Straus Park in New York

Bronze figure titled "Memory" gazing into the reflecting pool
in Straus Park was sculpted by Augustus Lukeman
and dedicated on April 15, 1915.

I had my tablet with me while sitting in Straus Park in the Upper West Side in New York, and searched for the biblical quotation inscribed behind the statue (in gold, it is visible in the above photo) to see it in the context of the biblical story it came from:

Lovely and pleasant were they in their lives
And in their death they were not divided
II Samuel 1:23

The quote is a strange and obscure one. It tells the relationship between a father and a son (Saul and Jonathan), whereas the memorial is dedicated to a married couple.

I suppose we can use biblical texts to transfer to, and describe, many kinds of loves. Still, it is a little strange to transfer a father/son love to that of a married couple.

Ida and Isador Straus were on the Titanic when it sank. Ida, rather than save her life by boarding a lifeboat which was rescuing women and children (first), decided to stay with her husband as the ship sank. Eye witnesses say that Ida chose to remain on board with her husband, saying,"I have lived all these years with you. Where you go, I go."

Straus Park with the sculpture and the small garden,
with 106th street in the background

I think a Biblical quote more appropriate to a married couple could have been found. I'm not sure who chose this quote, but it is probably a team of people from the various New York city offices, the sculptor and the the Straus family descendants. The plaque behind the memorial informs us that it was:


There is also an eternal fountain (see top image), which originally flowed into a reflecting pool. The pool was filled in to create a flower bed for easier maintenance.

Water lilies float serenely in the reflecting pool during
the dedication of the Straus Memorial in 1915
[Photo Source: Library of Congress]

The portrait below is of Isador and Ida Straus. Here is information on Isador Straus, who was an important citizen of New York:

Isidor Straus (February 6, 1845 – April 15, 1912), a German-American, was co-owner of Macy's department store with his brother Nathan. He also served briefly as a member of the United States House of Representatives. He died with his wife, Ida, in the sinking of the passenger ship RMS Titanic.

Isador and Ida Straus about 1910
[Photo source: Straus Historical Society]

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At the Cloisters

Standing Virgin and Child
Attributed to Nikolaus Gerhaert von Leiden
(North Netherlandish, active in Strasbourg, 1460–1473)
Date: ca. 1470
Medium: Boxwood, tinted lips and eyes
Dimensions: 13 1/4 x 5 1/8 x 3 9/16 in.

Above is a photo I took of The Standing Virgin at the Cloisters Medieval Gallery in New York. She is enclosed in glass. I wasn't aware that I couldn't use my flash. The museum staff were quick to point that out to me, upon seeing the sudden flash of light. I apologized - I really don't want to participate in the destruction of these beautiful pieces. The damage was done, but I got the lovely photo above, with the light glowing on the faces of Mary and Jesus, and on the folds of Mary's robe. The stained glass window on the left, part of the collection in the Treasury, is reflected in the glass on the right.

Although it isn't that unusual to see a depiction of the Madonna and child in stained glass windows, it is still a little bit of a coincidence that the image in the glass behind The Standing Virgin also depicts the Madonna and Child. I instinctively included the whole of the stained glass background, although most photos I find of this sculpture crop off the background (as I show in the collage below - one even obstructs a stained glass with the sculpture). For example, this could have been a perfectly acceptable version, which focuses almost entirely on the sculpture (I cropped the image in photoshop, not in camera):


The stained glass is:


Virgin of the Apocalypse
Circle of the Master of the Amsterdam Cabinet (active 1470-90)

Date: ca. 1480–90
Geography: Made in, Middle Rhine, Germany
Culture: German
Medium: Colorless glass, silver stain, and vitreous paint
Dimensions: 13 7/8 x 9 5/8in.

The imagery depicted on this panel derives from the Book of Revelation, which describes "a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars" (12:1). The Virgin standing on a crescent moon, surrounded by rays of light, is a specific iconographic type, of German origin, which became popular by the middle of the fifteenth century. Encircled by the rays of perfect light, the Virgin, Queen of Heaven, outshines the transitory and evanescent nature of all other realms, just as the sun dissipates the light of the moon.

The softness and delicacy of the figures, as well as the unmannered, free use of line, place this panel in the immediate circle of the Master of the Amsterdam Cabinet, arguably the greatest graphic artist active in northern Europe before Albrecht Dürer. [Source: Metropolitan Museum]

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I've written about the external beauty of the Cloisters here and here, but the Cloisters also house an expansive, and beautiful, collection of medieval art. The Standing Virgin is in the newly re-opened Treasury, which is:

an intimate gallery displaying some of the most precious small-scale works at The Cloisters, the branch of The Metropolitan Museum of Art dedicated to the art and architecture of the Middle Ages – has reopened to the public after two years of renovation. Originally constructed in 1988 in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the opening of The Cloisters, the Treasury houses small luxury objects acquired in the years subsequent to the branch museum's 1938 founding. [More on the Treasury here]

It was The Standing Virgin that caught my attention. I was taken in by the intricate carvings of her robe, her expression which is a mixture of alarm (she sees something in front of her) and expectancy, and her playful infant with his chubby cheeks and legs. Yet, this is clearly Jesus, who is blessing us. The guide who took us around said that the sideways view is as important (if not more important) than the view from the front, since Mary is holding her child sightly forward, so that his two-finger blessing is clearly visible from the side, and he is slightly ahead of Mary, making him more important then her. I found the back view also important, but in an artistic sense. The carver has not cut any corners with the back, giving us a detailed carving of her long locks, Jesus' curly hair, and the shawl on Mary's head which is draped forward leading us to Jesus' hand which is holding it at the front.

