Archives for May 2006

In my next “Sightings” column, to be published in Saturday’s Wall Street Journal, I ask whether “safe art” (to borrow a phrase used recently by a friend of mine) is ever worth experiencing. My answer? You better believe it.

To find out what I have in mind, pick up a copy of tomorrow’s Journal, where you’ll find my column in the “Pursuits” section.

Envy is the lot of the unwealthy art collector. I picked up a price list at the opening of Hollis Taggart Galleries’ Arnold Friedman retrospective on Wednesday, and it reminded me that any hopes I have of owning one of Friedman’s oil paintings–even a very small one–are contingent on my selling Hotter Than That: A Life of Louis Armstrong to Hollywood, or something at least as implausible.

I returned home feeling both elated (having just looked at four roomfuls of exquisite paintings) and depressed (knowing that none of them would ever be mine). Then it occurred to me to see if any Friedman-related bargains were to be found on the Web. I searched for “Arnold Friedman lithograph,” and what did I find? This. A few more keystrokes revealed it to be a pencil-signed 1940 Friedman lithograph for sale by the Philadelphia Print Shop for the unlikely-sounding price of $225. “That I can afford,” I muttered hopefully, and fired off an e-mail asking if it was still available. Answer came there eight hours later, and now the latest addition to the Teachout Museum is en route to my door via UPS.

The moral? You can’t always get what you want, but if you try some time, you just might find something (A) close enough for jazz and (B) a whole lot cheaper. And yes, I’m feeling incredibly smug….

My niece graduated from high school on Tuesday. I couldn’t be there, but I sent flowers, and spent the evening marveling at how time flies. Only yesterday she was a baby, and now she’s a tall, poised young lady about to go off to college. How can such things be?

I am immensely proud of Lauren Teachout, and of my brother and sister-in-law, who raised her right. Nothing I will ever do in my life will be as difficult–or honorable–as that.

“There has been a certain amount of self-deception in School of Paris art since the exit of cubism. In Pollock there is absolutely none, and he is not afraid to look ugly–all profoundly original art looks ugly at first.”

Clement Greenberg, The Nation, Apr. 7, 1945

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.

Here’s my list of recommended Broadway and off-Broadway shows, updated weekly. In all cases, I either gave these shows strongly favorable reviews in The Wall Street Journal when they opened or saw and liked them some time in the past year (or both). For more information, click on the title.

Warning: Broadway shows marked with an asterisk were sold out, or nearly so, last week.

BROADWAY:

– Avenue Q* (musical, R, adult subject matter and one show-stopping scene of puppet-on-puppet sex, reviewed here)

– Chicago (musical, R, adult subject matter and sexual content)

– The Drowsy Chaperone* (musical, G/PG-13, mild sexual content and a profusion of double entendres, reviewed here)

– Faith Healer* (drama, R, adult subject matter, reviewed here)

– The Lieutenant of Inishmore (black comedy, R, adult subject matter and extremely graphic violence, reviewed here)

– Sweeney Todd (musical, R, adult subject matter, reviewed here)

– The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (musical, PG-13, mostly family-friendly but contains a smattering of strong language and a production number about an unwanted erection, reviewed here)

– The Wedding Singer (musical, PG-13, some sexual content, reviewed here)

OFF BROADWAY:

– Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living In Paris (musical revue, R, adult subject matter and sexual content, reviewed here)

– Slava’s Snowshow (performance art, G, child-friendly, reviewed here)

CLOSING SOON:

– Awake and Sing! (drama, PG-13, adult subject matter, reviewed here, closes June 25)

– Bridge & Tunnel (solo show, PG-13, some adult subject matter, reviewed here, closes July 9)

– Doubt (drama, PG-13, adult subject matter and implicit sexual content, reviewed here, closes July 2)

– Defiance (drama, R, adult subject matter and sexual content, reviewed here, closes June 4)

– The Light in the Piazza (musical, PG-13, adult subject matter and a brief bedroom scene, closes July 2, reviewed here)

“The reader must sit down alone and struggle with the writer, and this the pseudo-scholar will not do. He would rather relate a book to the history of its time, to events in the life of its author, to the events it describes, above all to some tendency.”

E.M. Forster, Aspects of the Novel (courtesy of Kate’s Book Blog)

Everything you’ve heard is true. There were fancy-pants hot dogs, there were plays, and there was lots and lots of House, viewed with a hunger. Let’s look at a few highlights.

Saturday: Brunch at Hot Doug’s Sausage Superstore and Encased Meat Emporium. I was actually trying to keep this place a secret until the next time the Gurgling Cod pays a visit to Chicago, but the cat’s out of the bag now. At Hot Doug’s the line on a Saturday afternoon bends around the southwest corner of California and Roscoe and practically out of sight, but I’ve seldom stood in a more cheerful long line. It’s as if the length of the wait guarantees the transcendent goodness of the meal to come, and the patrons take an added pleasure in being part of a little community of good taste and adventure. Of course, the culinary adventures offered at Hot Doug’s come with all the comforts of the familiar, presented in the usual trappings of the most quotidian of Chicago foods. Beyond the casing, bun, and toppings, though, anything goes–last weekend it was bacon-cheddar elk sausage with spicy bourbon mustard and stripey jack cheese for Terry and saucisse de Toulouse with anchovy aioli and fromagier d’affinoise for me. The blue cheese pork sausage with pear cr