Touristing is Hard Work

[bolson]

My parents came to town Thursday night and we've had a busy weekend. Friday we went on a Duck Tour and then walked around downtown Boston for a couple hours covering several miles from Park Street past the convention center and Berklee and up Mass Ave to Central where we got back on the T to go home. Saturday we went to the Institute of Contemporary Art, walked from there through chinatown to My Thai Vegan Cafe for a yummy lunch then along Boston Common back to Park Street and T home. Sunday we drove out to Walden Pond and walked around its circumference, got lunch at the tasty Nashoba Brook Bakery in West Concord, then went to the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lexington. This involved several more hours of slowly strolling around a museum and grounds. My knees hurt and despite eating out more I feel like I may have lost a couple pounds this weekend.

Art!

There were good things to see though. Nothing in the most recent installation at the ICA was particularly moving to me, but some of their regular collection was still satisfying on a second viewing. I'm glad the video of pouring oil over sugar cubes exists; it is pretty. There was a funny video of someone doing performance art in a german supermarket. Andre the Giant still has a posse. There's a lightbox that shows endless reflections and I find it beautiful and deeply peaceful.

Walden Pond, where Thoreau went to get away from the crush of civilization, is now entirely trapped by the crush of civilization. I hadn't been there before and hadn't seen its current condition. If you go there seeking freedom and a walk in the woods, you'll find nothing but fences. Of course that is necessary to reign in the thousands of people who want to go there every week. Sigh. I hear there are still rebelliously free acts that go on there from time to time. ;-)

deCordova had several good pieces in amongst the usual art for the sake of something that doesn't speak to me. Two pieces struck me as typically 'burner' style: one made of scrap tires:

and one big thing made of polished steel that made me think of sleek 1950's imagining of jet engine futures and I thought that work would be greatly improved by spouting fire out of its orifices.

The last nifty thing I saw at deCordova was hard to interpret as you walk up to it:

The color and texture largely blends in to its surroundings. I expected to walk up to a pile of dirt and scoff that someone thinks its art. Instead I realized it was several tons of newspapers piled nine feet high, with a layer of forest floor starting to grow on the top.

It's not the best growing medium I'm sure, but maybe it's progress?

I wound up spending several minutes just walking around it admiring the craftsmanship of how the newspapers were woven into the rounded enormous piles; looking at the state of them about a year old and their mixed condition of decay and coherence; in awe simply at the scale of the thing; and generally thinking that it was kinda neat.

Oh yeah, and as often happens for family gatherings, there was good food. Yak & Yeti, my waffles, Other Side Cafe, My Thai Vegan Cafe, my home made pizza, Nashoba Brook Bakery, and my girlfriend's curry. All delicious. Good weekend.

Comments

[blk]

Slowly strolling hurts my legs and feet much more so than running or walking briskly through even twice the distance. I dislike musuems for this reason, even though I like art.