The Standing Virgin, images acquired from
various sources around the web.

In the bottom right of the collage is a reliquary arm.

Here's what the Metropolitan Museum's website says about this object:

Reliquary Arm, ca. 1230
South Netherlandish
Silver over oak; hand: bronze-gilt; appliqué plaques: silver-gilt, niello and cabochon stones
25 1/2 x 6 1/2 x 4 in.
The Cloisters Collection, 1947 (47.101.33)

Precious containers for relics—the bones of a holy person, or objects touched by that person—are among the most inventive and accomplished works of art in the Middle Ages. In this reliquary, a silver and gilded arm is bordered both by decorative filigree plaques set with gems and antique cameos, and figurative scenes crafted in niello on silver. These plaques include images of saints Peter and Paul, perhaps the patrons of the church from which this reliquary originally came. As a reliquary was thought to retain the power and holiness of the saintly person, clergy used arm reliquaries to bless people or heal the sick.

It is of course a larger, and more imposing (and truncated!) version of the blessing that Jesus is giving in the sculpture.

The wood used to sculpt The Standing Virgin is a rich, red wood. It is identified as "Boxwood" in the catalogs. Wikipedia says this about Boxwood:

Owing to its fine grain it is a good wood for fine wood carving, although this is limited by the small sizes available. It is also resistant to splitting and chipping, and thus useful for decorative or storage boxes. Formerly, it was used for wooden combs.

Owing to the relatively high density of the wood (it is one of the few woods that are denser than water), boxwood is often used for chess pieces, unstained boxwood for the white pieces and stained ('ebonized') boxwood for the black pieces, in lieu of ebony.

The extremely fine endgrain of box makes it suitable for woodblock printing.

And this about its use for musical instruments:

Due to its high density and resistance to chipping, boxwood is a relatively economical material used to make parts for various stringed instruments. It is mostly used to make tailpieces, chin rests and tuning pegs, but may be used for a variety of other parts as well. Other woods used for this purpose are rosewood and ebony.

Boxwood was a common material for the manufacture of recorders in the eighteenth century, and a large number of mid- to high-end instruments made today are produced from one or other species of boxwood. Boxwood was once a popular wood for other woodwind instruments, and was among the traditional woods for Great Highland bagpipes before tastes turned to imported dense tropical woods such as cocuswood, ebony, and African blackwood.

The Standing Virgin is attributed to Nicolaus Gerhaert von Leiden. She stands about 13 1/4 inches high, and was carved around 1470 [Source: MetMuseum.org].

Here is biographical information on the sculptor Nicolaus Gerhaert von Leiden:

Gerhaert is considered the most influential northern European sculptor of the 15th century. He was born in Leiden, Holland (present day Netherlands) sometime around 1420. Based on the location of his work, we know he spent most his working life in the Germanic areas of Trier, Straßburg, Baden, Konstanz, and Vienna. Much of his documented work is lost to history, but what has survived is characterized by elaborate drapery and extreme physical realism, both extraordinarily vivid and unconventional. His specialties were tombs, altarpieces and other religious pieces. Sandstone and limestone are among his most frequent mediums.

One of his most well known works currently resides in the Musée de l’Œuvre Notre-Dame in Strasbourg (Alsace, present day France). Called the Buste d'homme accoudé (1467), it is an indisputed masterpiece, and is believed to be a self-portrait. Gerhaert died on 28 June 1473 in Wiener Neustadt (present day Austria)

Man Meditating (Buste d'homme accoudé),
an apparent self-portrait, c. 1467

Another source describes the stone as Red Sandstone. Gerhaert seems to like rich rose colored media, like the boxwood he used for The Standing Virgin and the reddish sandstone he used Man Meditating. The Cloisters also incorporate pink marble from the Saint-Michel-de-Cuxa Benedictine monastery, located at the foot of Mount Canigou in the northeast Pyrenees of France, into the architecture. More current areas of the building also retain that warm, pinkish hue.

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Indian And Proud (In Canada)

The blog title is from the refrain: Proud to be Canadian. This refrain is perhaps chanted once a year on Canada Day by hyphenated Canadians, while all the other days of the year they are proud to be, well, wherever they came from.

I actually don't blame them. It is hard to be a Canadian in Canada.

These are the notes I typed down on the bus on my way back to Toronto from New York.

