One of my favorite bloggers posted the rules he gives to his writing students. These excellent guidelines for writers (and readers) are applicable as well to those of us who work in the visual arts. I have extracted from his posting below, but you can read the entire piece on his blog, Joe Felso: Ruminations. […]
Physicality and Intimacy
Nicole Long, poet and friend, sent me this quote from Henri Nouwen: A few times in my life I had the seemingly strange sensation that I felt closer to my friends in their absence than in their presence. When they were gone, I had a strong desire to meet them again but I could not […]
What is Unfolding
Beginners How could we tire of hope So much is in bud now? We have only begun to imagine justice and mercy, Only begun to envision how it might be to Live as siblings. We have only begun to know the power that is in us. So much is unfolding that must complete its gesture. […]
Certainty vs Complexity
I can’t move on, not just yet…Still thinking about Tom Stoppard’s trilogy, Coast of Utopia, and about Isaiah Berlin’s insightful Russian Thinkers, the book that launched Stoppard’s interest in writing about this historical period in the first place. Here is another quote from Aileen Kelly’s excellent introduction to Berlin’s book, a quote that is so […]
What Spring Does with the Cherry Trees
After seeing yesterday’s posting of the Eastern Redbud in full rapture, my friend Sally Reed reminded me of this exquisite and sensual poem by Neruda: Every Day You Play Every day you play with the light of the universe. Subtle visitor, you arrive in the flower and the water. You are more than this white […]
The Revery Alone Will Do If Bees are Few*
Best display of spring treeness goes to this amazing creature that uses every available surface to celebrate. (For those of you in New York City, this one-of-a-kind tree is in Central Park just north of the Metropolitan Museum in New York.) *Emily Dickinson, and yes, bees are few.
Indra’s Net at 88th and Fifth
Alyson Shotz, The Shape of Space, 2004. Cut plastic Fresnel lens sheets and staples. Highlight from a recent visit to the Guggenheim Museum: In the lobby, the first thing you see is a beguiling wall of light which turns out to be Fresnel lenses stapled together. I sat with and walked around this curtain of […]
Stoppard Marathons, Theatrical Extremes and Other Joys
So much good commentary is available online about Tom Stoppard’s trilogy, Coast of Utopia, so I won’t spend time here rehashing the larger context of the play and its subject matter. Instead I’ll be blatantly bloggish and personal and just say that I was in an altered state through the entire 12 hour marathon. (Still […]
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Lots of Language, and Not
I’m off to New York for the “Coast of Utopia” 3 play marathon on Saturday. Given Stoppard’s legendary love of words (“He uses too many!” says my friend Joseph Gifford), here’s a poem to commemorate the other end of that spectrum, where language is underspoken and unfinished… Ars Poetica would it wake the drowned out […]
Schjeldahl on “Global Feminisms” Show
Ingrid Mwangi (Kenya), Static Drift, 2001 While some may not be as enamored and delighted by Peter Schjeldahl’s art reportage as I usually am, here’s a passage full of ideas from his latest review of the “Global Feminisms” show at the Brooklyn Museum from the New Yorker. Of particular interest to me is his handling […]