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Artist Creates Scenes with Tiny People

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , on November 16, 2011| 2 Comments »

Michelle Aldredge once again introduces me to an artist I knew nothing about. Check out her wonderful post about the artist Slinkachu at her blog, Gwarlingo.

Like Banksy, Slinkachu is part of the London street art scene, Aldredge writes, but  “is everything Banksy is not — subtle, empathic, poignant, contemplative.”

I won’t try to replicate her post but will just mention that I especially like “The House of God” and “Dreams of Packing it All In.”

The photos are copyrighted by Slinkachu. If he doesn’t consider this “fair use,” I can take them down.

Update: He is in NYC until tomorrow, Oct. 7, 2012. Read up, here.

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On Videogames

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , on November 15, 2011| Leave a Comment »

From the Boston Globe comes a curious bit of research suggesting that videogames may allow people to “burn off the desire or the time to commit a crime.” Across U.S. counties from 1994 to 2004, a greater number of videogame stores is associated with less arson, car theft, robbery, and mortality.

Don’t you love counterintuitive findings like that? Does it mean that fantasy (or “Queen Mab” as Charles Dickens contended in Hard Times) continues to play a valuable role in our lives?  Read about the research here.

And while we are on the subject, the Innovators Insights listserv linked to an article on how playing a videogame has assisted city planners in their work.

“IBM has partnered with the Environmental Protection Agency to develop CityOne, a game simulation that provides city planners with an interactive tool to help them investigate complex energy and water interactions, learning how best to achieve certain performance goals under budget. Outside of the U.S., the tool has been used by governments in China, France, and South America.” Read more here.

These are just a couple examples. As Jane McGonigal, the author of Reality is Broken has written, today videogames are being used to “change the world.”

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The Lemon Eaters

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on November 14, 2011| 6 Comments »

My grandmother Mabel (called Garkie by my family as the result of a gross parental misinterpretation of my infantile diction) sometimes gave tea parties. In one tea-party story, my toddler self ate all the lemons, and Garkie had to keep going to the kitchen to get more for the ladies — my mother apologizing, and Garkie saying, “No, no. I have plenty more.”

A love of citrus is an inherited trait in my family. And since it runs in my daughter-in-law’s family, too, my grandson is doubly blessed, you might say. (I’m eating the lemons in my tea as I write.)

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“MobyDick”: The One-Man Show

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 13, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I spent four months reading MobyDick in 2010, and I must say that for me there was way too much information about different kinds of ropes, how to cut up a whale, and the categories of seagoing creatures. I could not figure out why people I admire read MobyDick over and over.

So, avast! There is now a way for people like me to grasp the essence of Herman Melville’s classic. It’s a one-man show performed by the Irish actor Conor Lovett, who — along with his wife and director, Judy Hegarty Lovett — adapted the book’s highlights.

ArtsEmerson presented this wonder in Boston recently, and I’m in awe.

Despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that the actor in his Ishmael role has the stunned, wounded look of Tommy Smothers (remember the insecure brother in the 1970s comedy duo?), Conor is heartbreaking. His facial expressions and body language before he speaks Melville’s famous opening, “Call me Ishmael,” convey a haunted man, one who, like Coleridge’s ancient mariner, has witnessed mysteries beyond human understanding and feels condemned to tell the story to anyone who will listen. His look says, Why was I spared? Why did I choose this voyage? Why did I listen to the prophetic mad sailor Elijah on a wintry Nantucket dock and still choose to sail on the cursed Pequod?

The production is full of dark musings, the roars of a crazed Captain Ahab, and the savagely raging elements of air, water, and fire. But at the outset, stage time is lovingly devoted to the humorous side of Ishmael searching for New Bedford lodgings, having to bunk with the “harponeer” Queeqeg, and learning to recognize the interior decency behind the mask of the “cannibal.”

That the novel is deep is clearer to me now. I’m still pondering Ahab’s speech about whaleness being merely the “mask” that MobyDick wears. When the devout first mate Starbuck says it’s wrong to seek revenge against a whale that is merely a dumb beast — a creature of God — Ahab counters that beneath the mask is an infinitely malevolent force that must be conquered at all costs. We never feel sure what this force is supposed to be. Satan? Then why do the natural elements seem to take the side of the whale? I’m still wondering why we never learn if the whale dies or lives to wreak havoc another day.

But at last I see why people admire this book. Read more here.

P.S. The play is part of Imagine Ireland, “a year of Irish arts in America.” Check it out.

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Annual Scandinavian Fair

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , on November 12, 2011| 4 Comments »

I’ve been attending the annual Scandinavian Fair ever since Erik came into our lives. Although he has yet to be in town when it has taken place, it’s OK. He may not feel a need to be more Scandinavian than he already is.

