ViVa La Sale: or, OOH LA LA!

When I was growing up, my mom would spend her free time in the afternoons going to estate sales and rummage sales. She pretty much dressed us in rummage. There were some sales that she never missed. Back then she swore by the rummage at the Church of the Covenant. She would come home with an entire wardrobe of dress clothes for me that would last a year or two, until I moved up to the next size. The things that she brought home were very nice…and I trusted her judgement…what I didn’t know was that they were in style shortly after the second world war. So, I grew up dressed like I was in an old movie, kind of like 12 year old Elizabeth Taylor in “National Velvet”. When I was old enough to want to choose my own rummage, I looked forward to the annual rummage sale at the Temple at 10th and Liberty (a block from my house), we referred to it as the Jewish rummage sale. This is where I was introduced to beaded sweaters and vintage hair combs. On a special rack, separate from the other items, you could find high end evening wear. I would go and try on full length gowns and the occasional fur coat, neither of which I could afford, but had fun looking at and playing a teen age version of dress up. Thinking back, I guess that this experience informed my taste even as a young adult. I sought out vintage camel hair coats, tea length party dresses that were perfect for grocery shopping, and the pointy toed spike heeled shoes which could be purchased as new old stock for 5o cents a pair during the late 1970’s. The shoes that I walked all over Boston in as a 19 year old artist away from home for the first time.

It has been years since the days of really great rummage in this town. Most of it was bought up by other women like me over the past 30 years…until now! Many of us  have perambulated into our 50’s and none of that great vintage has a chance of gracing our considerable backsides ever again! So, a few brave women have shut their eyes and dropped these fashion treasures into the donation bin for what will undoubtedly become the paramount rummage sale of the season…and don’t be mistaken, there is so much more than a gallery full of vintage. The eclectic taste of the members of our board of directors and their friends has resulted in the assemblage of over a hundred paintings, prints, and photographs, some high style upholstered furniture, and even some 1970’s children’s toys. Do not miss the large table of glassware.
“Viva La Sale” a Rummage Sale to support the Erie Art Museum. This amazing conglomeration of unusual items occurs on Saturday, May 5th at 9 a.m., and runs until 5:00 p.m. Half price is after 3:00 p.m. The sale is located in the EAM Old Custom House at 411 State. All proceeds benefit the Erie Art Museum. See you there, but I won’t have time to talk…I’m still looking for the right dress to go with that basket purse!

*k.d.

Thank you to Assistant Curator Amanda Steadman, Cheteyan Scholar Sarah Buyer, Museum Intern Stephanie David, Museum Work Study Shaha Ibrahim

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Unchecked Mollycoddling Results In Overpopulation Disaster

Some of you may remember my dire prediction as to the fate of Labbits far removed from the mechanisms that naturally control the over growth of their population. Oh, yes, Labbits are cute, and children love them, but what havoc they wreak upon an ecosystem when uncontrolled replication runs amok. You may recall that, back in December, I called for a halt to the unchecked mollycoddling and mishandling of these cunning creatures.
Well, the Labbits have “had at it” and my prediction has come home to roost. The Erie Art Museum is, indeed, overrun. Museum staffer, humanitarian, and the worlds foremost advocate for the prevention of cruelty to Labbits, Sandra Lopez, has become a one woman capture, rescue, and relocate team. Armed with nothing but a butterfly net and her love for Labbits, Ms. Lopez has spent countless hours tracking and trapping the smooth little buggers.
In a recent  interview with Ms. Lopez, she made the following statement, “The only humane way to tackle the worlds Labbit population problem is to put into place a policy of one Labbit households in order to keep in check the proliferation of breeding which occurs naturally within the genus.” As a force for social change, Ms.Lopez has convinced museum director, John Vanco, to allow her to capture and relocate the Erie Art Museum’s population of Labbits to willing households, with the guarantee that they will never, under any circumstances, acquire a second Labbit, the consequences of which we covered in the previous paragraph. Sandra Lopez has made a plea, and I, in earnest, hope that you the reader will answer her. Sandra asks that every household in our community with the resources to sponsor a Labbit, and a commitment to it’s proper handling, come to the EAM today through Saturday and choose one to adopt. There is a small fee of $12.00  associated with the adoption of a Labbit to help defray the costs of the capture and relocate program. I implore you to support this gentle woman in her work, do your part and adopt a Labbit today.*k.d.

