This week's Kid Pics

I'm thusfar happy with my switch to an IMAC; perhaps just because the new computer is umpteen times as fast as my ancient Gateway. Both Bonnie and Shari emailed photos that you see here. Bonnie, in Panama, is posing with 10 year old friend, Julie, at a site that shelters starfish, she says "more than you can imagine". She included the name of the place, but I didn't think to save that. I'm using that starfish photo on y desktop; the clarity of the water is amazing...Hope there's no oil to be discovered under those sands.

Shari too was busy with her Iphone camera. Here's a picture of grandson, Wyn, with his "City of Angels" haircut. He was a lead in his high school production of that musical. And how did Shari get into Dodger stadium, into the Dodger dugout to have her picture snapped? That's a question for our next phone call; but neither Ira nor I are surprised.

Heard from Megan Porter that the POP bubbe wrap show has been extended. So if you haven't been at ARTSPACE yet, here's another opportunity to enjoy the show.

POP Packaging for Pampered Patrons

Here are a few more photos of my installation taken a few weeks after the gala opening. The bubble wrap strips have been tied back to permit easier transit to the bathrooms, offices, for gallery patrons. However in this state, the participant doesn't have the tactile experience of going through that tunnel surrounded by the brush of the bubble wrap strips, the varying light coming through the material, etc. Would this occur in a NYC, L.A., Dallas, etal gallery? The title, seen by me as silly as the origin of this packaging, now seems appropriate.

Trapani tours

Our tour brought us to SEGESTA, once the center of the Elymian civilization: Trojans, Greek Phocaeans and Sicans.

The photos to the left show the unfinished 36 columned 5th c. BCE Doric Temple in that magnificent setting; the distance photo was shot from a bus that took us to the Greek theater high in the hills. The other two photos show the site of SELINUNTE, Segesta's enemy, founded in 628 BCE, destroyed by Carthage in 409 BCE. Only one of the eight temples found here has been restored. The restorers in the 50's reported that they couldn't be sure that the work they were doing was valid...that certain stones should be atop or next to one another, etc. So the other temple sites are piles of antique rubble. You can see how huge the columns, capitals were in these Doric structures.

Back from our great voyage

Our voyage on the Aegean Odyssey began in Piraeus. The next day's tour took us to Athens and the Acropolis. Its always full of tourists, school children, tour groups speaking a multitude of different languages, but in spite of the crowds, always a great experience. I think this was our 4th time there and we were delighted to see how much work has been completed. Lots of workmen putting up more scaffolding, using cranes, wahing down areas...There's still heaps more to be done.

The new Acropolis Museum opened recently. The huge glass fronted building looks out onto the Acropolis and houses the artefacts of only this site. The museum is built on the remains of another archeological area, and this is covered w. Lexan panels so the visitor can view the dig site easily. The second floor houses the original Caryatids of the Erecthion, and a huge display of the 4 sides (the metopes?) of the Parthenon. The latter exhibits the original stone pieces plus white plaster casts of the Elgin marbles held by the British Museum. I was shocked that so many pieces are totally missing. The whiteness of the reproductions may be viewed as a reproach to the British Museum that permitted Jos. Duveen to order technicians to scrub the original colors off the pieces before displaying them in the room he financed for their display. The British Museum's argument for not returning these to Greece is that if they hadn't preserved them, there'd be none now for anyone to view. The Elgin Marbles are the Brit. Museum's biggest draw.