a porcupine in New York

2008-08-24T11:55:00.002-04:00

Suzanne Vega played a concert on Thursday night in what seemed like an unlikely and surprisingly modest venue - the Brooklyn Masonic Temple in beautiful Fort Greene, Brooklyn. With an opening by Christina Courtin, Vega was crisp, funny, and perhaps even a bit self-conscious, but I think she reminded all of her fans why her albums were played over and over in the 1990s.

2008-08-20T11:51:00.000-04:00

Another weekend in the Berkshires, and the weather cooperated.

Saturday evening, West Village

2008-08-10T12:02:00.005-04:00

2008-08-03T23:58:00.014-04:00

The Museum of Modern Art's Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling is attracting the kind of interest that would not have been possible before the days of HGTV and Dwell, when only architecture students would have prowled the stuffy, model-filled architecture & design Siberia of the old MoMA. Now the hipsters are bringing their friends and children to compare materials, see "discrete" construction, and explore the idea that buildings are only a resting state for materials.

Salmagundi celebrates city workers

2008-07-27T11:20:00.004-04:00

The Salmagundi Club at Forty-Seven Fifth Avenue is celebrating art by city workers. The reception and awards ceremony on Thursday night was a festive affair.

Above: City Worker (1-3) by Patrick Ashley

Beauty, kitsch & controversy at Radio City

2008-02-08T22:26:00.000-05:00

Chinese New Year Splendor at Radio City Music Hall is billed as “a spectacular showcase of classical Chinese performing arts accompanied by a full orchestra and a dazzling high-tech backdrop,” and in most respects, that’s probably true.

The show comprises a series of musical and dance performances, each with elaborate costumes and an accompanying video projection that features a pastel-colored landscape of mountains, lakes, Chinese pagodas, or flowering cherry trees that would make the Teletubbies feel at home.

In between each performance, a pair of Chinese announcers (unconvincingly introduced as “Jerry” and “Kelly,” in tuxedo and floor-length gown, respectively) provide a bilingual commentary on the cultural significance of each piece, punctuated by amiable jokes (a piece about dreams prompts Jerry to remark about his dream of opening a seafood restaurant in Flushing) and exhortations to learn a bit of Chinese.

So it’s easy to believe that you are watching a celebration of Chinese history and traditions, likely sanctioned and promoted by the government as a way to spread awareness of its performing arts. But fairly soon the show takes on a didactic and preachy flavor, particularly when the lyrics to some of the songs (which make repeated references to Truthfulness, Benevolence, and Forbearance) are translated into English and projected onto the giant video screen.

Soon Jerry tells the audience that this program could not be seen in China because of its repressive government. The dance performances become explicit enactments of torture and imprisonment at the hands of black-clad evildoers. The show culminates in a particularly unsettling sequence set in an urban park, a vision of utopia in which modestly dressed citizens are enlightened by the ideals of living in harmony.

The show, as noted in the Times, is an outreach of Falun Gong, a spiritual practice that is banned in China. I did notice a number of people leaving, as mentioned in the article, but I didn’t realize they were likely objecting to the content of the show. During intermission and after the show, interviewers from New Tang Dynasty Television, which produced the show, approached audience members for their reactions.

The full realization of what we had seen didn’t unfold until later, and although it doesn’t particularly bother me, I’m surprised that I was so slow to recognize propaganda – wholly unapologetic and on a gargantuan scale.

2008-02-03T20:20:00.000-05:00

Improve your vocabulary and help feed the world by playing a game.

Via Dove's Eye View.

2008-02-03T01:55:00.000-05:00

This reminds me of when I edited a Wall Street weekly and some of the analysts wanted to publish something called a "blog." It was supposed to be edgy and topical.

"But it's edited and printed - how is that a blog?" I objected. "Do they even know what a blog is?"

Here it is: The Metropolitan Museum of Art's fashion blog.

