Email Newsletter July 2014: New York and Philadelpia

Brooklyn Bridge, with the Manhattan Bridge in the background
[Photo By: KPA]

Here is my most recent email newsletter. If you would like to be included in my list, please let me know.

Dear Friends of Western Civilization,

It has been a while since I've updated you on my book, website and travel projects. But that doesn't mean I've been idle!

Here are some of my recent activities.

I continue to update my website Reclaiming Beauty regularly, with the aim that it becomes an online record of activities that includes a wide range of contributors, and eventually develops into a "Beauty Movement."

I have started a new project: An online beauty museum, which I have titled The Museum of Beauty. The aim is to put exhibits and collections online, and to eventually look for a physical location. It is the "cheapest" form of a museum that I know to build right now. With added material, it will hopefully attract interest to pursue its larger ambitions.

I applying for a grant to the New York Public Library, again! I was rejected the first time, and I think it is probably due to insufficient ethnic, feminist, Third World, etc. identification, and my book's aim to introduce (or re-introduce) Western beauty in this world of non-Western multiculturalism. I might just inflate my "Ethiopianness" a little. After all, this is a year's salary while living in the expensive New York City that I'm competing for!

I am applying to attend and present in a conference titled The Power of Beauty, which is in October 2014 in the Franciscan University of Steubenville, in Ohio.

I was recently in New York and Philadelphia for the July 4th holidays, and managed to pack quite a bit in, which I am chronicling in Reclaiming Beauty. I've written a couple of posts on my travels, but have a few more to go. The great New York Public Library was open only for limited hours, although I did manage one visit there.

While in New York and in Philadelphia, I took a large number of photographs, which I'm still processing through, with a camera I bought especially for the trip. I hope to use some of these photos in my book.

I met and stayed with some dear friends.

I attended Larry Auster's new gravestone commemoration, made from beautiful Vermont granite, at the St. Peter and St. Paul cemetery near Philadelphia. I've chronicled it here.

I missed meeting with my "round table" of friends and like-minded people where we discuss literary, cultural and social topics, and to have a good meal together. But, I will certainly be with them again soon.

I visited the American Museum of Natural History for the first time, and was enchanted with an exhibition titled Natural Histories, of scientific illustrations spanning 400 years from the museum's library. Some of the illustrations were wonderfully fantastic.

In Philadelphia, we did a quick tour of the formidable Philadelphia Museum of Art. And we went out of town to the Longwood Gardens, which have spectacular fountain gardens. I have taken photos of many of these sites, so please check back on Reclaiming Beauty.

I finally made it across (or halfway across) the Brooklyn Bridge! I've taken photographs, which I will post shortly. There is a preliminary one above, showing the Manhattan Bridge in the background.

I have some new additions in my Best of New York City post. This includes the pleasant Toast Restaurant where our Round Table meets. I was at Toast a couple of evenings, after the short deluges we got in New York when I was there. These evenings made for lovely, dusk, photos, which I've posted here.

At Toast, I recommend the rosé Bieler Pere et Fils, 2011, served by the glass, which goes wonderfully with the smoked salmon appetizer ("House smoked salmon with capers and herb mayo," from Toast's menu).

I bought a couple of books in New York, including one titled New York Stories, which I have posted on here.

My most recent, and most contentious, post at Reclaiming Beauty is on Mississauga Mayor Hazel McCallion, and an unflattering portrait of her painted by a Pakistani (that's how he presents himself), artist. I describe this portrait as "downright menacing" of a white leader by a non-white portraitist. Here are my posts: Portrait of a Lady: Revisited, and Portrait of a Lady: Critique.

Thank you for your interest in my newsletter. Please check back at Reclaiming Beauty for my recent photos of New York and Philadelphia.

Sincerely,

Kidist Paulos Asrat

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Magical New York Stories

Argosy Books on East 59th Street
Where I bought a copy of Henry James' The Golden Bowl for about $3

I bought a book at what is now my favorite bookstore in New York City: Posman Books, at the Grand Central Terminal branch. It was expensive (for a book) $17, but it has been well worth the purchase.

The front jacket describes the book thus:

New York Stories takes us on an irresistible tour of the city's high life, low life, nightlife, and everything in between - from the dazzling chaos of Times Square to the elegant calm of galleries in the Met...

This is an irresistible introduction, indeed, and I bought it right away.

I am trying to read the short stories sequentially, but that is a difficult plan to follow.

I try to research the writers as I go along. The author Bernard Malamud has a story called The Magic Barrel. I didn't know that Malamud was a Jewish name. I thought it was Muslim. I decided to read the story (which is about a third into the book) to find out.

