Purple ride

soooo... today its purple, which is still my favorite color! this is in the car museum in the hague, where we went the day before tims birthday. i actually wanted to go shopping that day, and that was also the plan when we left the house, but instead we went to the museum and it really took forever to get out of it again. they have nearly 250 cars!!! and even without reading all the descriptions and not staring at each one intently, it took ages to get through the museum. and yes, at some point i was a bit bored! there were just so many, many.... cars..... the highlight for me was the purple car above. its in the central hall, so i had seen it upon entering the museum already..... it was custom made in new jersey in 2008, and the back has room for a harley davidson motor (as you can see here).

the museum was about to close, but there was still time to do some lunging in front of the purple car.... :) afterwards, there was just a tiny bit of time left for shopping...... ah well, it was for tims birthday after all....

Museum square

we went out today and got to take some pictures! it was a really nice day, not cold at all and rather sunny. perfect weather for biking... 

here you see a part of the museum square in amsterdam, which was reconstructed in 1999. this should be a little pond, but i dont know why there is so little water in it right now! in winter it apparently is a skating rink? (i really dont remember ever seeing that. wikipedia just told me... ). there are 3 museums located at the museum square. right behind is the rijksmuseum (which is huge and was just reopened after having been closed for 10 years; its renovation cost just 375 million euros..), and then there are the van gogh museum, and the stedelijk museum. right in front you could see the famous "concertgebouw" (concert building, with its highly regarded acoustics), but that truck is blocking the view. buuhh...

in the usa we visited many museums for free, either because at a dedicated time and day each week there was no entrance fee, or because we could enter for free with our bank card. in the netherlands there is no free entrance, i think... but my parents gave us a "museumjaarkaart", with which you can visit most dutch museums for free (or a small fee) for an entire year (you do pay for the card, but if you go frequent enough, its more than worth it). so.... we went to the rijksmuseum! we saw a lot of interesting things, but not everything, as we can now easily go another time with the card....

Bye MFA...

today it was time to say goodbye to the museum of fine arts in boston. its one of the largest museums in the usa, and has its own subway stop named, ofcourse, "museum of fine arts". once someone put an F in front of arts, but that was quickly removed....

me and tim have visited this museum many, many times. sometimes we went for a special exhibit, sometimes just because we had nothing else to do. we always very much enjoyed it and i was a little sad walking there today for the last time (at least for now...!). dutch as we are, we never paid the steep entrance fee of 25 dollars (when we came, in 2010, it was 20), as we could go with our bank card for free every first weekend of the month, and each wednesday its free from 4 pm onwards for everyone (you can, however, make a donation. i donated some money in the gift shop today ;) ). 

the museum is gigantic and has a very wide variety of art. we would often would get lost, despite having visited it so often. there were 2 pieces i liked to visit every time we went there (also to again try to take pictures of them, never satisfied when at home), and today i said bye to them.. :) (ooh, how dramatic! ;) ). the first you see above. its from the american painter john singer sargent. i had never heard of him before, but visiting museums throughout the usa we started to recognize his paintings. they are always beautiful, and full of detail. this one is named "the daughters of edward darley boit", painted in 1882.

the ladies were sitting there and didnt move... so then i decided to include them in my picture... :)

In line

these people are waiting to eat something in the center hall of the museum of fine arts in boston. we were there a few weeks back. its always amazing to see the restaurant being entirely full, and having people wait like this. its just in this gigantic open space that connects the different parts of the museum. somehow those eaters are part of the collection too, if only for just a while.....

we never ate there and do not have the desire to ever do so... :)

MFA exhibit

currently, the mfa has a nice exhibit featuring photographs by mario testino. its his first us exhibit and shows you, in huge size as you can see here. many celebrities you will have seen before. either in some sort of fashion photoshoot, partying or in just some weird and almost unrecognizable pose. some photos are well known shots, but its cool to see them so huge in a nicely lit museum, instead of in some magazine or CD cover.

we goto the museum of fine arts (MFA) quite often. the place is so terribly big! you can easily spend hours there... but that would be just a bit too much, so its nice to go often and just look at a portion of the museum. cheapos as we are, we are not members of the museum, but we know very well when we can go for free; each first weekend of the month since we store our money at the bank of america, and... each wednesday from 4 o'clock onwards you can visit the museum "by voluntary contribution". they suggest you pay 25 dollars (the current admission price, which is pretty high, i think), but you can pay whatever you want, or nothing at all, and the museum is open till 9.45! so... thats how we came to love this museum; i cant count the times we have been here during the past 2+ years....