Bus ride

- Indian women sitting across the aisle from each other
- Both talk about finishing or being in post graduate work
- Talk to each other in mixture of Indian language and English
- One has a white boyfriend, sitting in front of her, "occupied" on his iPad. Occasionally he turns around and shows her something.
- A lot of their conversation in English is on Indian stuff both here and in India
- The screen saver of the one next to me is some Indian star in a sari

- Mannerisms:

- eating with mouth open
- strong odor of body cream or perfume
- Indian style sandals

- No chance of assimilation, let alone acculturation

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The young white man seems to have acquiesced to the "Indian in Canada" life style. The two young women can keep talking in their mixed English/Hindi all they want. He will enter the conversation when he can (possibly when they give him an inroad). Otherwise he is content to entertain himself. He sits on a public bus, driving through the landscape of his country, yet he is more alien than are his foreign travel companions.

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New York Fire Escapes

Below, I've collected several examples of fire escapes in upper Manhattan from various sources on the web.

I went to the Cloisters a second time with a friend. It is not enough to go once, and even twice doesn't cut it. The ride up to the Cloisters is an experience in itself. The best way to get there is on the M4 bus, which might crawl along its route, but this gives one ample time to observe the scenery. Several tourist buses were on this route, most likely for a steep price. The M4, for a mere $2.25, goes all the way up Broadway right up to the Cloisters. The most interesting part of the ride up is probably between 155th Street up to around 193rd Street.


"Don't look at what's below," I quipped, as we traveled through the area known as Hamilton Heights, between 135th Street and 159th Street. The buildings' bodegas and dollar stores are a messy presence on the ground levels, but the upper parts still retain their beauty.


The outdoor fire escape stairs fascinated me. They briefly reminded me of West Side Story, but these are intricate, beautiful wrought iron works, which are works of art. I have never noticed them, or bothered to look at them, during my previous trips to New York. But, that is the nature of New York. Despite the imposing presence of the skyscrapers, the city's building facades are subtle, and can easily be ignored. "Subtle isn't what one associates with New York," said my New Yorker friend.

I have posted above photos I have culled from around the web buildings with these wrought iron fire escapes. I will write a post on the history of these structures soon.


I don't like to end on a negative note, but the above image shows buildings whose ground level messy bodegas and stores still do not spoil the beautiful architecture and stairways above.

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A Road Less Taken

A view of the Cloisters with the Hudson River

I cannot upload photos from my camera to the computer I'm using while in New York. I will make a file (a post) of photos I took here when I return to Toronto.

But, there are plenty of online images to download.

I tried to get to the Cloisters today. They are a branch of the Metropolitan Museum, but they are somewhere in the Netherlands of New York City. They are located in an area called Fort Tyron Park. The closest street intersection is 190th Street. I'm not sure if this is the Bronx, or if it is still Harlem, but I decided to take the M4 bus which supposedly goes straight there. It didn't happen so easily.

There was some kind of parade (actually it was the Puerto Rican Day Parade, or more precisely the National Puerto Rican Day Parade - what is "national" about Puerto Ricans in New York?) which held up buses between 44th and 79th on Fifth Avenue. At one point I waited close to half an hour to get a bus. When one finally arrived and we climbed on, we had to get off on 135th Street because...well the driver couldn't give a reason. He parked the bus and waited inside. Then this parked bus suddenly took life, and the patient group that was waiting for another (some people just left - to catch a cab?!) was allowed back on this one.

But it really was worth the wait. The ride on the M4 from about 135th street down to 79th was incredible. The bus went down Riverside Drive, along the Hudson and past the beautiful Riverside Church (which I think is even more beautiful than St. Patrick's, or St. John the Divine's just above 110th Street) until the driver turned on 79th Street and took Broadway. I went all the way to 59th Street and Columbus Circle and took the M10 down Central Park West, to get more views of another of New York's beautiful park. I got off just before 110th Street, where Central Park ends, to get to where I was staying on the Upper West Side. The ride took shorter than I thought, although it is a good 45 minutes. I highly recommend this "tour" for a mere bus token ($2.25). There were plenty of tourist buses taking a similar route, and I'm sure their's was an expensive affair.

A view of the Riverside Church with the Hudson River

One of the reasons I wanted (want) to go to the Cloisters is to see the beautiful unicorn tapestries.

The Unicorn in Captivity
At The Cloisters

(I've linked to backgrounds on The Cloisters and the tapestries, but I will write some more tomorrow on how they got to New York and to such a location. It is a fascinating bit of New York history.)

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Grand New York Architecture For the Public Good

American Youth Hostels building
on Amsterdam Avenue and 103rd Street, in New York City

The photograph above is from New York Architect, which
has many more photographs of the building

[Click on above image to see larger size]

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I'm in New York for a couple of weeks, and I am constantly amazed at the city's architecture. Almost anywhere I walk, there is something that surprises (astonishes) me.

The above building is one I stumbled onto on Amsterdam Avenue and 103rd street.

Here's what Wikipedia says about the building:

The flagship residence of the American Youth Hostels in the United States is in New York City, located in a landmark building designed by noted architect Richard Morris Hunt. This popular hostel occupies the entire east blockfront of Amsterdam Avenue between 103d and 104th Streets in Manhattan.

Here's information on the architect of the building, Richard Morris Hunt:

Richard Morris Hunt (October 31, 1827 – July 31, 1895) was an American architect of the nineteenth century and a preeminent figure in the history of American architecture. Hunt was, according to design critic Paul Goldberger writing in The New York Times, "American architecture's first, and in many ways its greatest, statesman." Aside from Hunt's sculpting of the face of New York City, including designs for the facade and Great Hall of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty and many Fifth Avenue mansions lost to the wrecking ball, Hunt founded both the American Institute of Architects and the Municipal Art Society.

