Reading and Roaming

Manhattan: Arts & Flowers

PORTRAITS

Bad pun in the title of this post, I know, but couldn’t resist. A new exhibit at the Whitney, Human Interest, contains 200 portraits —paintings and sculpture from its extensive collection. Lots to see and a lot to take in on one visit, including a larger than life-size sculpture that is a candle, so we went twice. First on Sunday when it was fairly crowded and then again on Monday morning when most of the visitors were school groups and for the first hour it was delightfully calm. I had a long conversation with a volunteer, Pamela, who is a dancer, writer, lover of art, and especially passionate about the Whitney and the excellence of its curators. Here’s a sampling from the exhibit:

Artist Cindy Sherman portraying herself in yet another guise

One of several spider women by Liz Craft

Synecdoche by Byron Kim; each square is a different person's skin tone including his — Synecdoche by Byron Kim; each square is a different person’s skin tone including his

BLOOMS

We didn’t get to the New York Botanical Garden last fall so it was a high priority for this visit. We got rained out a few days, then delays at Grand Central and on Metro North made waiting wise. Finally, all seemed propitious and we made the trek. Long walk from our apartment to the 6 Line at Union Square, subway to Grand Central, then a search for the ticket vending machines (they are tucked back against a recessed wall and initially we walked by), followed by a quick dash to just make the 9:25 train. Stated time to the Botanic Garden stop in the Bronx is 20 minutes, but more like 25 or 30. Nonetheless, we crossed the street from the station and were at the garden entry gate just at the 10:00 am opening.

Lovely expanses of green lawn and many trees. We first toured the small art exhibit on Impressionism in the garden in the Mertz Library, then walked areas of the grounds (think lilacs, peonies, and roses), ate a simple sandwich in the café, and ended our inaugural visit admiring the gorgeous traditional flowers (poppies, lupine, foxglove, and iris) in the Impressionism garden display in the historic domed conservatory. A relaxing way to while away a morning or afternoon. Looking forward to an encore visit in September.

Note: All photos by JWFarrington (some rights reserved)

Jaunting in Manhattan

JAUNTING ALONG THE HUDSON

We have taken advantage of being only a block from the water to explore nearby Pier 45. One evening at dusk, a group of young people were dancing to Brazilian tunes there while other folks sat on the lawn braving the cold breeze. The other morning we walked the promenade from Pier 45 up to Pier 88 (where the big cruise ships dock), about 40 blocks each way. This promenade and its extension going south comprise part of Hudson River Park. Nicely landscaped with many grassy areas, lots of benches, café tables and chairs, and periodic restrooms along the way, it’s well designed for pedestrians, runners and bicyclists. A small stretch of our route was still in the process of being built out, but even so, there were clearly marked lanes for walkers and bikers.

BOOK UPDATE

Priestly Politics

On the recommendation of a good friend, I decided to try one of C. J. Sansom’s Matthew Shardlake mysteries. The first one, Dissolution, is set in 1537 in London and Sussex. At the direction of Thomas Cromwell, lawyer Shardlake travels to the Scarnsea monastery to investigate the murder of a royal commissioner who was there on an inspection tour. In the spirit of Protestant reform and as the head of the new Church of England, King Henry is actively working to close and dissolve all the Catholic monasteries.

Hunchback Shardlake is an intriguing character—smart and thoughtful, though not without his own biases; his protégé, Mark Poer, is young, naïve, and attractive; and more suspicious deaths occur. I found the book slow at first, but then got engaged and enjoyed the suspense and learning about this piece of English church history. There are four other books in the series thus far.

Advice for Boomers

Old Age: A Beginner’s Guide by Michael Kinsley. I always liked watching Kinsley spar about politics and issues of the day as co-host of TV’s Crossfire. He was quick, witty, and cutting. As most people know, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in his early 40’s, more than 20 years ago, and that eventually changed how he approached his professional work. He is now 65 and his new book contains a lot of information about the disease (much of which I knew, but not all) and is intended as advice for the Baby Boomer generation. I found it less than satisfying, somewhat repetitive and not very helpful—perhaps that’s because I’ve already crossed the Medicare divide.

Header photo: Plantings at Chelsea Piers

All photos by JWFarrington, some rights reserved

Round-up: Books & Film

Books

My recent reading has ranged from the very serious to the quite serious to the more frivolous.

Stir: My Broken Brain and the Meals that Brought Me Home by Jessica Fechtor. Sound depressing, but it wasn’t. Yes, Ms. Fechtor did suffer a brain aneurysm at the tender age of 28, but her optimistic spirit and determination along with time in the kitchen saw her through a 2-year recovery period. There are medical details here, but also wonderful passages about the role of food and the emotional as well as physical sustenance good cooking can provide. She is a PhD candidate at Harvard as well as author of the Sweet Amandine food blog.

Consequence by Eric Fair. This is a memoir by a former soldier and contractor who was posted to Iraq and served as an interrogator. It is a disturbing, unsettling read, but one I couldn’t abandon. Mr. Fair grew up in Bethlehem, Pa., was active in the First Presbyterian Church there, and after college became a police officer before serving in the Iraq War.

With its spare, unemotional style, it’s almost as if Mr. Fair is writing about someone other than himself. He made a series of poor choices from high school onward and while stating that he made them and acknowledging that some of them were unwise, he doesn’t seem to own them. And he did things at Abu Graib that he feels guilty about and that haunt him, but he has not reached any closure. It probably took some courage to write this book (neither the military nor his contractor company come off very well), but I found it hard to applaud him for doing so.

