The Transatlantic Alliance is the strong foundation on which our collective security and our shared prosperity are built. It’s an honor to be at NATO HQ today, reaffirming America’s commitment to our 29 Allies and our vision for a more secure future. pic.twitter.com/vUJIszZAvT
— President Biden (@POTUS) June 14, 2021
BREAKING: A majority of the American public has a great deal or good amount of trust in Pres. Joe Biden to negotiate on the country's behalf with other world leaders, per a new @ABC News/Ipsos poll. https://t.co/zvgW0r7tne
— ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) June 13, 2021
President Biden at the NATO summit is calling on Vladimir Putin to step back from provocative actions targeting the U.S. and its allies. Biden, on an eight-day visit to Europe, meets with the Russian president Wednesday. https://t.co/JMdgxQuWo2
— The Associated Press (@AP) June 15, 2021
The Senate has confirmed Ketanji Brown Jackson as the first appeals court judge of President Joe Biden’s tenure. Biden has promised to name a Black woman to the Supreme Court, and many view Jackson as a top contender should a vacancy arise. https://t.co/crQdyrJp3O
— The Associated Press (@AP) June 14, 2021
Readership capture — mark your calendars:
After years of negotiations, starting June 18, “The Obama Portraits” will be shown at the Art Institute for the next two months — the first exhibition of the portraits outside of Washington, and the opening stop of a five-city nationwide tour.https://t.co/uRfBCkZntQ pic.twitter.com/PNA73NX0rN
— Chicago Things to Do (@redeyechicago) June 14, 2021
Per the Washington Post:
… The tour was announced last year, before the pandemic closed many museums across the country, and it opens on schedule at the Art Institute of Chicago (June 18-Aug. 15) before moving to the Brooklyn Museum (Aug. 27-Oct. 24), the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Nov. 7-Jan. 2, 2022), the High Museum of Art in Atlanta (Jan. 14-March 13, 2022) and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston (March 27-May 30, 2022). Most of the cities share a connection with the Obamas or the artists. In addition to the Obamas’ well-known ties to Chicago, Sherald grew up in Georgia, and Wiley was born in Los Angeles and has a studio in Brooklyn…
"Obama Portraits" is opening at the Art Institute of Chicago: Expect long waits, and 44 other things to know https://t.co/F5Rlip0tTg
— Chicago Tribune (@chicagotribune) June 13, 2021
The Art Institute of Chicago is welcoming two portraits to its galleries: Kehinde Wiley’s painting of President Barack Obama & Amy Sherald’s portrait of First Lady Michelle Obama. In celebration of these portraits, Princeton University Press published THE OBAMA PORTRAITS. pic.twitter.com/kq3cLswwg0
— 57th Street Books (@57thstreetbooks) June 8, 2021
debbie
Weird watching Colbert and seeing Dana Carvey sounding more like Jimmy Stewart or George HW than Biden, but okay.
OzarkHillbilly
NotMax
Morning mellow.
Thinking of relocating? The Prettiest Town in Every State.
;)
debbie
@NotMax:
Can’t argue with Yellow Springs being the prettiest, but the pickings are pretty slim.
OzarkHillbilly
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
NotMax
Should be noted that Judge Jackson is to fill the position vacated by Garland when he moved to become Attorney General.
Rs voting for confirmation: Murkowski, Collins and (hoodathunk it) Graham.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: Their definition of “pretty” must be different from mine. Hermann, MO is fine, so is Hot Springs, AR, but IMHO neither are anywhere near the “Prettiest” towns in these 2 states.
sab
@debbie: Seriously? Yellow Springs is flat as a pancake. Try Gambier. Or Kent. Or Granville. Or Hiram. Or Oberlin. And those are just the college towns.
Chagrin Falls is lovely.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone ???
rikyrah
Woke up with a crick in my neck ??
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: And I can’t believe they think Sheridan is the prettiest town in WY. Maybe they’ve cleaned it up since I lived there.
Baud
I feel like the media is more concerned about Biden’s meeting with Putin than they ever were with the puppet.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
I for one appreciate their frankness. Not.
zhena gogolia
@OzarkHillbilly:
And Mystic is not the prettiest town in CT. It’s so touristy. I don’t count that as “pretty.” Try Woodstock.
zhena gogolia
@OzarkHillbilly:
I spent time there as a child. I loved it, but not pretty.
zhena gogolia
@Baud:
Oh, yeah.
