Music at the Port

Once a year, sometime in early August, the Port of Olympia sponsors "Music at the Port". It's an early evening event held at the Port Plaza on the water side of Anthony's Homeport Restaurant. Whenever I've gone it's been the kind of summer evening you want to drink in and remember all winter long. This year was no different. The sun was casting a golden/purple glow as the shadows grew long. The music rocked with tunes from the 60's. The warm evening breeze kissed your skin. The crowd was smiling, the brave were dancing.

The gelato cart whet the appetites.

All is well. 

Georgetown Trailer Mall

The July sketch outing for Seattle Urban sketchers was in Georgetown, one of my favorite neighborhoods in Seattle to sketch. It was the weekend of the Georgetown Garden Tour. However it was also just a few weeks before the Urban Sketchers Symposium and Gail Wong wanted to run through her Expressive Watercolor workshop. So we headed over to the Georgetown Trailer Mall, a favorite spot of color in the urban brick industrial neighborhood. 

This sketch deviates a bit from my usual style. we used a bit of pencil first then laid in big washes of water color in strong juicy layers. It was fun to try to catch up with the washes and work with light and water. 

More New York Sketches

My daughter picked me up at the Newark airport early on June 10. As we drove in to Brooklyn my fingers were itching to start. Here's the Brooklyn Queens Expressway (BQE) about 8:00 A.M.

 

I had come to New York to participate in the Big Apple BBQ (BABBQ) in Madison Park. Our first stop, however was Red Hook, Brooklyn.  Hometown BBQ owned by our son-in-law, Billy Durney is, in fact, the reason that I came to New York -- to work the Hometown booth at BABBQ.

The weekend and the days leading up to it were focused on the BBQ event. You can read about that here.

After the weekend I had time to explore a bit. So I took the subway to Manhattan: 

I wound my way around the lower east side till I came upon Washington Square. Last fall I took an online class with Melanie Reim, an urban sketcher and illustration teacher at the Fashion Institute. She did a video demonstration of her process as she drew at Washington Square. I call this : Thinking of Melanie Reim.

I was heading to the High Line and the New Whitney Museum located at the southern end of the Highline in the Meatpacking District.  The new Whitney, designed, as was the old Whitney, by Renzo Piano. I was quite impressed with the building and would have loved to sketch longer to get a sketch with more clarity, but I also wanted to see the inside. I was not disappointed. They had an impressive inaugural exhibition: America is Hard to See - which covered several stories and spanned a century of American art.

 

My last day in the NYC area, I re-visited Jaralemon Street in the Willowtown section of Brooklyn Heights. I've stayed in this neighborhood a few times and love this particular set of brick row houses - all painted pastel. 

 

As I waited to board my departure, I sketched these folks who were also waiting. 

At that point I checked my bag for my IPad only to discover I had left it in the Security Station. 

I literally ran back to security and thankfully they still had it. All's well that ends well. It was a fun trip.

Capitol City Pride

 Capital City Pride week was especially meaningful this year as it coincided with the landmark Supreme Court Decision to uphold gay marriage. The town was ecstatic.

Big Apple Barbeque Block Party

"Where I come from, Bar-B-Que is the great equalizer between the class divide."

Sam Jones, Pitmaster

Skylight Inn

Ayden, North Carolina

Madison Square Park, in the middle of Manhattan, hosted the 13th annual Big Apple BBQ Block Party the second week in June. The street party takes over the park and surrounding area, providing an ironic juxtaposition of smoked meat and barbeque picnic among Madison Avenue's historic reputation for sophistication.

Sitting kiddy-corner from the famous Flatiron building, the 7-acre park has been hosting this event which has grown from three local establishments, to 17 nationaly known barbeque greats.

Hill Country BBQ near Madison Park hosted the "Brisket Sessions", a six-member panel interviewing some of the best pitmasters in the country, including:

Mike Mills, - 17th St BBQ - Murphysboro, IL
Wayne Mueller - Louis Buellers Barbeque -Taylor, TX
Billy Durney, Hometown BBQ - Red Hook, Brooklyn, NY
Sam Jones - Skylight Inn - Ayden NC
Charles Grund, Jr - Hill Country - New York City, NY

Each of the six well-known pit masters told the story of how they got started. Some have inherited the tradition and the business through generations, some have just recently learned the art, but the Barbeque family had plenty of encouragement for all.

 

The legendary Mike Mills of the 17th Street BBQ in Murphysboro wouldn't reveal his age, but his reputation was obvious. With four world championships,three grand championships, the lines for his baby-back ribs and baked beans. his crew worked the pit while Mike worked the crown autographing his book, "Peace, Love and BBQ".

Wayne Mueller, grandson of barbeque champ, Louis Mueller, owner of Louis Mueller BBQ in Taylor Texas doled out tender beef ribs and southern pickles. His smoker is almost foreboding but not because of the contents.

I got to work in the Hometown Barbeque booth, serving Jamacian Jerk St. Louis Ribs that dripped from the bone, and Carribbean Slaw with just enought of a kick to give you a taste of the tropics as you sat beneath the concrete roman arches.

The annual event is a fundraiser for the Madison Park Conservancy that works to keep the park bright, beautiful and interesting. The conservancy provides 98% of the funding to keep the park running, including horticulture, maintenance, sanitation,security and free cultural programs that are open to the public.

@Large: Ai Weiwei at Alcatraz

Ai Weiwei wasn't always a dissident -- at least not officially. It wasn't until the Sichuan earthquake 2008 when the Chinese government refused to release the names of over 5000 children who died, that Weiwei confronted the government directly. He produced a performance piece that read each child's name continuously and posted it online. Since then the Chinese government has kept him under continuous surveillance. Weiwei continues to speak out.