The building was originally:

...designed for the Association for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females (1883). [It] was renovated in the late 20th century and is now a youth hostel.[Source Wikipedia]

Here's a site which gives more descriptive information on why the building was commissioned by "the women who ran the Association for the Relief of Respectable and Indigent Females."

The building design and construction started in 1881, and it was completed in 1883.

Here's more on the architecture of the building:

The Association Residence Nursing Home, also called the Association for the Relief of Respectable, Aged and Indigent Females, is an historic building in New York City built from 1881-1883 to the design of Richard Morris Hunt in the Victorian Gothic style...An addition was constructed on the south end of the property in 1907, which contained seven Tiffany windows which are now in the collection of the Morse Museum of American Art. The building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.[Source: Wikipedia]

And finally, on the "demise and rehabilitation" of the building:

Financial problems due to the longer life expectancy of residents began following World War II. Robert Moses proposed razing the building as part of an Upper West Side slum clearance project. When Medicaid funds became available to nursing homes in the early 1970s, the Association planned to tear down and replace the building with a modern facility. A group of historic preservationists with ties to nearby Columbia University fought to preserve the building, making it into a community cause. Despite a fire during the New York City blackout of 1977 the preservationists prevailed and by the late 1970s, the building was acquired by the City of New York, and declared a New York City Landmark in 1983. During the 1980s the building was unoccupied as American Youth Hostels arranged neighborhood and government support for rehabilitating the building. They opened the hostel in January 1990 and with 670 beds it is now the largest hostel in North America.[Source: Wikipedia]

The building was designated a landmark site in 1983 by the Landmarks Preservation Commission:

On the basis of the careful consideration of the history, the architecture and other features of the building, the Landmarks Preservation Commission finds that the Association Residence for Respectable Aged Indigent Females (Association Residence for Women), has a special character, special historical and aesthetic interest and value as part of the development, heritage and cultural characteristics of New York City. [Source: Landmarks Presevation Commission, April 12, 1983, Designation List 164 (pdf file)]

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Back to Earth

Above are the incredible shots of the Space Shuttle Enterprise flying over New York City last Friday April 27. It was mounted on NASA's Shuttle Carrier Aircraft at Dulles International Airport for its final flight, landing at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport at around 11:20 am.

But on the way, [the shuttle] thrilled thousands of spectators by flying at low-attitude above some of Manhattan's most iconic landmarks, including the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building and One World Trade Center, as it followed the Hudson River to the Tappan Zee Bridge and back.

The above quote is from the Daily Mail, which has more photographs of the spectacular event.

The dramatic clouds over New York fit the grandeur of the shuttle. And one great lady raises her arm in greeting to a great American enterprise, which is paying its respects to a great American city.

On a sour note, President Obama's funding cuts for NASA:

leaves NASA funded at its lowest level in four years, forcing the space agency to juggle priorities and "devastating planetary science," said Bill Nye, CEO of space exploration group The Planetary Society.[From Foxnews.com]

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Sasha's Heart and Soul

I can't help noticing the gentle character that Sasha seems to be becoming. I think that's because it's such a contrast to her forceful mother and sullen older sister.

Below are photos of the Obama family's visit to Hawaii in January, which included Obama's half Indonesian, half sister (their mother is Ann Dunham) Maya Soetoro-Ng, her Chinese-Malaysian-Canadian husband and their two daughters. The photos show the families visiting the East-West Center in Honolulu, where there was an exhibition on the anthropological field work of Dunham.

Apparently, the East-West Center is where Ann Dunham met Lolo Soetoro, Maya Soetoro's father, while they were both graduate students at the center (Dunham lived in Hawaii on and off from 1959 until her death in 1995), and from where Dunham received her grant to do her PhD work from 1973-1978. She was doing field work in Indonesia from 1975-1978. Dunham would marry Soetoro in 1965, and give birth to Maya in 1972 in Indonesia. She would divorce Soetoro in 1980. [Source: Wikipedia]

This whole American/Indonesian/Hawaiian/Chinese/white/black/Asian family amalgam is a lot to wrap around for a ten-year-old, but Sasha seems to take it all in stride.

I've arranged the photos in some kind of sequence where Sasha picks up and carries her cousin, showing a concerned reaction to something her young cousin says.

The above photos show Obama's family,
along with his sister's family, visiting
the East-West Center in Honolulu
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Ann Dunham with Indonesian village women, from the
poster for the East-West event "Through Her Eyes."

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I wonder what Sasha will grow up to be, after her strange multi-cultural, multi-racial and multi-national roots, albeit with a father who as president is decidedly black, and a mother who wrote in her undergraduate thesis that as a black person, she felt that she would never be able to fully participate in the "white cultural and social structure" that is America?

Will Sasha become a cosmopolitan world traveler? Will she start a charity for poor Third World children? Will she study world poverty and/due to American imperialism? Will she write a book (or a PhD thesis) on growing up black in the White House? It's too early to say. I think, though, that it is a safe bet that she will grow up liberal (even leftist), which will cloud the decisions she makes about her position in the world.