Bluegirlfromwyo
@OzarkHillbilly: I can think of several towns prettier than Sheridan. Probably all too remote for the writers though.
Dorothy A. Winsor
I grew up in Detroit. I do not have high standards for a pretty place to live
germy
@rikyrah:
Maybe it’s time for a new pillow?
My old one, it said “washable” so I ran it through the washer and dryer. It was nice and clean after that, but it lost its fluffiness.
I bought a cheap pillow last week at Aldi. Not sure how long it’ll last, but it’s fluffy and supports my heavy head.
sab
@debbie: To be honest, I haven’t been there ( YSO) is 50 years.
SiubhanDuinne
So excited to see that the Obama portraits are coming to Atlanta next year! I’ve been yearning to see them for a long time.
WereBear
@OzarkHillbilly: Forget it Jake, it’s Clickbait Town.
sab
@WereBear: You sound just like my spouse.
Gin & Tonic
@zhena gogolia: I’d say the same about their choice of Newport.
WereBear
I still feel whiplash from the last 5-6 years.
Like I live in a house, which then burns down, and I spend some time in the hospital, and when I come back the house is rebuilt and what treasures I could save have been placed there for me…
Ken
@SiubhanDuinne: I’m one of those plebians who thinks looking at a jpg of the painting is as good as looking at the real thing, with the added advantage that I don’t have to wait in lines.
WereBear
@sab: We’re back to Yellow Press.
OzarkHillbilly
@zhena gogolia: I had a good time there, too good a time in fact, but Sheridan wasn’t much more than a dusty main street and looking at the picture it still isn’t.
@Bluegirlfromwyo: I certainly wouldn’t want to venture a guess as to the prettiest, but Story is a hop, skip, and a jump away and as pretty as any postcard. Probably not enough bars there. I suspect they don’t even have a motel.
WereBear
@Ken: I used to think so, then I saw some Impressionist paintings in person, and DAYUM.
germy
Energy Healer Unable to Manifest a Coherent Website
(I’ve noticed this. The more extreme the woo, the more dysfunctional the website.)
Spanky
@WereBear: It didn’t burn down, it was invaded by a troupe of white trash, who then proceeded to trash it.
But though trashed, it still stands, and is gonna require a bit of fumigating. To say the least.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ken:
You have a point about waiting in lines, but to me part of the experience of seeing paintings in galleries or museums is that you get the impact of scale. For instance, the first time I saw the Mona Lisa I was shocked at how small it actually is, since it looms so large in our imaginations. Other paintings are far bigger than a .jpg or other reproduction can possibly indicate, and to me the choice of size is an important part of what the artist wants to convey.
Betty Cracker
Fun fact about Judge Jackson: she is related to Paul Ryan by marriage. Her husband’s twin brother is Ryan’s brother-in-law.
OzarkHillbilly
Don’t ever change Misery: St. Clair man removed from storm drain
Kropacetic
Hey, I know a really civic-minded guy with a pillow company…
Soprano2
@sab: My mother was born in Chagrin Falls, and went to grade school there until she was 9. She was in the same class there as Tim Conway!
OzarkHillbilly
Hartmann: The Breakaway Republic of Missouri
SFAW
@NotMax:
Based on my limited experience (i.e., New England towns), I think the pre-edited title was probably “The Prettiest Tourist Towns in Each State.”
Soprano2
@WereBear: Yes, art in person is different from seeing pictures on the internet, although it’s good that the internet allows many more people to see paintings.
I have a cat question. We have been trying to “court” a young male cat who has taken up residence around our house, probably because we’ve been feeding him and he decided to use the small house my husband built for our “half-cat” (a cat who we kind of share with a neighbor). We’re pretty sure he’s never had an owner. I don’t think he’s feral, but he’s skittish enough that we can’t pet him yet. We keep talking to him soothingly, trying to get him used to us. We’ve been able to get closer and closer to him before he runs to a distance. We’d like to get him to trust us enough that we could take him to the vet to get him neutered and checked and vaccinated. Should we just keep doing this, or are there other things we could do? My husband wants to offer him sardines. LOL
Ken
@SFAW: Subtitle: “A nice place to visit, but everyone who lives here hates the tourists”.