It starts with:

Not long ago there lived in uptown New York, in a small, almost meager room, though crowded with books, Leo Finkle, a rabbinical student in the Yeshivah University. Finkle, after six years of study, was to be ordained in June and had been advised by an acquaintance that he might find it easier to win himself a congregation if he were married. Since he had no present prospects of marriage, after two tormented days of turning it over in his mind, he called in Pinye Salzman, a marriage broker whose two-line advertisement he had read in the Forward.

Nothing more Jewish than that! The story is humorous, but serious. After all, the spiritual life of a rabbi is at stake.

Here is a somewhat detailed biography on Malamud, who became one of those "atheist" Jews:

Bernard Malamud was born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Bertha (née Fidelman) and Max Malamud, Russian Jewish immigrants. A brother, Eugene, was born in 1917 . Malamud entered adolescence at the start of the Great Depression. From 1928 to 1932, Bernard attended Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn.[3] During his youth, he saw many films and enjoyed relating their plots to his school friends. He was especially fond of Charlie Chaplin's comedies. Malamud worked for a year at $4.50 a day as a teacher-in-training, before attending college on a government loan. He received his B.A. degree from City College of New York in 1936. In 1942, he obtained a Master's degree from Columbia University, writing a thesis on Thomas Hardy. He was excused from military service in World War II because he was the sole support of his widowed mother. He first worked for the Bureau of the Census in Washington D.C., then taught English in New York, mostly high school night classes for adults.

Starting in 1949, Malamud taught four sections of freshman composition each semester at Oregon State University (OSU), an experience fictionalized in his 1961 novel A New Life. Because he lacked the Ph.D., he was not allowed to teach literature courses, and for a number of years his rank was that of instructor. In those days, OSU, a land grant university, placed little emphasis on the teaching of humanities or the writing of fiction. While at OSU, he devoted 3 days out of every week to his writing, and gradually emerged as a major American author. In 1961, he left OSU to teach creative writing at Bennington College, a position he held until retirement. In 1967, he was made a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

In 1942, Malamud met Ann De Chiara (November 1, 1917 – March 20, 2007), an Italian-American Roman Catholic, and a 1939 Cornell University graduate. They married on November 6, 1945, despite the opposition of their respective parents. Ann typed his manuscripts and reviewed his writing. Ann and Bernard had two children, Paul (b. 1947) and Janna (b. 1952). Janna Malamud Smith is the author of a memoir about her father, titled My Father is a Book.

Despite being raised Jewish, Malamud was an agnostic humanist.

Malamud died in Manhattan in 1986, at the age of 71. [Source: Wikipedia]

Malmud could have used one of those Rabbis, who would have known how to win him back to faith. Perhaps this story is a way of trying to let the "magic" in.

Salzman, the marriage broker in the short story The Magic Barrel, says: “You wouldn’t believe me how much cards I got in my office. The drawers are already filled to the top, so I keep them now in a barrel, but is every girl good for a rabbi?”

The full short story is online, here.


Posman Books in the underbelly of Grand Central Terminal
A haven for literate travelers
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Night Magic

Fireflies in the Woods

My visit in the Philadelphia suburbs was graced with, among other things, evenings of firefly magic.

The above photo is what I found on the internet. I wish I had tried to take a photograph of these night magicians. But, sometimes it is better to let our memories furnish our imagination. I can still see the tiny glows of light sprinkled around the darkened trees. I wondered where fireflies went during the day, and if they also came out during the day, and we just couldn't see them becuase of the competeting brightness of daylight. Here are some answers to my questions.
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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New York Architecture

Brickwork on the Masters building exterior. This image is from google maps.
I couldn't find any of the building with a close-up to show the detailed bricks.
Here is a link to the full building.


Art Deco style lights in the lobby

Located at 310 Riverside Drive...the Master Apartments [was named] in Roerich's honor. A New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission Report on the Master Apartments, written in 1989, says:

Roerich, who advanced the theosophist belief in ancient masters who could relay messages and wisdom to modern man, considered himself a master and advised his followers in that role. The activities of the Russian artist, who worked in a neo-primitive style, and is perhaps best remembered today as the set designer for Igor Stravinsky's ballet, Le Sacre du Printemps (The Right of Spring, 1920).[Source]

Lobby floor of marquetry
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Portrait of a Lady: Revisited

The Mississauga Council of Chambers had this portrait of Mayor Hazel McCallion:


Portrait of Mayor Hazel McCallion
In Mississauga City Hall
[Photo by KPA]
Portrait by: Shahid Rassam
Painted: Ca. 2011

It is more ominous and menacing than the portrait I posted in my recent post: Portrait of a Lady: Critique, where I quote my 2005 post on the Mayor:

- [The 2005 portrait by Byron Osmond is] full of simplistic and childish codes.