A sculpture

this is a huge new sculpture in the decordova museum in lincoln, not too far from boston. i cant count how often we have been here by now; its such a great museum! there is a large sculpture park, and inside the museum are ever changing exhibitions of modern art. sometimes i dont like them at all, sometimes its ok, and sometimes its great! the sculpture park is always great; the grounds are so beautiful, even without the sculptures. it used to be free entrance with your bank of america card every first weekend in the month, but not anymore, unfortunately. but now its free every first wednesday of the month, and its always free if you come by bike (how nice is that?!).

the above sculpture is named lincoln, and was made specifically for the site by dewitt godfrey. here you can read more about it, and see it from another angle; i guess we have seen it 2 or 3 times now, and with the light and all i really had a hard time taking a picture i liked. i settled for this one because of the little boy; it also shows how huge it is! (you can walk through a few of the bubbles).

this was last saturday when the weather was really great. today it was quite chilly... and this weekends forecast does not look too good, colder weather is really coming our way...

Getty center

yesterday, saturday, we drove from san diego to los angeles to visit the getty center. sylvia and me had gone there last year already, but i was so impressed that tim had to see it too! it was very bright and sunny, a perfect day for some more hours in the car... ;) 

the getty center is situated on a hill and from many balconies from the 4 (or 3?) floor building you have an incredible view of los angeles and the ocean. it was built in 1997 and cost only 1.3 billion dollars.... it is a huge museum with lots of art, but just the building itself is already very impressive. the entrance fee is just 15 dollars per car regardless of the number of people... but well... mister getty owned 2 billion dollars at the time of his death, in 1976. we went to a photo exhibition of the work from herb ritts, an american fashion photographer who often shot in black and white. his photos really made an impression on me. you can take pictures of the human body, or you can make art of it.... and that is what he did.....so, if you are around los angeles; definitely go see the museum itself, as well as the exhibition! other than that, we walked around a bit aimlessly, which is not bad at all in this museum (just frustrating that we always seem to get lost in any museum...)

above, to the right you can see tim and sylvia enjoying the view.... the view from the terrace was endless yesterday, the sky was so clear, as opposed to last year when we were there.

You decide...

this piece of art is in the de cordova museum in lincoln. a museum where we have been quite a number of times now. it has an outside sculpture park, and a museum with rotating exhibitions of modern art. the grounds are absolutely wonderful, and i am never bored there. there is "weird" stuff too. but i like weird stuff. since this year, every first wednesday of the month entrance is free, so last month we left work a few hours earlier and went to the museum.

the above is made by the american artist steve lambert (1976). as a visitor of the museum, you can, if you want to, vote whether capitalism works for you or not. as you can see, the votes are counted. currently, this work is traveling through boston, together with the artist, and people are asked to vote and i guess think more/discuss about this question through this piece (i wonder if he notes down the votes. if he sees a difference in outcome depending on where he is. i think for example harvard yard vs eeehhhmm... revere or so). glancing at his wikipedia page, the artist seems interesting. in 2006, for example, he launched "why they hate us". "this project invited users to tag photos on flickr with "whytheyhateus", acting as a display of pictures that users suggest contribute to a negative view of the United States or have the potential to be misinterpreted as negative. Some of the themes include gun violence, war, crude humor, consumerism, obesity and big government and big business". hmm, im curious to see what kind of pics are posted there. apparently they are uncensored, and anyone can post.

but... its bedtime yet again. i will check it out tomorrow!