SFAW
@OzarkHillbilly:
I confess that I have limited (a/k/a zero) training in constitutional law, but I would think that nullification (as it used to be called) is not quite legal.
zhena gogolia
@Soprano2:
We did this with a trap we borrowed from our local cat shelter. You have to monitor it and whisk them off as soon as they go in.
Ken
I broke out laughing at this point. Sorry, just imagining the cat sitting there staring balefully at you afterward, thinking “I trusted you….”
Also sorry, no useful suggestions for getting it to approach.
Gin & Tonic
@SiubhanDuinne: Guernica.
Gin & Tonic
@OzarkHillbilly: Damn, the suspense. Was the Jeep there or not? Shoddy journalism.
debbie
@sab:
That whole area, which I think is the southern end of Hocking Hills, reminds me of New England, so I may be less than objective about this.
SFAW
@Soprano2:
Have you tried tranquilizer darts, or putting stuff in his food? That should increase his “compliance.” [Yes, I’m kidding. No useful suggestions, of course, but good luck! We “adopted” one of our favorite cats in a similar fashion, but he was not nearly as skittish as your guy.]
zhena gogolia
I love Blair Erskine.
sdhays
@WereBear: Oh, hell yes. You can’t fully appreciate the colors and textures of impressionist paintings through a jpg.
@SiubhanDuinne: I don’t know when you saw the Mona Lisa, but when I “saw” it in 2018, the crowds were so obnoxious that it ruined the experience. There was a fence keeping everyone at least 10-15 feet away (understandable), and there was a huge crowd at the fence….and everyone was trying to take a selfie. Not take a picture of the Mona Lisa to see better or take home, no. They had to have their ugly faces in it. And they couldn’t just take a picture and then move on and let people who actually wanted to look at it for 30 seconds look uninterrupted, they just had to continue taking “better” selfies. Practically no one was actually even looking at it with their own eyes.
But, yes, it’s much smaller than you’d think seeing it in movies or on the internet.
OzarkHillbilly
@Gin & Tonic: A follow up article said they found it deep in the sewer and he got a ticket for illegal parking.
Leto
@zhena gogolia: channeling her inner W with that word salad.
sab
I haven’t read the thread yet. I am a girl (old bat now) but when I was in high school I had a dozen gay friends. Not one of them survived AIDS. I love gay rights stuff, but it always makes me so sad.
SiubhanDuinne
@sdhays:
Happily, both times I visited the Mona Lisa were long before the proliferation of cell phones and selfies. The first time, in 1959, there weren’t big crowds at all. Certainly there was a decent contingent of tourists moving through, but it was far from mobbed. I remember seeing a young art student sitting on the floor doing a sketch of the ML, so obviously he had something of a clear sight line. There was a rope but it wasn’t very far from the painting — I imagine just far enough to prevent anyone from touching it.
My second visit to the Louvre was 1971. I seem to recall it was more crowded then, but nothing like what you describe.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@NotMax: I grew up in Michigan and honestly I could name a half dozen towns that are prettier than Mackinac Island. The island writ large is very pretty but the main town has all the trappings of a first class tourist trap. I like Mackinac Island but the only time I spend in town there is the time it takes to walk from the ferry dock to other parts of the island.
I’d take Frankfort, Leeland, Pentwater, Glenn Arbor and Cross village over it (also probably Holland, Saugatuck, and Grand Haven) as the actual towns go.
For Vermont…Woodstock gives Stowe a run for its money.
@debbie: Port Clinton has a picturesque setting on Lake Erie – as does Kelleys Island. Yellow Springs is pretty groovy though (I went to college in nearby Springfield – you can probably guess which college that is) and is nicer than Port Clinton as a town.
sab
@Soprano2: I did not know that. I knew he was from Ohio, but I did not know Chagrin Falls.
sab
@debbie: I live in the Connecticut Western Reserve (south of Cleveland) which my brother in law from Mass thinks looks like New England so I am biased. We have hills!