(And here is a well-considered view of the matter, via Ed W.:
"Bloggers are golden when they're at the bottom of the heap, kicking up. Why? When you write for pay, you worry about lawsuits, sentence structure, and word choice. You worry about your boss, your publisher, your mother, and your superego looking over your shoulder. And that's no way to blog.")

2008-02-03T01:44:00.000-05:00

Highly recommended: the documentary Helvetica.

As if you needed any more proof that graphic designers are lunatics.

What I've been doing since Christmas... & Kara Walker

2008-01-21T19:15:00.000-05:00

I made pernil, or Puerto Rican pork roast, from a recipe by Mark Bittman.

I made my first apple clafouti from a recipe by Julia Child.

I made bread for the very first time from the famous Bittman/Lahey recipe that appeared in the New York Times and has been blogged about ad nauseam. And yes, it is just as fantastic as everyone says, and no, you do not need a Dutch oven to replicate the results. (I would detail my alternative workaround here but I don't want to turn this into a cooking blog.)

I started learning Greek using Rosetta Stone.

And I watched countless movies - too many and perhaps too varied to list here, but I am still listening to the lovely soundtrack from Once and re-reading Persepolis.

But lest I forget the primary reason I started this blog almost two years ago, I have been trying to see some art when I can. Last weekend I dutifully went to see Kara Walker at the Whitney Museum of Art. Walker is an artist whose career I've been following since the 1990s for the truly banal reason that we are (almost) exactly the same age. What can I say? My mother once said that the first time she ever felt old was when the President in the White House was her contemporary. In the case of Walker, the fascination for me was to see how someone who grew up in the US as my exact contemporary found her voice and its most perfect expression by exploring, almost exclusively, this country's history of slavery.

Walker, enviably, has been called a genius since her twenties (literally - she was awarded a MacArthur genius grant in 1997). I think I first became aware of her at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, when her cut-paper silhouettes were exhibited either alongside or around the same time as other African American female artists like the distinguished photographer Carrie Mae Weems. The Walker, always politically correct and ahead of its time, still had a way of compartmentalizing these artists so that your immediate reaction was "race" and not "art." Or perhaps this was a mid-1990s art-world phenomenon - the depressing suspicion that museums were exhibiting only those black artists for whom race was the central subject matter.

To that end, Kara Walker fit the bill perfectly. Her silhouettes of slaves and plantation scenes were consistently angry, poetic, and unnerving. Her choice of subject matter was unwavering and, to put it mildly, dreadful - a so-called "reclamation" of something that no one wanted. Even an older generation of black female artists - led by Betye Saar - emerged to oppose her use of imagery and stereotypes that had taken so long to recede in popular culture.

So it was with some resignation that I went to see her traveling retrospective, if that is the right term for someone so young, because I knew what to expect: An ingenious formal device, a stomach-turning subject, some hints at where she would go next, but in the end an inescapable feeling that "there's no air in here."

2007-11-18T03:14:00.000-05:00

November in Vermont

2007-08-30T19:46:00.000-04:00

Most heartbreaking quote of the week:

‘Am I just standing here alone? What happened to all my townspeople? What is the purpose of life if I am all alone?’

From the Times's coverage of the fires in Greece.

2007-08-26T09:11:00.000-04:00

Saturday night performance, SoHo - August 18, 2007

View from Spitzer's Corner, Lower East Side - August 18, 2007

2007-07-26T07:52:00.001-04:00

This picture made me smile (from the New York Times).

Weekend in the Berkshires

2007-07-23T18:29:00.000-04:00

I spent the weekend in the Berkshires, where this horse and rider shared my room.

Volissos

2007-07-18T09:47:00.000-04:00

2007-07-18T07:24:00.000-04:00

2007-07-17T22:29:00.000-04:00

2007-07-17T22:09:00.001-04:00

Pyrgi, Chios

2007-07-17T21:54:00.000-04:00

Chios

2007-07-15T21:18:00.000-04:00

More scenes from Chios.

