At the Art Institute again

We arrived in time to take advantage of member hour, entering before the rains began. My photos show “Public Park” by Ker-Xavier Roussel, “Mother and Child” by Julius Gabri Melchers, “Untitled (Fumage)” by Wolfgang Paalen, “Portrait of Joaneta Obrador” by Joan Miró, “Casaguba” by Ben Nicholson, “New York” by Hedda Sterne, and “Woman on a Forest Path” by Ben Enwonwu.

New books

A reading friend sent me the Brooks and the Quashie; an article in The Atlantic led me to the Rosenberg biography; and because I owned only a tattered mass paperback of Frank’s diary, I picked up the definitive edition. (If you’re considering Anne Frank: The Exhibition, I would say, Go. It’s moving and important if a bit basic.) Late last week we visited the Kenosha Public Museum for fossils and the watercolor exhibition. (I cast my “people’s choice” vote for “A World of Design” by Thomas Schaller. See below.) On the way home, we stopped at a delightful independent bookstore, where I picked up The Stone Catchers.

Field trips

On Tuesday, we visited the Lizzadro Museum of Lapidary Art, which I first heard about on WBEZ. The scrimshaw of Richard Kovanda caught my attention at the end of our visit. (Yes, I’m reading Moby-Dick for the third time this year, this time with Roundtable.)

This is the time of year when my flute is at the shop for its annual COA, and I’ve taken to using the shipping and repair time (approximately ten days) as a break of sorts; hence, a recent flurry of field trips. In addition to the Lizzadro, I’ve been to the Art Institute to see the Willem de Kooning exhibit, into Wilmette to see the Shakespeare Project of Chicago in Antony and Cleopatra, back into Chicago for the spectacular TUTA Theater production of Crime and Punishment, and to the Milwaukee Art Museum to see the exhibition of German Romantic artists.