- Purple hair to show how ‘dated’ McCallion is

- Red to show her ‘strength’, I think he means her power, which not a good thing

- The footsteps around her, courtesy of his young son’s prints, to show that art should be run by someone younger

In this portrait, the artist, Shahid Rassam, says of his work:

"I was very much inspired by the mayor's service to the community over the years...She's so full of energy and I tried to capture that part of her eternal soul in the portrait."

Mayor McCallion comments humorously on this portrait:

I must have been at a council meeting (because I look) very concerned with what was going on," McCallion said as she admired her portrait."

And she generously says to Rassam:

"I understand you live in Toronto," McCallion told Rassam, "but we have a spot for you here in Mississauga."

Look at the glint in the thin slits of her Nordic icy blue eyes, which is echoed in the white pearl earring and the metallic ring on her finger; the glimpse of sharp, white, pearl-like teeth visible through her half-opened mouth; her hand shaped like a claw; the beak-like nose misshapen by the hard pressure of her hand; her wrinkled, tough, leather-like face; the orange of her jacket resembling some cold-blooded lizard's skin; and the wild tufts of her white hair, all making her look like some evil, reptilian creature.

Rasham clearly has some talent, and he knows what he is doing. He may say: "I was very much inspired by the mayor's service to the community over the years...She's so full of energy and I tried to capture that part of her eternal soul in the portrait," but he shows us something else entirely.

"This is the white mayor of a Canadian city, which is now fully multicultural and majority non-white, who needs to be demonized albeit in art, in order that she leaves space for the new keepers of the city: the likes of us."

I say he is deliberately casting McCallion in this manner, because his website shows other portraits, of a variety of brown-skinned posers, for whom he shows a good deal more affection.

We have gone a ways from a portrait of a mayor that is just unflattering (and grumpy-looking) to one that is downright menacing.

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Rust as Art

The Living Art Centre in Mississauga is a spectacular building. Our first introduction to it are its three-storey high windows. The Centre boasts a theater, a concert hall, galleries, resident artists programs and workshop rooms, restaurants, a gift shop, and a small but beautiful garden surrounding it. This is the legacy of Mayor Hazel McCallion, about whom I wrote a post (with another coming soon) here.

So, what is it with the rusted iron "sculpture" that stand at the front of the Centre?

This is what it looks like when viewed from the inside:



The "artist" is the same woman who did the scuplture in the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Garden, I posted about here. I've explained as much as I can of the psychology "sociology" behind her work at that post.
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Portrait of a Lady: Critique

[See my most recent followup: Portrait of a Lady: Revisited here]

Portrait of Mayor Hazel McCallion,
Titled: 1984
By Byron Osmond
Technique:

Osmond used an old photo of the mayor,
which he blew up and overlaid with chalk and
watercolours... [KPA: i.e. Number Painting for "artists"] (Source)

In 2005, I wrote a post on Mississauga mayor Hazel McCallion, and an unflatterting portrait of her. I critiqued the painting in a post titled, Portrait of a Lady: Not in her likeness (below is the full post).

I never followed up on my article, and critique, but it turns out that Byron Osmond, the portraitist, was ordered to remove the portrait from his store window by the Port Credit Business Improvement Association, according to this article:

A Mississauga business group demanded a local storeowner remove his portrait of long-time Mayor Hazel McCallion from his storefront window, saying the artwork is "offensive."

This order came in 2005, at about the same time I wrote the article.

I tried to find out more of Osmond's "rationale" for painting such a portrait, and what happened to him since.

Here are some quotes from a 2005 article in the National Post (the full article follows the link):

- Mr. Osmond titled his portrait of Ms. McCallion 1984, referencing the George Orwell novel that features an all-knowing, all-seeing character named Big Brother.

- He said his art was meant to portray Ms. McCallion, who has been Mayor since 1978, as wielding significant power but not doing enough to promote art.

- "I did it with all due respect," he said. "It was not meant to be disrespectful."

- He said it took him only a couple of hours to put the portrait together, using an old photo he had of the Mayor that he enlarged and finished with chalk and water colours.

- He said the hair was coloured purple to "represent that she is dated, especially when it comes to arts in Mississauga."

- The red in the background, he said, was meant to reinforce her image of strength. There are also several footprints around her portrait, which Mr. Osmond said were those of his four-year-old child, further meant to stress that "someone younger should be running the arts."

- He said he was unnerved by the suggestion that the display in his window was offensive.

