25. The MFA

25. Visit the new wing at the MFA

Ok, well when I wrote that the new wing was the refurbished Art of the Americas wing, not the even newer Contemporary Art wing, so I stuck with my original plan.

The new little bistro in this atrium space is sort of weird, honestly.

So I popped in for a couple hours and tried to use my time wisely in such a large space. I get museum fatigue pretty easily, so I try to pick out specific rooms and objects to spend time with. This was inordinately difficult in this wing, however, because the MFA has neglected to put together any useful publications for finding your way through it. It’s four stories of galleries, with another 4 story annex and the only thing the museum has for you is a list of featured works and where they are. Luckily there were still copies of the Boston Globe special for the opening that included a map of all the galleries and their contents. I don’t know what I’ll do when they run out of those. Anyway, the galleries in general are hung with pieces in context, which I think is a great choice. This is probably influenced by my preference for decorative art.

Mixed format presentation of the Arts and Crafts movement works particularly well

The strength of this strategy is most on display in multi-medium galleries. The Arts and Crafts movement didn’t just influence one format, it showed itself in ceramics, furniture, glassware, and also fine are forms like painting and sculpture. The small gallery really evokes the atmosphere of the time and synthesizes conversation between the pieces by putting them in a natural arrangement.

The elusive red glaze

If you read The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt, you’ll recognize the significance of these little red vases. The glaze was based on an old Chinese style and was very difficult to achieve. It’s like somebody just painted them with blood.

A temporary exhibit of American embroidery

During my visit there was a temporary gallery of embroidery, mostly from a family on the North Shore, I think? Skirt panels, stomachers, and bed curtains, all in beautiful vibrant palettes like this one. The work was precise and amazing, and always had a little bit of humor – check out that tiny squirrel up in the tree!

Mate cups and bombillas in the Latin room

One thing I appreciated about the new interpretation in this wing of the permanent collections was the transparency about gaps in the collection. There is only one small gallery of Latin American works (although the pieces there are some of the most extraordinary in the whole wing – just look at this silver!), but the signage and placards honestly detail the culturally bigoted reasons the museum did not pay much attention in acquiring Spanish and Native art throughout its history, and the efforts they are putting into aggressively collecting in these gaps.

So that was my trip to the museum! More to come…

 

Number 28

28. Take a trip to Seattle

This was one I was nervous about putting on the list. It seemed big at the time. But I think the lesson I learned is this: if I want to do a big thing, I need to put it on a list.

So in March, I prioritized going to Seattle before I started my internship at YNP. So I flew out, spent some quality time with Juli and Conor (and then got stuck and spent some more quality time watching Top Chef and drinking bottles of Rose). I also bought a car. I explored Seattle a ton. I was there long enough to get a little routine going, and have the guys at the coffee shop recognize me (or at least my headphones). I had a nice time, even while being in limbo and getting homesick. So here are some pictures I took. Unfortunately I don’t think I got a single one with me in it, but I’ll show you Juli at the end.

Outside the Experience Music Project. Personally, the museum was a bit of a bust, except the Battlestar Galactica exhibit. But the building is cool.

Okay, it was a good turkey sandwich, for sure. Not The Best(tm), but good. The stinky cheese, however, was divine (and I’m sure J+C agree, right?)

The Asian Art Museum. It was wonderful.

Camped at Larrabee State Park. Mountains and Ocean, that’s why people love Washington.

Drinking wine on the deck with Juli. Pretty much the best part.

30×30: updated

Here’s the list I made last year:

In no order:

1. Take a trip to Cape Cod (“the cape”)
2. Read Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
3. Go to the ICA
4. Make pizza dough
5. Quit Harvard Book Store
6. Write a short story
7. Call my senator(s)
8. Take the Roosevelt Island Tramway
9. Go to the opera as an adult (haven’t been since I was 10)
10. See the Boston Symphony Orchestra
11. Write my nephew at least 5 letters
12. Go to Franklin Park Zoo
13. Go to Forest Hills Cemetery
14. See The Graduate
15. Finish a sewing project
16. See Brokeback Mountain
17. Read a presidential biography
18. Send a letter to Camille
19. Send a letter to Brette
20. Go on a sailboat
21. Read a book by Agatha Christie
22. Register in Massachusetts
23. Get a Massachusetts ID card
24. Go to a local council meeting
25. Visit the new wing at the MFA
26. Grow an edible plant (excluding herbs)
27. Fully catalog my books
28. Take a trip to Seattle
29. Watch Roots
30. Build a (good) personal website

Time to update, beginning with:

8. Take the Roosevelt Island Tramway

That’s the tram returning from the island from inside our tram. Here’s another one from inside the tram:

And special thanks to Jerry, who overcame a lot to be with us on that weird little island. And my brother, for looking so cool all the time.

At 17, I barely passed AP Physics

Large Hadron Collider at CERN

Lately I’ve been realizing that there are things that I would love to be doing, but I didn’t know that I would love them early enough to actually be doing them. Mainly I’m talking about being a scientist. And right now, at this moment, I think I’ve realized it might have been the fault of AP classes. I failed Chemistry, flat out. After acing AP Bio that was a real shock. Later I crapped out on Physics, even though I loved it. All of that was stupid. I shouldn’t have been in those classes…nobody should have. If I had just gone through grade-appropriate Chemistry and Physics I could have realized that I do have an aptitude for them, and enough interest to make up for lack of immediate mastery. Instead, I was pretty sure I should just major in English. Pfft.