ETA: Also too sugar maple trees! With maple sugar!
OzarkHillbilly
SiubhanDuinne
@Gin & Tonic:
Sadly, Guernica is one I’ve not seen in person. It’s always been a favourite, and of course I know it’s ginormous. I know it only from reproductions, so I expect seeing it in the flesh (so to speak) would be pretty overwhelming.
Ken
@SiubhanDuinne: That reminds me of Art Buchwald’s classic “Six Minute Louvre”. In his version, instead of selfies, the rules require making “some innocuous tourist remark” at the Mona Lisa.
Betty Cracker
@sab: I know exactly what you mean. I lost several male gay friends too in the early to mid 90s, and I thought I was going to lose all of them, but then that drug cocktail came along and saved their lives. .
Soprano2
@zhena gogolia: We’ve thought of that, but I’m afraid if we use a trap once we bring him home and release him we’ll never see him again! We may have to resort to that if it takes too long to coax him.
Soprano2
@sab: It’s my mom’s one claim to fame!
sab
@debbie: Hocking hills is very pretty. I will never deny that.
WereBear
I would use a trap and a willing third party to take him back and forth to the vet.
Then, after they have been deposited by this third party in a quarantine room or a basement, and while they are still under the influence :) I would let them explore. The sardines could be an excellent move, here.
Then, see how he does with people in the house. Adjust to one’s own preferences and space, of course.
sab
@Soprano2: Really? Jackals are exceptional. So BJ needs to be kinder to Ohio. Some of your okay forebears’ descendants are still here.
sab
@Soprano2: I am so much wishing for your success and the welfare of this young cat. Keep us posted, please.
Soprano2
@WereBear: Thanks for the advice, I appreciate it. It’s so weird, we have no idea where he came from – he just showed up one day. He’s probably 4-5 months old, and doesn’t seem to have ever had an owner. I don’t remember seeing any yellow kittens around the neighborhood, either.
Gin & Tonic
@SiubhanDuinne: I count myself very fortunate that I saw it both at MoMA and then later at the Prado. I suppose a book could be written about moving it.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ken:
LOL! That’s new to me — funny stuff!
Soprano2
@sab: This is true, jackals are exceptional people. I’ve never been to Ohio, and my mom moved away when she was 9 years old. I don’t think she ever went back, either. She still likes cold winters, though.
Soprano2
@sab: I will, after the past couple of weeks we need some good pet news!
SiubhanDuinne
@Gin & Tonic:
I really envy you.
Soprano2
I went to the Louvre in January 1980 when I was on my choir trip (the same one where we sang at Chartres Cathedral, among others). We did finally reach the Mona Lisa, and I was also surprised it was so small. It was behind a glass barrier that was kind of like a little room for the painting, and there were a lot of people there, but I did get to actually see and take a picture of it. I also saw “The Night Watch” at the Reijksmuseum in Amsterdam on the same trip; I remember it being very, very large.
Citizen Alan
@SiubhanDuinne: Somewht off topic but the Mona Lisa talk amuses me. I just finished writing a chapter for the novel I’m working on that mentions the Mona Lisa … specifically the real Mona Lisa, which the antagonist, an immortal Randian Objectivist sorcerer, “acquired” in 1911 and replaced with an exact duplicate. He keeps the original in a secret vault (next to his signed, first edition Atlas Shrugged) where no one but him is ever allowed to look at it.
sab
@WereBear: Off topic. So should we give demon dobby some sardines? I don’t want to spoil him but I do want to woo him.
sdhays
@SiubhanDuinne: That sounds lovely.
sab
@Soprano2: When I travel west I will remember you. If you travel east remember me. We would love to see you.
Frankensteinbeck
@OzarkHillbilly:
Ah, the rush to Nullification. I remember when that happened under Obama, too. And the mainstream Republican pundits opinionating that maybe the military should step in and remove Obama from power. Good times.
O. Felix Culpa
@Gin & Tonic: Yes, I saw Guernica in both places too. Made a big impression both times [note of understatement].
Rembrandt’s paintings are another which MUST be seen live and in person. Reproductions simply cannot capture the subtlety and depth of his work. I am not close to being an art expert and don’t even play one on tv, but was transfixed by his self-portrait at the Reijksmuseum.
