Scattered but Optimistic

New Year's Eve morning, no matter the year, begins with me awake early, eyes closed and mind pensive of the (hopefully small) final list of needs still left to be done in the calendar year. The pressure is self-inflicting for the sake of poignancy and is based on melodrama absurdly passed on through generations in my family. We gather, we drink, we hug, we eat. Champagne is secondary and simply the intermission in a long, late-owl feast fueled with alcohol. At minutes to go from the strike of midnight, we prepare. The hosts of the year pass around to each of the guests 12 grapes which will be eaten one second at a time as the clock strikes twelve. This will serve as well wishes to all for prosperity. Prosperity is something we all in our recession fervently desire. As the countdown to another chance, another start begins anew. At midnight, we cry as the regret from the year just passed collides with the hope that ushers in the new. The hugging (crying), the smiling (kissing) and the eating (drinking) on a holiday that really is the start of a renewed possibility are the solemn occasions of my youth. Today, optimism carries me where the innocence that once surrounded me once did. I'm thankful for that ability, entrusted for the purpose of setting it forth year after year.

I carry forth Optimism into next year. Optimism is what has become of the hope bred from emotions carried over every year with no resolve, the continued aching after eight years of surviving in a world gone very wrong. How things so far away impact us so close should be a strengthening way to bring the world closer together to break through the hate. President-elect Barrack H. Obama's roll call was led with that hope. We now go into a year where that same unknown from eight years ago - before this madness came to our country, in a mad time when a Presidential election was being won by the votes of a mere seven Supreme votes - seems capable of being overshadowed by a little thing called hope. Tonight is as it was eight years ago on this night, when I was fresh in to New York City, more naive, but just as fiercely strengthened with the unknown. Eight years of walking in a world surrounded by the survival of good over evil has sprouted a world eager for honesty and freedom and for all of humanity , all man- and womankind, to work it out for the sake of our own.

Stockingtime in the City

A Very Bach Christmas

Every holiday, this year starting this past Monday 22, WKCR 89.9 NY from Columbia University presents its annual Bach Festival, which first presents all of Bach works in various ways and programs, and offers scholars, artists and fellow listeners to chime in and request their own favorites. Bach Fest is a time to let the world, no matter how wet or snowy or sunny or grim it can seem, hear again some of the greatest music ever written. Music is the way cultures have passed on stories throughout time. Bach's stories, built from within the pillars of churches in places like Leipzig and Cöthen, are now told with happiness and joy. His times were harder, he himself having fathered 20 children, 7 of which did not reach adulthood. What came out of his pen onto the musical staff, however, is proven over and over to be as miraculous as he felt his prayers' powers were at reaching God.

I'm streaming WKCR now, playing is the crackling of records under album 3 of 6 from a recording of The Christmas Oratorio or Weihnachtsoratorium, which Bach was rockin' with in Leipzig in 1734. It was originally performed in 6 parts over the Christmas season, 3 consecutive nights beginning Christmas and 3 more holy days in the first days of the year culminating with the feast of the Epiphany on January. Fabulous.

Sequence

Richard Serra, the illustrious sculptor who last year had a 40-year retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, must be as stoic as his massive endeavors. I've always wanted to meet him; I've let myself drown in the sensitivity behind the meaning of his pieces and have wanted to personally thank him for his creations. For now, I must enjoy his words in wonderful interviews like the one I recently saw from London's Guardian. I must have gone to visit those sculptures of his on 54th Street over 50 times in 2007. Serra, born in California, is filed under Post-Minimalist Modernism. The retrospective included early works of his from the 60s, in rubber and lead, as well as his famed large-steel plates: two from the 90s displayed in MoMA's outdoor sculpture garden, and three new pieces. The exhibit was in the works back when the museum's expansion was still being planned (the current site opened in 2004.) Consideration had to be given in order to build floors and galleries structurally stable enough to hold these mega-ton pieces that took over three floors of the enlarged museum.



The most impressive of those three new pieces, Sequence, has been permanently loaned by the artist to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. After a recent pilgrimage to the new Broad Gallery at LACMA, I can now say I've been able to explore and walk through the piece in the only two locations it will ever live. The Broad Gallery, LACMA's latest addition which boasts a phenomenal collection that is an encyclopedia of contemporary art which rivals that of MoMA's in star-power greatness, was designed by another admired great of mine, the architect Renzo Piano whose work I've mentioned both here and here.

His massive steel structures, which thrust themselves in astonishing contoured angles, morph spaces with their 20-foot steel curved plates pieced together like a giant's simple puzzle. From above, they are striking mazes. But the real adventures lie from the ground, looking at and walking through the sculptures that don't just stand there but jet out to surprising degrees - a pure demonstration and perception of physical space and weight.

Richard Serra studied in Berkeley before moving on to Yale where he studied with Josef Albers. The more I take in the breath of contemporary art and music stemming from this country over the last 50 years, the more I realize that California is the place that has bred the most originality. It's never been an arts capital but certainly has given us enough to consider it a mecca for expression.

Mom's day

On 12 December every year, our Lady of Guadalupe is celebrated internationally but no greater than with celebrations in Mexico which shine her as the bright ray of light that appeared to the humble, poor peasant Juan Diego in 1531. The day is about the mother of Latin America, the anniversary of her first appearance. To me, it is the beginning of a wonderful two day celebration of mothers. My own mother's birthday falls on 13 December. She hopes for all-encompassing peace and I can't blame her. I've simply learned to take that hope and try to untangle what's in the way to understand not only its possibility but also its source.

Taking a double take on what matters most sometimes can be the difference between fog and clear skies. At the same time, perfection is something to not take for granted because sunny skies are broken with thunder somewhere every day. I'm trying to make sure I get in everything, there is a lot...

Family is there to keep grounded, so it becomes, as always, bearable.

Happy Birthday to mom and her wonderfully simple way of keeping an eye on everything, surroundings herself with good while always keeping her shields up when treading through the unknown. She got me here and I'm proud to say its her why I float through spaces with such ease. Still so much to learn, I know, but I am made of a genius stepping stone whom I can't ever thank enough for always taking it all (me) on.

Face the illusion

From Peru this summer, I sent a small group of people a postcard of our adventures at Machu Picchu. A scan of the card is shown here on the left. As per usual from far-off countries, the postcards took several weeks to arrive, but once they did I immediately got a call from my mother asking about "the face" that was in the sanctuary. I couldn't understand what she was talking about and the subject was dropped.


Last weekend, while mom was visiting for Thanksgiving (yes, she baked THAT pumpkin cheesecake); she brought up the face. I took out my copy of the postcard I sent out. She took it and turned it on its side:





Now I've seen some crazy things before, and have heard
of crazier, but this one has baffled me ever since. I've been showing the photo around and it's certainly drawn attention. This is not a doctored photo but is considered an illusion because of the aerial angle with which one must view the site in order to catch the right glimpse. Still, it's pretty magnifiscent. Mom went as far as to say that the actual sanctuary seemed "like the Inca face's headdress".




The face has been seen and documented before so my chances for National Geographic are null but that has opened up my eye to other optical illusions:






DO YOU SEE A DUCK? DO YOU SEE A RABBIT??
DO YOU SEE A WASTE OF TIME???

I'm a sucker for time wasted on the internets, a focus for the premium blend of mindlessness.