Appreciation of beauty-a wonderful source of healing and nurture. Photos taken on my walk through Lincoln Park to get an end of the work week massage.
The other day, I went to see the Louise Bourgeois retrospective at the Hirshhorn. The works are a combination of exquisite technique and in-your-face, challenging emotions. I had a friend who raged at me once because I had created a piece that was radically, polemically feminist. “That’s not art; art is only meant to be beautiful and aesthetic, not to be political,” said my friend. Although he could not have questioned Bourgeois as an artist — her technique is too good — he might still have raged at it. (The high school group being shown art on a field trip, while I was at the exhibit, was scurried through a room or two, much to my amusement).
Seeing the exhibit led me to think of the purported purpose of left-handed tantric practices, which are meant to challenge us, turn us upside-down and inside out, and question what we recognize as the divine.
says the man next to me with a slightly interrogative inflection, while we are both looking at a photo of Dylan taken by Alan Ginsberg at the show of Ginsberg’s photos at the Nat’l Gallery. He is a beefy guy with a crew cut, wearing chinos and a polo shirt. He looks like he’s maybe one of the thousands of police officers from around the country who are here for “Police Week.” Lots of police wives are taking a break from the demos and competitions to look at the impressionist and modern paintings from the Chester Dale Collection. Maybe he just got a little farther west than he had intended.
I smile at him in a way that I hope seems welcoming and open, yet does not actually convey agreement with his statement. I wonder how he felt about the photos ofd the Orlovsky brothers. I am at the exhibit on my lunch hour for the first of what will likely be a number of visits.
The Beats are an important part of my identity. My parents met in Greenwich Village in the late fifties — my mother dabbling as an artist, my father involved in peace activism, the places they frequented also frequented by the beats. My great Aunt H’s favorit book in those days allegedly was “On the Road.”
As a teenager, I relished and romanticized this part of my history. In so doing I read widely not only the writings of the Beats, but also what they were reading, which included the great Hindu and Buddhist texts. To want to discover the illumination of the Beats was to explore Eastern philosophy and mysticism and to meditate and practice yoga.
“No,” I thought to myself, “I’ve never connected the word ‘strange’ to Bob Dylan. Maybe when I get home I”ll play me some before I sit to meditate.”
I cannot tell you whether the food is tasty or healthy or authentic, but something felt good about this truck that was at Eastern Market today.
Please comment if you’ve tried it.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