The Scandinavian Fair is a real happening — “sui generis to a fault,” as the humorist S.J. Perelman might have said. Definitely the place to go if you have inadvertently run out of glögg.

Update 11/13/14: This year’s fair is Saturday, November 15, at Concord Carlisle High School, Walden Street, Concord, MA, starting at 10 a.m.

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New Wing at the Museum of Fine Arts

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 11, 2011| Leave a Comment »

My workplace closes down on Veterans Day, so today my husband and I finally got a chance to visit the new Art of the Americas wing at the Museum of Fine Arts.

I didn’t realize that people bring cameras to museums now and take pictures of whatever they like. Is that allowed? For this post, I wanted to use a particular painting I saw today, but after trying the MFA site and searching the Internet, all I could find was a bootlegged photo for sale at Flickr. Fortunately, I did buy an MFA postcard that I was able to photograph at home.

This is a Louis Comfort Tiffany-designed stained glass window of parakeets and a goldfish bowl.

My favorite floor was the third, though. There we saw some great 20th Century art: Calder mobiles, a Jackson Pollock, works by Charles Sheeler, Georgia O’Keeffe, Arthur Dove, Marsden Hartley, the photographer Weegie, and more. Although the MFA also has a new gallery of contemporary art in a different part of the building, I liked the selections on the third floor of the Americas wing best.

At lunch we ate in the new dining area, a large, beautiful space that combines both classical and modern styles comfortably and features a tall, green, glass sculpture by Dale Chihuly.

The food was very good.

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Think Tank on Food Access

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 10, 2011| Leave a Comment »

There’s a new think tank at Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, one that’s focused on food access.

Food access, food “deserts,” and sustainable agriculture are big issues these days, and Food Sol founder Rachel Greenberger believes that addressing the challenges must involve bringing together all the stakeholders, even agribusiness.

Greenberger refers to her strategy as the “uncommon table,” writes Kathleen Pierce in the Boston Globe. “Located at Babson’s Social Innovation Lab, the company seeks to identify how so-called food deserts — geographical areas without access to a grocery store or fresh food — are formed, and how to make healthy food sustainable for all. …

“Greenberger, a 33-year-old Babson MBA graduate who studied food-system dynamics and consumer behavior in the sustainable food movement, came up with the concept for a company similar to a think tank, but centered on action. By creating a digital map to pinpoint food-related issues, Food Sol intends to highlight pressing topics such as food deserts and fair trade, linking experts in the field with would-be entrepreneurs to ignite working relationships. …

“Food Sol intends to foster ‘a way into thinking about innovation in the food-supply chain, whether it’s creating more cooperatives or building agribusiness in Fall River,’ says Cheryl Kiser [executive director of Babson’s innovation lab]. ‘We are a laboratory where people can come and engage in conversation.’ ”

The theory is that companies will pay to engage in a food think tank like this. In fact, Kiser hopes to involve Cargill Inc., Monsanto Co. , PepsiCo , the Coca-Cola Co., and more. Read more here.

The mention of entrepreneurs who might address food issues is reminding me of two young women who recently launched shipping-container grocery stores in food deserts. Read about that in this NY Times article.

“Carrie Ferrence, 33, and Jacqueline Gjurgevich, 32, were in business school at Bainbridge Graduate Institute in Washington State when they noticed that many local neighborhoods were ‘food deserts,’ without easy access to fresh local produce and other grocery staples.

“Their answer was StockBox Grocers, a company that repurposes old shipping containers as small grocery stores. The company won $12,500 in a local business plan competition and raised more than $20,000 online in a Kickstarter campaign to finance its first store, which opened in the Delridge neighborhood of Seattle in September.”

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Older Americans & Social Change

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 9, 2011| 2 Comments »

In a Yes! magazine op-ed, reprinted in the Christian Science Monitor, Marc Freedman of Civic Ventures writes about his favorite topic: the potential of older Americans to contribute beyond retirement.

“With big thinking,” he writes, “there is a chance to tap the talents and experience of the ‘baby boom’ generation to solve longstanding social problems, from health care to homelessness, education to the environment. There is a chance to turn an older population into a new workforce for social change.

“Some people, like Gary Maxworthy, are leading the way … [Around age 60] he thought a lot about his old Peace Corps dream and the prospect of returning to it. In the end, he chose a more manageable domestic option, VISTA, part of the AmeriCorps national service program. VISTA placed Maxworthy at the San Francisco Food Bank, where he discovered that—like food banks throughout the state of California—it was primarily giving out canned and processed food. It was all they could reliably deliver without food spoiling.