PST
@SiubhanDuinne:
My experience in that department was sort of the opposite: amazement at seeing Picasso’s Guernica a couple of years ago. Wow, that’s big! I knew what it looked like, and I even have a vague memory of maybe having seen it once half a century ago, but I was stunned by its scale.
Soprano2
@sab: I would love that! It’s still so strange to me to feel like I “know” a bunch of people I’ve never actually met in person.
BC in Illinois
@Ken:
@SiubhanDuinne:
On waiting in lines.
I saw the Mona Lisa at the National Gallery of Art (apparently in January, 1963). Yes, it was two hours of waiting in line, but the waiting in line was almost the best part of the experience.
As I remember it (I was 13 at the time), the Mona Lisa was in a gallery to the left. When you entered the National Gallery, after a certain amount of waiting outside, the line turned to the right. And then we wound through rooms of American art, then basically through the history of European art. So that by the time we got to Da Vinci, we had had a two-hour overview of art history, with time to read all the descriptions. Much better than a single showing of the one painting.
[ I got to go with my mother, because I was the only one of her sons who was interested. She was in Paris during WW II, as a WAC, but I don’t think that she had been able to see the Mona Lisa then. ]
germy
@O. Felix Culpa:
Same thing with statues. I remember seeing some Rodin statues that were larger than life. Someone told me he did it for a reason: he’d been accused by critics of working from casts of models. He wanted to show them he wasn’t cheating.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
@Citizen Alan: Before finishing your book you should watch a Polish movie called Vinci about the Lady with Ermine in Krakow…it’s a heist movie in which the thief has multiple replicas of the famous painting before attempting to steal it.
Barbara
@sdhays: I have not been to the Louvre in a long time, because when I visited the first time I was underwhelmed. Not by the art, of course, but by the experience. The Louvre was not built as a museum, and the curators at the Louvre seem to have built their expectations and ours on that principle — Well, it wasn’t built as a museum so what do you expect?
I don’t know exactly what policies they have adopted, but it seems like timed tickets and one-way flow through the most popular attractions (what the Vatican does), along with a time limit (what Borghese Gallery does) would at least ameliorate the problem. But truly, you can’t appreciate the most famous of the Louvre’s attractions because it’s just not possible to do so in the setting that is the Louvre. They have basically given up.
UncleEbeneezer
Very excited for the portraits show when it comes to LACMA. There’s a great PBS documentary called “Black Art” that features both of these artists (and several more) and their work is really amazing.
germy
@PST:
I remember seeing Guernica in person, and on the same visit I saw some other modern art (I don’t remember the artist) that contained newspaper pages and bits of other found stuff from 1912. Fascinating to look at.
I remember seeing Van Gogh paintings, and the guard was extremely vigilant. Watched us like hawks.
He explained some visitors had touched the painting, to feel the texture. He was on high alert after that.
sanjeevs
Trump had his assistant email the acting AG he’d just installed urging DOJ to file a Supreme Court brief to “declare that the Electoral College votes cast” in 6 states “cannot be counted,” and order a re-vote.
https://oversight.house.gov/news/press-releases/new-documents-show-trump-repeatedly-pressed-doj-to-overturn-election-results
PST
@germy: There is something about Van Gogh’s paintings that makes you want to touch them, isn’t there? And he’s not the only one. I’m lucky enough to live a short bike ride from the Art Institute in Chicago, which means it’s easy to make frequent short visits and never have to feel the need to see it all they way I would at other large museums. The guards are watchful, but there is no work that I can think of that you can’t get close enough to appreciate the textures, not even the most famous ones.
Baud
@sanjeevs: How does the timing fit with when Barr resigned?
Barbara
@Baud: Like within minutes of his resignation being announced, if I read the release correctly.
sanjeevs
@Baud: Barr announced his resignation on 14 December effective 23rd. This happened on 29th December. So I doubt he knew the specifics but guessed something crazy would be attempted.
Also
People like Meadows are getting their worldview off randos on YouTube.
Omnes Omnibus
@Barbara: You have to approach the Louvre as you will be back several times. Choose a few things or one section to look at, finish those and them leave. Plan to see other things the next time you come. It doesn’t matter if you never come back; you wouldn’t have seen everything any if you tried but your one visit would have both under- and overwhelming.
