more at the met

our first stop at the museum today was a tour with a guide named iris who took us to the american wing to view john vanderlyn's "panoramic view of the palace and gardens of versailles." m and c enjoyed talking with her and she pointed out where the artist had painted himself into the picture standing near csar alexander I and the king of prussia.

we then joined a tour of 15th century portraiture. c really like the young intern who was lecturing and said she made the subject interesting even for her. i think everyone else liked the young woman's presentation as well. she had quite a crowd around her. as the girls' dance teacher always says, "it's all in the details," and this lecturer had many details up her sleeve.

we also walked through the greek and roman wing and had to stop for the obligatory fountain shot. m and c also tried to figure out how much money could be sitting in there . .



finally, on the way home we stopped at lionbrand to look at yarn for m. she would like me to make her a shrug out of bamboo. they were so tired that we didn't last long there, though as you can see, m has the brown bamboo tucked under her right arm, just waiting to be checked out on her gift certificate.

walking home from lionbrand, we passed a restaurant on greenwich and west 12th street that i've always wanted to try, jarnac. however, it has closed, along with so many other restaurants in my neighborhood (mama buddha, alfama, mi cocina, valdino west, osteria del sole, hudson corner cafe, and some others whose names i forget as i didn't frequent them). my friend janet and i were reminiscing the other day about the owners of two of these restaurants we liked to eat at. they were very nice, hard working men who took pride in their establishments, and as they struggled to stay open, they became ill and tired looking, and began drinking more. owning a restaurant is such hard work, and if you go under you are left with nothing.

at lionbrand yarn studio . . again

we had another visit to lionbrand today (our last visit was to hear the discussion with artist robyn love) for m to film a meet me at the corner episode. donna guthrie is a writer who has created a wonderful website of three to four minute movies about children's lives in different corners of the US (composting worms at the queens botanical garden is currently up). donna is a lot of fun to work with and always picks an equally fun videographer (sometimes from craig's list . . which i'm old enough to find rather amusing. )


i couldn't resist snapping some fiber photos in the store . .

the store manager, patty lyons, was very relaxed while filming, and spoke well. she and m had fun chatting about gauge and hooks and yarn weight, while crocheting for the B roll. it's not easy staying loose for the camera, and many of donna's subjects forget what answers they want to give once they're being filmed. m and i have discussed it at length . . why is it that the world suddenly changes when the camera is on?

fiber art(ist) talk

robyn love spoke at lionbrand yarn studio last night. i know she was feeling a little nervous since so many people RSVPed to lionbrand, (she hinted as much in a blog post), but she spoke so smoothly and eloquently . . that it was quite moving. one came away with a true sense of what her work is about, along with her influences and inspirations. and i think all participants carried a piece of her passion out the door with them. she began with a thank you to her mom (who knitted her way through robyn's childhood) and moved on to other inspirations (elaine reichek, janet morton, barb hunt; she reflects on them here), along with slides of their work and her work. i think many of us learned so much about how one can embody a thought or idea through committment, logic, talent and passion; and then finalize with an actual object that can live on in the world without the creator. and seeing how robyn's work has changed and grown was inspirational. thanks, robyn!

lionbrand revisited

the lionbrand staff raised robyn's knitted nyc display and rearranged the buildings. it's no longer a slice of manhattan looking west from the east river.

if you look closely, the empire state building is now north of the chrysler building and the lipstick building and the UN building . . . even if you did turn it around and imagined you were facing east you would have to wonder why the UN building was on the hudson . . (looking back at the old photo from march 4th i see that the UN was always south of the empire . . i guess there was trouble fitting everything properly from the start . . )
the powers at lionbrand also nixed pale male flying across the top of the display with a banner waving in the wind behind him. robyn was working on a biplane but it came out more like droopy dawg so she has happily ditched the project. i'm just too saddened that they said no to sono's pale male. i just think he is so beautiful and quintessentially new york:

robyn's window

my friend robyn finished her window display for the lionbrand yarn studio. it is so fabulous! there's the beautiful empire state building with a big purple cable, the UN, the lipstick building, the chrysler building, king kong (with fay wray or jessica lange? to me it looked like jessica!), and special nyc pigeons, taxies and a garbage truck with nyc garbage falling out all over the FDR drive . . . and even mayor mike, knitting of course!