- "I was, dumbfounded," he said. "I don't need municipal censorship. That's what really hurts."

Mccallion is retiring with her reputation and dignity in tact this coming Fall. Not only that, she is credited to building and supporting the Square One area of Mississauga with a network of a Mall (Square one), a library, a Living Arts centre (an entertainment, art gallery, artist's center, restaurant, a vibrant transportation system, etc.) during her tenure. She has received many awards and recognitions. This is the woman he's calling Orwellian, in his portrait I posted above.

Osmond has been discredited as an artist, but seems to continue with his photography business, where it is listed as Byron's Photography, in Port Credit (near Mississauga). But, further search (through google maps) for his given business address, 106 Lakeshore Rd. East, gives no result for his store. At 106 Lakeshore Rd. East, is a hair salon called Shazam.

In 2005, putting up a nefarious portrait of a public figure causes the city's citizens to boycott your business, and to ensure your demise.

What about ten, short years later, in 2014? Is anyone exempt from such retaliation? And if so, who is?

See the rest in Portrait of a Lady: Revisited

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Camera Lucida
Thursday, November 03, 2005
Portrait of a Lady: Not in Her Likeness

Mayor Hazel McCallion is one of Canada's outspoken, daring and most successful leaders of a city.

She dared to voice her mayoral point of view on free-loading refugees and immigrants taking over her hospitals and institutions, at Canadians’ tax payers expense.

Now it seems the arts community is also feeling her bite. As usual, it is the mediocre ones who complain.

Byronn Osmond, a photography store owner, was asked to pull down an uncomplimentary painting of the mayor. His reason for putting up this dismal portrait: The mayor doesn’t support the ‘arts’.

He finally took down the painting due to negative publicity for his business. So his higher ideals are all about money.

But once again, here on Camera Lucida, it is always interesting to look at the work of art, and see how it fits with the behavior of the beholder.

Let’s analyse this situation:

1. Osmond actually took a photograph of the mayor, which “he enlarged and finished with chalk and water colors.”

True to 'artists' of Osmond’s ilk, they have no drawing skills, are adept at tracing and copying, and keep their photoshop always at hand.

2. It’s full of simplistic and childish codes.

- Purple hair to show how ‘dated’ McCallion is

- Red to show her ‘strength’, I think he means her power, which not a good thing

- The footsteps around her, courtesy of his young son’s prints, to show that art should be run by someone younger

Borrowed footprints, borrowed portraits, and a little bit of slapdash paint does not art make.

Like the piggy-backing immigrants, McCallion has realized that artists belong into that category as well. And Osmond has a hard time accepting it.

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Hidden Garden

Queen Elizabeth Jubilee Garden, Mississauga, Ontario
[Photo By: KPA]

The Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Garden is a tiny space located behind Mississauga's City Hall. The grass needs patching, and a blue bench in the far corner needs some paint. This is indicative of the absence of recently retired Mayor Hazel McCallion, the forceful, formidable leader of Mississauga, who never lost an election, and who had to retire when (because) she reached her nineties. The entire city center is full of her touches, giving this rather bland Toronto suburb a character of its own. I fear, though, like the park, there may not be other dedicated leaders to continue McCallion's legacy. They are more interested in promoting multiculturalism. The link leads to Mississauga's yearly festival Carassauga which tells us that "Over 72 countries [are] represented at 28 Pavilion Locations, throughout Mississauga" - note the 72 countries all represented in Canada! This is not an international event, but a local and national one. This clearly refers to the multicultral and not international nature of the event. Dedicating parks to English monarchs is far from the agenda of Mississauga's, and Canada's, leaders.

Here is more from Mississauga.ca on the park:

The Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Garden is located at 300 City Centre Drive and was originally named Civic Garden Park or the Rose Garden. It is 0.17 hectares.

This garden has been part of the Civic Centre since it was originally dedicated on July 18, 1987 by The Duke and Duchess of York. Fifteen years later in October 2002, Buckingham Palace agreed to have the garden formerly named The Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Garden in commemoration of Her Majesty The Queen's 50th Anniversary of Her Accession to The Throne. (The full article is available at Mississauga.ca)

As always with beautiful things in our modern world, we have to deal with the ugly alongside it, competing for space and for attention.

Right in the middle of the garden, there is a hideous, rusted iron "sculpture." I tried to find its title, and its creator, and was able to do so at the Mississauga.ca website.


Anne Harris (1908)
Canadian
Northern Eye
Bronze
1995

Here is how the website describes it:

The sculpture the Northern Eye done by Anne Harris is cast bronze and steel and is a more humanized example of Harris' work which tends to be more geometric and mechanical in character. This piece evokes a definite sense of vulnerability and is a provocative and dynamic piece as it displays the artist's interest in interior and exterior space and also poignantly references the human body as a vessel and the body, metaphorically, as a wound.