Chios

2007-07-15T20:44:00.000-04:00

Some scenes from Chios, in the Aegean Sea.

2007-07-07T08:30:00.001-04:00

Lefkanti

2007-07-07T08:29:00.001-04:00

Athens

2007-07-07T08:18:00.000-04:00

Subway station in Athens

2007-07-07T08:00:00.000-04:00

You know you’re a jaded New Yorker when a gleaming subway station leaves a more lasting impression than the Parthenon.

Off to Greece

2007-06-30T00:30:00.000-04:00

I am off to Greece for two weeks. Above, the island of Chios, in the Aegean Sea.

2007-06-11T20:49:00.000-04:00

Last Thursday: Dinner at Caffe Falai, and then the hilarious rock musical Passing Strange at the Public Theater, which reminded me quite a bit of Hedwig and the Angry Inch in its musical telling of a young bohemian's international journey, punctuated with calls from Mom in LA. The music is fabulous. Go see it.

And on Sunday: Is it improvisation or careful choreography? Noche Flamenca at Theater 80.

Meanwhile, on the movie front:
The Man Of My Life, 2006 - Questioning one's sexuality with Provence as a backdrop.
Friday Night, 2002 - Questioning one's fidelity with Paris as a backdrop.

2007-06-04T19:59:00.000-04:00

Saturday: The fine Liev Schreiber in Eric Bogosian's Talk Radio on Broadway.

And then a walk along Fifth Avenue with a stop at the Fendi windows (above).

2007-05-13T20:03:00.000-04:00

At the Guggenheim, which is undergoing a massive restoration that has stripped the facade to its concrete core.

2007-05-13T20:01:00.000-04:00

Two views of the Upper East Side: A congregation of twins in Central Park, and a congregation of doctors to treat life's most troubling ailments.

2007-05-12T10:02:00.000-04:00

Joan Mitchell at Cheim & Read.

2007-05-10T21:21:00.000-04:00

A Thursday night in Chelsea

2007-05-09T10:12:00.000-04:00

Tuesday evening: Walking around Tribeca

Monday night sunset

2007-05-07T20:28:00.000-04:00

2007-05-06T21:17:00.000-04:00

Saturday: Burritos at Noche Mexicana, then American Repertory Ballet at Symphony Space. Before that, a stop at the Conran Shop (above).

Here's to Spud

2007-05-05T11:33:00.000-04:00

A short stop at Otto, and then Spalding Gray: Stories Left to Tell, at the Minetta Lane Theatre.

Yup, go see it.

2007-05-02T11:05:00.000-04:00

Central Park Conservatory Garden at 105th St. and 5th Ave.

Party, ancient Cypriot style

2007-04-30T20:25:00.000-04:00

New Greek and Roman Galleries

2007-04-29T19:57:00.000-04:00

Freedom of movement

2007-04-29T16:11:00.000-04:00

Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City

Architectural highlights of Astoria, part I

2007-04-29T12:09:00.000-04:00

2007-04-29T12:05:00.000-04:00

Tuesday night sunset

2007-04-24T20:24:00.000-04:00

Beautiful Fort Greene

2007-04-22T20:24:00.000-04:00

On Saturday we headed to Fort Greene, a rapidly gentrifying part of Brooklyn that I had only read about. And indeed it seemed to be inhabited by unusually attractive people, their children, and their toy dogs - or so it appeared on the first warm spring day of the year. Our ultimate destination was Kronos + Cosmos, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, an artistic juggernaut of an institution that I had never visited. But first we wandered around the park and the neighborhood in search of a restaurant, and wound up at Loulou, a sweet little French place on DeKalb Avenue that happened to be playing Belle and Sebastian when we sat down.