“Maxworthy knew that California farmers were discarding tons of blemished but wholesome fruits and vegetables that were not up to supermarket standards. He launched Farm to Family, a program that in 2010 distributed more than 100 million pounds of fresh food to needy families in California.” Read more.

For those who are interested in “encore careers,” check out Encore.org, by Civic Ventures, “a nonprofit think tank on boomers, work and social purpose.”

 

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Generations in the Jewelry Business

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on November 8, 2011| 5 Comments »

When Suzanne started the birthstone-jewelry business Luna & Stella a few years ago, I didn’t make the connection right away.

Suzanne never knew my grandmother Mabel, but Mabel (the woman I called Garkie from an early age) was also an entrepreneur, best known for jellies like Cinnama-Tang and for jewelry. I remember seeing her on black & white daytime television in New York when she was interviewed about her ventures.

My cousin Margot was going through the personal items of my late Aunt Maggie (Margot’s mother and Garkie’s daughter) and unearthed articles and artifacts. Here are samples. Styles have changed, but the urge to sell something creative has not.

The angel wing is Suzanne’s.

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Closing the Opportunity Divide

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 7, 2011| 2 Comments »

I went to a conference today on how industry and higher-education entities can collaborate better to prepare students for the jobs that companies want to fill. There was a big crowd, and among the speakers were U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy.

I was especially pleased to hear panel member Gerald Chertavian and catch up with what his nonprofit has accomplished in the past few years.

Starting in college, Chertavian volunteered as a Big Brother, and the experience had a profound effect on him. After he went to Harvard Business School, launched a company, and sold it, he decided to invest in helping motivated youths aged 18-24 who lacked the money, networks, or opportunity to get a good education or decent job.

So he founded Year Up. He built on his list of corporate contacts to make internships a key part of a training program that ended in jobs.

Interested young people had to have a high school diploma or GED and demonstrate through the application process (which involves getting references) that they are serious. They earn a stipend during a year of training in either financial-industry or tech skills. They learn workplace behavior and business communication. At the same time they get college credits at an affiliated school, which most students decide to put toward a degree after their year in the program. Companies have found the Year Up youths invaluable, and some are changing their HR requirements to allow in more people without a bachelor’s already in hand.

At the conference, Chertavian acknowledged that in spite of having helped 5,000 students over a decade through Year Up programs around the country, the organization was not big enough to achieve its ambition of a major impact on the opportunity divide. To scale up, he said, Year Up is partnering first with a college in Baltimore that will use the approach. It hopes to keep expanding the new model after Baltimore.

There are a lot of great You Tube videos that might interest you — some about the Year Up program, some about Chertavian, some about the students. Here is one.

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Kadar Qian, Young Pianist

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , on November 6, 2011| Leave a Comment »

My friend Alden, the oboist, is in considerable demand around the area. A good oboe player is hard to find, and he is very good. I have seen him solo with the Charles River Wind Ensemble and also take part in a lovely performance of Handel’s Messiah.

On Saturday night Alden played oboe with the Melrose Symphony, where a young piano soloist got a nice ovation. Alden writes, “In fact, the audience clapped between each of the movements he played. It was such a nice reception because he really is so talented and such a genuinely sweet, talented kid.” Read about it here.

The Melrose Symphony bio says, “Kadar Qian, 13, is a native of Westford, MA. As an award-winning pianist he has appeared with the Salem Philharmonic and Cape Ann Symphony in addition to over 60 performances in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York City. Qian recently appeared on the NPR radio show From the Top performing the Goldberg Variations by J.S. Bach, heard locally on 99.5 All Classical. Qian is a high honor roll student at Stony Brook School in Westford and has been a member of the math team since third grade, winning top prizes at the Academic Math League competitions. He was recently elected as Vice-President of the student body.”

Here he is playing a Chopin Waltz.

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Mystery Writers in Concord

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 5, 2011| Leave a Comment »

We had a great time at the Concord Festival of Authors Friday night. The brainchild of book maven Rob Mitchell, the festival has been going strong for about 20 years and lasts a month. The authors and topics are always amazing.

The event we most wanted to see this year featured a panel of mystery writers: Archer Mayor,  Spencer Quinn, and one whose books I know well, S.J. Rozan. The fans of these three novelists — and of Concord-based moderator and author Mark De Binder — filled the lobby of the Concord Library to overflowing.

I already knew from the Lydia Chin/Bill Smith mysteries that S.J. had a wacky sense of humor, but Mayor and Quinn also were hilarious in talking about their work and their lives. My husband said, “Who knew mystery writers were funny?”

Read about S.J. at the festival here and at her own site here.

