The ultimate day of Christmas activities

Today was a whirlwind adventure of Christmas fun. Tomorrow is a day of hard-core final exam studying. But today was a day of Christmas fun.

First stop: the White House Christmas tree.



Surely it looks better lit up at night. But I thought twice about braving a cold winter night as I pulled on my under-the-jeans tights to keep warm on this sunny day.

Next stop: get a picture of yourself with your home state Christmas tree.



Here is me with the Maryland tree. What a pair of classy broads.

Next: go to the Willard Intercontinental Hotel and drink a hot toddy in the decorated lobby. Things went awry a little bit at this stage of the activities as I placed my feelings of adventureness ahead of my feelings of "what sounds good". I found myself ordering the Hot Buttered Rum, which was literally heated rum with a slab of butter floating and melting around in it. Note for next time -- go with the spiced apple cider or that peppermint drink, not the drink that Mark Twain supposedly enjoyed, Jesus what is wrong with you?

Pit stop at Teaism for a bento box of delicious Japanese food.

Next: browse the stalls at the downtown holiday market. Buy presents only for yourself. Actually, I only really bought just one thing: a yummy photo print of a farmer's market in Venice (photo taken by this man). I have high hopes for this print and the kitchen of my new apartment.

Keep going!: visit Julia Child's kitchen at the American History museum.



While not particularly a Christmas activity, it was on my must-see list.

Finally: visit the parents and put up and decorate the T family Christmas tree!



The responsibilities fell on Papa T and I this year, and my absolute favorite part was unwrapping each ornament and associating it with a certain memory.



This one my mom bought during the Chinese Year of the Boar, since yours truly has a pig year birthday.



This one I purchased at the Buckingham Palace shop the year I spent New Year's Eve and the two following weeks in London with a college friend.



This one serves as a reminder of the year I was supposed to study abroad in Japan for three weeks and got sick with the flu two days before the flight and was unable to go.



Ah yes, the Irish harp I bought last year when I was living in Ireland by myself and had no Christmas tree, but thank goodness my parents came to town and saved the day and visited me for the holidays.



These I can remember from forever ago. My mom calls them the "GDR ornaments" because, yes, they were made in East Germany way back back in the day.

What are your favorite ornaments (or Christmas activities)?

Snow Hill

This past weekend I visited the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. Where? I have no idea where that is. Especially since the Tom Tom had to find us a minimum of three alternative routes before we were able to arrive at the front door and not at someone's locked gate deep in the woods.

But we made it. And there, I was formally introduced to the paintings of Andrew Wyeth, and in particular, my new favorite painting, Snow Hill:

Wyeth painted this picture to mark his seventieth birthday -- each ribbon representing a decade -- and it is absolutely stunning in person. The setting is a hill overlooking Kuerner Farm, which was a major source of inspiration for Wyeth thoughout his painting career. The figures are his models from his earlier works. They dance around a maypole during Christmas time, perhaps celebrating in anticipation of Wyeth's death (Wyeth lived to be 91 years old however).

It's a sureal scene. And just beautiful.

Departure checklist

1. Receive a bag full of presents from coworkers, including a card with a wad of cash paper-clipped inside. Check.

2. Drink one last Butler's hot chocolate, although the magic is slightly gone because it's just too warm outside. Check.

3. Go to the National Gallery for the third (fourth?) time to finally see Lady Writing a Letter with Her Maid because she is back from Tokyo. Just in time. Check.

4. Call Mama and cry. Check.

5. Call Mama again to tell her about the wad of cash. Check.

6. Set up a flickr album with the "b-sides" Ireland photos, may of which, after some clean up, turned out splendidly. Check.

7. Go through an apartment "walk through" where soup spoons and love seats and toasters are all counted meticulously. Check.

8. Go to one last museum. Drink one last pint of beer. Walk past Grafton Street one last time. Check.

9. Post a final POD from Ireland.

Winter wonderland

In the Netherlands, I fell in love with Dutch painter Hendrick Avercamp's winter landscape paintings. This particular one I saw at the Mauritshuis in The Hague and it made me want to jump right into the scene with a mug of steaming hot chocolate and the Fleet Foxes' "White Winter Hymnal" playing in my ear.



Avercamp's paintings are anecdotal and humorous, with every figure performing a different activity -- washing clothes, playing hockey, slipping on the ice and having a bare butt exposed.