@Large: Ai Weiwei at Alcatraz, a potent and provocative installation at America's most notorious prison-turned-national-park embodies the idea that freedom of expression cannot be silenced. The seven installations in four separate buildings are integrated with the standard Alcatraz tour. Weiwei's work, however, transforms the crusty prison,  confronting visitors with stark contrasts and bringing up questions about freedom and human rights.

Sketched on location while visiting Beijing January 2015

On April 3, 2010 police arrested Weiwei without charges and detained him at an unknown location for 81 days, finally releasing him on June 22 without explanation and without his passport. He cannot leave China. A bicycle whose basket of flowers is refreshed daily sits just outside the door of his Beijing studio, and beneath several surveillance cameras--a silent statement.

Because he cannot leave China, Weiwei used books, memoirs, & photos to study the Alcatraz prison site, mapping it's construction and layout while designing the exhibition. Weiwei's staff, park staff and local volunteers assembled the installations.

Weiwei uses the opportunity of the exhibition to speak to what happens when people lose the ability so speak freely and to bring the conversation to a broader audience. He researched political prisoners throughout the world and uses this opportunity to call them, their repression and their causes to our attention.

The theme of human rights, freedom of expression and the political repression of many countries, including the U.S., runs throughout the exhibition.

THE NEW INDUSTRIES BUILDING - the vast structure where inmates worked doing laundry for military bases and manufacturing goods for government use. The three most visually dramatic installations are in this building.

With Wind
A traditional hand-painted silk Chinese Dragon kite seems to burst through the confinement; the head confronts you at the entrance and the body, hand-painted silk discs, winds through tall pillars contrasted by walls with peeling paint and exposed rusty pipes. Some silk discs display quotes from political prisoners including Weiwei.

With Wind - Industries Building - Alcatraz

Trace
The signature art piece of @Large: Ai Weiwei on Alcatraz, panels with 176 faces made of millions LEGOs cover the floor in a patchwork of color. Each face is the portrait of a real person who has had some experience with political imprisonment. Some are still imprisoned; some are now free: some deceased. 

Trace - the faces of more than 175 political prisoners constructed from LEGO bricks - Industries Building - Alcatraz

Trace - photo

Refraction

Refraction - New Industries Building

A massive sculpture sits in the basement of the New Industries building. The monstrous wing whose feathers are constructed with reflective panels from Tibetan solar ovens calling to mind Tibet's long struggle with the Chinese government -- a wing enclosed, captured even, by the prison walls.

CELLHOUSE - "A" BLOCK

Stay Tuned
Prison cells, empty except a stool and headphones invite viewers to sit inside, getting a sense of imprisonment while listening to the recorded voices of political prisoners - those who have been detained for expressing their beliefs. Isolation and expression. 

CELLHOUSE - HOSPITAL

Illumination
This installation in the sterile psychiatric observation room resonates with chanting from both Tibetan monks and Native American tribes, drawing a direct correlation between Chinese and American governments' oppression of native people.

Blossom
In 1957 Chairman Mao initiated the Hundred Flowers Campaign inviting the population to free expression of their ideas about the governing of China.

"The policy of letting a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend is designed to promote the flourishing of the arts and the progress of science." (Wikipedia)

Blossom - Cellhouse Hospital

As criticism of Mao increased, he changed course with what is known as the cultural revolution. Dissidents, now easily identified from their free expression, were publicly humiliated, arrested, tortured, sent to labor camps and even executed.

Weiwei's family was sent to Xinjiang Province, a remote area in western China. His father Ai Qing, once a lauded poet and scholar was forced to work daily cleaning communal toilets; their family ate seeds to survive. Knowing a bit of what his family experienced gives deeper understanding of Weiwei's crusade for free expression and human rights.

Blossom transforms fixtures - toilets, bathtubs, sinks with the installation of fragile, porcelain flowers alluding to the Hundred flowers Campaign and the possibility of transformation through free expression.


Yours Truly
Again, a memory Ai Qing, Weiwei's father informed the last installation. While the family was still in the labor camps, his father received an anonymous postcard announcing the 30 year anniversary of one of his poems. His father was deeply touched knowing that he was remembered.

Yours Truly encourages viewers to participate in a global conversation and to act to let individual prisoners know they haven't been forgotten. You can choose from any number of postcards, each addressed to a specific prisoner, with a symbol of the country where that prisoner is detained. The  cards are mailed to the individuals letting them know they are indeed remembered.

"The misconception of totalitarianism is that freedom can be imprisoned. This is not the case. When you constrain freedom, freedom will take flight and land on a windowsill."    - Ai Weiwei

Alcatraz Island - near San Francisco

The exhibition will close April 26, 2015.

In-depth information: AiWeiweiAlcatraz.org

Passports and pedicures.

Early in December our son unexpectedly invited me meet him in Beijing and head down to Thailand for a couple of weeks. He and some friends had recently acquired a 10 year lease on some property on Ko Phanang, an island in southern Thailand. One the group arranged for them to go on a private mindfulness meditation retreat. There was only room for a small group and I was invited.

Passport? Check. Expires in June; plenty of time.

No. Wait. I'll need a visa for China and you have to have six months left on your passport in  order to get a visa.

Passport Office: 5th avenue in downtown Seattle.


Passport was the first step. Next was the visa. I used a visa service, however it was all just around the holidays and the Chinese kept changing their reqirements. I finally got all the paperwork in just before New Years thinking it would come back in plenty of time for my January 7 departure date.

When my visa hadn't arrived by the predicted time on the morning of the departure, I had to do someting. Since you definitely need decent looking toenails when in the tropics, a pedicure was in order.