Giant head

this is one of the 2 gigantic baby heads that are flanking the back entrance of the museum of fine arts in boston. we were there today, and as it was quite sunny and not too cold, i once again tried to picture these sculptures... one has its eyes open, and the other, above, has its eyes closed. they are bronze, and weigh  just 1.6 tons at 8 feet tall.  the sculpture is titled "night and day", and made by Antonio Lopez Garcia.

about every time that we go to this museum (and thats pretty often. although we only go when we can go for free. that is, on wednesday evenings or the first weekend of the month with our bank card), i take pictures of these heads, but im usually not very successfull. they are just sooooo big, and it is such a weird piece of art... when i saw them first i thought there was something wrong with me. i passed by in a bus and wondered if i really saw what i just saw. when i really saw them, a few weeks later, i didnt like them at all. now im not so sure anymore. for sure they are interesting! perhaps one day i will like them... (probably when i am able to photograph them in a way that i am satisfied..)

Citgo sign

i showed you the boston (in)famous citgo sign once before. here you see it from the other side, a little further away (or quite a bit, actually), but still very well visible.

i like the lamps in this street. the houses are pretty nice too, but you cannot see them here... its quite a fancy street! im rather sure its commonwealth avenue (or comm ave, as they refer to it here), but im not 100% sure. if you get out at the kenmore stop on the green line, you should visit the fancy commonwealth hotel. they always have a photo exhibit, which is for free! (and you get to see a glimpse of the hotel). we have been there now twice, and both times saw some really interesting photographs. both times there was work from harold feinstein, whom i didnt know before, but now i even bought a photobook from him for tims birthday, that is not yet published. but when it does, it will come with his signature.. :) which reminds me... i think they might have changed the exhibit at the hotel... time for another visit!

MFA evening

on wednesday nights, the museum of fine arts in boston can be entered free of charge, you only have to politely decline their request "do you want to make a donation?" (or not), and you can get lost in this enormous museum that seems to be expanding every time we visit. 

above was in the new wing of contemporary art. this piece of neon text was particularly interesting, as only in the picture you could see that the words actually have different colors. you could not see that in real, there it was just all white neonlight. i dont know how its done, but im sure it was on purpose. i forgot the name of the (danish?) artist, and could not find it back on the MFA website, so i cannot find out more about it....

we also went to the relatively new wing "art of the americas" where they had a lot of paintings from john singer sargent. this painting is in their permanent collection, and every time we go, we go see it, i like it so much! (in reality its much better than this picture of it). im not that much into "old" paintings, but his i really, really like, and im always happy to recognize one in one museum or the other. i just checked the blog of the sartorialist, and his latest post is of some lady in paris that reminds him of a living singer sargent painting. i agree!

WTC memorial

the 9/11 memorial at the WTC site opened this september. fountains have replaced the 2 towers, as you can see here. lit during the night. i took this pic from our hotel room, at 7 in the morning, new york just waking up on a sunday.... they are still working there, as you can see.

to visit the memorial, you need to reserve passes in advance, (they are free, however) specifying date, time and number of people. i tried (here), but it was booked until end of october. since we could see it from our window, that was ok. you could also stand in an enormously long line at the day you are there, to see if there are still any passes left. why isnt it just open for everyone to see? perhaps its just temporary, and they dont want this place to be overcrowded. there are 2 entrances, one for normal visitors, and one for family/friends of the victims. both require an airport-style security-check.

the two fountains have all the names of the victims engraved, also those of the attack on the WTC in 1993. here you can read more about it, also how they arranged all the names. 

on saturday, we went to the international center of photography in new york (free entrance with our bankcard!). i wanted to go there since they had an exhibition about 9/11, to mark the 10th anniversary. however, there was also an exhibition of the danish photographer peter sekaer, who photographed the usa between 1935-1945. those were really good. the professional 9/11 photos did not impress me that much. but... there was also a small room with many, many photos having something to do with that day or the WTC site itself, which were taken by "people". this was a project, i forgot the details, but they asked everyone who felt like it to send in their pictures of that day, the aftermath, or how the WTC looked before... and those were really impressive. some were really good, and many of them really sad. i didnt understand why they put those in such a cramped room....