Labbits are available for responsible adoption at the EAM Gift Shop

We are asking for a one time donation of $12.00 for each Labbit to help ensure an end to this senseless mollycoddling that has resulted in the current situation

special membership discounts do not apply

The 89th Annual: or, Nothing Says Spring Like a Spring Show Rejection Notice

Every year the EAM hosts an Annual juried exhibit, “The Erie Art Museum Annual Spring Show”, this year is the 89th. Now, you have probably noticed, if you read this blog regularly, that I am curious about people…so, being a curious person, I asked the museum director at our weekly staff meeting last Tuesday how many Spring Shows he has been around for, and as he said, “This year will be 44″…he realized at that moment that he has seen the process for half of them, and that he’s approaching the tipping point… John says that no matter who juries year to year there are some artists whose work you will see again and again…and that is a kind of indicator of the continuity, and accuracy of judgement from juror to juror…like a kind of bell weather. There are some who would likely disagree with that statement, most likely those receiving rejection notices again this year, but John does tend to be right about these things, and who can argue with 44 years of observation? Now, you may not know this, but this exhibit is juried from actual physical artwork presented to the juror as a sample of art from the region on one day every spring…but, getting it all there and ready for her takes about 3 weeks, and around 50 volunteers who work with the artists as they submit their numerous works…this year over 600 works from over 300 artists.
Now, I don’t know if you have ever worked with artists, or attempted assisting an artist to fill out an entry form with multiple parts that requires specific, and accurate information. Or, attempted to keep an artist’s focused attention on a form with multiple parts while they interact with the other artists in a cue, whom they begin talking to about the art they are entering, while talking to you, the person helping them fill out the form with multiple parts, that needs to be taped in a specific place on their entry, while at the same time processing their entry fee, and having them self-address an envelope…oh, yes, and all legibly. As you can imagine, this process can have some challenges, and of course even after 44 years of writing a prospectus and coming up with precise verbiage…artists can still find unique ways of interpreting simple words like Deadline for submissions is 5:00 on Sunday March 25th, or Works should not exceed 72 inches in any dimension or weigh more than 100 pounds.
The whole process is a happening in itself, and year after year volunteers come in and patiently and graciously assist the artists to prepare their forms, and safely stack their works. People in the community feel gratified to become part of the process, whether submitting work and being rejected or accepted, lending a hand as a volunteer, or pledging to purchase work as a patron, this annual event has become part of what makes the art community in Erie flourish. So, whether Accepted or Rejected, a participant or a spectator, the 89th Annual Spring Show of the Erie Art Museum is a promise…like death and taxes.

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Hank O’Neal XCIA: or, How To Succeed at Everything Without Really Trying

There is something about Hank  O’Neal that gets the proverbial goat in me. He’s pleasant enough, and generous, too. He treated me like an old friend’s friend, patiently answering my inquiries, and even allowing me to look with him through the lens of his camera, sharing a recent capture from a weather beaten altered ad of Kate Moss…But, I am admittedly flawed, and the serendipitous luck he spoke of in his life brought to mind in me the realization that drives me mad;

Life is a random string of events, while coincidence seems less than random.

Hank spoke of a lifetime filled with life altering coincidental meetings that swept him along seemingly without any rudder. His success appears to be the effortless outcome of being in the right place at the right time. I can’t even refer to him as an opportunist because that requires effort, and Hank presents himself as hapless. I get the feeling that I did not really get the full story from Hank, surely he was holding back. Did I meet a public facade of retold stories (great stories) about famous people? I heard tell of amazing visual encounters, with the overwhelming spectacle, of the up close visual inspection of street life on a global one world scale. I’m not sure if I met the artist or the ex CIA man using the craft of personal camouflage. Doesn’t much matter. Hank, in his affable generosity, left me with his portrait, trusting me with my $99 Kodak lens .*k.d.

