“The vertical garden, designed by Patrick Blanc, is 4 storeys high and takes up one outside wall, overlooking the plaza. It has 15,000 plants from more than 250 different species and most of it is flourishing.
There is an irrigation system which seems to be ongoing, given the gentle mist of droplets that emanates from the garden. The architects said that they wanted to ‘create a very unusual encounter between the rough and the natural, …to incorporate nature so there can be the smell of a garden where you would not expect it.'”
https://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/05/madrids-green-wall-flourishing.php
Bowls made of plywood at MOMA. Were they made from real thick pieces of plywood, or were they bent?
Spiffy little Fiat on display at Book Expo America
These were at the Haster Kraeutler gallery in Chelsea. The first 2 are by Richard Avedon; one of these had sold for $70,000. The cowboy is by Robert Frank, no listed price. There’s just something about photos shot with film, and in black and white, that you don’t get with digital, in color. You don’t really see it here, in these digital photos, but the real things are stunning.
I spent yesterday afternoon with Ivory Serra, son of my good friend Tony Serra ( I’ve known Ivory and his twin brother Shelter since a few days after they were born). Ivory’s a working photographer, worked with Annie Liebovitz for a while, and knows the NYC art scene. (It’s quite wonderful that Ivory and Shelter, coming from this little town of 3000 people, have survived and thrived in NYC, and as artists.)
We went to some bookstores and a few galleries. I can’t find my notes on which gallery this was , or the sculptor, but he’s quite famous, and these are ultra expensive (prices not listed, but Ivory thinks maybe $150,000). It was a great afternoon, we started out at Grumpy’s coffee house on West 20th, and then went to all these places I would not have known about otherwise.
According to Wikipedia, it’s really Grand Central Terminal, but commonly called Grand Central Station. Built in the early 1900s, it really is grand. I’d forgotten.
“This levee protects a home surrounded by floodwater from the Yazoo River on May 18, 2011 near Vicksburg, Mississippi. The flooded Mississippi River is forcing the Yazoo River to top its banks where the two meet near Vicksburg — causing towns and farms upstream on the Yazoo to flood.”
–Scott Olson/Getty Images
https://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2011/05/mississippi-floodwaters-roll-south/100069/
Built by Efrain Zamora: Size: 6′ X 8′, Recycled redwood barn boards. Cedar shingles for the roof.”
Check out his small structures at: https://picasaweb.google.com/ixtahua/GentleFootprintDesigns?authkey=Gv1sRgCIy6wcC-xaCyUA#
I just had dinner at Han Bat, a 24-hour Korean restaurant a few doors down from the hotel. Meals served in stone bowls heated to near-incendiary temperatures, very exotic, many side dishes of pickled vegetables, almost all people eating there Korean. Like stepping into another country.
Upon the recommendation of Janice at the Spoonbill bookstore, I had dinner at Caracas Arepa, a Venezuelan restaurant a few blocks off Bedford last night. Hugely popular place, rightly so. Rum drinks. Their specialty is arepas, various fillings inside a wrapping made of white cornmeal, which is not fried, but grilled, then baked, making it crunchy. Wonderful food, wonderful place.
There were 4 girls having dinner at a nearby table. They had a pitcher of sangria and were having a great time. In the past week I’ve seen a bunch of girls-nights-outs at tables in various restaurants. So different without men. They’re really connecting, sharing, tuning into each other, comfortable without the big T present. Harmony.
Then I went over to the Ragegast Hall (a serious beer bar) on N. 3rd Street to see The Baby Soda Jazz Band. The bass player is Peter Ford and he plays a box bass that he sort of invented. (A year ago I finally talked him into making me one — I’d seen the band playing in Washington Square — and I play it a little almost every day.) The band was in great form, doing ’20s-’30s music like Baby Won’t You Please Come Home and Struttin’ With Some Barbecue. Peter’s awesome on this one-string bass. A guest trombone player, who has played with Wynton Marsalis, sat in. Great dancing, wonderful to see young people picking up on songs from this era. Diga Diga Doo…
