Tater on the left and Will on the right.



and not pictured are G (who spent the weekend in his hotel room with a back injury perhaps acquired at the Celtics game), RG, the Monkey and Atari.



And I drank "Original Sin" cider and ate pulled pork at an insanely popular place called


The blazingly good company of the Boston bloggerati more than offest the remnants of hurricane Noel. Oh and Lynette? We talked about you incessantly.

Stella Matutina

If you haven't looked up into the pre-dawn sky in the last few weeks and seen the brilliant Venus, you really should. We did this today and I am taking it as a favorable omen for the weekend to come which will be spent in Boston in orbital intersection with these other celestial luminariesand their uncharted moons.

Sol Lewitt for sale at Christie's on January 15th.

On January 15th, Christie's will offer our Sol Lewitt painting at auction. One of the benefits of consigning a piece like this to a major auction house is their ability to create some buzz about the piece. They know people. They have also assured me that our smallish Sol Lewitt, which may have originally been a study for his much larger paintings entitled "Squiggly Lines" (I saw them at his Whitney retrospective and also at the now defunct Ace Gallery in New York.) will be in the good company of a few other Sol Lewitts.

As I took it off the wall and swathed it in bubble wrap, I took one last moment to review what I had learned from it. A painting can be successful if it forces you to look twice at the way colors or shapes interact and cause a reaction in your brain. That's what made Sol Lewitt good. Though disarmingly simple, his images put the viewer in a pleasant stranglehold.

I put it in a large plastic bag from Bed Bath & Beyond. To avoid the rain, I brought it into a crowded subway at 66th Street for two short stops and wondered what a thief would think if he were to snatch it and get it home and unwrap it.

At Christie's receiving dock on 49th Street, no one fawns over what you bring in. A man in a glass booth puts aside a styrofoam coffee cup (I'd thought they would all drink from Limoges), and checks your paperwork. I signed something, and when I turned around to pick up the painting and officially hand it off (and to take back the very large and reusable BB&B plastic bag), it was already gone. Like a movie scene in which a too young mother gives up her baby which is whisked away from her before she can give it one last kiss.

For a decade we had lived with this painting. I fear we never really gave it the love it deserved. We bought it at a silent auction in the Wretched Little City. A benefit event involving a drag ball. Sol Lewitt was a generous and unpretentious man who made a habit of donating pieces for worthy causes. Only one other person in attendance knew its value and bid against us. We were delirious when the bidding closed and it was ours for very little.

There. I've done my part to help create some buzz. If any of you other bloggers feel inclined to wrestle with the notions of modern art, conceptual art, intellectual art, minimalism, traditional or representational art and want to lift this photo and use "Sol Lewitt" in your subject line, you'll increase our chances that some young trader looking to invest a bit of his year-end bonus may see it and do battle for it in January, and that will make us very happy. I know. I am shameless.

Amusing news

A Rotarian, a priest and a perv,
And seventeen husbands pulled up to the curb
Of a Westchester stop
Where they met a hot cop
Who showed them the love they deserved.

Ecce sacerdos magnus qui in diebus suis placuit Deo.

I've lost a friend who was indeed a great priest.

He didn't much like losing his hair at an early age but managed to laugh about it.

He knew all the old hymns, both the Catholic and Protestant ones. When I told Edward that I had read that Wallis Simpson's favorite hymn was "Will there be any stars in my crown?", he immediately pulled his copy off the shelf, took me right up to the choir loft and pounded it out on the pipe organ while I sang every verse in the empty chapel at 2AM.

As you can see, he and Renato could resist looking at the camera whenever we were being photographed at St Peter's, but I could not. This was our position behind the high altar, three feet away from where the Pope was lowered in the sedia. As soon as his feet touched the floor, the three of us would make a profound genuflection that caused our white pleats to billow in unison. Paul VI would give us a moment's attention through narrowed eyes and once or twice he grumbled something under his breath, but he knew we were just having fun and enjoying our youth, and being part of the spectacle, and perhaps doing just what he had done when he was our age.

Edward and I could easily crack each other up, and more than once we got into a bit of trouble for not being able to stifle uncontrollable laughter during the papal solemnities.

Edward, I am honoring your wish for prayers and candles to speed you out of purgatory and into heaven where you will once again have a full head of hair in which to anchor a crown full of well-earned stars.

A.G.A.S.T.

Last weekend, we made the trip to industrial Brooklyn to take in this year’s AGAST, (Annual Gowanus Artists Studio Tour).




We saw some unspeakably bad art but I amused myself with an examination of how the various artists kept their paints and brushes. Some neatly and some not.





C, however, was quite taken with an installation by Melanie Fischer in her workspace. She had fashioned twisty “plants” of green material and set them on the floor, creating an eerie little forest in which one finds a swing. I admire C’s willingness to enter into the enchantment of a stranger’s dreamscape but I wasn’t sure about the functionality of the swing.






We walked by three ladies laughing the day away in the tiny corral in front of their seasonally decorated home. The one in the middle urged me to take their picture. The one in blue wasn’t having it.