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New York and More

I took my trusted camera to a trip to New York City this past week-end (plus a couple more days), and shot the following photographs of facades of buildings across from Central Park, mostly along Fifth Avenue between 103rd and 96th streets. My camera's battery failed (or more like, I neglected to charge the batteries - my camera and its accessories never fail!), so I was able to take only these few photos of the countless (beautiful) buildings along the park from 103rd and beyond. I walked as far as 34th Street, to Macy's.

I also photographed a statue of DeWitt Clinton at the Museum of the City of New York (which I planned to visit, but which had a school group in for the morning, and was thus "closed").

DeWitt Clinton at the Museum of the City of New York


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Facades of buildings between 103rd and 96th streets





At Macy's, I looked for the new Chanel perfume Jersey, but the shop assistant told me to go to Saks, but I passed Saks (on 44th) - the sidewalks around that area were very crowded. I continued walking up Fifth, and peeked at the Christmas tree, the angels and the skaters at the Rockefeller Center. I then walked up Madison Avenue, which I think has better boutiques than Fifth. I was pretty tired around 70th Street (despite a soft pretzel from the park, and a "mixed veggie" pizza from a takeout), and I took a bus back up to 106th, where I was staying.

Along the park, there are vendors selling paintings, mostly of New York. I found one who was selling black and white photographs (printed as postcards) of early New York. I found them on-line:

- Flatiron Building, 1907
- Looking Northwest toward Skyscrapers on East 42nd Street, 1930

[Photos by KPA]

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The Chinification of Karlie Kloss

The Chinification of Karlie Kloss

Karlie Kloss, an American fashion model who is highly in demand these days, is transformed from a fresh-faced mid-western girl with a genial smile into an anorexic Vogue fashion face who looks Chinese. Her blue eyes have morphed into dark slits, her wavy reddish-blond hair has darkened into a black mop, and even her complexion has changed ("yellowed"?).

Admittedly, she is a bit of a chameleon. Here she looks like Lauren Bacall, and here a charmless Brigitte Bardot. But better Bacall or Bardot than a Bing Bing.

Karlie Kloss at the Eve NY garment factory in China
wearing a $2,570 Miu Miu double-faced wool coat
(From Sept 2011 Vogue)

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The September 2011 issue of Vogue (curiously silent about September 2001, it is after all the tenth anniversary) has this on its cover:

"Made in China: The explosive rise of a style superpower"

I was genuinely interested to see what fashion designers and models there are in China. But it turns out there are none, at least according to this Vogue issue.

There are 22 pages dedicated to fashion in China, with nineteen of those in images (here is a blog which has posted all the images). But "fashion in China" turns out to be an elusive term. The model (there is only one) is the American blue-eyed, blonde-haired Karlie Kloss, who has been given the "Asian" look with dark straight hair (it looks like a wig, but that may be the point), her high cheek bones emphasized with careful coats of blush, and her eyes slanted with the help of eye-liner and other make-up tricks. And all the designers are Western, from the American Michael Kors to the British Stella McCartney (but Vera Wang doesn't figure amongst this illustrious group).

There is a parade of Chinese "cultural icons," such as film director Lu Chuan, actors Daniel Wu and Bing Bing, "novelist, race-car driver and renowned blogger" Han Han, and jeweler Bao Bao Wan, who are photographed alongside Kloss. Even the diminutive workers at the Eve NY sweat shop are presented as iconic figures, despite the 5"11 Kloss looming beside them. And her Miu Miu "double-faced wool coat (at $2,570)" resembles their white-collared uniforms. All of Karlie's clothes take reference (in color or in concept) from these "iconic" Chinese.

The locations for these photo shoots are also iconic landmarks : the Great Wall, the Pangu Plaza in Beijing, a sweat shop, in the Forbidden City.

Kloss has already appeared in the August 2010 and May 2011 issues of Chinese Vogue, so it is apt that American Vogue should solicit her help with their China-based article. After all, she is now the Western expert on all things Eastern.

The title of the Vogue article says it all: Go East. This is of course after the famous quote "Go West, Young Man," where going West meant adventure, discoveries, and even wealth (gold, land, etc.). But what does going East do for us now, and especially if it is a young woman (a fashion model at that) who is leading the way?

Western cultural guardians better be careful. The Chinese are not admiring our culture as much as finding ways to take from it, and there is more to take from us than they are able to give. They take our elaborate and sophisticated ideas and throw back at us their cheap and inferior "Made in China" versions. Before we know it, we will all be Chinese.

