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11/25/2005: "November Travel Tips" by Sue Spaid

Get the answers to last month’s contest and try to identify images from my recent trip out west!

If last month’s sassy stance concerned you, consider this traveling the most extreme tact before discerning balance. Since then, I drove over 9,000 miles through 19 states, so I’ve had plenty of time to surmise why this blog incites so much audience ire! Yet, I’m still wondering. Hilariously, museums eager to host chat rooms on their websites recently contacted me to find out about this blog’s audience response. Whenever I remark, “Be prepared for hate mail,” they’re speechless. So long as art lovers routinely contact me for travel tips, I’ll feel compelled to pursue this ceaseless meander through space and time.

Thanks to everybody who wrote in with correct website addresses. Sorry for the errors.


To follow are the answers to the October 19th contest.

(left to right/top to bottom)- 1) roadside pumpkin patch in New York State, ten miles west of Massachusetts, 2) arcades beneath Louis Kahn’s Philips Exeter Academy Library, 3) Warren Angle’s deer installation at Abington Art Center, Jenkintown, Pennsylvania, 4) Jan De Cock’s impenetrable structures at Tate Modern, London, 5) Robert Smithson’s “Floating Island” on the East River, New York City, 6) Franz West’s outdoor works, Rotterdam, 7) Daniel Buren’s bandaged sculptures, Leuven, 8) 2005 Serpentine Pavilion, London 9) Cowgirl Café, New York City, 10) Warren Angle’s U.S. duck pond, Abington Art Center, 11) Little Abington Meeting House, Jenkintown, 12) Michele Brody’s grass painting, Abington Art Center, 13) Marc Quinn’s sculpture, Trafalgar Square, London, 14) Serpentine Gallery’s sun-dome, London, 15) Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank, London, 16) Marcel Breuer’s student-run dorm, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York.








November Travel Tips
1) Even those courageous enough to visit Spiral Jetty should heed DIA’s advice to hike the last bit.
2) Is there anywhere lovelier than Lake Tahoe? It’s heaven on e(art)h, despite its dearth of art.
3) An equally gorgeous environment awaits Aspen Institute visitors, who explore on foot Herbert Bayer’s modernist resort and its outdoor projects, such as his influential Grass Mound (1955), Matthias Goeritz’s Big Dipper and a Buckminster Fuller geodesic frame.
4) Taking its cue from the Aspen Institute’s successful integration of art and nature, the Sonoma County Museum of Art features art created in response to its local environment.
5) Even if you’re no Hans Haacke fan, run (don’t walk) to SFMOMA where his magical, blue sail hovers at the very end of a series of seven, adjacent second-floor galleries. While there, you’ll want to visit the fifth floor to explore Olafur Eliasson’s totally unique mirrored crystal cave, whose kaleidoscopic effects totally trump earlier mirror rooms.
6) Unless you sample magnums of wine and tons of Copia-grown produce, you’ll fail to reap what you sow. Fortunately, Copia’s “taste test,” a computer program that judges your food preferences to determines whether you’re unique or normal, is quite amusing.
7) Congratulations go to Lisa Kereszi, recipient of Baum Award for Emerging American Photographers, whose second museum show this year is at the Berkeley Art Museum.
8) Despite its towering features, the de Young, Herzog and de Meuron’s newest museum (of Walker Art Center and Tate Modern fame), seemed ridiculously difficult to locate.
9) When you want to laugh aloud, rent the video Little Frank and his Carp (2001), Andrea Fraser’s sensuous exploration of Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum-Bilbao.
10) Looking for a unique experience, let alone a bizarre “historical” spot? I recommend the Winchester Mystery House tour, which strangely leads through dilapidated rooms.
11) Ecstasy: In and About Altered States, Paul Schimmel’s thematic exhibition at the Geffen Contemporary (MOCA), might have been even more exhilarating had our experiences not been so specifically filtered through his brand of “altered states” (drug-induced stimulation). Even stranger was how the foggy cloud surrounding Pierre Huyghe’s Light Box resembled a typical Ann Veronica Janssen atmospheric installation, yet her flickering work here recalled an Olafur Eliasson strobe-light installation, making his work here appear redundant for those unfamiliar with his prior efforts. Getting to experience Carsten Höller’s rotating, over-sized, upside-down mushrooms is worth the price of admission. Alternatively flat-footed is Klaus Weber’s Public Fountain LSD Hall, which proposes that exposure to LSD (via osmosis) might offer new insight.
12) Looking for a really mind-blowing experience? Check out Marnie Weber’s dollhouse and related photographs at the Luckman Art Gallery, Cal State-Los Angeles.
13) You won’t believe Whole Food’s new flagship grocery store in Austin. Don’t miss the gelato. I sampled fragrant citrus rosewater, pied pumpkin and delicious pear.
14) It’s hard to imagine, but Galisteo, New Mexico has a 300-year old inn with fab food.
15) If you already love Gruet’s delicious champagne, taste their chardonnay at their winery, a few miles north of Albuquerque.
16) Doubt you’ll ever get to Rio during carnival? Try “Tropicália,” the MCA’s totally experiential trip through Brazil’s post-1967 theater, art, architecture, music and fashion.
17) Ever fear dodgy or tasteless sushi? Eating is believing, so don’t miss the especially delicious sushi at Fujiya (Minneapolis) or Sagano (Oak Park, Illinois) near the Suburban.
18) If you expect the Smart Museum’s “Beyond Green: Toward a Sustainable Art” to sport smart solutions for sustainable living, think again. “Beyond Green” rather explores sustainable art, which pushes art to be more sustainable, though not necessarily practical.
19) A spin through Huang Yong Ping’s Walker Art Center retrospective proves incredibly insightful and inspiring.