Is this what 9/11 sounded like? At BAM we heard the New York premiere of "My Beautiful Scream," composed by Julia Wolfe and performed by the Brooklyn Philharmonic and the Kronos Quartet. The piece was inspired by September 11 and written in its aftermath, an orchestral evocation of the day's panic and unfolding terror.

2007-04-20T23:35:00.000-04:00

Thursday: Smoke and Mirrors at the Flea Theater.

2007-04-14T13:24:00.000-04:00

Last Saturday: Ballet Memphis at the Joyce Theater
Friday: Dinner at Crispo, then Stay at the Rattlestick
Above: A shop window in the West Village, observed on the way home

Happy Easter

2007-04-08T00:55:00.000-04:00

Back from Bermuda

2007-04-04T16:10:00.000-04:00

So much more exquisite than I ever expected...

2007-03-28T09:45:00.000-04:00

Here's a headline that should warm the heart of every New Yorker:

Wal-Mart Chief Writes Off New York

2007-03-25T09:45:00.000-04:00

Saturday:

Genesis, no! - another experimental performance at PS 122 - is a parody of museum culture.

Weekend roundup

2007-03-18T22:14:00.000-04:00

Thursday: We went to see the Aquila Theatre Company's production of Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus at the Classic Stage Company, with David Oyelowo.

Friday: With several inches of snow on the ground, and ice pelting us from the sky, we ventured to New York City Center to see the Paul Taylor Dance Company.

Saturday: Onward to Chelsea to see Justine Kurland's photographs of mothers and children in majestic natural settings, at Mitchell-Innes & Nash; then Nan Goldin at Matthew Marks; and finally the Lebanese-born artist Walid Raad at Paula Cooper.

Sunday: Irish Modern Dance Theater's "anarchic and quirky" RrrrrrrKILLKILLKILL . . . to infinity (MAKE IT LOOK REAL) at Performance Space 122. Then, dinner at Café Mogador.

Breaking and entering

2007-03-14T10:15:00.000-04:00

Sunday at the Whitney Museum: Gordon Matta Clark and one of my favorites from a decade ago, Lorna Simpson (above).

Amazingly bad idea department

2007-03-07T11:14:00.000-05:00

France Bans 'Citizen Journalists' From Reporting on Violence
The French Constitutional Council has approved a law that criminalizes the filming or broadcasting of acts of violence by people other than professional journalists. The law could lead to the imprisonment of eyewitnesses who film acts of police violence, or operators of Web sites publishing the images, one French civil liberties group warned.
Via mediabistro.

In other news, France has agreed to allow Abu Dhabi to attach the Louvre’s name to a new museum for $520 million. "For France the agreement signals a new willingness to exploit its culture for political and economic ends." From the New York Times.

2007-03-06T23:33:00.000-05:00

Tonight, dinner at Kefi, which has clearly benefited from this favorable review, and then Merkin Concert Hall, where a visibly nervous teenage pianist charmed the audience (program below).

Camerata NY & the Leschetizky Association
Rossini - Barber of Seville Overture
Chopin - Piano Concerto No. 1
Mendelssohn - Symphony No. 3 "Scotch"

(Piano soloist Graciela Arguedas was the winner of the Leschetizky Foundation Youth Players Competition.)

Beethoven in Astoria

2007-03-04T20:11:00.000-05:00

The impressive Cuban pianist Orlando Alonso played Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 with the Astoria Symphony.

The rest of the program:

Debussy Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun
Schubert Symphony No. 8 (“Unfinished”)
Soluri Pas de Trois: Ballet Sketches
Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 5 (“Emperor”)

Sunday, March 4, 2007 at 5:00 p.m.
St. Joseph's Catholic Church, 43-19 30th Avenue at 43rd St., Astoria

Abbas Kiarostami

2007-03-04T15:26:00.000-05:00

Abbas Kiarostami is a contemporary Iranian filmmaker I had never heard of until I saw his photographs on my most recent trip to P.S.1. He is now the subject of an exhibition and retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art.

