It rarely snows in Palermo but I was pleased to see the universal winter snowflakes on the windows of the elementary school. Our apartment is near the Piazza Marina in the center of which is the Giardino Garibaldi where enormous fig trees create what must be welcome shade in the summer. The largest tree in … Read more
On the back-end of bronchitis I’ve been hacking, wheezing and coughing my way through Palermo with the long-suffering travel mate. Here’s part of the first day. First impressions: Grit – the sort that swirls around your feet – , garbage and graffiti. Everything seems pitted and pocked and either under construction or crumbling. Narrow streets … Read more
A few images from a century ago to wish everyone the very best for 1917. War is lurking! This Reading (Pennsylvania) Times cartoon sees the threat of war lurking ahead. The US entered the war in April.
There’s a great exhibit on at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC: Max Beckmann in New York It highlights Max Beckmann (1884–1950) connections with New York City and includes works from his time living in New York as well as works from 1920-1948 that are in New York collections. One of the first works in … Read more
This 1809 cartoon by the political caricaturist James Gillray is in the National Portrait Gallery. London. It is entitled Pandora Opening her Box. It depicts spokesperson Kellyanne Conway letting loose all the evils of the world as proposed by the Trump administration. The story behind the woman in the cartoon – Mary Ann Clarke – … Read more
In celebration of Labor Day: It’s Steel Workers 1939 by Philo B Ruggles and his brother John Ruggles, a study for an unrealized mural for the Post Office in Bridgeport, Ohio. It’s part of the current exhibit Celebrating Heroes: American Mural Studies of the 1930s and 1940s from the Steven and Susan Hirsch Collection at the Frances Lehman … Read more
On Christmas Day 1915 David Lloyd George the former radical liberal,then Minister of Munitions and soon to be Prime Minister addressed a crowd of restless shop stewards and trade unionists in St. Andrew’s Hall, Glasgow. He was there to try and forestall strikes in an area where labor relations were contentious and complicated. He also … Read more
The winter solstice – the shortest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. The earth – tilted away from the sun – receives the least amount of sunlight today. Here’s Winter Solstice by Barbara Hepworth – originally created in 1970 as part of Hepworth’s suite of screenprints and lithographs known as ‘Opposing Forms’. This work expresses … Read more
There’s an interesting photo exhibit just opened at the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar. Called “the Making of an Argument” it shows the story of Gordon Park’s Life magazine photo essay from 1948. The subject was Leonard (Red) Jackson – the teenage leader of the Harlem gang the Midtowners. The story was … Read more
It’s not every day that you get to paint with an internationally renowned artist. But that was just one of the many delights of our Poughkeepsie Mini MakerFaire yesterday. Here is PDS parent Nestor Madalengoita creating a portrait of Eleanor Roosevelt with the help of many hands of all ages. And what a day it … Read more
There’s a really useful article in Education Week that reviews, summarizes and connects the basic thinking and research out there on what helps promote creativity and helps children incubate the curiosity that leads to innovation, discovery and invention. There’s little here that is new and indeed I have written on all of these topics many … Read more
The Art History class took off for Italy last week. It’s well over 4,000 miles from Poughkeepsie to Zurich and on to Florence but here’s the extra mile: Wayne created these books – in Florentine red – one for every student. It’s for notes,sketches and reference on the trip. The sleeve at the back has … Read more
With school closed for the day there was time for a walk. Buttercup Farm Sanctuary off Route 82 just north of Stanfordville has one path that tracks along Wappingers Creek as it runs down from the head waters at Thompson Pond south toward the Hudson. It was quiet except for the rustle of squirrels, a … Read more