The author of this description is at odds about how to describe a work he clearly dislikes, but he cannot be forthcoming about his opinion, where the Art God reigns supreme in modern culture.

Below is Harris's Monarch. A faceless head-like structure. I wonder why the park chose Northern Eye, other than its obvious Canadian reference? The park is after all commemorating Queen Elizabeth. Well, the committee which made this decision was wary even of the Northern Eye, and I would think that its members couldn't find it in them to put this lump of "monarch" bronze in the garden dedicated to their queen.

This little garden is hidden in many aspects. It is hidden from view. This diminishes its importance and its association with a British monarch. It is hidden in intent where codes and representatives have to be used to deflect, or to diminish, its original and true intent. Harris becomes its cover, and Queen Elizabeth is put on the periphery. It's grandeur is hidden, or diminished, where the flowers and plants are small and unassuming, considering it was set up to celelabrate Queen Elizabeth's jubilee.

I am therefore at odds about it. Its small size, and removal from a grand and open space, gives it charm and character. But it is too small for what it represents. It would have been better to have given it another name altogether, and to remove Queen Elizabeth's identity. Better to have no monarch at all than one with such diminished presence.


Anne Harris (1908)
Canadian
Monarch
Bronze
1974
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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The Best of New York City

I was in the US for almost two weeks, with about five of those days in Philadelphia, and the rest in New York.

I've done The Best Of New York City once before, and here is one more. Some of the items from my previous list stand, and I've added some new ones.

NEW Best Smoked Salmon: Toast, on 105th and Broadway. It is served with mayonnaise (with some lemon flavoring) and capers on toast crackers.
NEW Best parquette: The American Musuem of Natural History, 81st and Central Park West. For quiet contemplation, or a quick sandwich, before embarking onto the City again. This is smaller than, and different from, the "Small Park" at Strauss Park I list below.
NEW Most exhilarating 30 minute walk: Brooklyn Bridge. From Manhattan to Brooklyn (or almost to Brooklyn). I tried to find the Washington Plaque, but it will have to be for next time.
NEW Best Walk by the Hudson River: Riverside Drive. Don't get annoyed by the stream of traffic along the driveway, it is actually strangely soothing, like a flowing river. And the sparkling water is beautiful near sunset, when there is a breeze flowing from the river.
NEW Best Coffee: Plaza Hotel Food Hall (it is NOT called the Food Court). At the Pain D'Avignon stand.
NEW Best Bus Ride: Down Central Park West with the M10 to view the Park and the stately apartments. Again this is different from the M4 I list below.

Here is the rest, from 2013:

Best Hotel Lobby: The Plaza Hotel, on 59th and Fifth.
Best Hotel Bakery: The Plaza Hotel, at the lower level.
Best Hotel Bakery Item: The Hamentashen at the Plaza Hotel (apricot filling).
Best Hot Chocolate: Broadway Restaurant. Ask for whipped cream at 25 cents extra. The Broadway Diner has apparently been used for several movies, including George Clooney's Michael Clayton. As far as I can recall, there were also photos of old time movie stars on the wall, who had dined at the diner.
Best Pork Chops: West 107, on Amsterdam. For $13.50 you get the Grilled BBQ Pork Chops, which are listed under "From the Farm" on the menu. They are enough for two meals (share with someone, or take home a doggy bag). The side vegetables aren't spectacular, but they will do.
Best Burgers: I'm no real expert on burgers, but Toast's $10 burger (well, $9.95) fits the bill. The restaurant decor, some kind of faux Art Deco is spacious, in a bohemian (Art Deco) sort of way. And the best way to eat a burger I learned, is "medium rare." That way, there is no need to cover up the over-cooked, dry meat with all kinds of condiments. Toast (Downtown?) is on 105th and Broadway. Apparently, there's another on 125th Street.
Best Bagels: Broadway Bagel. Quick service, quiet and cheap.
Best Midtown Cafe: Europa Cafe. It does have a French cafe feel to it.
Best Midtown Diner: The Red Flame. Quiet and bright.
Best Irish Pub/Restaurant: Kennedy's. Despite a bit of a shaky start, the "Library" in the back of the restaurant provides a pleasant atmosphere for a group dinner.
Best Ethnic Restaurant: The Red Rooster Harlem, run by Ethiopian Chef Marcos, who's adds his own touches to "world" cuisine.
Best Museum/Gallery: The Morgan Library and Museum. Free on Tuesdays 5-7, but the adjacent McKim's room is free entrance Tuesdays, 3-5; Fridays, 7-9; Sundays, 4-6.
Best Museum With a Garden and a View: The Cloisters. Views of the George Washington Bridge (with the Hudson River) and the New Jersey Palissade from the garden.
Best Ceiling Mural: Grand Central Station.
Best Mini-Park: Strauss Park. With benches for sitting and contemplating.
Best Department Store: Bergdorf Goodman (no not Macy's). Bergdorf Goodman is understated, and has a beautiful entrance (don't mind the slovenly pedestrians in the linked image) with a doorman.
Best Christmas Window Display: Tiffany's. Disclaimer: I haven't actually been to see the Tiffany display, but Macy's, Lord and Taylor and Bergdorf Goodman have strange "pagan" themes to their windows, and have no luster (is it because of the paganism? I think so.).
Best Window Shopping Strip: No, not Fifth, but the adjacent Madison Avenue, where the many designer boutiques are located.
Best Bus Ride and Tour of NYC: The M4. Make sure to click "continue with the tour" at the bottom of the linked website to go on the tour from start to finish, starting at the Cloisters and ending at Penn Station.
Best of Best Of: Just walk down the avenues, look up at the buildings, take your time and don't mind the crowd, New Yorkers are friendly and polite.
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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25 West 81st (at Central Park West)