I’M BACK!

Back from Yellowstone, and back to the blergh-o-sphere.

I don’t have enough things in front of me or attention span to actually blog right now, though, so just look at my pictures in the meantime.

 

I’m going to update my 30by30 in the next few days, watch for it!

Pictures!

Come and get’em:

picasaweb.google.com/francesharrell

 

Life happens.

I’m stuck in Seattle. It was a mistake made by somebody else, the thing that stranded me here. Not sure when I’ll be heading to the Montana/Wyoming boarder; the FBI will let me know, I suppose.

For now, I’m grateful to be staying with some of the best people I know. Nothing can make you feel good about accidentally living in somebody’s house for 3 weeks, though. Sigh.

Headed up north to go camping for a few days…I think tomorrow, or the next day. I got a few books to keep me company, hopefully it will be dry. I should have some nice pictures to show for it, as well.

Hmph…all this uncertainty is making me homesick.

Got a car, dudes.

Bam!

Want another? Well, here you go:

why you should care about the NFL players’ strike

Michael and I have talked about this a lot in the past few weeks. I get really frustrated and annoyed when I read/hear people bitching about how much money professional athletes make. This may be surprising, since I also regularly call the NFL, NBA, and MLB out on their various damaging attitudes and effects in our culture (generally terrible messaging about women in all ways). I also love watching baseball and football (and sometimes basketball) and my feelings about sports culture and fandom are complex and hard for even me to navigate.

All of that aside, the NFL players union strike and the lock-out (which I haven’t been following terribly closely) have given plenty of blow-hards (including our President) the opportunity to mock the athletes as whiney millionaires. There’s an op-ed in Politico that covers the main points, though it is admittedly a little overwrought. The point is, the situations for players is even worse than I thought.

The editor at Politico throws out some facts sourced from a group called Games Over, which is headed up by ex-Packer Ken Ruettgers. They do peer based mentorship to help retired athletes transition back into real life, and I bet they could increase their numbers served tenfold and still not be anywhere near meeting the needs of the three major leagues. Some hard numbers from their research:

• over 78% of NFL players are divorced, bankrupt, or unemployed TWO YEARS after leaving the game
• 50% of NFL players have careers of just over THREE YEARS or less.

Many ex-players end up with expensive medical conditions that require care for the rest of their lives. Care they can’t afford. The leagues do precious little to support and educate new players on managing and retaining their wealth, especially in football and basketball, where men can be starting their careers as young as 19. Many of these players also don’t leave the league with the skills necessary to build new careers and they simultaneously have to deal with the loss of their major purpose in life. They won’t all be Michael Jordan in retirement, or Larry Bird or Magic Johnson. Not even 5% of them will be.

The country just did a collective double-take at the vicious anti-union actions of the Wisconsin government, but we can’t take 5 minutes to understand or care about a huge labor issue in an industry that we all fund with our viewership, ticket prices, fantasy leagues, and merchandise to the tune of billions of dollars a year. The obvious fact is that football wouldn’t exist without players, and if they don’t see a significant chunk of those billions of dollars, then there is something severely wrong. They break their bodies for our entertainment for a few years, and if they get out of it with a small retirement fund they’re lucky, all while Jerry Jones probably owns a private island off of Trinidad. That’s disgusting.

I guess the bottom line is, stand with the players or shut the fuck up.

As a bonus, a great idea from Matt Taibbi, my journo-crush:

Matt,
The NFL lockout: bigger assholes, players or owners?
Jeff

Jeff,
Definitely the owners. I’m kind of amazed there’s even any controversy here.

Remember how we had replacement players in 1987? Here’s my question: how come we can’t have replacement owners? I realize it’s impossible, but I’d love to see every city do bond issues or IPOs and raise money to create temporary ownership structures… do a new draft, create new teams from every city, get lease deals for functioning local university stadiums, and then strike brand-new TV deals and just kiss the NFL goodbye in favor of a new league, only with all the same players. The thing is, pro football is such a draw, you could make a billion-dollar business overnight even if the games were only broadcast on the Food channel, or, hell, PBS. Again, I realize it’d never happen, but I’d love to see a situation where all the teams were publicly-owned and the players got 80% of all revenues, with the rest of the cash going to pay for road repairs, teachers’ salaries, and so on. Then I’d love to see Jerry Jones or Jerry Richardson and all those assholes strapped to chairs and forced to watch their former profits spent on new school gymnasiums and wheelchair ramps for courthouses and that sort of thing. I would be willing to go without football for a full year – no, make it two years – if at the end of it I could watch a weeping Dan Snyder taken on a tour of a new Public Football League-funded school for the blind.

Amen.

new glasses

I got new glasses, what do you think?

They’re kinda big, but I’m into it.

Also – been practicing my ukulele. Not ready to record yet, but soon. Then I’ll figure out how to put a playable track on this thing…