Art day! We set out about 10:45 for the Museum of Fine Arts, which was about a 30-minute walk from our apartment. It was cool and overcast and thus lovely for the walk there. We had timed tickets for their special exhibit on M.C. Escher for 11:15 and went there first. I was prepared to enjoy it, but not put too much thought into works that I had obsessed over as a teenager but not thought of too much since. I expected to see the familiar prints that get recycled all the time but what we got was a very detailed story of the evolution of the various spatial illusion motifs that keep showing up in his most famous pieces, like the portrait in the sphere, the waterfall that flows back into itself, or the hands that draw each other, as well as the various Moebius strips and figure-ground designs where fish become sky and birds become sea, and so on. We learned about the work Escher produced in Italy, mostly stylized, art-deco-ish Italian landscapes, with a few still lives and portraits mixed in, and about his many experiments with woodcuts vs. lithographs vs. mezzotints, and really did learn a lot. The exhibit is the biggest ever put together–400 artworks, including some 3D carvings and also a number of his plates, from a collection by a man who basically bought 90% of his estate at Escher’s death. It was certainly impressive.
Lithograph on gold-coated wove paper.
Aside from the Escher exhibit, we also saw the Obama portraits–I got a closer look at Amy Sherald’s Michelle Obama portraits and got confirmation of some of my own thoughts about the link Sherald draws between the grayscale she used for Black skin in her portraiture and the early black and white portrait photographs of Black Americans in the 19th century–which are of course completely up my alley. And then, after a light lunch and a STRONG latte at the museum cafe, we looked at their permanent collection, especially in the new wing, which is a very beautiful, organic, Guggenheim-y space for the contemporary art. There were a few pieces I really loved, including a Helen Frankenthaler that was a real deviation from her typical style; I love it when a painter surprises me like that. The older works, both here and in the oldest wing of the museum were what you’d expect: a little bit of everything from antiquity and the Renaissance to modernism, and also some Islamic and Japanese art (other “world art” exhibits are currently being remodeled). But I told Mark to be sparse with photos, because much of it did not stand out.
At about 3 pm, we had had enough and walked the half hour to the Menil Collection, also stopping at the Rothko Chapel, which, to my embarrassment, I had never visited while I lived here (to be fair, I also don’t have visual memories of the Menil and the MFAH, but I know I must have gone). At the Menil (no photos allowed, so you are all spared!), the big surprises were the many Max Ernst works, spanning his whole range of styles and approaches, and some Magrittes that were quite different from what I expected–not nearly as sanitized. There was also a special exhibit of Meret Oppenheim’s oeuvre that made me wish I knew more about her work and her as an artist. But all in all, I was actually glad that the museum was fairly small and that it only took us about an hour to walk through it, because we were getting “arted out” and pretty tired. So we took the 40-minute walk home (basically, the slightly longer base of the triangle that connects the MFAH, the Menil, and our Sonder apartment building in the “Museum District”), with a little detour to a grocery store to get some cheese, and once we were home, I spent about 10 minutes making us some fruit salad, plus some cukes and tomatoes we still had, and we did open-faced grilled cheese sandwiches–super fast and very yummy.
Then we drove to my former advisor and friend Helena’s house, to meet outside at her pool (again avoiding Covid risks)–I swam a little while the other chatted on dry land, as Helena and Scott’s many dogs were also excitedly playing fetch in the pool, and we caught up and talked about (grown) kids and travel plans (and whether they can go forward). It was lovely at the poolside, especially as it got dark and the pool lights came on, changing colors every so often. Before we left, we got a brief masked tour of the house, which has fabulous and quirky features, built with repurposed doors and wood panels and even fixtures, so that it feels very Victorian, even as it is actually just a few years old. Except that the rooms, doors, and windows are much taller than the average Victorian. Pretty amazing! I am so glad I got to see Helena and her family, the house, and at the very last minute even Zelda, their gloriously beautiful Bengal cat!
The last act of the day was the 10-minute drive home (Mark has been braving the freeways, which, truth be told, I always hated in Houston) and then we did a little pre-packing and I wrote this, before crashing at 10:30. Tomorrow, we’ll be testing ourselves again and then meeting some more friends if tests results allow, and leave for San Antonio.