Eating Art for Lunch
Best Saturday ever: first, Ann Hamilton’s installation at the Park Avenue Armory, then the George Bellows retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Ann’s from Lima, OH; Bellows hails from Columbus. As a Cincinnatian, nice to know that our state’s renown extends beyond it being a swing state, and a conservative bastion. If either work...
Birthday Suits
Sometimes a demurral speaks volumes, as I discovered at the Metropolitan Museum of Art this weekend. Me and my spouse dropped in to catch Naked Before the Camera, a pocket-sized exhibition of photographic nudes culled from the Met’s own holdings. The show is smart and informative, combining names from the arts canon (Eakins,...
Dig Two Graves
The sound of the wind was strong. It was that, and what felt like sudden warmth that made Christina sit up, then shield her eyes from the sharp light. She’d fallen asleep in the field. How long had it been—an hour? Minutes? She yawned. The inhalation rephrased the moment, reminded her why she’d come back...
The Friends of Frank
On recent sleepless nights I’ve been haunted by an image of a person I’ve come to know well. The man has the face of a pugilist; tall and long-limbed, he stands with his hands behind his head wearing nothing but a pair of boots and a taunting, defiant stare. This portrait of Frank O’Hara, by...
James Farentino 1938-2012; Nicol Williamson 1936-2012; Eiko Ishioka 1938-2012
Farentino was lethal: a handsome actor whose performances ranged from Happy in Lee J. Cobb’s Death of a Salesman (later onstage as Biff to George C. Scott’s Willie) to Juan Peron in the Faye Dunaway telefilm “Evita Peron.” My favorite: his hotheaded lawyer in TV’s The Bold Ones. The Scotsman Williamson was a pretty decent...
Pleasures By Parsons
With Manhattan now plunged into tundra-nipping temps, no one could be blamed for falling into the contagious warmth that emanates from the Joyce Theater in Chelsea. Now through the 22nd, Parsons Dance is weaving its spell of virtuosic imagination that since 1985 has only deepened in its ingenuity and delights. Would that every company instilled...
Too much to see dept…
From Gayletter: Above: Charles Demuth (American, 1883–1935). Dancing Sailors, 1917 Slideshow: Keith Haring (American, 1958–1990). Unfinished Painting, 1989.
Serra, Serra…
Ah, those pesky associations: as I walked the curves and alleys of Richard Serra’s Junction/Cycle now showing at the Gagosian Gallery, the déjà vu practically bit my butt. Those swerving surfaces reminded me of other Serras, sure, but they also resemble the vistas captured in the film 127 Hours, the biopic about hiker Aron Ralston’s...
Capering Calders
In a perfect world, I’d have lots of money, a non-stop supply of peanut M/M’s and a house with an Alexander Calder sculpture in every room. Long shots all, but the third is close enough to touch, at least until the 23rd of December: Calder 1941 focuses on a pivotal year in the life of...
Opening Doors, on Fifth Avenue and in Harlem
It’s the comeback of the year. Pardon my exaggeration, but the National Academy Museum has always held a fond place in my heart since I first visited in the mid 1990s. A block or so north of the Guggenheim, it’s one of those unsung jewels that, because of its size, tends to get overlooked on...