k.d.- There is another thing that makes me curious, Hank. It is how you ended up in the CIA. Was it one of those deals where you were recruited on your college campus during the 1970’s because you were smart?
Hank O’Neal- Actually, my dear, it was during the 50’s. I graduated from high school in June of 1958 and went to college in September of 1958. I was told I had to be an engineer and I had 6 colleges to go to, I had my choice…MIT, RPI, Texas A&M, Case, Indiana University…and what did I leave out? Something…I went to RPI because it was closest to Syracuse where I lived and I could use my state scholarship, and I got $500 whole dollars, which was a big deal, when your tuition’s only about $700 bucks.
k.d.-Sure.
Hank O’Neal- and I went to RPI, wound up hating it, didn’t want to be an engineer…went back to call my Daddy and I said, “Please,… come get me  into Syracuse, I’ll work hard, whatever…I’ll make up the credits”…He did, and by accident I took  a course in Russian government and did very well at it.  I was trusting and naive. I didn’t even know it was a graduate course, but I did well and I signed up for another course with that professor. The professor said…the professor said after I did this, he said (Hank imitates the professor in a serious funny voice), ” Mr. O’Neal, ahhh you did very well in my class do you know what you’re going to be doing when you graduate from college?” And I said, “Professor Bishop, I’m 19 years old. I don’t know what I am going to be doing tomorrow…and he says, “I want you to talk to someone.” So, in the spring of 1959 he had me talk to the CIA guy who came through town once or twice a year. They talked to me every year, every semester until my senior year, and then they thought I was okay…and they said, “You want to take some tests?” And I said,”Why not?”  So, I took all the foreign service exams and all that kind of nonsense…and by spring of senior year I had 3 jobs on the table. I was going to either be in the regular Army…’cause I was second in my class, or an assistant to a New York Senator because my political science professor had done that, or I had the CIA. I wound up opting for the CIA because they had a program which enabled me to do my 2 years of active military service with them without a uniform.
k.d.- Nice
Hank O’Neal-And the bureaucracy in the Army was just, I mean my father was…well, a full time soldier…it just didn’t work. So, I did the CIA thing, and as a result, every thing that has happened to me spun from that…that decision.
k.d.-Isn’t that something?
Hank O’Neal- Because it turned out the man who was my first real boss…I mean, I was very lucky in that I got to spend 7 months in the Office of National Estimates as a 24 year old, and I actually got to work with Sherman Kent, Unitas Smith, and all these people who were the smartest people I have ever known. And I couldn’t stay there because I was outed in that office. I had to work in that office because somebody had quit and I did that job, but I had to do it in true name…which meant I could never be in the clandestine services…so, they did the next best thing which was the Office of Operations for Domestic Activity. The Office of Operations for Domestic Activity was run by a man named Squirrel Ashcroft, E.M. Ashcroft the 3rd who had played with Bix Beiderbecke in the 1920’s, had seen Louis Armstrong and King Oliver at the Lincoln Gardens, so I was home free.
k.d.-That’s great.
Hank O’Neal-And he set me up with everything in music to start with when I got to New York.
k.d.- Wow, serendipitous crazy luck.
Hank O’Neal- Of course, when I got to New York I could pick up the phone, call Ahmet Ertegun and he would take my call, because Squirrel Ashcroft had told him to talk to me, or John Hammond or whoever.
k.d.- All because of ending up in that graduate level Russian government course as a college freshman…Wow, that’s amazing, people have no idea…small decisions, how they affect life.
Hank O’Neal-Little things make a difference. If my father had not elected, if he had taken the first job he was offered out of college, which was to be a principal of a school in Mineral Wells, Texas. I can remember walking up the steps to this school, big tall weeds growing out of ‘em. He said, “No, I’m not going to do that. I’m gonna go on and get my doctorate”, which got us out of Texas. I’d be a used car salesman, or dead…Because he went and got his doctorate at the University and then went from there to Syracuse…
k.d.- That’s amazing
Hank O’Neal- If it hadn’t been for the GI Bill, he came back from the Army in 1946 and was so sick he couldn’t move . He was in Military Hospitals for 2 years and when he got out he went to college as a freshman at 38.
k.d.- I think our parents must be about the same age Hank.
Hank O’Neal- Mine would be 90? my dad was born in 1910.
k.d.-He’s a little older than my dad he was born in 1918..Now that was an interesting story. I wondered about it, I was curious.
Hank O’Neal- I never regretted a minute of it. I was the office lefty. I was with the CIA but all of my left wing friends…it was not a problem. I mean the lady, Berenice Abbott, she didn’t carry a card…but, as close as you could get…