Below are photographs of a building on 81st street, just around the corner from the American Museum of Natural History, in New York.

As I got off the bus (M10), I thought I would take a look at some of the buildings around the museum, and settled on 25 West 81st Street.

It happens to be a landmark building. Here is some of its background:

Architects: Gronenberg & Leuchtag
Built (completed): 1927
Floors: 16
Designation: City Landmark

The building is across from the side entrance to the American Museum of Natural History. Despite the imposing design of the museum, I found its sprawling structure with a combination of architectural styles too confusing (compare it to the elegant Metropolitan Museum of Art).









[Photos By: KPA]
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Starting Out in the Evening

View from Toast, on 105th
This scene reminds me of one of my favorite New York movies,
Starting Out in the Evening
[Photo By: KPA]


Building across the street from Toast
Showing the dusk glow on its facade
(The building is visible in the above photo)
[Photo By: KPA]


The "X" marks the spot where I was sitting (for the couple of evenings I went during the rain.)
The third time, it was a lovely mild evening, and I sat in the patio.
[Photo from Toast's website]

Although I started out very early in the mornings during my stay in New York, the end of the day was equally special.

I took the above photo at late dusk (around 8:30 pm) at Toast on 105th street on Broadway. It had just rained, a thundershower to be exact. The street was empty except for the occasional yellow cab, and it was fast getting dark. My camera just about can take photos in the dark. But opening up the aperture to let in more light also affects motion, so some of the photograph looks blurred, especially the rustling leaves. But I also got those neat effects of streaming light.

I think the photo picks up the mood perfectly of the quiet evening. I was sitting by an open french window inside the restaurant since the patio seats were still wet. But I got the best of both interior and exterior, with a breeze coming through, and an unobstructed view of the street in front.

I had a delicious smoked salmon appetizer (House Smoked Salmon with capers & herb mayo, from Toast's menu. I usually don't like capers, but I didn't leave anything behind, finishing off the capers first so as not to detract from the mild and sweet smoked salmon), with a French rose. The wait staff knows me, and kindly accommodates my sometimes demanding requests.

Here is how Toast's menu describes the wine:

Bieler Pere et Fils 2011, France
It’s that time again! Ripe fruit with strawberry & a tingly dry finish. This classic Provence style always shines. Now in its 9th strong vintage - and by far our top-selling rosé every season! Ahh...Rosé.

After the Rain
[Photo By: KPA]

The lights floating on the trees are reflections of the restaurant's lights on the window, behind which I took the photograph on the wet evening when the french window was still closed (they opened it up a little later, at my request).
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Paris in Phillie

This is Paris, or a relative of Paris, a French Poodle. I met Paris in Phillie last week during my trip. She was sitting a little out of breath, so presumably she had been out for a run in the park.

"What's her name?" I asked her owner.

"Paris."

"Can I stroke her?"

"Just make sure she smells your hand first."

"Hi, Paris," I greeted her, stroking her surprisingly soft fluff of coiffed hair.

She just sat grinning at me, quiet and calm.

"Paris!" I said to my friend who was showing me around Philadelphia. My friend is a France expert, and speaks fluent French. She also knows the real Paris.

It seemed a good sign, to find a poodle named Paris in Philadelphia. And indeed, the rest of the day went beautifully well.