Banquet of Consequences by Elizabeth George. Hard to believe, but this is the 19^th Inspector Lynley mystery. Inspector Barbara Havers is the primary mover with Lynley in a more supporting role as she and Nkata delve into the murder of a noted feminist author and the convoluted relationships she had with her personal assistant and her publisher. Not her best, but still entertaining.

The Restaurant Critic’s Wife by Elizabeth LaBan. This is a novel about food and restaurants, but even more so about the trials of being a stay-at-home mother of two young children constrained by a husband’s demands that she remain inconspicuous and invisible. Craig LaBan is the longtime restaurant critic for the Philadelphia Inquirer and originally from New Orleans like Sam Soto in the book. For my Philly foodie friends, this lighthearted fare will have you guessing which restaurants are being reviewed!

Film Fare

Eye in the Sky. There are several female actors whose films I would see no matter what and they include Maggie Smith, Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren. In this film, Helen Mirren is the British colonel in charge of a missile strike on some key terrorist leaders who are holed up in a house in a residential area outside Nairobi. She, working with the general played by Alan Rickman, must evaluate how great are the odds of injury or death to nearby civilians (including a young girl) and get all the stakeholders to agree to the timing of the strike. The stakeholders are scattered from England to Nevada and both British and U.S. leaders and politicians are involved or need to be consulted. A sobering and suspenseful look at how warfare by drone is carried out.

Love & Friendship. This one’s for Jane Austen fans of which I’m one. Based on her short novel, Lady Susan, it’s not a great film, but an enjoyable one. There are lots of characters, the principal ones introduced with name, title and relationship in the opening scenes, which makes for a somewhat slow beginning. The pace picks up once Lady Susan, schemer extraordinaire, is installed at her sister-in-law’s country estate, and begins to weave her web to ensnare Sir James Martin for her daughter Frederica and Sir Reginald deCourcy for herself. But, complications ensue, her true colors start to emerge, and what ultimately results is a complete turnabout.

Manhattan Meandering: Fashion & Food

AT THE MET

A good friend came into the city for the day and she and I were engrossed for several hours viewing two exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was a rainy Friday and the corridors were packed with people. Fortunately, the first exhibit hall was less crowded so we could get a close up view of the paintings. Vigee le Brun was a French artist who lived from before the French Revolution into the 1840’s. Initially dismissed because she was female, she became popular in her day and was portrait artist of choice for many royals including Marie Antoinette. After her death, her work seems to have been overlooked or ignored for many years. Certainly, she was unknown to me until this exhibit. Some of the portraits were really stunning and I also enjoyed seeing the several self-portraits she painted over the years.

The Costume Institute exhibit, Manus ex Machina: Fashion in an Age of Technology, was dense with museumgoers which made seeing the gowns occasionally challenging. It is a fascinating study of the hand crafts (embroidery, pleating, beading, feathers, etc.) involved in the creation of haute couture over the years along with the use of the latest 3D printing to create nylon mesh and other unusual fabrics. Gowns by the Houses of Chanel, Dior, and Lagerfeld shared space with very edgy ones by the likes of Alexander McQueen and John Galliano. The alcove spaces and the ethereal background music gave the whole experience a church-like feel. This exhibit runs until August and is definitely worth seeing. For more info see The New York Times’ review article which also includes photos.

FASHION IN FILM

Following on the fashion exhibit, we went to see Andrew Rossi’s new film, First Monday in May. Note that Rossi also directed the compelling documentary, Page One: Inside the New York Times, about the challenges of staying relevant in the age of the Internet. First Monday is a sumptuous, gorgeous look behind the scenes at the creation of the Met’s 2014 costume exhibit on China and the extravaganza of a gala that precedes the opening. Stars here are Anna Wintour (her dresses and suits are almost as much fun to see as all the historical and contemporary gowns) and curator Andrew Bolton. Running through the film is the idea that fashion equals art, and that it is only in recent times that fashion has been recognized and accepted as such. Visual treats!

DINING

Three new places for cozy dinners.

Café Loup on West 13^th St. We sampled the chicken with tarragon and the fish and chips and were happy with both at this white-walled French bistro. Also good were the mesclun salad and the house green salad. It was crowded the night we were there with what looked to be lots of academics.

Doma na rohu. A rustic German restaurant on 7^th Ave with wood tables and an inviting bar. Happy hour specials include the usual beer and wine and also pretzels with sausage and mustard. Skip the veal schnitzel (dry and unadorned), but do tuck into the great sides—German potato salad, reminiscent of my grandmother’s version; very tasty browned spaetzle; and the so-called bowl of greens—a salad with cubes of beets, cherry tomatoes and a few slices of cucumber.

Trattoria Pesce Pasta. On Bleecker Street, this is comfort food incarnate and perfect when you’re tuckered out from a long day—for us, said long day included a bus trip to Bethlehem and back. We skipped salads and just enjoyed the sole with artichokes and sundried tomatoes (very saucy and not fancy) which hit the spot. Sides were a choice of sautéed broccoli or spaghetti with red sauce. One of us was healthy and the other couldn’t resist the pasta which was surprisingly good!

All photos by JWFarrington (some rights reserved)

Header photo: Jackson Square

JOTS & JAUNTS

Manhattan: Arts & Flowers

Like this:

Jaunting in Manhattan

Like this:

Round-up: Books & Film

Like this:

Manhattan Meandering: Fashion & Food

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this: