People on deadline, crazy writer types and polyamorists all benefit from having structure in their lives, even on vacation. We used happy hour in the lounge of our Washington, DC hotel to structure our days last week, and there at the Carlyle we saw the museum-quality exhibit Larry Rivers in "Collaboration, 1923-2002." Rivers and Kenneth Koch were a great gay artist and poet of the New York School, and this exhibition featured several of their collaborative collages composed of Rivers' drawing and Koch's poetry. Here are two lyrical samples.
"O French/Ice-cream! balconies of deserted stuff! The hills are/Very underwear, and near 'to be'/An angel is shouting, 'Wilder baskets!'" - "The Dirty Beautiful Jingling Pajamas (with K. Koch)" (1968), collage in Plexiglas box. (For Wilder.)
"In my loafers I 'wint' to jail to see my brother/Perish in his 'little' loafers beside the iron fountain/The milkman referred to yes'tiddy as the Electric Chair./I want to whoosh/Down an armchair, inch of the summer sunlight,/And find my brother, the grayed one, still reading his newspaper/And using his toothbrush, or using his toothbrush. Goodbye!" - "Perish in his Little Loafers" (1970), collage in Plexiglas box.
DC is such a vibrant, cosmopolitan city, too bad that its citizens don't get any representation in either house of Congress. Now that the reactionary right and the generals have seized federal power, DCers won't be getting satisfaction anytime soon. While we were in town, the House of Reps stripped protections against discrimination toward gay people from a defense bill. Once you make it OK to violate the civil rights of Muslims, Mexicans and gays, anyone could be next on the chopping block.
From the new roof terrace of the renovated East Building of the National Gallery, a kick-ass view of architect John Russell Pope's West Building dome and that great phallic symbol, the Washington Monument. Inside, delicious Rothko paintings, Barnett Newman's "Stations of the Cross" and a Calder survey in the tower galleries. Plus Matisse cut-outs, "Modern Art 1900-25, 1910-8"; "American Art, 1900-50"; and "French Painting, 1890-1940." An all-star line-up.
In the West Bldg., a great retrospective of Stuart Davis, the most important American artist of the 20th century's first half (Warhol being that of the second half). As Davis was "the artist of the Jazz Age," Swing Era jazz music wafted through the galleries. We took a docent tour of the NG in Spanish. Because Out There knows a lot about the modern art our docent described, it was easy to understand when she said, "Jackson Pollack comprendio la importancia del gesto."
We went to see the Jacob Lawrence "Migration Series" at the Phillips Collection, then spent a day wandering around the embassy district. Some of the most elegant buildings belong to smaller countries: Estonia, the Sultanate of Oman. Were touched to see a plaque on one, "Franklin Delano and Eleanor Roosevelt lived here, 1912-20," now the residence of the ambassador of Mali. It was much like, stamp collecting as a boy, we marveled at how the most extravagant stamps often came from smallest nations, such as Yemen.
We lingered by the Brazilian embassy to overhear some of the staff because we love hearing Portuguese, the way it presses the tongue against the palate. That night, the bartender at the Carlyle had saved the last bottle of Malbec for us. "The Argentine Embassy is just down the street, so if need be, we can go raid their wine cellar."