Our server was out of commission yesterday, making it impossible for OGIC to post her account of our fun-filled weekend in Chicago. (Yes, it’s coming.) I couldn’t post anything, either, so I spent the day planning and booking theater-related travel instead. It seems I have quite a complicated summer ahead of me. I’ll be seeing a couple of shows in Philadelphia and Baltimore this weekend, followed shortly thereafter by trips to Georgia, Idaho, Oregon, and Utah–and that’s just in June and July!
Once my calendar was neat and tidy, I headed over to Hollis Taggart Galleries
for the opening of the Arnold Friedman retrospective about which I posted earlier this week. It is a truth universally acknowledged that nobody goes to gallery openings to look at art, but I actually managed to pay close attention to a couple of dozen canvases in between sips of Veuve Clicquot. I also chatted with an interesting assortment of interested parties, including Tommy LiPuma (who collects Friedman’s paintings, though he’s better known as a record producer), William Agee (who curated the show and wrote the catalogue essay), and Friedman’s grandson (who told me that he remembered seeing a copy of Skater and Dog, a Friedman lithograph I bought last year, hanging over the artist’s bed). Best of all, I ran into Albert Kresch, another chronically underappreciated American artist about whom I blogged enthusiastically a couple of years ago. Needless to say, I plan to go back again and see “Arnold Friedman: The Language of Paint” under more favorable (i.e., less crowded) circumstances, but I had a good time anyway.
From there I went downtown to 55 Bar, a low-ceilinged Christopher Street hangout where good jazz can frequently be heard, and caught a set by Amanda Monaco‘s quartet. When not playing guitar with the Lascivious Biddies, of whom she is a charter member, Monaco performs her own very interesting compositions with a tight little band that’s always worth hearing (I commend their CD to your attention).
What next? I’ll be spending most of Thursday writing a Commentary essay about the new Clement Greenberg biography, after which I plan to meet the beauteous Sarah at the Jazz Standard to hear Roger Kellaway.
Yes, I’m back in business again, and it feels great–but now I need some good old-fashioned shut-eye. See you later.
UPDATE: Here’s an online interview with Albert Kresch that’s very much worth reading.