k.d.-Oh yeah. I looked at the photos and I saw the one of her dresser?
Hank O’Neal- No that was my girlfriend’s mothers dresser, Pauline (?). No, Berenice did not believe in religious ideas. Berenice hated 2 or 3 things…more than anything else in the world and one of them was the Catholic Church. Because of what they did to girls, however one time Berenice decided that…umm…I had given her a record that I had made with Mary Lou Williams a great piano player, and she just loved Mary Lou Williams, and she says, “Hank, I want to learn to play the piano like Mary Lou Williams”…And I said, “Well, good luck, you’re a hundred and nine”…and she said, “Do you think you could get her to come up here? to Moose Head Lake Maine?”…And I said…I thought to myself, “Hmm…I’ll bet I could , but you might not like some of the trappings”…and she said, “What do you mean?” I said, “Well, Mary Lou has a manager who is a very devout Jesuit priest…A JESUIT PRIEST, BERENICE…he has to go to church everyday. He has a special dispensation take care of Mary Lou.” And she says,”Well, I would really like to see her.” And I said, “Well, okay,” because I can hook it up with Father O’Brien…he officiated at our wedding, for heaven sakes…and he brought Mary Lou to Moose Head Lake.
k.d.-She actually came?
Hank O’Neal-And hung out for a week on the lake, and relaxed and everything, and Berenice actually took them to church in Greeneville and sat in the car like this (Hank hunches up his shoulders and scowls) while Mary and Peter went to church. She didn’t like church.
k.d.- Yeah, I don’t blame her. You know, I saw online today in the headlines that the Pope has his own fragrance, now…did you see that?.
a.s.-You’re kidding me!
k.d.-No, I am not kidding, I don’t watch T.V., but I saw it on my Yahoo home page…a picture of the Pope, holding up his hands…now it’s not for sale, it’s a personal fragrance.
Hank O’Neal- It’s a little creepy…
k.d.-It’s creepy, I was immediately creeped out, and of course they had this great picture of him…so, yeah, I have another question…I don’t know if you have…
Hank O’Neal-Look(he points to the wall next to his seat in the office). You have religious gum…it says “King of the Chews”, it’s wonderful! Where did you get that? You should stock it out there in the gift shop.
k.d.-Okay, I have another question; I know when I shoot, I return to the same locations a lot. Just last week I finally got a good picture of a place I’ve been trying to shoot for a couple of years…so, are there locations you return to again and again?
Hank O’Neal-Of course, all the time…because you’re not going to get an interesting picture of graffiti on the side of the Empire State building, but you certainly might on the Williamsburg Bridge. So, you go back to the Williamsburg Bridge…you never go to the Empire State building. It’s pretty simple…or, you make it part of a project. I go back to highway 80 in east Texas all the time…because, god, somethings gonna be different, somethings gonna change, and sometime I’m gonna see something I didn’t see…the light’s gonna hit that in a different way.
k.d.-Is there a place you still haven’t got a good picture of? That is like burning for you? For me there is a shot I’ve been trying to get for years.
Hank O’Neal-You just keep trying.
k.d.-Well, cool, I’m really excited to about seeing you talk tonight.
Hank O’Neal-I’ll probably just mumble a lot and not say anything.
k.d.- Well, no, you’re really funny…I could always play this tape for them.
Hank O’Neal- Well, sure.
k.d.-Yeah, let’s just put the tape on.
Hank O’Neal-Amanda was going to put me in the wheelchair and I was going to do the entire lecture from the wheelchair, then at the end I was gonna jump up and say hallelujah!
k.d.-That’s hilarious…you should do it.
Hank O’Neal-You know who used to do that to great effect?…it was so good because he would come out, Bo Diddly in his last years, he’d be sitting there playing this thing and he’d get down to the last set and he’d be playing “Hey Bo Diddly” or what not, and then finally he’d struggle up and he’d go into another one and everybody would go crazy…it was a great tool.
k.d.-That’s a great piece of performance…So, that’s the interview, officially over, but I will take that picture…

thanks, Hank.*k.d.