Using my blog to catalog Vermeers, because I am perfectly comfortable with my nerdiness

Vermeers already viewed:
1. The Milkmaid
.....(The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
2. The Glass of Wine
.....(Gemäldegalerie, Berlin)
3. View of Delft
.....(The Mauritshuis, The Hague)
4. Woman in Blue Reading a Letter
.....(The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
5. Woman Holding a Balance
.....(The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.)
6. Woman with a Pearl Necklace
.....(Gemäldegalerie, Berlin)
7. A Lady Writing
.....(The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.)
8. Girl with a Red Hat
.....(The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.)
9. Girl with a Flute
.....(The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.)
10. The Girl with a Pearl Earring
.....(The Mauritshuis, The Hague)
11. The Love Letter
.....(The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
12. Lady Writing a Letter with Her Maid
.....(National Gallery, Dublin)
13. A Maid Asleep
.....(The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
14. Officer and Laughing Girl
.....(The Frick Collection, New York)
15. Girl Interrupted in Her Music
.....(The Frick Collection, New York)
16. Woman with a Lute
.....(The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
17. Study of a Young Woman
.....(The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
18. Mistress and Maid
.....(The Frick Collection, New York)
19. Allegory of Faith
.....(The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)





Vermeers for future viewing:
1. Diana and Her Companions
.....(Mauritshuis, The Hague)
2. Christ in the House of Martha and Mary
.....(National Gallery, Edinburgh)
3. The Procuress
.....(Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden)
4. A Girl Reading a Letter by an Open Window
.....(Gemäldegalerie, Dresden)
5. The Little Street
.....(Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam)
6. The Girl with a Glass of Wine
.....(Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum, Brunswick)
7. The Music Lesson
.....(The Royal Collection, The Windsor Castle)
8. Young Woman with a Water Pitcher
.....(The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
9. The Concert
.....(Isabella Gardner Museum, Boston)
10. The Art of Painting
.....(Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna)
11. The Astronomer
.....(The Louvre, Paris)
12. The Geographer
.....(Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt am Main)
13. The Lacemaker
.....(The Louvre, Paris)
14. The Guitarplayer
.....(Kenwood)
15. A Lady Standing at a Virginal
.....(National Gallery, London)
16. A Lady Seated at a Virginal
.....(National Gallery, London)
17. A Young Woman Seated at the Virginals
.....(Private collection, New York)

Luck be a lady tonight

On my walk home from work tonight, I stopped by the National Gallery to see this painting:


"Lady Writing a Letter With Her Maid" by Johannes Vermeer.

With five Vermeer paintings consciously visited and admired, I am on a quest to seek out and pay homage to the other thirty. Unfortunately, The Lady is currently on loan in Tokyo and is not returning to Dublin until January. Without my guide books, I flew by the seat of my pants, if you can say that about something that you would do at an art gallery, and went off exploring on my own. The gallery was nice -- easy to navigate, calm at this time of day, free, and a woman sang baroque music in the corner with some chamber music accompaniment.

I saw a Hals, a Caravaggio, a Modigliani, a Brueghel the Younger, and a Reubens among others. I am only hoping that The Lady does not let me down and returns back to Dublin before I have to leave.

Oh, the shame

One of the sites to see in Rothenburg is the Crime and Punishment Museum, which has the feel of a 5th grade cut-and-paste poster board science project, and the content of a truly informative seminar or medieval law. My most favorite object was this "shame mask" that a person would have been required to wear publicly, standing in the town square, had he/she acted like a pig.

Speaking of shame . . .



In this photo, captioned "Let's Ride!", I totally look like a competent and proficient bike-rider, I mean look at that form. What this photo doesn't tell you is that 5 seconds into the four and a half hour bike tour around Berlin, I realized that I had not ridden a bike since maybe the 5th grade and I wasn't going to have an instantaneously easy time of not colliding with other bikers and metal poles, nor would I feel at ease riding in the street with cars and buses and crossing busy intersections. For extra fun, the seat was uncomfortable and too low, my gears were messed up, and the bell rang of its own accord at every small protuberance in the road. Cobbled streets, which are quite popular in Europe, evinced a continuous RING. No one would ride next to me -- not sure if it was the weaving, the scary bell ringing, or the sorry's! that put them off. I affectionately nick-named the experience the "4.5 hours of shame" and to this day, Dana will not tell me what she overheard the Australians in our group saying about us. But hey, everyone came out of it alive and satisfied. I also came out with a large bruise on my leg from an unfortunate pole collision and two spectacular, matching thumb blisters from really gripping on to those handlebars.

More favorite photos are posted on Flickr.

Forger's Spell

The Forger's Spell: A True Story of Vermeer, Nazis, and the Greatest Art Hoax of the Twentieth Century
by Edward Dolnick

This art history book reads not like a textbook but like a novel. It tells the story of Han van Meegeren, a mediocre artist from the 1930's, who paints a handful of forgeries and convinces the art world that they are authentic paintings by the Dutch master Vermeer from the 17th century. The book jumps around from a chapter on van Meegeren's background, to a chapter on Hitler, to a chapter on Vermeer, back to a chapter on van Meegeren's technique, to a chapter on a revered art connoisseur. Somehow it all comes together and makes for an engaging story. The author explains exactly how van Meegeren was able to make the paintings look "old" and pass simple scientific tests, why the art critics were taken in by the fakes, and how the entire hoax eventually unraveled. The color insert in the book allows you to compare authentic Vermeers to the forgeries painted by van Meegeren.