Duck extension

this evening tim and me met at the ducks in the public garden. i could sit there everyday watch the children. its so cute, and i could prove my theory that almost each kid does the same when seeing this statue; sitting on each duck (there are 8 small ones and the mother duck; above), at least one time. and the parents do the same too; grab their cameras and take as many pictures as possible. this girl put her skirt over each duck head (the park is one of the few places without hand sanitizer). tim was worried the skirt would get stuck onto the head when she was about to jump off, but it didnt.

after that we went to the hatch shell to listen to some free classical music, but it got a little chilly so we left during the break. then we went to the cinema; we saw the help. it was sad, but also very funny at times, and i really liked it.

Glass ceiling

my dear friend wikipedia tells me that the glass ceiling refers to "the unseen, yet unbreachable barrier that keeps minorities and women from rising to the upper rungs of the corporate ladder, regardless of their qualifications or achievements." i do not necessarily think that this only applies to women, so i am happy to read that the next wiki sentence tells me that it can also refer to men.

glass ceilings can be pretty too; above you see part of a glass ceiling. its in the MFA, and belongs to the chihuly exhibit i wrote about before, we then could not get in. i actually then saw it a few weeks later, but today i went with someone who had not yet seen it. when we got to the museum i saw lots, and lots of people, that formed a line, extending from the entrance up to the sidewalk onto the back of the museum... whoops. yup, it was free entrance night today, but more importantly, the last week of the chihuly exhibit. and no, being there around 6.45 was too late to get to the exhibit, even though the museum closes at 9.45. the MFA people were smart; they were offering us the option to skip the line and get in immediately.... if.... you become a member of the museum for 75 dollars. some people did... :) we (like many others) just left when it became clear we really had no chance to get in, and had a delicious dinner instead! here you can see some more pictures. it was hard to take pics, as it was rather dark there, and the sculptures so big!

Listening stone

i did not know a title for this post, until i looked up the name of the artwork... :)

i never thought of this stoneface as listening, but it actually makes sense. it is made from granite, by joseph wheelwright. it is in the de cordova museum in lincoln, where we have been many times, by now. the park is beautiful, this time we brought a blanket and had a small pinic in between all the sculptures. the museum is nice too, and exhibitions change rather regularly.... if you come to the park by bike, entrance is free!! isnt that nice? i think in general the museums in the us (the ones we saw and that are quite some, by now), are very nice,but i think this museum is my favorite!

behind the listening stone you see another artwork; its a 1936 chrysler equipped with monitors and speakers. its named "requiem to the 20th century" by nam june paik. he is considered to be the first video artist, and his work is in collections all over the world. here is a quote from him that i like: "Our life is half natural and half technological. Half-and-half is good. You cannot deny that high-tech is progress. We need it for jobs. Yet if you make only high-tech, you make war. So we must have a strong human element to keep modesty and natural life." and this one too: "The only way to win a race is to run alone".

How cute!

this girl was enjoying the fountain at the christian science plaza today. yesyes, there was a parade for the bruins, but since everyone else was there already, we decided not to go... the girl was not shy at all, she showed us how she ran into the water, and later she asked me how old i am. she went from 20 to 42, to 36 and eventually 29. ofcourse, she knew it!! and she is 6... :)

other than that, we saw how cruel the world can be. we went to an exhibition at harvard about the holocaust. it showed how scientists, physicians and politicians joined forces to create a superior race. this was called eugenics. to stop biological degeneration, as they called it, germany was supposed to produce more fit children. i do not want to go into details; if in/around boston, you should just go to this exhibition. what amazed me was that also other countries, including the US, were into eugenics. this included sterilization of people that were deemed "inferior", as determined by observation, family genealogies, physical measurements and intelligence tests. simply look at this horrible display used by the american eugenics society in the 1920s. it shows how disgusting the human race can be, and/or is... the exhibit showed how monstrous people can become, when given power. but... why do others obey? is this a reasonable question? i guess you cannot answer this question unless you have been in that situation yourselves. is it simply altruism? i dont think so. i think people have descended from altruism into mere egoism and selfishness.