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Hank O’Neal Street Photographer: or, A Pirate And His Canon

I have spent some time over the past 6 months thinking about intellectual property and process…and what it means to a culture when trying to control the distribution and fair use of another artist’s ideas also means criminalizing the creative process. The implications of a system where using another artist’s music, images, and ideas in the creation of metaphorical content, or even in mimic, is controlled by legal statute is mind bogglingly stifling (SOPA). So, when I had the opportunity to talk to Hank O’Neal, I was also looking for some perspective. I decided to initiate a frank inquiry into his use of other artists’ imagery in the making of his own art. Following is the answer Hank generously shared with me.*k.d.

k.d.- Hank, I have a burning question that I just really want to know the answer to…I am trying to understand what makes the documentation of street art “ART”, as opposed to history… Like when Alan Lomax did field recordings and collected songs, he didn’t call it art. I know that your art looks like art…but, I need to know, why is photographing  someone else’s work “ART”?

Hank O’Neal- Well, here’s an example…this is the part of it that fascinates me the most, in one instance, in the book there’s 350 pictures or something…there’s a big number…there’s only about 2 or 3 that still exist. I mean, they’re all gone..and the part of it that interests me the most is where it goes and when it’s gone. Now, play like you went to the Village Vanguard and the Amanda Steadman Quartet was playing (Amanda Steadman, EAM assistant curator, is sitting in on the interview and smiles slightly), and they’re pretty good, and then at 11:30 Kenny Burrell came out and he started playing something else…and then maybe a half hour later, Ornette Coleman came and started playing and it became something else. What fascinates me the most is when a picture goes up on the wall, and somebody adds another one…it’s an improvisation on a wall, and that to me is the most interesting stuff there is…because you see people creating, and you want to grab that, and if you grab it the right way…and you have to do it on the street. You can’t do it driving around, you can’t do it in a taxi cab…you’ve gotta be on the street walking, because a lot of the things in here (points at book), a lot of the things in my files or stuff like that are little (Hank holds two fingers apart indicating 2 inches), they’re that big…and it’s good, and what makes it an artistic statement in many instances is the juxtaposition of…
I mean it’s no big deal if Banksy puts something on a wall and you just take a picture of it, of what he has done on a wall. If you take it in conjunction with other things or other people or other things that people do to the wall…I mean for example, on this book the publisher wanted me to be on the front of the book…a picture of me, and I said “Ken, that’s the silliest thing I ever heard.”  Here I am, 70-year-old white bread, taking pictures of street art and skate board culture and Hip Hop this and that…the last thing in the world is you want “whitey” on the front of that book. That just doesn’t make any sense, and I left the room…
…and then I remembered something I had done 4 or 5 years before, where I had to go to a birthday party but I was going to be in Europe…and the lady who’s throwing the party for her husband says, “You have to be there, you have to be there. I’ll fly you back for the day.” …Don’t you understand, that’s the last thing in the world I want, I wouldn’t fly back anywhere for a day, and I said, here’s what I will do…and I went down to Tom Caravaglia’s studio, we took a picture of me sort of like I am now, blazer and stuff and a camera around my neck just like this. I sent the file to Suzy, she blew it up life-size and made a cardboard cut out, and stood me in a corner, and that was fine. So, I told these guys, I’ll do something…I’ll take a picture, but instead of making a cardboard cut out we are going to make a sticker and we are going to put that on the wall someplace…all over. You’re going to hire the people to do the stickering, I’m not going to go out and do that…but, we’re gonna do that, and we’re gonna see how, what happens to it, ’cause to me that’s interesting.
Now, if you look at the book….and you have to understand, on this book I gave the people, the publisher, about 650 pictures…and I let him pick out what he really liked and put them together in various combinations. Then, I would look at it. I wanted him to have a serious cut. One of the pictures that they chose is this picture (Hank opens up the book to Comme des Garcons, a two page spread night photo of a wall covered with a large number of juxtaposed images). You see, if you were to see this picture here without the cut in the middle, that’s me right there (Hank points at the center seam) covered up with weeds and god knows what…and I went over there that night, and actually, one of the best pictures that night was not like this. There was this guy walking down the street with his girlfriend, and just a little bit out of the frame of this picture (Comme des Garcons) there was a picture down at street level that was mixed in with a whole lot of other things, but this guy went absolutely nuts on this picture.
He literally got down on the street…now, I don’t know if he was trying to impress his girlfriend or what, but the picture was a bit degrading to women, and he went absolutely nuts clawing at the picture. He got out a little pen knife and he was hacking at it, and he was so engrossed with doing this…I was having a really good time taking pictures of this guy going nuts on the street.
…but, it isn’t just about taking a picture of what somebody else did…it’s putting it in the context of what it is, and it’s often the ones that really interest me the most are the ones where there are “comment” that people made. For example, I just finished up a thing Supreme Skateboard just put out with Kate Moss on it, and for whatever reason (Hank turns on his camera and pulls up a picture to show me) here it’s on the camera. Look at what theyv’e done to her face, and I’ve been taking zillions of these shots and I’ll hang them all together very much in the same way I did Gaga, it’s the same company. I don’t just care about what they do to the image, look at what they did to her.  (Hank pulls up another image) They put a cow’s head on her.

