Foto Fettish

This is the title of the archive I keep of my digital photography. The title came from my poetry and short story archives: Pen Fettish. Some 17 or 18 years ago I heard someone use the word in a positive way, and it stuck with me. Several years later, and a little wiser, I looked the definition up in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, and this is the first one I found:

fetish: 1 a : an object believed to have magical power to protect or aid its owner; broadly : a material object regarded with superstitious or extravagant trust or reverence. b : an object of irrational reverence or obsessive devotion.

Very appropriate, I thought.

For those of you who know me well, you know I have a penchant for mad scribblings and a tendency to spend days working over the small details of a photo I’ve shot. I love it, and it’s a definitive, creative outlet, like music. In the beginning, I was too young to know that I was using the incorrect spelling of the word (fettish, not fetish), but the misspelling stuck through the years.

I’ve decided to start putting more of my more personal work on the web – not sure yet if it’ll be on this blog or on a separate page, but the idea is to have everything in one place.

West Side Story

Yesterday afternoon I had the pleasure of seeing the University of Colorado at Boulder’s production of West Side Story: The Opera (written by composer Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, directed by William Gustafson and Nicholas Carthy). It was so much fun! I have to admit, this production took me by surprise, as it did not follow the more traditional operatic style of voice–we left feeling more like we’d just watched a musical for three hours, instead of an opera–but it was very enjoyable, nonetheless. Hey, different is good!

I do actually believe that this production is the first opera I’ve seen that wasn’t written originally as an opera–WSS was composed by Mr. Bernstein for Broadway in 1957. The “light opera” style was great, as the background to WSS is very animated and passionate and is based on Shakespeare’s timeless story of Romeo and Juliet. Mr. Bernstein brought current the often told themes of love, family, feuds and youthful passion with scenes of gang life in the streets of 1950’s New York. The story begins with a brawl between two local gangs: The Sharks (a Puerto Rican gang) and The Jets (a polish gang). Likened to Tybalt and Mercurio, the gang leaders, Bernardo and Riff, want nothing but respect and are so blinded by their rage and hatred for each other they are willing to murder to get it. Of course, a romance ensues between Maria (Bernardo’s sister) and Tony (Riff’s right-hand man and most-trusted friend). Their love is forbidden from the beginning, but it only serves to fuel their passion. Ultimately, each must face a decision–loyalty to their families or to each other.

I was especially delighted to see and hear the performance of Katherine Miller (Maria), whose talented acting and girlish, soprano voice stole the show. In the last act, as she sang an extremely heavy lament over her murdered lover, I looked around and was unable to find a single dry eye near to me. Such regret and sorrow came through in her singing–such love and such remorse! Another delightful performance was that of Meg Marino (Anita) whose sultry alto voice and stern words made an ideal street-wise and protective companion for Maria. The well-balanced synergy between the two was intriguing to watch.

Between the acting and singing talent, the stage production (awesome lighting and props!) and the well-known musical score (“I Feel Pretty”, “Tonight”, and “One Hand, One Heart”, just to name a few…), WSS will go down in history as one of my favorites!

And, to make a fun evening even more fun, there was dinner at the Mountain Sun afterwards…

My Mountain Sun Take-Away Dragon

Why playing the cello ROCKS…literally.

The following video, titled A Cello Rondo, was performed and produced by Ethan Winer, a wonderful cellist. There are 37 cello parts–from the main melody to the percussion–and each is performed using only the cello. The video is fun to watch, but even better is Mr. Winer’s creativity and style. Hats off to him and his crew for an enjoyable performance!

An Imagined Winter

Or maybe not so imagined…

Our most recent snow drifts have inspired me to look deeper into some terrain rendering software I stumbled across while surfing the web one day. It’s called Terragen and it’s pretty neat what one can do with it. Here is an image I rendered after playing with the software for an hour or so (click on the image to see it in finer detail):

A few other images I’ve made can be viewed here.

List #2

Things I have to do while I’m in Buffalo:

1. Go to the Lexington Co-op and buy Earl Grey and Green teas
2. Have cup of delicious coffee and slice of yummy dessert at Spot Coffee
3. Go to Amy’s Place and have “the usual” (ham, broccoli and cheddar cheese omelette, with english muffin, home fried potatoes, sweet tea and strawberry jam)
4. Find old bass classical string method lesson book
5. Find out whatever happened to last year’s Christmas and Kwanzaa gifts that were supposed to get boxed up and mailed to Colorado; box them up and mail to Colorado
6. Dig out old Organic Chemistry (Orgo) molecular modeling kit (in attic???)
7. Dig out old Orgo text book (refer to number 6)
8. Consider likelihood that numbers 4-7 are all in the attic
9. Add numbers 4, 6 and 7 to box in number 5
10. Find out if rumors that Niagara Cafe has closed are false (keep fingers crossed)
11. Visit with old professor/PI from Biochemistry department at UB
12. Visit Albright-Knox Art Gallery
13. Finalize a few wedding plans with Nic
14. Have dinner with family and friends at Happy Jack’s in Erie, ON (don’t forget to buy extra bag of fortune cookies)
15. Sleep

The Pawn’s Revenge

While web surfing this evening, I found this really cute comic by artist Tarol Hunt, creator of the Goblins comic series:

I’m getting work done.  Honest.

“It was the most profound experience of my life.”

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of visiting with friends in Denver. It all began innocently enough when I suggested to a couple of my girl friends that we go to Denver and check out the latest art exhibits showing in the local galleries. A few days and emails later our little group grew to include a few other enthusiatic art fans. It was a shiny autumn day as we gathered inside the Denver Art Museum on 13th Street near the Civic Center. We had the pleasure of viewing several exhibits, ranging from Contemporary art to ancient Japanese art, that spanned 4 stories. We saw paintings by Monet, a modern artist’s version of the Mona Lisa and a rather buxom-looking anime statue that, according to the little girl next to us, looked just like someone name Misty.

Oh man, how I wish I’d remembered to bring my camera.

After viewing all of the exhibts at DAM, a few of us decided to head over to the new site for the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver at 15th Street and Delgany, near downtown. That was a hysterical time, as we got lost on the way, had trouble seeing the building even after we’d got the directions by phone, and then walked in to find only one exhibit showing. But wow, what an exhibit it was. It’s titled Fade, by artist Erwin Redl, and it’s a wonderful mix of light, texture and space. We sat in the middle of the room, our heads and faces crowned with small halos from the wall of red light that surrounded us, and quickly found ourselves sharing stories from our day to day and taking a few moments of reflective pause. We jokingly decided to tell the others in our group that they’d missed the most profound exhibit any of us had ever experienced. Ironically, though, I really hadn’t seen anything like it. Profound, probably not, but unique and beautiful, yes. It had a presence that made me want to sit and watch for what came next. The exhibit came to be more than something to just look at, that was for sure.