UncleEbeneezer
Carmel-By-TheSea??? Are you f-ing kidding me? When we did an epic trip from Los Angeles up to Crater Lake NP and back (via coast) Carmel was like the ONLY place that we weren’t impressed by. It looks way to polished, planned and purposely styled. There are SO MANY prettier cities in CA. June Lake, Mammoth Lakes, Ojai, Mendocino, just to name a few. CBTS looks like a Hollywood set. Pass.
debbie
@Gin & Tonic:
I saw it at MoMA and couldn’t get over the size. Hard to step back and take it all in when you’re painting at that scale. But it’s definitely awe inspiring.
sdhays
@Barbara: For me, the Mona Lisa was the only real bad part of the Louvre. Most of the art at the Louvre is from an earlier period than I usually really like, but it’s all pretty much the creme de la creme of Europe, so of course it’s fantastic. I ended up enjoying it more than I thought I would.
Of course, the Musee d’ Orsay was absolutely stunning. Walls and walls and walls of fantastic impressionist art from all the masters. Just incredible.
Barbara
@Omnes Omnibus: I did all that. It is simply impossible to appreciate the Louvre’s most famous art works in the setting in which they are being displayed. I might be pickier than average. The NGA in Washington has a stunning, much less famous Leonardo portrait of a woman that is displayed in a much more intimate setting and is never mobbed. The dichotomy between what the Mona Lisa deserves in order to be appreciated and what it gets is too great, even without crowds. Ditto for Venus de Milo, although that is somewhat less jarring. Even the Uffizi (Botticelli’s Venus) and the Accademia (Michelangelo’s David) manage this dilemma better.
debbie
@Barbara:
When I was unemployed in NYC, I visited the Met most every week. I took it room by room and really spent time looking at each thing in the gallery. Amazing how much more I saw than I had on the countless visits before.
Madame Bupkis
Dr. Jill and Handsome President Joe. Making me cry for all the right reasons.
WaterGirl
@sanjeevs: It wasn’t just as bad as we feared, it was even worse.
artem1s
@debbie:
@sab:
Or any of the river towns or North Coast urban landscapes. Not everyone thinks ‘pretty’ is defined by what attracts tourists.
opiejeanne
@Betty Cracker: Wouldn’t that make her husband his BIL also?
TomatoQueen
Dept of I Hope It Rains So Nobody Has to Walk Back Anything…
With coronavirus infections down sharply, Biden and Bowser announce mass July Fourth celebration
President Biden and D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) called on Americans to gather and celebrate July Fourth in Washington, announcing that as in past years, before the coronavirus pandemic, an Independence Day celebration will be held on the National Mall. The Biden administration will host military families on the White House’s South Lawn, and Bowser said the local Barracks Row and Palisades Fourth of July parades will return.
Another Scott
Obligatory – Google Earth exterior of the Louvre.
Louvre virtual tours.
Google Arts and Culture – DaVinci.
It’s amazing what’s on line now. Yes, it’s not the same as being there, but it’s closer than looking at static pictures in a book.
Cheers,
Scott.
WereBear
@Soprano2: He could have been dumped and is working through the abandonment.
He knows people will help him. He’s just afraid. And I wonder about ferals: at that age, he could warm up fairly quickly. But I’ve heard about adult ferals, who live like shadows for a year or more… and then one day decide, “Well, they haven’t screwed up yet.”
And become domesticated :)
WereBear
Of course! It’s like dating!
And who are you kidding? Don’t you want to spoil him? It’s a loving cat’s natural state :)
opiejeanne
@UncleEbeneezer: June Lake! We used to rent a cabin at Big Rock Landing almost every summer for several years. I don’t remember the town being especially pretty, although it did have that magnificent lodge (the last time we went they were turning it into time share condos). We fished and hiked and explored the rest of the region, got scared by a bear, and always had one supper at the Carson Peak Inn. The kids are grown but they still think it’s heaven and have taken friends and spouses there.
