Speaking of visiting art museums and studios...
Self portrait on a bicycle early in the morning along a favorite wall
Austin Kleon: what is your strategy when you visit an art museum?
Mary Ruefle: See where it leads me, and don't read any instructive text unless you're utterly in love.--via Austin’s SubStack.
Ok, so, Mary,
I like this sentiment and feeling more and more the wisdom in how I arrange or not my calendar based on Hemingway’s observation that “time is the thing we have the least of” which seems to thread the needle of stoicism nicely through modernism but I’m less interested in -isms these days because of, well, time, and more interested to invest toward things which attract me and even if I don’t understand why and so I would add a comma or a semicolon depending on which grammar style I’m leaning toward and then choose an em dash anyway because no one really understands how to use a semi-colon so when I see something that totally confuses me in an art museum I’m also interested to read the instructive text and titles and learn more about what I don’t understand which is that I don’t see myself in everything and I’m enjoying those things more and more.
You’re invited / looking for an art event this weekend (Oct. 12 and 13, 2024)?
Along those lines, if you’re looking for art this weekend (October 12 and 13, 2024, 10am-6pm), and happen to be in the Boise, Idaho area, I highly recommend checking out the Boise Open Studio Tour. There are around 70 artists who will open their work spaces for people to cruise through and see art and talk art.
Ok, yes, I’m part of the tour this year and so I’m also inviting you to come check out some photos and bicycle-themed artworks and see the new wearable editions and check out our early fall gardens and the bike shop in the backyard. We’ll be at 3632 W. Sunset Ave both days and would love to see you.
Visit the Boise Open Studios website for addresses of all the participating artists. You can find several artists I really admire at The Common Well Boise.
These things recently inspired me
Free Download: A Knitting Pattern for a Sweater Depicting an Iconic Cover of George Orwell’s 1984 — We all love the Penguin Classics publishing house for bringing the oldies to us. Why not share that love on a sweater?
Tom Waits “Glitter and Doom” concert film — well, not really but you know I love his ability to evoke an atmosphere with music and fill in tiny details with poetry. This is a constructed fan-made film of Waits’ 2008 “Glitter and Doom” tour.
“21 Phrases You Use Without Realizing You’re Quoting Shakespeare” — and, obvs, he was just remixing the parlance of his time, the way that people spoke in his day, when they were speaking poetically. I don’t really know what I’m talking about but I do love learning that some things have been around a few hundred years that still attract us to them.
“Schumann resonances: Amazing physics, sham medicine” — Science vs. psychology here a little I think as this article gets at the physical properties of “the hum” that we call Schumann resonances but there are still some who hear a hum so perceptual and physical realities collide — and they will never tear us apart. The article does not go into how the hum will necessarily sound a different pitch depending on many factors like time of year, weather and where we are in our elliptical orbit around the star we call our sun.
“An interview with Mary Ruefle: Conducted via typewriter and the postal service” — what else to say on this except I love her optimistic approach to these questions.
Lastly and about that barn photo
This is it for this barn photo which I am sincerely weary of printing and sharing even though it was one of the first photos I made very intentionally.
Barn. Joseph, Oregon. 2020.