Came across this pretty little garden, planted in honor of One Boston Day (April 15). Love observing these little reminders of the resilience of this beautiful city. – plus I can’t resist a hydrangea.
Tag: Boston
bits of inspiration – #10.
Signs of spring..
bits of inspiration – #9.
Seen in Boston this morning.
On a related note, this trailer for the Boston Marathon documentary looks amazing.
bits of inspiration – #3.
Always inspired by my city, even when heading out for a few days. 
bits of inspiration – #1.
The current wave of January-esque weather around Boston has left me feeling a little irritable the past few days. It’s frustrating when something totally out of your control can have such a negative impact on your mood, especially when I know that I have plenty for which to be really grateful. In an effort to boost my own spirits and practice some mindfulness, I’m committing to posting one image per day (either my own or found) that inspires some joy for me. For now, I’m calling these bits of inspiration.
The first of these is a photo I took yesterday while leaving my apartment. I look up to take in this view everyday and there’s something about the relationship of these buildings and the reflection of the greater city-scape that I never get tired of seeing. Even on a chilly day in April Boston is beautiful!
#techstyle at the MFA.
On Sunday I visited the Museum of Fine Arts for the opening of it’s newest contemporary exhibit, #techstyle. The exhibit explores technology’s influence on fashion design and was really remarkable to see. Several works were intended as performance art while others addressed the issue of waste and sustainability by utilizing repurposed materials. I was especially drawn to a number of pieces that had been created using 3-D printers.
The show runs through July 10 and I would highly recommend seeing it. Below are some photos I took during my visit. Enjoy!
Incertitudes shirt and shorts, Ying Gao
MFA Dress, CuteCircuit
Solar Dress, Pauline Van Dongen
Anthozoa Cape and Skirt, Iris van Herpen and Neri Oxman
Kinematics 8 dress, Jessica Rosenkrantz
Molecule shoes, Francis Bitoni
Wearable Drawings; leather jacket, Elvira ‘t Hart
Ensemble, Noa Raviv
Metallic Leather Fringe Dress, Giles Deacon
Engineered Reptile Print dress. Sally LaPointe
Wearable Art, Viktor&Rolf Haute Couture
SoWa holiday market.
On Sunday I visited the SoWa Holiday Market for the first time. Although I’d heard good things I arrived with pretty low expectations. I’ve been to other holiday craft markets and was envisioning a collection of kind of chotchkie ornaments and snow globes. I have to say that I was SO pleasantly surprised by the quality of really everything at this market. I was actually overwhelmed by how many things I loved and wanted. I kept myself in check and only made two purchases but the damage could have been much worse. Here are just a sampling of the photos I took.
and then the food…
My two purchased items:
a screenprint on vintage newspaper by Nate Murrell
and some gourmet hot chocolate by Yummy Mummy Brownies.
the arcs at the orpheum theater.
“I was born to love her, everybody knows
Just the way it is, just the way it goes
She’s a cold companion, like a desert rose
The worse it is, the more she glows”
-The Arcs, Cold Companion
Earlier this year I posted a brief list of albums I was enjoying. The list included “Yours Dreamily“, the first studio album by The Arcs. For those unfamiliar, Arcs is a rock band created as a side project from The Black Keys guitarist and prolific producer of incredible music, Dan Auerbach. I had learned about a month ago that The Arcs would be performing at The Orpheum Theater in Boston in December. Having just racked up a hefty credit card debt buying Christmas presents I thought I might have to sit this one out and try to catch them the next time around. Out of curiosity this week I decided to see if ticket prices had dropped at all and turns out they had had! I came across two 3rd row orchestra seats for $18 each on SeatGeek. I convinced myself that it was a sign from the universe that I was meant to see this show and bought the tickets.
The Arcs is a relatively new band and the show was not heavily promoted but this deal still seemed pretty insane considering The Black Keys have sold out TD Garden (about 17K people capacity). I was only about 60% sure that the tickets weren’t counterfeit but to my relief they scanned and we were let in and ushered to the best seats I’ve ever had at a concert.
