Colorful Morning in Brighton Beach

As I told you my new habitat is Brighton Beach, just a stretch of boardwalk down from Coney Island (home of the infamous 4th of July hot dog eating contest). To take advantage of my new surroundings, and because I feel compelled to do uncomfortable things that are good for me, I have started jogging.

Howl says the circus poster. I felt like howling myself, if I had the breath to, but luckily it’s an interesting stretch of boardwalk to torture yourself on: full of joggers and sunbathers and swimmers. Even at 7 AM on a Saturday morning, the old people had made their way down to the shore line for sunbathing and calisthenics.

Barnum and Bailey circus has set up their tents just past Coney Island and before a gorgeous old landmark that is now a roller rink. The man in front was sporting a very chipper boating outfit complete with ship’s captain hat.

Then, just as I was starting to feel really proud of my panting and puffing, I came across what appeared to be hundreds of  penguins. It turns out they were triathletes in wetsuits. It was a little demoralizing, but not as much as seeing people three times my age jogging past me.

At this point you might be wondering whatever happened to that art blog I had been writing–me too. I can’t think why I’m dribbling on about my morning run except that all my mental space is currently occupied by my new job. Yesterday was my first day, and I left quite excited about some of the projects I will be working on. If you’ll bear with me a bit though, I have some lovely interesting art posts that I’m working on as well.

Life Is Beautiful (on Twitter)

Beautiful images from the photography blog Life is Beautiful, which you might have delighted in already if you followed me on Twitter @linnea_west.

I’m not saying twitter is the best or only way to learn things; I’m just saying you should check out the dynamic spread of awesome information. I’ve totally been sucked in.

But with peaches like that, how can you resist biting in?

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Standing In: Me and Pistoletto’s Standing Couple

Michaelangelo Pistoletto, Standing Man, Standing Woman with Hat, 1980

The contagion of self-portraiture carried on, from the mirrors of the Kiki Smith exhibition (reviewed here) to the mirrors of the contemporary art galleries at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Pistoletto’s two figures on mirror seem to be facing me and the red wall installation behind me. It looks like we are carrying on an awkward conversation, perhaps because I am in color while they are stuck in black and white.

If one is going to look at art, and think about art, and write about art, after a bit shouldn’t that person join the art? Oscar Wilde said that “One should either be a work of art, or wear a work of art.” Surely with a little smoke and mirrors, or maybe just mirrors, I can get past this silly division of art and life and do both.
“All that I desire to point out is the general principle that life imitates art far more than art imitates life.” –Oscar Wilde