k.d.- So, in the book, you know, it’s like you’re talking about what you were just saying…the democratic process of art…the multiple people working on a piece. Do you see yourself in the end documenting as part of the process?

Hank O’Neal- Sure I am part of the process.

k.d.- That’s an answer. I was curious about it.

Hank O’Neal- Sure, and you guys (EAM) are too, because you’re putting it up on a wall.

Hank O’Neals most recent publication XCIA’s STREET ART PROJECT is available for purchase in the EAM Gift Shop $39.95 http://vimeo.com/33135045

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Bridgman/Packer: or Genius At Play

Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer photo: Steven Schreiber

I have seen a lot of interesting visual art over the years. I seek it out. I frequent Museums and have attended and participated in various kinds of weird visual experiments. I live with a performer who has spent a lifetime seeking out the absurd, and then sharing it with me. When someone says to me, “You have got to see this,” I am secretly  a little afraid of being disappointed, sometimes to the point of not looking. So, when at 6:00 this morning my visual-thrill-seeker-of-a-partner said, “You have to see this,” I was too groggy to protest…I just drank the coffee and watched the spectacle on the screen in front of me. What I saw is difficult to describe. It is something that must be seen, and I am embedding a link here so that you can go directly to it and see for yourself. I am going to, once more, write about something that I don’t really have the technical vocabulary for. Here are my observations. When I watched the live excerpts from a performance by Bridgman Packer, I was witnessing gifted people who have figured out how to be both inside their bodies directing their movement while simultaneously existing outside of their bodies in order to collaborate with the self, each other, and each others shadows, in order to work together in a visual delay pattern…kind of like a time traveler that has figured out how to play with reality a second or two forwards, then backwards in time. The synchronicity of movement between the physical body and the projected image is thrilling. Beyond that, the visuals are stunning and intelligent. The clip that I watched today presents a stream of visual motion filled with anachronism and gender play.
I am so excited about the prospect of going to this performance on Friday. This is an extremely exciting visual spectacle. This performance is an opportunity to see genius at play. Bridgman Packer is also conducting an  open workshop on Saturday morning at the EAM. Exposure to the work of these brilliant choreographers is the opportunity of a lifetime for young dancers and performers.*k.d.

For information on the performance or workshop

Take a look at the video clip, and get to the Museum early enough to claim a seat, and observe genius at play.

Bridgman/Packer live excerpt

http://www.bridgmanpacker.org/

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A Special Mad Mouse Featurette “Afternoon At The Museum”

►

*k.d.

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Special thanks to Fletcher Henderson and his Orchestra

See you in my dreams Susan *k.d.

Susan Gray Optimist Died Today At Age 52

Susan Gray Optimist died today at age 52.