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Woody Allen's European Tour: Next Stop, Italy

Painting by John William Waterhouse,
A Tale from the Decameron, 1916

My previous post is on Woody Allen's latest movie, Midnight in Paris, which is part of a series of films he's shooting in Europe. He started this series in 2008 with Vicky Cristina Barcelona, then he went to London in 2010 with You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger. Midnight in Paris is his latest film set in Europe, and came out in 2011. His European tour continues in Rome, with his forthcoming film, The Bop Decameron, which might have been titled (and conceived) after The Decameron, Giovanni Boccaccio's medieval stories. It looks like Allen is paying homage to Italy's literary and film traditions in this film, where, for example, he refers to Frederico Fellini's La Dolce Vita using the talents of the Italian actor Roberto Benigni. Here is Wikipedia's synopsis of the film:

The Bop Decameron will be a modern-day take on Giovanni Boccaccio's "The Decameron" that will consist of four vignettes--one of which will consist of a husband (played by Allen) and his wife traveling to Rome, and meeting the family of the Italian man that their daughter is going to marry. Another of the vignettes will feature Roberto Benigni as a man named Leopoldo who gets mistaken for a movie star. A third segment will feature Alec Baldwin as an architect from California visiting Rome with his friends.

I can only speculate that the "bop" in the title refers to bebop, and we might get some more of Woody Allen's jazz music.

The Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini has already tackled these stories in his 1971 film The Decameron.

I wonder when Allen will return to his beloved New York?

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"Midnight in Paris"

Vincent van Gogh's painting The Starry Night is also
on the poster for Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris

I wrote in this blog entry:

Woody Allen is back. In a modest and sweet way. He's brought his ironic, but profoundly romantic, slant back to his film-making in his latest film You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger.

You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger was in the cinemas in 2010. A year later, Allen has another romantic, light comedy, Midnight in Paris. He seems to be on a roll. I hope he comes up with similar projects each year, to make up for his hiatus.

Midnight in Paris is a flight of fancy movie with characters who wish they were living in previous eras. Owen Wilson's character, Gil Pender, has been stuck on writing his novel for several years. Gil says that he admires the 1920s and idolizes all these artists, who help him create his novel (in his epoch of 2011). Appropriately, his novel is about a man who works in a nostalgia shop. While not laboring over his oeuvre d'art, Gil is a successful screenplay writer for Hollywood.

He is in Paris on vacation with his fiancée Inez and her parents. When Inez leaves him to go dancing one night, he decides to go for a walk himself. At the strike of midnight (à la Cinderella?), what looks like a vintage car from the 1920s stops near him, and the driver tells him to climb in. Thus begins Gil's adventure, where he enters the festive Paris of the 1920s literary stars such as Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway, the Fitzgeralds, surrealist painter Salvador Dali and modernist photographer/filmmaker Man Ray.

His 1920s interlude lasts only for the night, and he is back in ordinary Paris during the day. But he keeps returning to the same spot each night to be transported back to his idyllic era. There, he also meets Adriana, a young woman who is an assistant to Coco Chanel. She has recently separated from none other than Picasso, and Gil is more than willing to take his place. Her idyllic era is the very early 20th century Belle Époque, where, naturally, Gil and Adriana are transported (at least Dali, the guardian of surrealism finds this "natural"). Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec and Gauguin await them there. Gauguin reveals that his favorite era is the Renaissance, in the company of Titian and Michelangelo. And so back in time we travel again.

There is a funny interlude (still, the whole film is funny and witty) where Inez's parents hire a detective to follow Gil in his nightly escapades. Allen frames the detective in a dark doorway in the high contrast style of 1940s Film Noir, trying to hide from Gil. Later on this "detective" is seen lost running around in 17th century Versailles. Neither of these times seem to be the detective's ideal eras, but rather it is the filmmaker (Allen) who teases him (and us) by changing the backdrop according to his whim and creative fancy. I just think that Allen is biased towards "creative" people, and detectives not only don't fall in that category, but that their very role inhibits creativity.

These travels back in time aren't mere fantasy. They are Allen's way of showing us that artists are indebted to those who came before them, and do travel back in time figuratively when creating their own contemporary pieces. The film is as much a comedy about time travel as it is a gentle, imaginative exploration about how artists create. And surely, even Adriana, the modest assistant to Chanel, has chosen the rich late 19th century as her creative reference for designing and creating clothes.

Woody Allen fills this fantasy film with beautiful Paris scenes, and costumes and interiors straight out of art books. He also infuses his film with music, as he did in You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger. In Midnight in Paris, he has Cole Porter, Louis Armstrong's contemporary Sidney Bechet, and Glenn Miller's Moonlight Serenade. And many French melodies. He also reintroduces jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt, who was on his score for You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger.

While looking online for more references on the music from Midnight in Paris, I found a link to Duke Ellington's 1962 album of the same name. Wikipedia informs us that: "The album features performances of compositions inspired by or associated with Paris." The album has the fountain at Place de la Concorde with the Eiffel Tower in the distance on the cover (here is a current view of the fountain). Was Allen, a jazz musician himself, inspired by the Duke's music and homage to Paris to make his own film about the city? The intricate layers of influences that make a piece of art continue to unfold.

I have to admit that for all the bumbling ways of Gil, I am impressed with his choice of the 1920s. I say here:

As I wrote in my previous post on Chanel's No. 5:

During that era, film making, photography, music, theater and dance were all meshed together forming a kaleidoscope of art. The more "applied arts" like design and fashion were also taken seriously, and were included in the artistic activities.

I think if I were to relive any epoch in the short life of our galaxy, it would be the 1920s, and not because they were "roaring," but because they were so creative.

