Sue Conley, co-founder of Cowgirl Creamery
@ National Harbor
Q:What's your favorite food TV show or host?
A:"John Shields of 'Chesapeake Cooking.' He was a deep appreciation for local foods."
THE JACKSON POLLOCK painting hanging on the back wall turns out to be the key to "The Year of Magical Thinking."
What originally looks like typical set dressing for an elegant New York apartment is puzzling at first. After all, Pollock's abstract, paint-splattered canvasses mean something different to each person who sees them.
And there's no doubt about what "The Year of Magical Thinking" means.
The one-woman play, based on the memoir of the same name, is a first-person account by essayist Joan Didion of the sudden deaths of her husband and daughter. Well, perhaps it is less about their deaths and more about the ways we cope with unimaginable grief, the tiny lies that we invent to stave off true mourning.
Continue Reading "The Patterns of Grief: The Year of Magical Thinking" »
THERE'S NO EASY way to categorize street art. Or exhibit it, for that matter. But despite the vagueness of the term, it can be defined in part by its intention: It allows artists to use the city and its streets as their canvas.
Washington is loaded with its own examples, such as the Shepard Fairey mural with his famed Obama image on 14th Street NW. Now, there's another street-art destination, located in an alley off P Street NW, behind Irvine Contemporary.
The outdoor installation is part of "Street/Studio," which includes street-art biggies such as Fairey, with his Soviet Socialist Realist-style graphics, and Swoon, with her lyrical, silhouetted portraits. But what sets this show apart is that it offers both sides of the street art practice.
Continue Reading "Irvine Paints the Town: 'Street/Studio'" »
THIS WEEK: Here's the thing about the plays of Anton Chekhov: He presents you with an impossible, hilarious melodrama and then somehow, as you're laughing, hits you with the human sadness of the situation. He's a master, and "The Seagull" is arguably his best work. In "The Seagull on 16th Street," Theater J weaves concepts of faith into Chekhov's original script. It works, most of the time.
» Theater J, 1529 16th St. NW; through July 19, $21-$55; 202-777-3210. (Dupont Circle)
Photo courtesy The Washington Post
"PAINT MADE FLESH," the Phillips Collection's new show, looks at post-World War II figure paintings from Europe and the U.S. to suggest that paint is the best medium for conveying the cultural significance of flesh. Among works by Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud are paintings by John Currin, an American painter known for his provocative works depicting the human body. Currin will be at the Phillips on Thursday to discuss his work.
» EXPRESS: "Paint Made Flesh" suggests that paint's material properties make the medium well-suited to conveying metaphors for human vulnerability. How accurate do you think that is for your own work?
» CURRIN: I suppose that there's an obvious metaphor between the surface of oil paint and flesh. It's vulnerable the same way that flesh is, and it was probably invented in order to render flesh. I certainly subscribe to that, and the most exciting and difficult part of painting is rendering flesh. It's not a specific color, so it's a mystery how to get it right.
» EXPRESS: The majority of your work is of the female figure. Why is that?
» CURRIN: The simple answer is that I enjoy looking at women more than I enjoy looking at men, but the more pretentious answer is that I find it easier to think of metaphors and allegories when I'm using women in paintings.
Continue Reading "'Paint Made Flesh': Figurative Painter John Currin" »
WEDNESDAY: We're gonna be upfront about this: Joan Didion's "The Year of Magical Thinking" is one of the most depressing books you could ever read, and one of the most engaging. The one-woman play based on the book looks like it will follow the same pattern. The plot concerns Didion's life after the unexpected death of her husband. Plus, her daughter was severely ill at the same time. Yes, you're going to cry.
» Studio Theatre, 1501 14th St. NW; through July 5, $41-$61; 202-332-3300. (Dupont Circle)
Photo courtesy Jame M. Thresher/The Washington Post
SATURDAY: It's Capital Pride weekend! For a full schedule, check out Capitalpride.org, but our money is on Saturday's parade, which goes through Dupont and Logan circles. From 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., check out the neighborhood barbecue at 14th and P streets NW. Later, head to the Hirshhorn Museum for Pride After Dark from 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. Tickets to that event are $25.
» Parade starts at 23rd and P streets NW and ends at 14th and N streets NW; Sat., June 13, 6:30 p.m., free. (Dupont Circle)
Photo by Rcihard A Lipski/The Washington Post
WE STOOD AT the Home Depot paint-mixing counter in an exasperated stalemate, paper samples of "Village Square" and "Toffee Crunch" shades clenched in our fists.
Then she said it. "I ... hate ... you." Her voice was flat and even, as frustration culminated in those three words. Then, to the horror of the salesman helping us, Tracey burst into tears.
Uh-oh. Maybe living with my sister wasn't such an inspired idea.
It was May 2008 and we were two weeks away from moving into the two-bedroom condo we'd bought together in Clarendon. How was I going to survive living with my younger sibling of three and a half years if we couldn't agree on how many gallons of paint we needed for our pad? But the contracts were signed, the mortgage loan ratified — I looked at Tracey and knew there was no turning back.
Of course, if I'd consulted roommate and sibling relationship experts before signing the lease, they would've predicted potential disaster.
"Our relationships with our siblings are very passionate ones," says Dorothy Rowe, a psychologist whose book, "My Dearest Enemy, My Dangerous Friend" ($18, Routledge), focuses on the dynamics of sibling relationships. "We care enormously about what our siblings think of us: their praise, their approval," Rowe says. "At the same time, we're scared of their criticism. If you've grown up together, your sibling knows just what to say to upset you, tease you or really hurt you. It's a very complicated relationship that doesn't get simpler as you get older."
Continue Reading "Roomies? Oh, Brother: Why Some Siblings Are Opting to Live Together" »
THIS WEEK: For those of you who don't know (hi, Mom!), Postsecret is a blog that collects the deepest, darkest secrets of humanity. Anonymous artists mail in postcards decorated with the statements they can't say out loud.
You can see a display of these confessions — and tack your own onto the wall — at the Hillyer Art Space. We'll be looking for the secrets of Washington's elite — and yeah, we mean Dick Cheney.
» Hillyer Art Space, 9 Hillyer Court NW; through June 26, free; 202-338-0680. (Dupont Circle)
Photo courtesy Post Secrets
THERE'S SOMETHING ALMOST science fiction about Yuriko Yamaguchi's show at the Adamson Gallery. The carefully constructed networks of industrial wire, resin and plastic tubing feel like they should be in a laboratory instead of in a sleek gallery space.
Not that there's anything monstrous about the sculptures. On the contrary, these light-filled creatures are opaque and ethereal. Certain works come close to representing organic shapes, including two works titled "Bubble" (No. 1 and No. 3), composed of shorn plastic tubing, glue and resin, which call to mind cells, crystals and other structured life forms. "Season of Change," a hanging sculpture of cast resin drops and steel, brass and copper wire, arranged in cloud-like formations and vortices, appears capable of growth beyond the gallery walls.
Continue Reading "The Art Studio As Lab: Yuriko Yamaguchi" »
THIS WEEKEND: In Transformer Gallery's "Domesticated: Men and the Domestic Interior," four artists study the masculine animal's relationship to the home. Photographers Yolanda del Amo, Dru Donavan, Amy Elkins (a detail of whose work is above) and Jamil Hellu evoke complex responses from their images of men behind closed doors. Hirshhorn's Al Miner curates this thought-provoking exhibition and will give a talk on the show on Saturday, the day of its opening.
» Transformer Gallery, 1404 P St. NW; opens Sat., May 16, through June 20, free; 202-483-1102. (Dupont Circle)
Written by Express' Arion Berger
Addison Road
