New York Mysteries Nov. 12 – Nov. 18

Volez, Voguez, Voyagez ( Fly, Sail, Travel), The Louis Vuitton exhibition at 86 Trinity Place, is a knockout. To think it was assembled in a month is incredible. You walk from room to room, floor to floor, surrounded by French luxe ranging from 1854 when Vuitton opened his first store in Paris to the present day. He came from a humble background, leaving his village in the Jura Mountains on foot at the age of fourteen and arriving in Paris two years later. The exhibition is divided into four main themes: travel by rail, travel by car, travel by sailing and travel by flying. The entrance has a charming mock up of a Paris metro. You proceed to Trunks for Stars i.e. Greta Garbo, Julianne Moore, Exquisite Bottles, Sophisticated Dandies i. e. Douglas Fairbanks. On the main level a plane, circa 1930, is mounted from the ceiling. On its wings are various Vuitton luggage. In the Rise of Yachting there are examples of different kinds of luggage such as The Steamer Bag. The exhibition closes January 7, 2018. Lots of fun and highly recommended.

Poster at the Current Vuitton exhibit
Metro mockup, Vuitton Exhibit

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Luggage for 30 pairs of shoes, Vuitton Exhibit
Bushwick Street Art

Bushwick, anyone? You bet! What a delightful, artsy neighborhood. A friend and I went to Heather Christian’s Animal Wisdom at the Bushwick Starr. Lots of soul searching, jumping around, loud music, musings on death and ghosts done with a Southern accent. The Bushwick Starr is a cosy space with rudimentary plumbing and flickering light bulbs. I lucked out. My seat backed on some machine where I rested my head during a long blackout.

The best line of the evening was my friend’s Irish quote:

“You wouldn’t worry so much about what other people think about you if you knew how seldom they did!”

 

 

Graphic Lessons: Recent thirty-five-year-old widow Millie Fitzgerald applies for a private school teaching job, faints on a stabbed and dying man in the school kitchen, 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: Nine-year-old Dana is the only witness who overhears a person 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? She tells Millie.

Graphic Lessons: Something’s eating at NYPD Detective Steve Kulchek: a failed marriage? surviving a car bomb? his girlfriend marrying his corrupt boss? screwing up an important case? It doesn’t matter because he’s relentless.

 

 

 

New York Mysteries Nov. 4 – Nov.10

Murillo’s portrait of Juan Arias de Saavedra

With the celebration of the Reformation – 500 hundred years ago – I was interested in what Catholic countries did to stem the inevitable tide. The Spanish had the Inquisition. A form of persuasion and persecution since the 12th Century, it took on added importance during the Reformation. A portrait of one of its enforcers is on view at the Frick Collection in the current exhibit, Murillo: The Self-Portraits. The portrait of Juan Arias de Saavedra was done in 1650. In addition to being a senior member of the Holy Inquisition, he was a connoisseur of painting. It’s a gorgeous portrait given a frisson of terror from knowing the sitter’s background. In Italy, to control the schism, the popes commissioned churches, statues, fountains, paintings that glorified holy rite. One of the most beautiful is Bernini’s statue, Ecstasy of Saint Teresa.

From the sublime to the ridiculous: the MTA. How many times this week have I stared out the subway windows as we flew past my stop. Construction is rife both underground and above ground. These murals are in the Prince Street station. Don’t these people look weary?

Prince Street Station Mural
Print Street Station Mural

 

Graphic Lessons: Recent thirty-five-year-old widow Millie Fitzgerald applies for a private school teaching job, faints on a stabbed and dying man in the school kitchen, 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: 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? She tells Millie.

Graphic Lessons: Something’s eating at NYPD Detective Steve Kulchek: a failed marriage? surviving a car bomb? his girlfriend marrying his corrupt boss? screwing up an important case? It doesn’t matter because he’s relentless.

 

New York Mysteries Oct. 29- Nov. 4

I came to Ai Weiwei very late.I didn’t know he had been detained for eighty-one days because he was critical of the current Chinese Communist party. Nor did I know he helped design the “Bird’s Nest” stadium for the 2008 Olympics. In other words, I knew nothing. His public art exhibition, Good Fences Make Good Neighbors, made me curious about him. I kept passing the cage-like metallic structure that’s been installed in the middle of the Washington Square monument. A friend suggested, actually dragged me to Human Flow the last day of its showing at the Angelica. It’s a long, heart breaking documentary by Ai Weiwei about refugees. Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian diplomat, explained that being a refugee deprives an individual of respect. He or she is suspect, not trusted.

Weiwei filmed in 28 countries. The photography, much of it from drones, is wonderful. Ai Weiwei comes across as a gentle, simpatico person. He reminds me of another gentle, simpatico person, Dr. Willie Parker, who toils in the field of legal abortion in several southern states. Weiwei lives in Berlin. He longs to go back to China to see his mom. He is a refugee albeit a celebrated artist. In one scene he and a refugee in a camp playfully exchange passports. Weiwei gets the refugee’s tent and the refugee gets Weiwei’s Berlin apartment. In your dreams.

 

 

 

Installation Notice of Ai Weiwei’s Structure
Ai Weiwei’s Washington Square Arch Structure

 

 

 

Graphic Lessons: Recent thirty-five-year-old widow Millie Fitzgerald applies for a private school teaching job, faints on a stabbed and dying man in the school kitchen, 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: 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? She tells Millie.

Graphic Lessons: Something’s eating at NYPD Detective Steve Kulchek: a failed marriage? surviving a car bomb? his girlfriend marrying his corrupt boss? screwing up an important case? It doesn’t matter because he’s relentless.