Department of 'familiar metatheatrical gambits'

2007-03-04T14:53:00.000-05:00

I had high hopes for "A Spanish Play," by Yasmina Reza, who did "Art," which I really liked. (I didn't see "Art" on Broadway, though; believe it or not, I saw it at the Weston Playhouse in Weston, Vermont.) But the monologues go almost nowhere, and the gimmick of filming the actors with a handheld camcorder and simultaneously projecting the footage against the back wall is weird and disruptive.

2007-03-01T23:59:00.000-05:00

Drinks at Thalia, to toast a former colleague's move to Hong Kong, and then the parody Altar Boyz.

Red Dot art fair

2007-02-23T22:51:00.000-05:00

Tonight we attended the opening reception of the Red Dot art fair, at the Park South Hotel, where we were most charmed by the proprietors of the Repetti gallery. Later, at Pongal, almost every table was occupied by dealers and visitors from the fair.

P.S.1: Best in show

2007-02-21T10:14:00.000-05:00

P.S.1 is quickly becoming my favorite museum in New York. I started this blog a year ago with a trip to P.S.1, so it's hard to understand why it has taken me so long to go back. On Monday, wandering around the quiet hallways of the former school on a frigid holiday, under the watch of sometimes very young guards who might giggle when they see your eyes widen, I began to look at the densely packed museum as a possible standard against which to judge other contemporary art museums.

Standouts on this trip were the photographs of Brazilian artist Vik Muniz, who has used sugar, dirt, dust, chocolate sauce, and perhaps most memorably, peanut butter and jam to create two likenesses of the Mona Lisa. Also the cool black-and-white images of Norwegian photographer Tom Sandberg (above).

2007-02-18T16:41:00.000-05:00

On Saturday, we saw "Every Day Above Ground," based on Michael Ondaatje's novel "The Collected Works of Billy the Kid," at P.S. 122. Later, dinner at Mercadito.

Armando Reverón

2007-02-10T13:45:00.000-05:00

This retrospective exhibition of Venezuelan artist Armando Reverón, at The Museum of Modern Art, made me wonder how many other treasures have been ignored by Western museums.

Ehon: Japanese picture books

2007-02-03T09:37:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I happened to be in the vicinity of the New York Public Library on 42nd Street, and just barely managed to catch the exhibition Ehon: The Artist and the Book in Japan, which closes on February 4. That's where I encountered Kyoto-based Kamisaka Sekka (1866–1942) and his remarkably spare "Spring Rice Fields,” above, from Flowers of a Hundred Worlds, 1910. Then it was off to Turks & Frogs to celebrate Pinky's new job! (And then the Brooklyn Brewery for a surprise birthday party!)

2007-01-28T14:14:00.000-05:00

Pinky's cappuccino, at the Alessi store in Soho, 130 Greene Street.

2007-01-28T10:39:00.000-05:00

Struggling artist turned deal maker Scott Latham.

Department of pointless inventions

2007-01-28T10:36:00.000-05:00

Neat freaks can now enjoy a worry-free breakfast in bed.

Good question

2007-01-21T11:07:00.000-05:00

Jerry Saltz asks "Is the art market making us stupid?"

Funny links

2007-01-17T11:18:00.000-05:00

College economy on Indexed (and What's in your basket?).

How warm has it been in New York?

2007-01-07T23:54:00.000-05:00

Flowering trees in January (from Pinky).

$125 million

2007-01-03T10:07:00.000-05:00

The Museum of Modern Art is selling its last vacant parcel of land in Midtown for $125 million to an international real estate developer.

Saul Steinberg at The Morgan

2006-12-26T19:29:00.000-05:00

Saul Steinberg (1914–1999), the "Leonardo of graphic drollery," is the subject of a major (and surprisingly well-attended) retrospective exhibition at The Morgan Library & Museum.

2006-12-24T09:46:00.000-05:00

From Slate.

