SPRING/BREAK Art Show @ the Old Post Office

Whole lotta "Transaction" going on at the SPRING/BREAK Art Show.  No other image better defined the theme.  

Wish I could credit dozens of artists by name.  You've already heard about a few but you're going to to be hearing about a lot more of them.

Art or not?

Nothing like the hand feel of a "dumb" old princess phone.

#268

Its face a cargo
of conclusion
O, swell, wash

to cancel a pattern--
that channel I
feel none.

This equipage
that term--the old
cancer of things.

moves in prayer moves
and deforms, makes
a brain a victim, begins.

Hands down, nothing farther out than this installation.  Think Where The Wild Things Are (Pharmaceutically Inclined!).

Pinned mosquitoes.

My thoughts exactly.

In Like A Lion . . .

Out like a lamb, isn't that what they say?  Crossed the park twice in steady snow.

Snow coats are cut in many shapes.

Nancy Reagan dressed in red to be noticed.

As usual, there was a feeding frenzy in the Ramble.

At sunset, a fountain sprays the promise of a spring thaw in the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir.

Two Down, None To Go

Tom had his second hip replaced at the Hospital for Special Surgery.  The same surgeon replaced my right hip several years ago.

His physical therapist had him walking up and down stairs the next day.

Chilly Birthday

The Central Park Conservancy celebrated its birthday with a couple of ice sculptures in front of the Bandshell.  

Happy New Year in Holyoke

Varick invited us to ring in 2015 at the firehouse he's converting to a home in Holyoke, Massachusetts.  About 40,000 people live there, near the Connecticut River.

Here's the Victorian house he restored and sold several years ago.

And here's a (not very good) view of the firehouse from one of the city's many canals. Amtrak recently added service to Holyoke so if you're visiting him you can leap off the train into his kitchen.

Varick's nine guests didn't have any trouble parking.  That's one of the advantages of living in a firehouse.  You also can jump on the trampoline in the attic.

The Connecticut River provides Holyoke with an independent source of power.  That's why so many paper companies built factories there in the 19th century, and why the lights stayed on in Holyoke during the 1965 blackout in the Northeast.

Like any good host proud of his city, Varick led a walking tour.  We had the place to ourselves on New Year's morning.

Here's Andrew by an old turbine (I think).

Holyoke's City Hall looks great from the canal.

But close-up you realize the city has seen better days.

We took advantage of a mostly intact ice sculpture of a penguin to snap our first portraits of 2015 outside of the local carousel.

Andrew

Thom

Steven

Ted

Varick

Randy

Peace!

No doubt about it, Holyoke is struggling to find its mojo but some of the decay is picturesque.  I love how this WWI memorial in Veteran's Square has tattered the Stars & Stripes.  Metaphor, anyone?

In addition to Varick's homesteading, a few artists (and cats) already have decided that vacant industrial space in an environmentally self-sufficient community offer a fresh, cheap and politically correct canvas for re-purposing.  

After the tour and a falafel lunch we headed back to the firehouse before going our separate ways.  Randy demonstrated how Dick Cheney and other water boarding advocates could use Varick's basement to interrogate terrorists.

Thanks again, Varick and Ted!