we were in need of some lighting, so i recycled one of my mom’s old lamps which i remember using as a kid growing up. the old lampshade actually still had the tacky plastic wrapping on it after 25 years, haha!
i found some pretty rice paper from paper-ya and ribbon which i glued onto the lampshade with spray adhesive and a glue gun.
the end result.
i went to the ‘one of a kind’ show at canada place with helen. fun and unique crafts, clothing, jewelry, food and housewares. notable finds: apple maple syrup, beeswax infused plate and bowl covers. i think there’s a show in chicago too, maybe i’ll try to check that one out as well.
i liked the little mushrooms.
we spent the morning (into the early afternoon) at the metropolitan museum of art. their egyptian collection was quite impressive, and i liked how they would create spaces reminiscent of the artifacts’ original locations. the temple of dendur:
i thought this painting by salvador dali was very interesting. up close, the painting consisted of white dots. how many images can you see?
and we couldn’t miss the near eastern gallery, although it was on the small side.
by the time we finished at the museum, it was already early afternoon, and we were starving! conveniently, the museum is right at the edge of central park, so we found an empty bench and had a picnic lunch. then we strolled around the park, watching people in their boats. it was really pretty with the buildings in the background.
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we walked through the park and came out at the southern edge, so we headed down fifth avenue towards rockefeller center.
it was time for a hot dog.
then we checked out bryant park, which was undergoing a bit of construction in preparation for fashion week in september. there was an area called “the reading room” with free books for people to read and enjoy.
view of buildings around bryant park.
finally it was time for our broadway show! we saw “in the heights”, which is a newer musical, based on the neighborhood of washington heights, on the northern part of manhattan. it won the tony award for best musical in 2008. we had great seats, and really enjoyed the show!
i’m not sure why it took me three years to visit the hyde park art center despite passing it a billion times, but i finally dropped in to check it out for the first time. in addition to offering many programs for the community, the center exhibits work from emerging artists from the chicago area. i like it.
i’ve always liked to draw although for some reason, either due to lack of time or lack of drive, i never do it. anyways, now that i have a lot more time on my hands, together with seeing good friends who are artists producing beautiful work, i’ve been inspired to be more intentional with being creative, because it always brings me a lot of joy. i’ve been drawing with just a black ball point pen on paper in a little notebook, and i was honestly quite surprised at how well my first few drawings turned out. i’ll do my best to keep this up and occasionally post more drawings.
a portrait of my mom as a little girl (pen on paper, june 2009)
family room window (pen on paper, june 2009)
we discovered an ice sculpture exhibition in downtown that we decided to check out. here are a few examples… “spirit horse”,
“einstein”,
and “the obamanable snowman”, which was sculpted by high school students.
today we saw an art installation at millenium park featuring Paintings Below Zero, by Gordon Halloran, a canadian artist. the installation is a 95×12 feet wall of coloured ice situated right in the middle of downtown chicago.
despite the cold and ice, we made our way to the renegade craft fair on the northside of chicago. it’s always fun browsing through these fairs because you never know what you might find. as expected there were many vendors selling jewelery, bags and paper goods. one booth specialized in recycling old hard cover books (for example a math text book, dr. seuss, nancy drew etc) and using the covers for “new” coiled notebooks. i picked up a couple buttons made of letterpressed cotton paper.
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