Brice Marden at MoMA + Mahler’s Symphony No. 3

2006-12-18T20:52:00.000-05:00

On Saturday, I saw Brice Marden's retrospective at MoMA with a new art buddy - a math teacher with a much longer attention span than mine. The show is perfectly gorgeous, though it's hard not to laugh at the taped interview with Marden describing a romantic figure in a landscape when you're staring at a monochrome canvas the color of a wet slate roof. The end of the chronological exhibition is the most stunning; although Marden is using the same intertwined ribbons of paint against varying fields of color, the recent paintings have built up in intensity.

Jerry Saltz points out, however, in his review for the Village Voice, that "Viewers will leave the sixth floor of this retrospective never knowing that Marden was in artistic hell for nearly 10 years." That's for sure. The show unfolds as if Marden always knew where he was going, and excludes his "false starts, dead ends, and messy thoughts."

Later that night it was time for Gustav Mahler's titanic Symphony No. 3 in D Minor, performed at the Church of St. Paul the Apostle.

Above: 6 Red Rock I, 2000–2002

Susan Hauptman

2006-12-14T21:27:00.000-05:00

Tonight a show of works on paper by Susan Hauptman opened at the Forum Gallery. Hauptman’s charcoal self-portraits are rendered so accurately as to be clinical. Some are androgynous but others incorporate lace gloves and slips.

Self-Portrait (with Branch) 2004

Charcoal on paper

2006-12-14T00:30:00.000-05:00

The explosion of hedge fund wealth has created a new financial pecking order, and museums are scampering after its biggest beneficiaries.

Bizarre gift ideas for the pet lovers in your life

2006-12-13T09:44:00.000-05:00

Is Fido taking up too much space when he sleeps? Then get him the Pet Murphy Bed, which stows away when not in use.

What about Kitty? Always shivering? Then she'll really appreciate the Heated Cat Cup. Maybe now she'll stop hogging all the radiators.

Wondering what to get the dog who has everything? Acknowledge his sophistication with Leather Cigarlike Chews, handmade cowhide chews that are rolled, sealed, and come presented in a cigar box.

What about you? Does Kitty complain when you wrap her around your neck? Give her a break and get a Black & White Tuxedo Herbal Therapy Cat instead; throw it in the microwave and enjoy soothing, aromatic warmth for about an hour.

One of the biggest complaints about cats is the unsightly litter box. Solve the problem in style with a Rattan Litter Pan Cover; add a little palm tree and you'll be wondering why the cat has a better-looking toilet than you do.

2006-12-05T10:28:00.000-05:00

This is why I think I'd love Japan - they have a term for wandering aimlessly around an expensive shopping district: "ginbura," or strolling the streets of Ginza. (Maybe here we can call it "Madisonbura.")

2006-12-05T09:32:00.000-05:00

Here's something I'll be sorry to miss:

Repetti Gallery: Alejandra Villasmil and D. Dominick Lombardi:
II STRANGE BREW
December 1-20
Opening reception Wednesday, December 6, 6-9 pm.

From Art Cards.

2006-12-03T21:07:00.000-05:00

If you want to be a homeowner in New York, you have two options, generally speaking: (1) be a banker, or (2) marry a banker. (I suppose you could be born to a banker, but that would predate free will.) This is why every few months or so, after visiting relatives in Connecticut and contracting a severe case of Appliance Envy*, I start looking up real estate listings. And that is how I came upon this 1898 Victorian.

* An affliction that is familiar to all New Yorkers who have considered leaving the city after prolonged contact with a suburban dweller's sparkling new Sub-Zero refrigerator with freezer storage drawers.

2006-12-02T09:10:00.000-05:00

What would you find inside?