I know that she would think that her doctor was being negative for pronouncing her dead.*k.d.

I have re-posted an earlier blog that is a tribute to Susan.

Susan Gray Optimist; or, There Are No Goodbyes

Over the years we have seen a lot of people come and go here at the Erie Art  Museum. Nonprofits are often revolving doors of challenge and opportunity. We cycle through work studies as they navigate their way through Gannon University, and we cultivate interns, sending them on to bright futures in their respective fields. Here at the EAM, we have said a lot of goodbyes.
Then there is Susan Gray, the lovely weekday desk receptionist with the million dollar smile. Susan spent just about a year greeting patrons and answering phones at the Museum with warmth and grace…especially under pressure…a rare quality, to be sure. Susan, like every one of us, is many things; a mother, a daughter, a friend. She is also an accomplished artist…a jazz singer and piano player, she played piano and sang every Friday night at the Maennerchor Club…but  I’ve got to tell you, more than anything else Susan is a positive person, irrepressibly optimistic. I  remember a while ago complaining to her about a someone who was making my life difficult…when I finished she said to me, “Oh, isn’t it sad that someone can be that way?” I looked at her and shook my head in wonder that she could take that perspective…she is just so damn nice. Last summer, after a lot of deliberation, Susan decided that she would need to leave the schedule at the desk for a while…Susan had been in treatment for a serious ongoing illness for a year, and she wanted to spend the summer with her two young children. Her optimism made it a seem like a see you later, not a goodbye. She told me, “I’m not going anywhere.”

Susan takes positive thinking very seriously, it is her therapy of last resort…when left with few choices, Susan decided to spend all of her time thinking positively and loving life. We hoped that she would be able to defeat the illness that has become such a deadly enemy for her and return to us. Today she is still battling valiantly and thinking positively, but from a hospital bed, now. I know that people wonder where Susan has disappeared to, she hasn’t been seen performing around town for a while. I hope that those that read this and remember the million dollar smile think a positive thought with her and for her.*k.d.

Susan Gray~  4/19/59 ~2/29/12

Doc Brown Does It With The Lights On: or, Global Warming is Hot

I thought last week when I listened to and reported on Dr. Donald Brown’s lecture, that people would find it a bit of a yawn, and that I would have chalked one up to recording another day in the life of our Noble Institution…you know, that’s me, back to writing about inflatables. Boy, did I get that one wrong?! I seem to have stumbled into a real wasps nest this time. Wow, I gotta tell you, that Doc Brown runs with a rough crowd. I guess I had professors of Environmental Ethics, Science, and Law stereotyped as mild mannered.
Doc Brown has introduced me to a strange new world… Did you know that there is a group of people that have dedicated themselves to, wait for it…bringing back DDT! They even sell t-shirts and stuff. I couldn’t believe it, at first I thought that it was a joke because, you know…who knew that there was this whole retro movement for like, pesticides? I mean, I get the retro-fashion thing, and the retro-music. I mean, who doesn’t love 70’s music, Plastic Ono Band, 801 Live, The Sex Pistols…but 70’s pesticides? Honestly, the Doc turned on the lights, and I could not believe my eyes. This is a rough crowd, after reading my post the other day, Steve Milloy of Fox News Commentator fame reblogged portions of it on his site junkscience. I was accused of being a Globalist murdering scum, and other preposterous things by individuals that follow the junkscience blog he writes. Kinda cool huh? My old mother is so proud that she started calling the relatives. She laughed out loud over the DDT thing, which is hard with her oxygen tube and all. She is 91 and has lived through enough history to get the joke. The site spends a lot of time defaming people in the name of furthering the effort to bring back DDT as a solution to problems worldwide, along with a lot of other mumbo jumbo. I think they’ve kinda got it out for the Doc, which is where me being a Globalist murdering scum comes in. I said that I like what Doc Brown has to say…so, I guess that makes me fair game for verbal skeet shoot. It seems to me that he’s got these boys on the run. They sure do seem to spend a lot of time trying to make him look like a radical. Fact of the matter is, the Doc is one of the good guys.  Looks like they set the Hell Hounds on his trail because they know he’s right. Personally, I think the junkscience readers might be looking for a dust up. This is a tough talking slice of the American pie. I guess it’s the whole “let’s turn climate change into a discussion about ethics” thing that’s got them on the hunt…because the American public is a pretty good bunch, and if you start to frame this whole discussion as something to take to church, and think about how we treat the least of our brothers, well, that sheds a whole new light on things.
I was going to end it right there but the “shed some light” thing brought to mind a kitchen we had in an apartment on Beacon Street in Boston during the 1970’s. If you turned on the lights, the roaches would run for cover…hmm, maybe it’s the roaches that have Steve waxing nostalgic for DDT. *k.d.