Barbara
@sdhays: I wasn’t too fond of Musee d’Orsay either. It was better than Louvre, for sure, but it still seems to me that there is a “greatest hits” quality to both museums, and maybe that is inevitable given the grandeur of the setting and the vast quantity of great art that people want to see when they visit Paris. The museum that I visited without any preconceived ideas of what I was getting myself into was Austria’s state museum of art in Vienna. I didn’t have nearly enough time to see it, but what really struck me was the amount of effort that had been expended to group paintings in a way that made it possible to appreciate their qualities individually and put them into historical context.
On the whole, however, I am glad that people still love and want to go to any art museum, so I will seek out the smaller and more curated experiences I like and not harumph too much about others taking selfies under the Mona Lisa.
Origuy
Guernica is now at the Reina Sofia, which is where I saw it. It is stunning when you see it in person. When I go to Chicago, I almost always go to the Art Institute and stop at Le Grand Jatte. I’ve never been to Paris, so I haven’t seen the Mona Lisa in person. Not a big fan of portraits in general. I liked The Night Watch, which is more of a genre painting.
I looked through that list of prettiest towns; there must be prettier towns in California than Carmel-By-The-Sea. I agreed with the choice of Bloomington, Indiana. I may be biased though, since I grew up there.
Ken
@NotMax: About half the pictures aren’t “this town is pretty” as “if you go a couple miles out of town, the scenery is pretty.”
And the picture for Hermann MO is ridiculous. I’ve been there, they could have shown the view over the Missouri River or the vineyards; why a pair of empty railroad tracks?
sab
@debbie: Lol. My sister is an art historian. When we would go to a museum she and my dad would spend all day in one gallery while the rest of us saw every gallery and also ate lunch.
J R in WV
On my last visit to Manhattan, NYC, with friends, we booked an art history professor for our visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which included her taking us to the “club restaurant” for brunch after spending 6 hours on guided tour. We started with Greek and Roman art from long ago, worked through Renaissance art masters, then did impressionists.
After she took off and the brunch with wine, we visited other wings of great stuff, arms and armor on horses, from Japan and Europe, Unguided strolling — the majority of their art is either donated private collections willed to the museum or on more-or-less permanent loan from owners. Amazing what people can collect when money is of no import. And all the NYC museums have Sackler wings from the opioid magnate families…
Was probably the best museum visit we had ever had, guide knew not only all the art on display, she knew most of the art in storage in vaults as well. By the brush stroke, and who each artist studied to begin their careers. Total geek genius on art history, worth every cent they charged for her service. Was the week before Thanksgiving week, almost no tourists The Empire State Building had no lines for anything, and the museum crowds were mostly locals.
The Golux
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yes, indeed. Several years ago, we went to see an exhibit of Monet’s water lilies at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, and (a) they were huge, and (b) the texture of the paint was astonishing. Incredibly thick. It really made you admire Monet’s ability to visualize the end result as he was applying the layers.
No way a computer image could do it justice.
StringOnAStick
There was a copy of Guernica on the wall my undergrad college snack bar, full sized. I looked at it nearly every week day for 4.5 years since that’s where I did most of my studying. I think it made me even more liberal and anti-war than I already was.
Mary Ellen Sandahl
@OzarkHillbilly:
Huh! I’m 77, and I first encountered Monty Python when , recently out of college and visiting Britain for the first time, I saw it in its virgin run on the Beeb on the telly of a rather cool fellow I was dating. We had just had a small joint, and I found myself watching the Gynecologists vs Long John Silver Impersonators match with joyful gaping mouth, wondering how much of it was the hemp!
The Pythons didn’t make it onto US television until about 3-4 yrs later, IIRC. All my friends dug them instantly, and I felt a bit smug!
sab
My cats don’t like sardines at all. I think it is because sardines are slathered in olive oil, which my cats don’t like. Canned crab they like. Also tuna fish.
SiubhanDuinne
@opiejeanne:
No, except in a casual and inaccurate sense. I expect the family connection is that Judge Jackson’s BIL (her husband’s twin) is married to Ryan’s sister.
The English language doesn’t distinguish between “spouse’s sibling” and “sibling’s spouse.” And it should.
The Lodger
@Gin & Tonic: Van Gogh. Prints and web don’t communicate at all how three-dimensional his paintings are. He sculptures that paint on the canvas.