“In her new novel, Ghost Hero, American-born Chinese P.I. Lydia Chin is called in on what appears to be a simple case. An art world insider wants her to track down a rumor. Contemporary Chinese painting is sizzling hot on the art scene and no one is hotter than Chau Chun, known as the Ghost Hero. A talented and celebrated ink painter, Chau’s highly prized work mixes classical forms and modern political commentary. The rumor of new paintings by Chau is shaking up the art world. There’s only one problem—Ghost Hero Chau has been dead for twenty years, killed in the 1989 Tiananmen Square uprising.” We enjoyed hearing S.J. read a passage from Ghost Hero, in which she had Bill Smith adopt her grandfather’s Russian accent and locution.

Quinn made me envious of his blog’s success. It attracts hordes of people who love his canine protagonist so much that they upload photos of their  pets to be the dog detective’s friend. Perhaps if I weren’t such an eclectic blogger …

If I had one reliable focus, though, I’d get bored.

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Leaping Over Obstacles

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on November 4, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I was chatting with a colleague in the washroom today, asking what she was doing this weekend, and she said she was going to New York to cheer for her brother in the marathon. She also mentioned in a proud but modest way that there was an article about him in today’s NY Times. We went and looked for the article, and I realized I had already read it word for word.

What an unusual brother! Kevin Dwyer decided as a child to be a dancer and had a ballet career, all while suffering from cystic fibrosis. The youngest in a family of seven children, he was the fourth to have CF. He didn’t tell people.

Although he and his siblings have a mutation of the disease that means it is not as severe as for many, it takes a real toll. Nevertheless, this weekend Kevin is running a marathon. His aim is to raise money for Team Boomer (started by the retired quarterback Boomer Esiason),  which funds much-needed CF research.

The NY Times writes that Kevin has “chronicled [his marathon training] in a lively blog, Kevin Running. When he goes out this Sunday, he will have lung capacity of 58 to 60 percent.

“ ‘I can beat this, in one little way,’ he said. ‘For at least one day, I can beat it. We’ve trained at 11-minute miles, but I think we will go kind of slow, maybe 11:45 or 12 minutes, so I can take everything in. Take everybody in. Make it a celebration.’ ” Read more.

I highly recommend chatting with colleagues in the washroom. I have learned so much that way!

P.S. Kevin was on the Early Show the next day.

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States Where Artists Find Work

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 3, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Miller-McCune.com tweeted today that the National Endowment for the Arts has new data on where artists are finding work.

Four of the six New England states are among the states with the most arts jobs: Vermont, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.

“The report on artists in the workforce supplements and expands upon a 2008 paper, which found about two million Americans list a job in the arts as their primary source of employment. That comes out to 1.4 percent of American workers.

“New York heads the newly released state-by-state list, with artists making up 2.3 percent of its labor force. California, home to the film and television industry, places second with 2.0 percent.

“Not far behind are Oregon and Vermont, each of which has a workforce in which 1.7 percent of workers are artists. That means they exceed the national average by a substantial 20 percent.

“ ‘Writers and authors are especially prominent [in Oregon and Vermont],’ the NEA report notes.

“Also exceeding the national average: Colorado and Connecticut (where artists make up 1.6 of the labor force), and Hawaii, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maryland, Washington, Nevada, and Minnesota (at 1.5 percent).”

Although there likely to be different perceptions of what kind of work constitutes arts employment, I find the report interesting. And since I know anecdotally that there are arts jobs in Maine and New Hampshire (the two New England states not among the top few), I can’t help hoping that some organization will do an in-depth study of the region. Unfortunately, ornery New Englanders don’t often think regionally.

And more generally, what are the reasons some states have more arts jobs? Public policies? Landscape? Accident?

Read more here.

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How Design Can Help the Poor

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 2, 2011| Leave a Comment »

A new exhibit organized by the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York demonstrates the power of design to make life better for disadvantaged people.

“This is a design show about remaking the world … And that’s thrilling,” writes Michael Kimmelman, “whether it’s happening in Cupertino, Calif., or Uganda, where H.I.V. infects hundreds of people a day, and the latest news cellphone-wise has been the design and distribution of a text-messaging system that spreads health care information.

“In Kibera, an area of Nairobi, Kenya, and one of the densest slums in Africa, the challenge was different. Traditional wood and charcoal fires cause rampant respiratory disease there. Refuse fills the streets. So a Nairobian architect designed a community cooker, fueled by refuse residents collect in return for time using the ovens.

“From cellphones and cookers to cities: in Thailand, a public program called Baan Mankong Community Upgrading has, for the last eight years, been improving conditions in hundreds of that country’s 5,500 slums, bringing residents together with government and nongovernment agencies to design safer, cleaner places to live.”

Read more in the NY Times.

You will also enjoy reading about slum (favela) painting in Brazil and what a new coat of paint can do for building residents’ skills while lifting their spirits.

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