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The Education of *k.d.: or, How Doc Brown Helped Me Get It Off My Heaving Chest

I attended the lecture “Turning Up the Volume on the Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change” by Dr. Donald Brown, Associate Professor of Environmental Ethics, Science, and Law at Penn State University last night at the EAM. I have got to say that this guy is brilliant, and it is very evident in his blog http://rockblogs.psu.edu/climate/. I think you should probably navigate straight to it now in lieu of spending another minute reading this post. He presents the most articulate argument and support materials in this series of entries, in plain language that anyone can understand. Afterwards, stop back for an update on my own take on the lecture accompanied by my observations from the edge of reason.

About my latest admission…you know, the one about having ripped that liar of a talking box aka. the television off of the wall in my home BECAUSE IT WAS LYING TO ME. Well, after listening to Don Brown speak, I feel validated, indeed. Now, what I refer to as LYING he so very eloquently referred to as a disinformation campaign, and was actually referring speciffically to the effort by conservative think tanks to dispute the consensus on climate science. And, of course, I am referring to that, and everything else that is contained within that cesspool we commonly refer to as network television.
I just don’t feel comfortable with that kind of deceptive behavior in my home, and the offending box had it coming.

Doc Brown comes across as a man bursting with a message that must be heard. He has so very thoughtfully constructed an indisputable argument for an immediate halt to carbon emissions, that I am going to make a bold, if not outrageous statement (outrageous based on my own lack of education, but when has that stopped me) that his reasoning will one day be cited as the single most important legal argument ever devised in relation to this cause. It is brilliant in it’s obvious and elegant simplicity of design…he argues something that every kindergarten child knows…that it is ethically wrong to kill another person to profit by it. We, for to long, have been looking at this (global warming) from a cost benefit analysis point of view, and we need to make amends. We (the beneficiaries of a seemingly endless supply of carbon based energy aka. the developed world) need to fess up to the fact that we know that it is ethically wrong to let those that will in-arguably  profit from continued and escalating carbon emissions to frame the conversation through a cost benefit analysis approach to the problem. The big money interests (read the Doc’s blog) have perpetrated a 25 year relentless release of disinformation and repetitive misstatement of “fakt” that has clouded our collective judgement, and made us feel comfortable with our (America’s)  delaying and stone walling of actions to curb emissions world wide. We have been  burying our collective heads in the sand, and people are dying. Whew, got that of my heaving chest.
Now, I am a solutions kind of person, and I like this next bit that the Doc proposed…it makes me feel kinda empowered, and I am not talking about the feeling I get when I separate my recyclables…I mean like I could make some noise, I could turn up the volume on the ethical dimensions of climate change. Doc Brown says we need to engage in civil disobedience, that the hour is getting late, and our most powerful tool left is to ask why…why do we need to wait for every detail, until every shred of disputable science is resolved before we stop the death and destruction that is happening right now in sub Saharan Africa? He says maybe this is a discussion that should be taken to church, and then out onto the streets and right up the front steps of our pillared halls of justice in Harrisburg and Washington D.C. Now, it is a pretty well known fact that I am not a church goer, but I do have ethics (my substitute for morals). I like to look at the museum as my church, and I feel like I just heard one hell of a sermon. Doc Brown has a lot to say and I urge you to right now go and read his very easy-to-read blog. *k.d. bloghttp://rockblogs.psu.edu/climate/

Doctor Donald Brown’s lecture at the EAM was in conjunction with the exhibit

 DoubleExposure & Politics of Snow in the Bacon Gallery through March 4th

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