yuk.. now i really became too negative. but this exhibition was thought provoking...

on a lighter note; we went to see the movie Super 8. i loved it! every single moment of it.... and please, remain seated when you think the movie is over; it is not quite... but most americans missed that when rushing out as soon as they thought it ended (including me; only because tim was so slow we saw it till the very end!)

The family

a while ago, it must have been a first sunday of the month, we had free entrance to yet another museum. this time in new hampshire, where we went to this museum. a spacious museum with a lot of interesting things. there was an exhibit from jon brooks, a wood sculptor. im not into that at all, but it was simply beautiful (you have to check out his website!). as bonus, he himself was there and gave a presentation about his work, and signed his artbook for us! but i was too shy to ask for a picture.

so.. above something else we saw there, and that i liked. this artwork is called the family, by marisol escobar. it is a comment on "the families of the 60s". mom is dressed stylishly (the gloves, the hat etc), her husband, and 4 children. it featured as the cover of time magazine in 1970, when they had an article about the "crisis of the american family". i just searched for it and could perfectly find it back online (hooray for the internet!!), here the quote with which they start the article: "Students in rebellion, the young people living in communes, unmarried couples living together call into question the very meaning and structure of the stable family unit as our society has known it." The family, says California Psychologist Richard Parson, "is now often without function. It is no longer necessarily the basic unit in our society." click here for the entire article!

time magazine is smart, as soon as i found the article, a window popped up, offering me a yearlong subscription for their weekly magazine for only 30 dollars! now thats a deal..... and i anyways should learn more about the us of a, no?

Downtown Dallas

on saturday we went to Dallas, Texas. it was hot, hot, hot! i guess it was over 35 degrees, not a cloud in the sky, and we had an afternoon to check out dallas... we first went to the dallas museum of art, which had free entrance (jeejjj!), and was very big and pretty. as all american museums we visited so far; they all are spacious, architecturally interesting, and with a lot of european art. they all have quite some dutch painters, a rodin or 2 (this one had even more), some monets.... then some ancient art, and some contemporary art. we always get lost and dont understand the walkway and/or the map of the museum... but its always very enjoyable (and usually free; or at least on the day we choose to go.. ;) )

after that we decided to walk the streets of dallas. that was pretty toasty! the streets were deserted, on a saturday afternoon! and we could not find any shops... so that was kind of disappointing...

Staten island

ok... back to new york... :)

this time we took the staten island ferry! its always nice to see the skyline of a city from the water, and even better if you dont have to pay for it. and... the staten island ferry is free! it goes very frequent and provides you with a 30 minute ride during which you can try every setting on your camera to get the best picture... if still not satisfied, there is still the way back to manhattan... :D

when on staten island we didnt see anything in the immediate vicinity of the terminal that could entertain us, aside from an au bon pain to get some food, so we went straight back.... the ferry is huge! and its also good to have an hour rest from all the walking through new york while just enjoying the view of manhattan, ellis island and the statue of liberty....

above you see another staten island ferry (i like that they are yellow... :) ), to the left you see new jersey, with their tallest (and my favorite) building; the hackensack building, and to the right manhattan...

In line

we went to the MFA today, since it was the first weekend of the month, we had free entrance with our bank of america debit card. the line at the front entrance was sooo long, so we thought we were clever and went to the back entrance; but as long a line as the front entrance. it was mother's day, so mothers were apparently dragged to the museum en masse...

ah, and there was a new exhibit, chihuly, the reason we went there; glass art. however, if you wanted to see that, it meant waiting in line for 2 hours, and by that time the museum was about to close. so went to see a photo exhibition instead. the only glass art was this green icicle tower, of which you see only a little bit, i was more fascinated by the girl's fascination...