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Camera in Hand: Part II - Brookfield Place Eateries and Asian Hegemony

Ki Japanese Restaurant in Brookfield Place
[Photo by KPA]

Beauty in this city is mired by strangeness, or alien-ness (ugliness?). Brookfield Place, photos of which I posted in my previous blog post, looks like it has very little retail activity (perhaps I'm unfairly comparing it to the chaotic Eaton Centre). Most of the stores are underground, separate from the main floor's Allan Lambert Gallery and its three-story high glass structure. That's not the strange part; in fact, I think it is a great design feat to make the place look empty of commerce, when it is commercial at its core.

What is strange is the dominance of Asian (and specifically Japanese) restaurants in the center. There are two Japanese (or Japanese sounding) sit-down, formal restaurants of the four formal restaurants in the center. The two non-Japanese formal restaurants are generic (European?). One (Marché) sounds French, but it is simply the French influence in Canadian names, and the food ranges from oysters to grilled chicken. The other is a diner-restaurant called Pumpernickel, and the name says it all.

The Japanese-sounding restaurant is called Obika. Its sign has Japanese-looking script with the appropriate accents, and its interior has Japanese decor and seating. But it is actually an Italian restaurant trying to look Japanese. Its menu even includes "zucchini sushi" (smoked mozzarella wrapped in grilled zuchinni, as a waiter described to me). Here's what a May 13, 2011 review by the Globe and Mail about Obika:

Obika does not boast the clichéd hallmarks of an Italian eatery. There are no red-checkered tablecloths, cans of tomatoes or garlic braids. In fact, the southeast corner of Brookfield Place in the heart of Toronto’s financial district looks more like a Japanese restaurant with its black and red color scheme, stark calligraphy typeface and sushi bar set-up where fresh ingredients are featured front and center in the glass display.

Of the four formal restaurants, two are Asian. Three of the six Asian (formal and fast food) restaurants are Japanese (I will include Obika in this group since visitors will assume Obika is Japanese from its signage, and part of its menu includes Japanese-style foods such as zucchini sushi).

Obika (Japanese but Italian?) Restaurant in Brookfield Place
[Photo by KPA]

Here is the rundown of the types of restaurants in Brookfield Place:

All restaurants and food kiosks
- 23 venues

All non-Fast Food - percentage of all foods
- 17% (4 venues)

All Fast Food - percentage of all foods
- 82% (19 venues)

All Asian Food - percentage of all foods
- 26% (6 venues)

Asian non-Fast Food - percentage of all foods
- 9% (2 venues)

Asian non-Fast Food by Country - percentage of all foods
- Japanese - 9% (2 venues)

Asian Fast Food - percentage of all foods
- 17% (4 venues)

Asian Fast Food by Country - percentage of all foods
- Japanese - 4% (1 venue)
- Chinese - 4% (1 venue)
- Thai - 4% (1 venue)
- Indian - 4% (1 venue)

All Non-Asian Food - percentage of all foods
- 78% (18 venues)

Non-Asian, non-Fast Food - percentage of all foods
- 13% (3 venues)

Non-Asian Fast Food - percentage of all foods
- 65% (15 venues)

Non-Asian Fast Food by Ethnic Foods - percentage of all foods
- Italian - 4% (1 venue)
- Middle Eastern - 4% (1 venue)
- Mexican - 4% (1 venue)
- Greek - 4% (1 venue)

*Obika included both in the Asian and Ethnic restaurants

There are altogether twenty-three food kiosks and restaurants. One quarter (26%) of all the food places are Asian. Three (or 13%) are Japanese (or Japanese-themed).

My point, in this long post, is to show that there is a strange infatuation with all things Asian in Toronto these days [see references below], and especially Japanese. I will continue to monitor this observation. The most prominent manifestation, which always surprises me and takes me aback, is the number of Asian female/white male couples there are as I walk through Toronto's downtown - I've roughly counted that one in three couples are this Asian/white mix. I've already defined in a previous post "Asian" to mean East Asian - often Korean or Chinese, although Japanese women (students in their twenties) are appearing more frequently.

Since I haven't yet theorized about this phenomenon, I will start here and develop it in later blog posts. Curiosity about other cultures (and unknowns) drove the Western civilization to produce hardy men who traveled around the world to fulfill that curiosity and desire for knowledge (even during the time when they considered the world flat, and believed that they may never make it back from the deadly precipice that may await them). This was also coupled with a sense of adventure. But those men never considered staying in the lands of the other but came back with representations of the other through food, "art," cultural objects, etc.

As long as this quest to understand the other was an exploratory, scientific, or even religious mission, the West was able to keep its culture and society pretty much intact. But, now in the modern era, the world has essentially been explored (and heathens are no longer deemed unacceptable), and this energy has been transformed into some kind of immersion with (and infatuation for - a stronger version of curiosity) the actual other. Immigration has been an important factor in bringing the other into Western lands, with all his remaining exoticism and alien habits to learn from and adopt. But, this includes not just a desire for "friendship" but also for mates. The white male/other female pairings are a modern manifestation of this adventurous curiosity of white men. And immigration provides an endless supply of this other to satiate their curiosity (and desires).