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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New York Public Library Grant Application for 2013

Objective

Modern man is a literary man, possibly more so than a visual one. Through the written word, with timely examples and with an exhorter’s clarity, I will be able to relay the urgent message that beauty is disappearing.

The book Reclaiming Beauty aims to document the contribution that beauty has made toward our Western civilization, from the earliest records of God’s love of beauty, to a young child who sees beauty almost as soon as he is born. Our civilization thrived, prospered and matured because of beauty. Our great artists, architects, writers, philosophers and scientists have always referred to beauty with awe and wonder. It is in the modern era that beauty began to be undermined and eventually neglected by artists and other intellectual leaders.

Reclaiming Beauty will show that the abandonment of beauty leads to the death of culture, and eventually society. Modern man’s neglect of beauty has initiated the cult of ugliness, leaving us with bleakness and nihilism.

But, people want beauty. And they will surround themselves with some kind of aesthetic quality. Still, beauty is the business of the knowledgeable. The man on the street may be able to recognize beauty, but he would not be able to explain why it is beautiful. That is the task of the experts.

With Reclaiming Beauty, I aim to present my ideas, observations and analyses on beauty, and to provide a guide for recommendations on how to remove oneself from the nefarious influences of our beauty-rejecting world. This way, we can build a parallel world which will eventually form a growing movement of beauty-reclaiming individuals, who can start to shape a world where beauty is not minimized and rejected.

Significance

Reclaiming Beauty will be the first book on beauty to make a comprehensive, historical, cultural and societal review of beauty. It will describe the moment (or moments) when beauty was not only undermined, but eventually abandoned, as a paradigm of civilized life. Rather than attributing beauty to a Godly goodness, philosophers, writers and artists began to view beauty as their enemy, and as their nemesis. They saw God as a judge who would not let them do as they wished. In order to pursue the image of beauty they desired, they began to look elsewhere. They began to abandon God, and by abandoning God, they began to change their world, filling it with horror and ugliness.

I maintain that this was not their objective, which was merely to look for a different perspective on aesthetics. The realization of the horror they have created may have come too late, and too weakly, from cultural leaders, but ordinary people, who are most affected by these changes in worldview, are already incurring changes. But they cannot make useful inferences, and hence necessary changes. They still need an elite to help them materialize their desires and observations.

A new elite that is pro-beauty needs to take the cultural reins, to guide and return our world back to its awe and wonder of beauty. To this end, Reclaiming Beauty will add an element which no other book on beauty has attempted: guidelines on how to renounce this world of anti-beauty, and how to progressively bring beauty back into our culture.

The book will be a manifesto for concrete references to these basic ideas. Along with the book, a website will be developed that will be an interactive continuation of the book. On the website, members can post their original articles, shorter commentaries, articles and excerpts from other authors, and encourage feedback and comments from other members. At some point, this group can develop into a more formal society, which can meet in a physical locations a few times a year, building beauty societies, whose purpose would be to develop ideas and strategies for bringing beauty back into our culture.

Part of the book will be revised versions of what I've been developing over a number of years in my blogs Camera Lucida, Reclaiming Beauty and Our Changing Landscape, and from my full-length articles from Kidist P. Asrat Articles.

All images that head the chapters will be from my own collection of photographs and designs. Some of these images can be found at Kidist P. Photographs and Well-Patterned. Others I will choose from my collection of photographs, mostly in negatives and prints. Others I will take as the project progresses.

The image on the book cover is a photograph I took of the the inner courtyard at the Cloisters Museum in New York. There is a section in the book dedicated to the Cloisters titled: The Sturdy Periwinkle: Linking the New World with the Old, which discusses the Western, European influences in North American culture. The chapter will be a revision of a post at the blog Reclaiming Beauty.

What I plan to accomplish at the New York Public Library

The library’s vast, world class research facilities will assist me in finding the scholarly, historic and artistic information necessary to develop the ideas for my book.

