Art
A Window into Art
VISITING AN ART GALLERY is almost always a visit to the past; to representations of people, places, and relics of days gone by. It’s not that you go to see the past for its own sake. You go to see the art as art. But sometimes you go deeper. Without really trying, you can... Read »
City of Art
MOST VISITORS to St. Petersburg go to the Hermitage, and rightly so. It houses one of the world’s most large, if not largest, art collection in a former czar’s palace (the Winter Palace) where the Revolution of 1917 was staged, and where each room boasts a unique parquet floor, wall paneling, molding, and window... Read »
Dance: Noon and Night
ONE LAYER of Lucinda Childs’ DANCE is the eleven dancers who spill across the stage with movement that is like a live feed of entrances and exits in head-spinning sequences that are contained in constant parameters, and propelled by the pulsating flurry of the Philip Glass score which is experienced behind the final layer... Read »
Temporary French Art
TEMPORARY BECAUSE you can eat it—which you will do… quickly. We’re talking fresh pastries, baguettes, and macaroons made daily by a superior French pastry chef at the new Macaroon Boutique on John Street. The front door is usually open, delectable pastries loom on open shelves, enchanting co-owner Fabienne is at the cashier, and maestro... Read »
Spoleto Opera and Art
THE FIRST DAYS of Spoleto have, for me, been preoccupied with my eldest daughter’s graduation from the school she has attended for the last eight years. This departure before a new beginning has overshadowed my usual feeling of the festival’s whirlwind kickoff. Nevertheless, I have gotten to a few events. As an opera amateur,... Read »
Gallim Dance: What’s Modern Today?
TODAY’S MODERN DANCERS are not dealing with the emotional palate of yesterday. Their responses to the world deal with an ever-changing sense of psychology, technology, and culture. The form of modern dance is at its best when the perspective is fresh, the movement is original, and the performers are invested—which was true of the... Read »
A Painter’s Way Through Poetry
“YOU GO WHERE your life takes you,” mused artist Kat Hastie in a conversation we recently had about an upcoming show where visual art and poetry meet. “Contemporary Charleston 2010: Influence” runs at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park from May 20 through July 3 with an exhibit that matches 10 poets with 10... Read »
First Baptist Church
ROBERT MILLS, architect of First Baptist Church, described it as, “the best specimen of correct taste in architecture of the modern buildings in this city. It is purely Greek in its style, simply grand in its proportions, and beautiful in its detail.” He was mistaken only in its being purely Greek in style, but... Read »
The Little Festival with a Big Punch
AS SPRING BLEEDS into summer, don’t forget the other frolic that kicks off in tandem with Spoleto USA. While the “big” one toots its horn about being an international festival, Piccolo Spoleto boasts the continuous discovery of homegrown talent—artists, writers, and performers from Charleston and around the southeast. Ellen Dresler Moryl launched Piccolo Spoleto... Read »
What Was Whistler Thinking?
THAT’S THE QUESTION I kept asking myself as I gazed into the intimate world of James McNeill Whistler’s etchings at the Gibbes (until May 16, 2010). When you look at oil paintings you are generally aware of standing in front of them looking at them. But with etchings, especially good ones, you somehow step... Read »