But why the preference for Asian women? Black women prefer to be with black men. What about white women? They are quadruple victims: of feminism; of Asian female aggression (at finding white mates); of their own personalities which fall between aggressive blacks and the more feminine-behaving Asians; and of the quest for the other by their white men. Lazy "feminist" white men are thus drawn to the other in the seemingly more feminine Asian women, and not willing to do the work of living with white women, something which their predecessors have done for centuries despite their forays into exotic lands and cultures.

These are the same white women whose genes provided for the extraordinary successes of the white race, which has now allowed, through modern technology and modern liberalism, its existential competitors to freely enter the West. Life in Western countries is coveted by almost all the peoples of the world. And these non-white, non-Western populations, who are allowed free entry into Western lands, give white men the pick of the world's crop, so to speak, when choosing "desirable" mates.

The supposedly less aggressive (compared to blacks and whites) Asian women thus behave the most aggressive of the three races when landing a white mate.

What about Asian (and Japanese) men? How can fathers allow their young women to travel alone, and live alone, thousands of miles away from country and family, as is the case of the Japanese students? How can Asian men allow their daughters to marry outside of their culture and race, where she, following their traditional behavior, is expected to adopt the man's cultural and familial background, and lose her Asian culture?

But, in this topsy-turvy world of immigration and multiculturalism, the white male makes extraordinary efforts to adopt (and adapt to) the Asian woman's world and culture. (With Asian male/white female pairing, the cultural background of the male is kept as much as possible and this could be a reason why such pairings are much rarer, since our feminist society - and its women - would find this "misogyny" hard to accept.) Still, in the final analysis, the offspring of both these kinds of pairings work towards the sinicization of the Western culture. "Asianness" trumps everything else. I've observed this especially in creative fields like art and design.

This post is mostly about culinary dominance in a major Toronto commercial center. So, why is there a preference for Japanese food, over all the other Asian, and over all other non-Asian, non-Western foods?

First, there is no doubt that Japanese food is more sophisticated than the other Asian foods (in the minimalist way that modern avant-gardes, through their Epater la Bourgeoisie rebellion, admire) .

The other reason is that the Japanese may indeed be starting their "outreach" into the West, not just for economic reasons, but for domination. The Japanese restaurant, Ki, at Brookfield Place is a huge, fort-like structure, something which most Westerners are not accustomed to seeing. Japan is demure tea ceremonies, and shy and subservient women in kimonos, isn't it? Such outright attempts of dominance and power by the Japanese is unexpected by most Westerners, and therefore ignored.

Which brings me to the phenomenon I've discussed above regarding Asian immigration, and the consequent interracial marriages. I think this is a concerted (perhaps not yet systematically planned) endeavor by the Far East to try and get foot-holds into the West. And what easier way than through (wine) women and food?

Articles posted at Camera Lucida blogs on China, Chinese immigrants, and Chinese in Canada:

1. Donald Trump for Made in New York

2. How a Focus on Culture Might Get at Imperceptible Societal Changes Quicker than Focusing Only on Politics

3. A Sino-Draconian Mission

4. More Sino-Muscle Flexing

5. Proof Positive

6. China Rising?

7. China Rising? [cont.]

8. Precedents to China Rising

9. Land Grab from the Poor to the Poor

10. Is China Providing a Better Way of Life?

11. "Revolt on the Nile"

12. The West's Fascination with the "Other"

13. Erosion of Civility

14. Festering beneath the Calm of these Chinese Immigrants

15. The Smorgasbord of Cultures that Will Be Canada in 2031

16. A Place To Eat for Every (and Any) Culture on Yonge Street

17. Multiculturalism in Canada Is Here To Stay

18. Visible Minorities in the GTA [Greater Toronto Area]

19. Immigration and Visible Minorities

20. Jason Kenney Thinks Immigration Is All Good

21. Time for Ezra Levant to Focus His Energy on Addressing Multiculturalism and High Levels of Immigration

22. Oh Canada, Poor Canada!

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Two Mountain Ranges

In one trip

I made a mistake a couple of days ago when I said I traveled through the Adirondack mountains. I did travel through two mountain ranges, one was the Pocono, the other was the Allegheny, which is north of the Pocono, but south of the Adirondack, cutting through both Pennsylvania and New York State. The Adirondacks are much further up north New York State.

Here are maps of the mountain ranges, and one of my trip's route, which I've marked in red. I like looking at maps when I travel, it gives me a sense of a place - both orientation-wise and the geography around the place. I can also see cities and towns in relation to one another. Unfortunately, for this bus ride, I had no map, and was craning my neck to see signs of towns and cities as they passed by me.

The Pocono Mountains, and the Allegheny in Pennsylvania
[Click image to see larger map]

The Allegheny Plateau (or Mountains) in New York, and the Adirondacks
[Click image to see larger map]

Route from New York City to Toronto, stopping at Binghamton, Syracuse, Rochester, and Buffalo
[Click image to see larger map]

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Mountain Views

My trip to New York took me through the Adirondack and the Pocono Mountains. Here are just a few shots I took of those spectacular views. Fall must be the crowning glory of those mountains.

More posts to follow on the trip.

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