The show was really incredible. Dan Auerbach seems like a mad scientist having an out-of-body experience when he’s performing. I have seen The Black Keys in concert before but being this close to the musicians was a totally different experience. There was some trippy projected lighting and a few potted plants on stage but otherwise the set was really simple and low-tech. The paired down set felt really fitting to this band that seems solely committed to just making authentically great music free of any other frivolity.
Below are some photos I took throughout the show. Enjoy!
Had to shout out the beauty that is the Orpheum Theater. Like a lot of theaters in Boston it is really old (1852) and could use a little love in places (the seats) but still.. such a beautiful space to see a show.
Now onto the concert
Back-up vocals and instrumentals are provided by Julie Justine Acosta, Mireya Ramos and Shae Fiol, three members of the all-female mariachi group Flor de Toloache. I spent at least half of the concert just watching them because they were so talented and seemed like they were having the most fun.
leap before you look – a visit to the ICA.
“Instead of art I have taught philosophy. Though technique for me is a big word, I never have taught how to paint. All my doing was to make people to see.”
-Josef Albers
On Sunday I spent the afternoon with my mom at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, viewing their latest exhibit “Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933-1957”. Years ago I worked at the ICA – first as a visitor’s services assistant (gallery monitor) and later selling tickets at the front desk. Despite the lower back pain I experienced from standing on a concrete floor for 8 hours at a time, the ICA is still a special place for me and their latest exhibit did not disappoint.
Leap Before You Look presents the history and the work created at Black Mountain College during the school’s 24-year lifespan. I’m not going to get into a detailed review of the show because The Boston Globe and The New Yorker have already done so better than I can. I will give a little context though. Black Mountain College was founded by Andrew Rice in 1933 and was not, in fact, an art school – but rather a liberal arts college which placed art at the center of its’ curriculum. The school was headed by Josef Albers and ultimately produced many of the most influential artists of post-war America.
As I made my way through the show, I was struck by the number of famous names I recognized from my own study of art and art history (Josef & Anni Albers, Robert Rauschenberg, John Cage, Merce Cunningham, Willem & Elaine de Kooning, Robert Motherwell and Susan Weil to name just a few). While many of the works in the exhibit read as finished pieces by established artists, others have the distinct feel of being a student project. The pieces range from painting to sculpture to poetry to dance and everything seems to reflect the free-form spirit of the institution itself.
Below are a few pictures I took during my visit (back when I worked at the ICA, visitors weren’t allowed to photograph any on-loan artwork but luckily they’ve relaxed this policy). The exhibit runs through January 24 and I absolutely encourage anyone and everyone to visit. The museum is free on Thursday evenings from 5-9pm!
Josef Albers, Multiplex
Josef Albers, Encircled
This was a color study that Josef Albers required his students to perform. As an undergraduate studio art major I had to complete a similar assignment. As I mentioned this to my mom while viewing the piece, a woman next to us said to her friend “they’re still doing this in art school!”
Josef Albers, Variants
Ruth Asawa, Untitled Sculpture
Ilya Bolotowsky, Upright in Gold and Violet
Pat Passlof, Yardstick
Franz Kline, Painting, 1952
Susan Weil, Secrets
Stan VanDerBeek, A Book of Ours
Come for the art, stay for the view.
south end flower boxes.
My mom is really good at gardening. Just about every time I visit my parents (which is really often) she has a new plant or two and they’re always thriving. It seems though, that a “green thumb” is not a genetic trait since I genuinely cannot keep a plant alive. I’ve made a habit of keeping cut flowers in my apartment because I really do love the energy they add to a space. Even though I no longer try to keep my own live flowers in my home, I am fortunate to live in a neighborhood full of beautiful urban gardens, maintained by those people who don’t kill everything they plant. Because we’re in the city, front lawns are few and far between but flower boxes are really really prevalent.
Over the past weekend I took advantage of what may have been one of the last really mild days and walked around my neighborhood documenting the flower boxes that I saw and liked. I am so envious of these people who are able to enjoy these beautiful little mini-gardens adorning their homes. To numb the pain I also stopped for snacks.
obligatory foliage pic to start the afternoon.
now on to the flower boxes…
the flowers pictured below belong to Mike & Patty’s in the Bay Village. I stopped here for a sandwhich and you should too because it was amazing! pro tip: call ahead to order.
walking is exhausting so I also stopped here for a coffee and a macaron. both were great.
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