5 out of 5

Today there are only 36 recognized Vermeer paintings in the world. Eleven of them are housed in museums in the United States, four of them at the National Gallery of Art in DC. I took a quick trip to visit them this afternoon, and I must say that it was an afternoon well-spent. Perhaps "Girl With a Pearl Earring" starring Colin "Mr. Darcy" Firth deserves another viewing as well.


Woman Holding a Balance, Johannes Vermeer, National Gallery of Art

Helmut Newton

Apparently the people of Berlin are indifferent to celebrity. I, however, am not indifferent to seeing the paparazzi photography exhibit at the Helmut Newton in Berlin.

No End in Sight

Tonight I watched a documentary called No End in Sight (number 7 on the 2007 Howard Movie List), which chronicles the invasion of Iraq and its subsequent occupation and the mistakes that were made along the way. The film briefly touches upon the National Museum of Iraq, which contains a large collection of art and historical artifacts from the Mesopotamian civilization, the "cradle of civilization", thousands of years old.

The museum was looted in 2003 after the U.S. invasion of Baghdad, and the U.S. government was criticized at the time for not protecting the museum. When asked about the museum's looting, Donald Rumsfeld replied, "To try to pass off the fact of that unfortunate activity to a deficit in the war plan strikes me as a stretch."

The Barnes Foundation

Yesterday morning, Alison and I drove up to Philly to visit Kristin and see the Barnes Foundation in Merion Station, PA. This is a private collection of over 800 paintings by famous Impressionists, post-Impressionists, and modern artists such as Van Gogh, Renoir, Cezanne, Seurat, Matisse, Picasso, and Modigliani. Dr. Albert Barnes, the collector and founder of the foundation, arranged the paintings into "wall ensembles" that he chose himself and that he specified could not be altered. The foundation's charter and bylaws state that the works must always be displayed as arranged by Dr. Barnes. He was also very particular about not loaning the works out or have them travel, as well as the number of visitors that could see the collection in any given week. The foundation ran into financial trouble in the last 10 years, and now there is a controversy surrounding the gallery and its movement from Merion to a site in Philly. We wanted to check it out before it moved.

The best word to describe what you feel when you enter is: Overwhelmed. This was unlike any other museum exhibit I have been to or could have imagined. Dr. Barnes arranged paintings practically one on top of the other, covering each wall. Some are too high to see properly. There are no descriptions next to any of the paintings -- no title, artist, year, country. At best, you can squint to look at the artist's name, etched on the frame (you will be reprimanded if you step too close to a painting, inside the black electrical tape on the floor). Asian art will be placed next to a Byzantine triptych, which will be placed next to a Renoir painting of a bather. Amid the chaos of the art, Barnes has also strategically arranged pieces of iron work. We thought they might be something stolen out of a Medieval church - there were circular designs, curly designs, forks, spoons, craziness.

I was looking forward to seeing a painting by Seurat called "Models" (see top painting above). Seurat's pointilism technique is awesome. Up close, you can see that each brush-stroke is an individual dot or point. From afar, you see the picture as a whole. Two of my most favorite paintings are his "Sunday Afternoon.." which I know I've seen but I don't remember where (Paris?) and "Bathers in Asnieres" which I saw at the National Gallery in London. "Models" is drawn on the same large scale as the other two, and has a painting in a painting, since you can see part of "Sunday Afternoon" in the background. Unfortunately, Barnes placed "Models" too high for anyone to get anywhere near close to it.

I wish there were a book that describes how each wall of each room is arranged. For example, on one wall, Barnes did not like a red flower in a particular painting. He arranged other paintings on the same wall with bits of red in them to anchor that red flower and draw imaginary triangles with the eye. A large iron casting at the top of the arrangement is meant to complement or anchor the large hat on Madame Cezanne, in the bottom center painting. On another wall, he has an El Greco painting that depicts a monk (?) but is mostly a study of the folds and the shading of his robes in candlelight. Barnes placed a painting of Cezanne's to show how El Greco influenced Cezanne's still-life of a skull and fruit. Yet another wall had a painting by Hieronymus Bosch showing some pig people. I started thinking out loud about how he paints hell in his works, and a man walked up to us and said that painting was depicting hell, and on the other side of the wall, in the next room, on that exact spot, Barnes had placed a painting of heaven. We made guesses about the ironwork. Barnes placed a huge fork next to a painting of trees. Perhaps the shape of the fork emulates the shapes of the trees? (per Kristin).

I walked away from this gallery thinking that Albert Barnes is a madman and feeling entirely overwhelmed (and even slightly faint, but that could have been the after-effects of my morning venti cappuccino). However, it was definitely a cool experience, and the madman definitely has a lot of fantastic art that you wouldn't be able to see in any other exhibition if it's never allowed to travel.

Thanks to Kristin for introducing us to the Barnes Foundation!