perusing the paper & architecture and politics

(NPS photo)

My nephew asked me about the obituary for Dr Lloyd Watson, a bee scientist who had been a major influence on my father as he was growing up. Enough that I was named after his son. The obituary appeared in The New York Times for February 27, 1948. I looked at the obituary on the TimesMachine so I was looking at the content as a newspaper page.

An obituary in a neighboring column was for a Dr William Maxon, a botanist and expert on ferns. Probably not a relative but I am related to Maxsons, a variant spelling of the surname. LCSH uses Maxson family with a reference from Maxon family and a couple other variants.

I couldn't help myself. I turned the newspaper back a page or two, noting book reviews, letters to the editor, opinion pieces, and other items that now seem less integrated in today's Times. Next to the main book review was an article entitled "Decision to stand on Jefferson Arch: prize-winning design for huge parabola is opposed here as similar to Mussolini's." The arch, designed by Eero Saarinen, is now known as the Gateway Arch and is part of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial.

The Jefferson Arch was criticized by Gilmore D. Clarke, the chairman of the National Commission on Fine Arts, as similar to a Mussolini arch. Mussolini had approved a parabolic arch for the international exposition in Rome in 1942 celebrating twenty years of fascism. The president of the Jefferson Memorial Association argued that the similarity of the designs was "purely coincidental." Saarinen described the parabola shape as a basic form and said he had never seen the Rome design. The connection of fascism to modern architecture, particularly in Italy, is troubling to me (and others).

As an aside, Gilmore Clarke is mentioned three or four times in the article and his "Clarke" is misspelled as "Clark" in the first instance.

 

housing inequality

The National Edition of the Sunday New York Times includes two or three pages of real estate and metropolitan content at the back of the business section. These days, when stock prices and currency exchange rates are readily available on the web, the business section has more content about business people or firms and socioeconomic context. The two real estate articles this past week, on facing pages, were titled "A name brand as an amenity" and "In Detroit, an eviction rattles a housing plan." While not explicitly about housing inequality, the amenity article addresses apartment buildings in Miami and elsewhere with condos selling for as much as 59 million dollars. The Detroit eviction article addresses the eviction of a homeowner for not living full time in her tiny house. Her name appears on the lease of her boyfriend's riverfront condo. She says that she works for her boyfriend's firm which is based in the apartment. The tiny houses are owned and operated by Cass Community Social Services and the rent is $1 per square foot on the lease-to-own basis.

(Photo by Michelle and Chris Gerard on Curbed Detroit)

Neither article is simply about high-priced or low-priced housing but I cannot help thinking about how many decent living spaces could be created with 59 million dollars. Not just tiny houses but living spaces from abandoned industrial buildings, rehabilitated houses, accessory dwelling units, as well as new buildings. Rehabilitation also can go a good distance on greenhouse gas mitigation.

I just finished reading Solomon's Crown by Natasha Siegel. When I went to the shelf to pick my next book, I selected The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal about Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power by Deirdre Mask. I guess I will be thinking more about the socioeconomics of housing.

Jane Lapotaire

Every once in a while, there's a scene in some film or other program where an actor just shines. Jane Lapotaire is the actress that just knocked me off my chair. She plays Princess Alice (Battenberg), the mother of HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, in The Crown. She has been staying at Buckingham Palace after a coup made the situation in Greece precarious. Her brother, Lord Mountbatten, has just gotten a dressing down from Queen Elizabeth for conspiring (QE II's word) with others against Harold Wilson's government.

Lord Mountbatten goes to see Princess Alice in her room and their conversation resonated for me as I think about what to do about more Trump presidency. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT6yUlDzkfs 

As I was watching that scene in The Crown, I realized that Jane Lapotaire also played Princess Kuragin in Downton Abbey.

I was wearing my t-shirt yesterday with a quote from Moira Rose of Schitt's Creek. "When one of us shines, all of us shine."

the Napier line

Lady Sarah Lennox by Sir Joshua Reynolds

(Art Institute of Chicago)

Lady Sarah Lennox was a favorite of King George III of Great Britain. I learned this while watching an interview with India Amarteifio and Corey Mylchreest who play Charlotte and George in the Shonda Rhimes and Netflix series "Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story." Lady Sarah married Charles Bunbury and later George Napier. She and Napier had eight children. One wonders if Evelyn Napier, a friend of Lady Mary in "Downton Abbey," was perhaps a grandson or great-grandson of Lady Sarah.

The Heart's Invisible Furies

I have been getting toward the end of The heart's invisible furies by John Boyne. A compelling read and some portions have been just a little too close to things that are happening or have happened in my life. This morning as I was reading, someone asked what I was reading. I handed the book to him and said something like "it's the story of an Irish man from the 1940s and I'm in the '80s now." I rarely recommend a book to someone. Enjoying a particular book is such a personal thing. Again, more resonance in Furies when I read the following passage just now.

And I quote ....

"No, you're all right. I believe you," she said, waving my offer away. "Cyril then, if you prefer. What's that you're reading?"

I turned the book over to reveal a copy of Colm Toibín's The Story of the Night. I'd owned it for years but had never got around to reading it until now.

"Now, I haven't read that one," she said, picking it up and reading the back. "Is it any good?"

"It is," I said.

"Should I read it?"

"Well, that's up to you, really."