Websites for places visited
Desmoines Art Center- www.desmoinesartcenter.org
Jun Kaneko Studio- www.ceramicstoday.com/potw/kaneko.htm
The Museum of Nebraska Art http://monet.unk.edu/mona
Aspen Center for Environmental Studies- www.aspennature.org
Aspen Institute- www.aspeninstitute.org
Spiral Jetty- www.clui.org or www.spiraljetty.org
Lake Tahoe- www.tahoecam.com
Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive- www.bampfa.berkeley.edu
Commonwealth Club- www.commmonwealthclub.org
Endangered Garden- www.patriciajohanson.com
CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts- www.wattis.org
Southern Exposure- www.soex.org
Sonoma County Museum of Art- www.sonomacountymuseum.org
COPIA: The American Center for Wine, Food & the Arts- www.copia.org
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art- www.sfmoma.org
de Young- www.deyoungmuseum.org
Pixar Studios- www.pixar.com
Winchester Mystery House- www.winchestermysteryhouse.com
Museum of Contemporary Art- www.moca.org
The Luckmann Art Gallery- www.luckmanfineartscomplex.org
Albuquerque Museum- www.albuquerquemuseum.com
The Galisteo Inn- www.galisteoinn.com
Gruet Winery- www.gruetwinery.com
Fayetteville Library- www.faylib.org
Suburban- www.suburban.org
Museum of Contemporary Art- www.mcachicago.org
Smart Museum of Art- http://smartmuseum.uchicago.edu
Art Institute of Chicago- www.artic.org
Walker Art Center- www.walkerart.org

Replies: 3 Comments

on Sunday, December 11th, Joe Morris said

Hi Sue,

My name is Joseph Morris, I'm a senior art major at SUNY Purchase College. Anyway I saw your lecture -The Gist of Isness. I really enjoyed it and was hoping that you could e-mail me some notes or maybe a quote or two if possible, I'm trying to put together an artist statement and would like to include some of what you said. If you can't...I understand (I mean should really taking notes at these things anyway), but please e-mail me to let me know.

Thanks
-Joe

on Sunday, November 27th, Hyacinthe Baron said

Sue: You remind me of several performance artists I knew in the Village back in the 60's...they achieved some degree of fame for their flamboyant ability to wine and dine, sleep and weep with the best of the nobility and the Bohemian wannabe's who became the "peasant class" of artists who later became the "Pop" Art contingent.

You are to be admired for your travel skills. Can you tell us what you are searching for? Do you just want to see what is up? Or do you ache for a true discovery, perhaps the next phase in the world of art?

In any case I would like to invite you and other artists to join us at our intensive Art Workshop Experience Retreat in March, an 8 day exploration of the awe and wonder of art and the pristine desert environment here at the Baron Conservancy in Wonder Valley.

You will find artists under every rock and have an opportunity to discover yourself in new ways.

Check it out at www.barongallery.com in the next few days.

And Andrew, we are looking forward to hearing about your workshops.

on Sunday, November 27th, Andrew said

I admire the relationship you find between food and drink, and art. All of the places to go to for tantalizing your taste buds you mentioned are off the beaten track. It would be truly difficult to find them without active searching. Word of mouth from locals or people familiar with the area probably helps.
Art produced by masters is not so different from masterly creations in the culinary arts, or in music. To achieve harmony and create a masterpiece, you need to use your materials in just the right quantities, and touch the senses with a knowledge of how each item changes the effect of the whole. Multi faceted tastes like the range of sensations you get in drinking a complex wine can be the key to creating a masterpiece in painting, or in sculpture. If you want your art to have a finish like the scent of roses, you are best off being enough of a master to know how to reach that level of expertise.
While the arts you promote are as questionable as anything so popular should be, you are to be highly commended for the food part. Trying something new really requires the courage that leads one to seek those sublime creations that can't be found without quite a lot of effort.