At the Frick we went to Senior Curator Susan Galassi’s talk, Turner’s Modern and Ancient Ports: Passages through Time. It was given in the Frick Collection’s Oval Room. Henry Clay Frick had bought two oils, Turner’s Harbor of Dieppe and Cologne, the arrival of a Packet-Boat, over a century ago. For the exhibit, an unfinished painting of Brest’s harbor was place between them. Curator Galassi suggested the third painting was the unborn child of the first two paintings. The two Frick paintings teemed with life and a sense, real or imagined, of reality. The unfinished work glimmered with light and unfinished figures, reminding me of an x-ray. The other paintings in the Oval Room were fanciful images of an imagined Rome and Carthage. In the East Gallery there’s a wide selection of Turner’s watercolors, scenes in England, Germany and Holland. To quote Hans Hoffman, “In nature light creates color; in painting color creates light.” The exhibit runs through May 14.
Indochine has always had a glamorous reputation: the gay crowd, the fashion crowd. We dined at the unfashionable hour of six so we’d be on time for LATIN HISTORY FOR MORONS across the street at the Public. Indochine’s setting is wonderful and the wait staff wear the nifties clothes I’ve seen outside an Orry-Kelly film. Think Bette Davis in The Letter or Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca. Twenty years ago, the food was as exotic as the setting: mirrors, palm tree paintings, enormous flower displays. Now, both are part of the general culture. You don’t own a wok? You can’t eat with chop sticks? My friend is having his Florida condo bathroom wall-papered in palms.
LATIN HISTORY FOR MORONS, John Leguizamo’s latest rant, goes on forever. I preferred Mambo Mouth and Spic-o-Rama. Leguizamo’s strong points are his sense of ridicule, his mimicry, and his burning anger. His weak point is that he thinks he’s a deep thinker which encourages him to behave like a preacher. Also, sentimentality ,sooner or later, creeps into his script. The audience consisted of fans who gave him the obligatory standing ovation.
R.I.P.
St. Charles County police responded to a medical emergency on Buckner Road at approximately 12:40 p.m. today (Saturday, March 18). Inside the home, first responders observed an unresponsive man and immediately administered lifesaving techniques. Unfortunately, the 90-year-old man could not be revived and was pronounced deceased at 1:26 p.m.
The St. Charles County Police Department sadly confirms the death of Charles Edward Anderson Berry Sr., better known as legendary musician Chuck Berry.
COMING SOON:
Graphic Lessons: Recent widow Millie Fitzgerald applies for a private school teaching job, faints on a stabbed and dying man, deals with the only witness to the stabbing – a troubled nine year old, develops a crush on a NYPD detective and her dog dies.
Graphic Lessons: NYPD Detective Steve Kulchek: something’s eating at him: a failed marriage? surviving a car bomb? his girlfriend marrying his corrupt boss? screwing up an important case?
Graphic Lessons: Nine year old Dana is the only witness who overhears three people fighting with George Lopez, the soon to be stabbed Windsor School kitchen worker. Who can she tell? Her mother who never listens or accuses her of lying? Her father who’s started a new family in Singapore?