.... end quote

As it happens, I think The story of the night is my favorite book by Tóibín.

ARLIS/NA @ CDMX

I just got back from the Art Libraries Society of North America conference in Mexico City, our first conference in Mexico although we have been proudly North American all of our collective lives. We have already met a few times in Canada (Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, and Banff). Mexico City is a gritty city, like I like 'em. Gritty, busy, noisy, diverse, full of architectural treasures, good and interesting art, food (fancy and plain).

On our last afternoon, after the business meeting, Bill and I walked over to see the murals in the Secretariat of Public Education building. Diego Rivera, Jean Charlot, and others. We meandered on the way back, partly on the Calle de la República de Cuba. In addition to bridal shops and gay bars, we saw this building that could use some attention and maintenance. I think a third-floor deck would be just fine through those open arches.

That evening, we went to the Palacio de Bellas Artes for a concert by the National Symphony Orchestra of Mexico. The program included an overture by Louise Farrenc (Opus 23), a double bass concerto by Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf (KR 172), and the Third ("Organ") Symphony by Camille Saint-Saëns. The music was lovely. The conductor was a joy to watch. The hall has a Tiffany dome as well as a Tiffany (glass) stage curtain. The first and third works were played on the full stage. The Ditters von Dittersdorf only uses a chamber orchestra so they put some chairs on the front of the proscenium and lowered the Tiffany glass curtain for that portion of the concert. We were physically as well as musically in heaven. Bill had purposely chosen seats in the top of the house (más alta, por favor) so we were close to the Tiffany dome.

Now back home and last night was the dance showing by choreography students at Alfred University. Pretty glorious too. Stendhal much?

(view from exhibit hall at the conference, Hilton Reforma)

(my CDMX picture album on Flickr)

Radio Girls, before and after their time

There are all sorts of reasons why you buy and/or read a book. Sometimes it's the stack of books on the new releases table in the bookstore. Sometimes it's a review. Sometimes a friend recommends the book. Maybe the book is just in the social air. And sometimes the daughter of a friend and colleague is the author. It was this last circumstance that put Radio Girls by Sarah-Jane Stratford on my to-read shelf.

(image from Penguin-Random House webpage for the book)

Sarah-Jane Stratford is the daughter of my longtime art cataloging colleague Nancy Norris, now retired from UCLA. It took me a little while to get into the story but I'm awfully glad I got past that. The story is set in London, between the wars, as the fascist threat grows and people become more and more aware of the seriousness of the threat. The "radio girls" are working at BBC which is in its infancy.

The first printing of the New American Library paperback edition was in June 2016. It is amazing and terrifying how the story resonates with the situation in the United States from 2016 when Trump was running and then serving as president. Suppression of news. Officious bosses. Male date assumptions. Stratford must have had her fore-seeing glasses on.

Always looking for parallels, I was amused that one of the bad guys was a Mr Grigson. Not quite the same name as Michael Gregson, from Downton Abbey, but our heroine Maisie Musgrave's fiancé Simon does go to Germany on family business and get involved with Grigson on some corporate shenanigans related to making deals with the Nazi government. By the way, librarians are mentioned a couple times as being good with facts.

teardowns

I have been watching the 1981 version of Brideshead Revisited. Lady Marchmain has died and the London house has been sold by Lord Marchmain. Bridey has asked Charles to paint some views of the house before it is torn down, to be replaced by flats. But don't worry. The house will be saved and the flats will not be built. Charles will find his painting career with the success of the paintings. I know the house will be saved because it is also Grantham House, the London residence of the Crawleys from Downton Abbey.

This photo of the actual Bridgewater House, on the site of Cleveland House, is on Flickr, taken by jupiter1953.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/b1953/7616519714

I first watched the 1981 Brideshead at Judith Holliday's apartment in the Dewitt Mall Apartments in Ithaca. My then boyfriend Randy and I went over every Sunday night while it was on Great Performances on PBS. I had not had a television and bought a modest black-and-white television so we could watch the series. Randy also did not have a television. Judith had a color TV and it beat out my B&W model. I took along my copy of the book and it was amazing (and surprising) how much of the dialogue in the book made it into the telescript.

meta credits

So you may know that I watch film credits pretty voraciously. I love the loopy rhyme of Loop Group as well as the name of such a post-production sound group that I have seen credited a number of times: Sync or Swim. Sometimes, the folks responsible are called Crowd ADR or just ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement). I just watched Going Down in LA-LA Land and was amused by the credit for Expendables. Those responsible for expendables were Studio Depot, The Expendables Recycler, Bulbtronics, and Expendable. I glanced over the YouTube comments and someone noted that they really enjoyed watching the credits because "The ADR then is hilarious." Here's the two leads getting to know each other:

P.S. Emma Kantor also reads the end credits: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/21/magazine/closing-credits-movies.html

at hand, just six feet away

I occasionally think that I should find an institution that could use the books on art and architecture that I've been buying for decades. I used to worry about the appraisal for tax deduction purposes and decided that was just an impediment. Still, it is satisfying to have my book collection when I am at an Unboxed Lunch sponsored by the Archives of American Art. Josh Franco talked today about new accessions to the Lucy Lippard archive. He happened to pick out the folder on her book Overlay. It was glorious to stand up, take a couple steps, and take Overlay off the shelf and look at it as he spoke.