John Currin & Lucian Freud

2006-12-01T23:51:00.000-05:00

This afternoon I walked up Madison Avenue in the warmth and the rain to see an exhibition of new work by John Currin at the Gagosian Gallery. I don't normally visit galleries on weekdays, and the crowd was a noticeably more business-like lot than the self-consciously artsy types who roam around Chelsea on Saturdays, determined to make a day of it.

The exhibition of unframed canvases is in one large room, and no sooner had I turned from a portrait of the artist's instantly recognizable wife than I saw her - Rachel Feinstein - gazing at another painting. That seemed like an odd coincidence until I saw John Currin himself, talking to a gallery employee. It’s not unusual to see an artist at his or her opening, of course, but it’s something else entirely to see them examining their own paintings on an ordinary day, especially if the paintings include portraits of family members, not to mention assorted orgies.

Those orgies – oddly unsexy configurations in which disproportionately tiny hands grasp at engorged genitals – have already attracted the lion’s share of attention. But the portraits of Currin’s wife and son are more memorable – sweetly luminous and sensitive, they fit well in the mannered style that he has so deftly adopted.

Still to come: Lucian Freud at Acquavella Galleries

A new Woodstock museum

2006-12-01T23:40:00.000-05:00

DC Dude informs us that he is working on a new Woodstock museum to be built on the old concert site up in Sullivan county:

http://www.bethelwoodslive.org/im_overview.htm

2006-11-30T00:15:00.000-05:00

Despite the resounding silence here, I did actually see some art over the long Thanksgiving weekend - Americans in Paris, 1860–1900, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Charles Courtney Curran (1861–1942)

Afternoon in the Cluny Garden, Paris, 1889

Another assassination in Lebanon

2006-11-21T19:12:00.000-05:00

When I called my father to tell him that Pierre Gemayel had been assassinated, he said "The kid?" Pierre Amine Gemayel was the 34-year-old grandson of Pierre Gemayel, for whom he was named, and the son of Amin Gemayel, a former president of Lebanon. This prominent Christian family has been targeted before.

The choice of victim is also an act of historical blackmail, resurrecting as it does some key ghosts of the 1975-1990 Civil War: A 1980 car-bombing killed the 2-year-old daughter of his uncle, then-Lebanese Forces leader Bashir Gemayel; another blast killed Bashir himself after he became president-elect in 1982. The assailants' identities and immediate demands are unknown, but their message is clear: They will bring the country to - and possibly beyond - the brink of disaster to get their way. -The Daily Star

And the killing crystallized a sense of foreboding, as everyone waited for Sheik Hassan Nasrallah's "surprise."

An impending assassination has been in the air for the past few weeks. We could all feel it -- it stood out from the general sense of dread hanging over Lebanon since the war. It was specific. We didn't know who or when, or whether the attempt would succeed -- but we knew it was coming. - Chercheuse d'Or

Most observers expect today's killing to further polarize the pro-Syria and anti-Syria bloc and shape the country's future.

This weekend

2006-11-15T07:48:00.000-05:00

Printed Matter presents the first New York Art Book Fair in Chelsea. 548 West 22nd Street (10th & 11th Aves)

2006-11-14T20:49:00.000-05:00

From Pinky...

2006-11-13T22:20:00.000-05:00

I feel compelled to post something once in a while, even if it doesn't involve art. Tonight we had a very nice dinner at a restaurant I'd never heard of. You see, there's Giorgione at 307 Spring Street, which I hear is very good, but we went to its cousin Giorgione 508, at 508 Greenwich Street, and it was really excellent.

2006-11-12T09:54:00.000-05:00

I love this photograph. From New York Magazine.

2006-11-11T10:15:00.000-05:00

Did you ever dream of monitoring the foot traffic in a hip store from the comfort of your home?

Oh good. Because now you can watch people shopping at Uniqlo, Japan's most popular retailer, in SoHo. Surprisingly mesmerizing.

