VIENNA REPORT: 2010

Christoph Schlingensief @ TB A21

When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?

-- Billy Joel

The latest installment of the now-six-years-old Vienna Art Week, directed by Robert Punkenhofer, arrived with something of a dull thud during the week of Nov. 15-21, 2010. Too bad. One of a long line of ambitious, incredibly funded, far-reaching Viennese art-world extravaganzas, it pummeled the city with openings, performances, illustrious visitors, local color and panel discussions and, oh, a stripper. Can’t forget the stripper!


Click below to read more....
Artnet: Vienna Report

Image of Christoph Schlingensief installation Vienna.

BED HALLS RANGING

BED HALLS are RANGING and why? Well, RED BALLS HANGING just sounded too crude and the alternative of switching spheres for balls seemed repressed. However BED HALLS RANGING perfectly describe the subversive oddity of these the most Viennese of Christmas decorations. They are fluffy in texture and glow bright red at night but it is the proportion of the things that perplex and fill the mind with wonder while visions of sugar-plums dance in our heads.

GREEN AND ALL ITS MEANS

Recently I have been picking through old emails, texts and images trying to apply some system of order over what now can only be called 'random'. That's when I ran across the above image of an innocuous green stem held by anonymous fingers. Except it is not. 
I remember the green and the hand and the man attached to it. The email read "Wanna share?" I thought, "Ha! Sure. You can have the woody stems and I'll take the bitter little leaves." And that would have been that had I not started to think about the watercress itself and the idea offerings. 

So in observance of having found the long lost offering of a wee green stem I decided to transform it and bitterness in general into a new edible offering. I caramelized two large onions with several anchovy fillets and a splash of sherry vinegar. I sauteed watercress, radicchio, romaine. I piled the first over the later and covered them with roasted red grapes and toasted hazelnuts. I don't think I could ever reproduce the dish exactly making it the perfect offering: Grapes and Greens. 

MIDWEST BUFFET BOAT AND VIENNESE FORTUNE SEEKS NYC PROSPERITY

What will the ship look like when it comes in? A Chinese junket off (way off!) the shores of lake Michigan?

Arriving on a wave of cheap brown tiles and a torrent of shag carpeting the specialties included Egg Foo Young, Hot 'n Sour soup and Chow Mein. I'd like to say it was shrimp Chow Mein or beef Chow Mein, but really, it was barely Chow. 


In Vienna recently I had received the following fortune....

IWON'T worry but on New Year's day I walked to PROSPERITY DUMPLING (46 Eldridge St.) NYC and ate 5 fried pork dumplings (just in case). 

WITCHY WOMEN of WISCOSIN

As a high school student growing up in Wauwatosa, WI there were tons of fun things to do. Most involved driving. Driving by overly familiar locations and seeking out exotic experiences or seeking out exotic destinations and familiar experience. The most exotic and familiar being The Witches House. We had all been there before but no one ever remembered the exactly where it was. The roads were dark, no one had been drinking or smoking, but if they had I am certain the roads would have seemed even more dark and always twisting about at odd places. The name of the road we were looking for had the word "Beach" in it or "Sand" or something about water. It was as if by blocking the memory of the road name we would always be fascinated to find it again. Genius. To this day I use the same finely honed mapping skills to seek out what now is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Ye 'ol Witches House. Believe me, at night and at 16 the place had a totally different vibe. The Violent Femmes caught more of the ambiance in their songs and on the cover of their 1984 album Hallowed Ground.

Mary Nohl's real story can be read on Facebook.

LAKE FRONT

The Milwaukee Art Museum's 2001 Santiago Calatrava addition received an enormous amount of attention and made a great impact on the landscape of the city though less so on the internal galleries. Other than the grand foyer the museum inside feels much as it did pre-Calatrava. That said I am still a fan of the original 1957 Eero Saarinen-designed museum that still resides in the lower parts of the Milwaukee County War Memorial. 

SOPHIA'S BAKERY & CAFE: Madison, Wisconsin

I drove from Milwaukee to Madison in the middle of a blizzard. Half the trip was absolutely fine driving (for a blizzard in Wisconsin) the other half of the trip was complete white-out and winds that pushed the car sideways and then a semi-truck began to jackknife ahead of me and well, gosh did I deserve that pain au chocolat from Sophia's! 

831 East Johnson Street
Madison, WI 53703-3937
(608) 259-1506