How I plan to use the New York Public Library’s Stephen A. Schwarzman Building

I will primarily be using the Arts and Architecture Collections. The material I am interested in is the Western collections (fine art, decorative arts, architecture and design history, as described in the NYPL website). Here are the specific ways I will peruse the library’s facilities:
- Catalogues Raisonnes
This will provide me with specific works of art by specific artists, who played important if not seminal influence on Western art and culture
- Thirty Minute Consultations
Since my time is limited at the library, periodic, short consultations, especially at the beginning of my research schedule, will save me time and help me find relevant and pertinent information.
- Vertical Files
Although vertical files are no longer being catalogued, my research is also concerned with a historical perspective on art and culture, and the perception of beauty. The material that is catalogued between 1910-1950 will be useful to analyze how the detrimental effects of two world wars (1914-1945) affected the culture.
- Photographic Collection
Examining photographic records of recent history will provide me with a documentary of the society's aesthetics when image production started to be more democratic, and more available. Photographs don’t, and don’t need to, eulogize their subjects, as did painters.
- Print Collection
The collection which dates from the 15th century, and which encompasses almost five hundred years of image reproductions, will provide me with a historical survey of how beauty, and beautiful images, were viewed over these centuries.
- Spencer Collection
I will have access to the Spencer Collection through the Photograph and Print Collections, providing me with further material to enhance these two collections, including medieval and renaissance manuscripts.
- The Manuscript and Archives Division
This houses documents ranging from medieval and renaissance illuminated manuscripts, which is also connected to the various other prints divisions in the library, and will enhance my research.
- Map Division
Besides the practicality of maps, there is an aesthetics to maps as well. The Map Division will provide me with this aesthetic survey of maps over the centuries.
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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Commemorating Larry Auster's Tombstone

Laura Wood, of The Thinking Housewife, who organized the event to mark the placing of Larry Auster's new tombstons, writes here:

Last week, five friends of the writer Lawrence Auster, who died in March of last year, gathered at his graveside at Sts. Peter and Paul Cemetery in Springfield, Pennsylvania to mark the placing of a new tombstone at the site. We all continue to miss him, but it was a happy occasion to be there together and remember the man who so inspired us and truly was the greatest of friends. Afterward, we went to a restaurant nearby and talked about Mr. Auster’s work and life. There was so much to say. We agreed that we would all visit his grave together at least once a year.

Thank you to the readers of View from the Right and to Auster family members who contributed to this beautiful monument made of Vermont granite. I wish to thank especially a reader from New Orleans who contributed $1,000.

Larry Auster would have been happy with this choice of material: Vermont granite.

He posted a discussion at View From the Right an article on the Martin Luther King Memorial in 2010, where a reader comments:

...one reads with interest the February 11th [2010] issue of The Washington Post, where an article describes the future arrival of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial. This enormous piece of carved stone will stand nearly 31 feet above the ground at the other end of Washington’s Tidal Basin, the site of the cherry blossom trees, and opposite the Jefferson Memorial. King’s stone image will be at least 10 feet higher than Jefferson or Lincoln in their respective memorials, and will require driving hundreds of concrete piles into the ground to support this 55 ton Stone of Hope Memorial, on which King is shown, bracketed by two called Stones of Despair. What may interest, as well as amuse, some readers is that The King Memorial was carved entirely from Chinese stone, and will be shipped from China.

Another reader comments:

...the weighty and ponderous slabs of stone that comprise the memorial, each of which weighs, “thousands of tons,” are “ready to be shipped,” according to The Post article

And adds this from the Washington Post article:

...these component slabs will leave Xiamin China and arrive in Baltimore by March or April. At that point, the Chinese architect, Lei Yixin, plans to finish the work by the summer or early autumn...

The sculptor also carved a statue of the Chinese communist leader Mao Tse-tung. This isn't mentioned in this particular posting at VFR, but I do remember someone bringing it up in a discussion at another posting.

The full Washington Post article is here.

Chinese stone, carved by a Chinese, to commemorate an American was a subject worthy of Larry's attention, and indignation.

He would have certainly approved of the American stone chosen for him, carved by an American craftsman, to be placed on his modest grave.

The light gray, textured stone is beautiful. The base, which seems to have been left uncarved, gives us some idea of where this stone came from.

In order not to detract from the simple beauty of the stone, Laura arranged to have the inscriptions as simple as possible, but with a beauty of their own. The simple cross and the varied scripts with the Biblical quotes in italic, give a solemn, yet light message.


Rock of Ages Granite Quarry, Barre, VT
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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The Colonial Supreme Court in Philadelphia

Located on the corner of Chestnut and 5th Streets, Old City Hall is open year round, with hours varying by season. Visitors are admitted free of charge on a first-come, first-served basis. Ranger talks are offered. Built as the City Hall of Philadelphia, [Old City Hall] was used by the U. S. Supreme Court from the time the building was completed in 1791 until 1800 when the Federal Government was moved to Washington D. C.. The municipal government and courts occupied the building during the 19th century. [Source]

I will be posting more on my recent trips to New York, Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, but above is the lovely Old Supreme Court in Philadelphia. The image is not mine, and I foolishly didn't take any photographs while I was there. Nonetheless, the charm of this small, stark room is obvious from the photo above, where much work was done.
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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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