2006-11-10T22:25:00.000-05:00

The beginning of Art School Confidential reminded me of one of those Saturday-morning sitcoms aimed at teenagers. And not in a good way. It's too bad, because the insular universe of art school is ripe for a black comedy, and the premise could not have been in better hands: Terry Zwigoff directed the documentary Crumb, about the cartoonist Robert Crumb, and one of my all-time favorite movies, Ghost World. That's not to say that there weren't some truly funny moments in the movie, and seeing John Malkovich again made me want to order all of his movies from Netflix.

2006-11-08T14:31:00.000-05:00

After I voted yesterday, I was treated to a pretty fabulous exhibition of self-portraits in my neighborhood public school. Apparently the art teacher there had taught his grade-school students about Expressionism, and they had learned their lesson well.

2006-11-08T14:11:00.000-05:00

Gray skies are gonna clear up,
Put on a happy face;
Brush off the clouds and cheer up,
Put on a happy face.

2006-11-05T21:52:00.000-05:00

I haven't been posting much lately because my job has gotten in the way. But that doesn't mean we haven't been engaging with our fellow freaks! Yes, on Tuesday we took in the Village Halloween Parade. Despite a creepy undertone of, well, advertising (how many Borats and Marie Antoinettes do we need in one parade?), I was impressed by the limitless supply of creativity that is unleashed whenever a New Yorker is presented with that most tantalizing incentive - an audience. Here I am thinking of the dude who dressed up as Viagra, or more accurately, the effect of Viagra.

And today was the event that I look forward to most all year - the New York City Marathon. It's hard to explain why this parade of agony has become a favorite of mine. I think it dates back to when I lived in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and we'd cheer the (eventual) winners as they ran by, then go back home and eat bagels until they crossed the finish line a couple of hours later. I think I've gone to see every marathon since then, and I've known a couple of people who ran. It's very moving (and baffling) to watch people from around the world put themselves through this torture. Someone once told me that the most heavily represented profession in the marathon is lawyers; watching the runners today, I find that very easy to believe.

2006-11-03T09:48:00.000-05:00

One intrepid reporter rolls up his sleeves to study a single block of 25th Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues.

Also in the Times, apparently the lack of available men in Beirut is worse than in New York.

2006-10-29T22:48:00.000-05:00

Time to get squiggly with it.

Brice Marden's retrospective opened at MoMA.

2006-10-29T22:15:00.000-05:00

For the past couple of Fridays, we have been hitting the happy hour at Lure pretty hard. But this past Friday night I went overboard and ended up seeing stars. I haven't been that wine-soaked since my last Christmas party at Morgan Stanley, when at least a dispatcher put me in a black car home. Even then, the trip from the sidewalk up to my apartment seemed long and unnerving. I guess you're never too old to regress into adolescence; it just takes longer to recover.

2006-10-26T21:44:00.000-04:00

Tonight, art journalist (and blogger) Lisa Hunter officially launched her book The Intrepid Art Collector: The Beginner's Guide to Finding, Buying, and Appreciating Art on a Budget. Lisa (who is actually cuter and prettier than her photo), is a charming and engaging speaker. Her advice is pragmatic and realistic, and tailored to those of us who are not in a position to make a career out of collecting. My favorite line of the evening was her characterization of contemporary art as New York’s “contact sport,” in lieu of a football team. Lisa, I’m sorry I didn’t hang around to meet you but I have to be up at 5 a.m. tomorrow. I hope you’re throwing a few back at Otto.

Make way for an icon

2006-10-25T00:48:00.000-04:00

Opening on Wednesday at Gagosian Gallery, at 555 West 24th Street and 522 West 21st Street, is an exhibition of Andy Warhol's late work.

2006-10-24T23:58:00.000-04:00

On Saturday, I went hiking with a friend up on Fishkill Ridge Trail, about 1,500 feet above the Hudson River. It was a beautiful day and the vistas begged to be painted, but the hike was fairly strenuous and I was not prepared; my legs were really sore for a couple of days.