The Semi-Permanent design conference takes place in NYC 9/9-9/10
The Semi-Permanent design conference takes place in NYC 9/9-9/10.
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kottke.org posts about NYC
FontHunt is a typographic scavenger hunt taking
FontHunt is a typographic scavenger hunt taking place in NYC the week of July 21. Doesn’t get much geekier (or cooler) than this, folks.
Couple fires their nanny because they were
Couple fires their nanny because they were uncomfortable about her blog and then write about it in the NY Times. And the nanny fires back on her blog.
Duccio’s Madonna and Child
The Metropolitan Museum of Art recently purchased a painting called Madonna and Child by Duccio di Buoninsegna. The Met paid $50 million for the early Renaissance piece, more than they’ve paid for any single acquisition to date. The New Yorker has the story of how they came to own the last Duccio in private hands. In the article, Calvin Tomkins explains the reason for the painting’s importance:
Small as it is, the painting has a powerful presence. It captures the eye from a distance, and commands, up close, something like complete attention. Holding the Christ child in her left arm, the Virgin looks beyond him with melancholy tenderness, while the child reaches out a tiny hand to brush aside her veil. Centuries of Byzantine rigidity and impersonal, hieratic forms are also brushed aside in this intimate gesture. We are at the beginning of what we think of as Western art; elements of the Byzantine style still linger—in the gold background, the Virgin’s boneless and elongated fingers, and the child’s unchildlike features—but the colors of their clothing are so miraculously preserved, and the sense of human interaction is so convincing, that the two figures seem to exist in a real space, and in real time. Candle burn marks on the frame, which is original, testify to the picture’s use as a private devotional image. It is dated circa 1300.
I had the good fortune to stumble across the Duccio at the Met a few weeks ago (I was there for the Diane Arbus exhibition and passed it by accident on the way to another part of the musuem). What struck me at the time was a certain oddity of the piece…almost like it wasn’t what they’d said it was but magical all the same. I know Jack about art[1], but after reading more about Madonna and Child, it probably seemed odd to me because it’s a transitional piece, not quite Renaissance but not quite Byzantine either. The piece is a thin slice of a phase transition that had barely begun, a moment frozen from when the artists of the day were collectively working out how a Renaissance painting would eventually differ from earlier European styles and represent the wider cultural changes then occurring. Marco Grassi writes in The New Criteron:
More importantly, the artist places the Virgin at a slight angle to the viewer, behind a fictive parapet. She gazes away from the Child into the distance while He playfully grasps at Her veil. One must realize that every aspect of this composition represents a departure from pre-existing convention. With these subtle changes, Duccio consciously developed an image of sublime tenderness and poignant humanity, almost a visual echo of the spiritual renewal that St. Francis of Assisi had wrought only a few decades earlier.
More more on Duccio, check out his biography on Wikipedia and some collections of his work (1, 2, 3), including other Duccio representations of the Virgin and Child),
[1] I wish I’d taken an art history class in college, but my 18-yo self wasn’t that interested.
Good review (with photos) of Thomas Keller’s Per Se
Good review (with photos) of Thomas Keller’s Per Se.
Ephermeral cities (SF, Paris, Berlin, NYC) provide
Ephermeral cities (SF, Paris, Berlin, NYC) provide alternative lifestyles to “nonfamilies and the nomadic rich”. “To retain an important role in the future, a city needs upwardly mobile people whose families and businesses identify them with a place. A great city is more about clean and workable neighborhoods, thriving business districts, and functioning schools than massive cultural buildings or hipster lofts.”
Slideshow of the making of Barcade, the
Slideshow of the making of Barcade, the bar/arcade in Brooklyn.
With higher rents (and other factors), good
With higher rents (and other factors), good cheap food is getting hard to find in Manhattan.
Slide show depicting a collection of New
Slide show depicting a collection of New York City coffee cups.
Adam Greenfield sights a celebrity hero in New York
Adam Greenfield sights a celebrity hero in New York. “We finished up our meal, we retrieved our bikes, and we rode away, into the ongoing rush and joy of a life given to me in large measure by the unhappy-looking man at the table behind us.”
Allan Tannenbaum’s photos of NYC nightlife in the 1970s
Allan Tannenbaum’s photos of NYC nightlife in the 1970s. Discos, Studio 54, Andy Warhol, porn stars, etc. NSFW.
Bernie Goetz is running for public advocate
Bernie Goetz is running for public advocate on a platform of vegetarianism and, uh, squirrels. Goetz shot four youths who tried to rob him on the NYC subway in 1984. (Is this campaign for real?)
Trace of one person’s walking and biking
Trace of one person’s walking and biking in New York City over a year’s time.
eGullet thread and roundup of the 2005 Big
eGullet thread and roundup of the 2005 Big Apple BBQ Block Park.
A list of weeds you might see on the subway
A list of weeds you might see on the subway. Including iPodpea, Prickly Metscap, Mumblecane, Dozing Slabface, and Edgy Sweatnettle.
Slideshow from GMHRD, an arcade game contest
Slideshow from GMHRD, an arcade game contest in which contestants are clad only in their underwear. I missed my chance to shine at Dig Dug in my boxers because I was watching Six Feet Under. :(
A street sculpture by REVS was recently
A street sculpture by REVS was recently stolen in my neighborhood.
A literary map of Manhattan
A literary map of Manhattan. “Here’s where imaginary New Yorkers lived, worked, played, drank, walked, and looked at ducks.”
Improv Everywhere played a fake U2 concert
Improv Everywhere played a fake U2 concert near Madison Square Garden last week. The Edge was played by an Asian guy and the “band” got arrested during their final song.
The launch party for Eyebeam’s Contagious Media
The launch party for Eyebeam’s Contagious Media Showdown is tonight, 6:30pm.
Whatever happened to the subjects of Diane Arbus’s photographs?
Whatever happened to the subjects of Diane Arbus’s photographs?. CNN’s Anderson Cooper was that weird looking baby?
If you haven’t yet, the Diane Arbus
If you haven’t yet, the Diane Arbus exhibition at the Met is worth checking out. Open through May 30.
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