Seattle: Public Places

There were a few hours on our Seattle trip when we were bug free and we made the 3 minute journey from our hotel room, down the elevator, across the lobby, over the street to the place I've had on my must-visit list since 2004: Seattle Public Library.


Apart from the cool Rem Koolhaas architecture, there's the fastest, smartest book location system, a "living room", banks of computers, dedicated teen section, a writer's room. I could go on for ever... I could have stayed forever


The children's section that has the best language resources I've ever seen


and great art, too: Mandy Greer's "Babe"


The Guy and I did a self-guided tour (there's even a podcast) but there are guided tours available that last about an hour, too.


We split up eventually and met later outside the meting room. I recognised The Guy because he was the only non-rouge item on that floor.


The library people are so friendly - they really seem proud of their library and want to show it off - even security was happy. If I worked here, I'd be pretty damn buoyant as well.

Strip Feest

That's strip as in comic strip or BD (Bande Dessinée) Brussels 2010, not the kind you catch at the "gentlemen's club".

A two-day celebration of comics starting with a balloon parade through the centre of town on Sunday afternoon. This gets better and better every year.

If I had better planned my life I would be there this weekend through the next so I could join in the fun and catch Josh Ritter at the Botanique on Thursday. Next time!

Bare Naked Ladies

Look it's Paris and it's art, so no modesty patches or drapes and no stupid pixels disguising the beauty of the sculptures.


No sensibilities offended, no youth corrupted, just the artist's interpretation of the female form. Enjoy!

Cleveland: Breaking it Down

Last week I upped and left on for a couple of fun-filled days of travel. I provided the interwebs with a few clues but the teaser I left posed a few problems and no one got the answer from that post so let's break it down. First the visuals the montage of images consisted of landmarks cultural and iconic, musical and artistic, kitchsy and culinary:


The Free Stamp, outdoor sculpture by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen.


The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame


The Mall, a great public space with outdoor art.


The newly opened East Wing of the Museum of Art


The iconic lampshade light from A Christmas Story, which was shot in this city.


Iron Chef Michael Symon whose restaurant Lola served up the best oysters and yellowtail (above) I've eaten in the US and a smoky, chile-flavored Berkshire pork chop that made me wish we'd had time to visit his other restaurant, Lolita, for the Tuesday Night Pig Roast.



Then there was that verbal clue about "using your ingenuity". That refers to the Ingenuity festival of art and technology, held in July.
In retrospect it was easy, wasn't it? More to follow soon from my trip to the positively fabulous city of Cleveland.

Warhols!

Jenni over at ThirteenEleven commented recently that I get to go to wonderful exhibitions, and she's right I do. Wherever I'm traveling I try to build in time to see something special and, hopefully, spectacular. Sometimes, though, it just doesn't work out. For example I flew out of Montreal one day before the Warhol Live: Music and dance in Andy Warhol’s work exhibition opened at the Musee des Beaux Arts.
I would have loved to see the portraits of Aretha Franklin, Liza Minelli and Debbie Harry and all the pop art but even more, something that hasn't been shown before, a private collection of album covers Warhol designed, including the iconic Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers.



Other rarities on show will be this video for The Cars as well as films and art installations. It runs through January 18 2009, and during that time, over at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal there will be another music inspired exhibition, Sympathy for the Devil: Art and Rock and Roll Since 1967.
Unfortunately, I don't think I'll be finding myself back in Montreal that soon. Dommage!