Truth-Telling in Poetry and Art: The Horrors of War and Human Complacency
I read a brilliant piece in The New York Times this morning about how suffering hides in plain sight. The …
Category Archives: Culture
“Isn’t It a Pity,” A Fitting Duet for MLK Day
If you’ve never heard Nina Simone’s version of George Harrison’s song “Isn’t it a Pity,” I can’t think of a …
The Radical Humanism in Alice Neel’s Artwork
I knew nothing of Alice Neel or her artwork until I came across a retrospective of her at the MET …
Spinning Tales, It’s in our Bones
Story-telling is in our bones. It rises through us like sap through roots and leaves into the air. It began …
O Holy Night
The single-most, salient symbol of Christmas, for me, is a shining star in the night sky. It’s what wakened the …
Albert Ryder, A Wild Note of Longing
He’s considered by many the father of American modern art, and yet I’d never heard of him until visiting the …
Satie’s Gnossienne, Forking Paths, and Time’s Ever Presence
Time-travelling—that’s what it feels like when listening to Erik Satie’s Gnossienne. When I close my eyes and let the music …
Titian in a Venetian Palace in Downtown Boston, Or Lost in Time and Space
That’s how I felt visiting the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum when visiting Boston a few weeks ago. I went to …
Multiple Layers of Reality in Film, and in Us
In several of his films, Ingmar Bergman plays with the notion of multiple layers of reality. This can be seen …
Chopin’s Nocturnes Tinkling the Keys of Consciousness
I spent Sunday morning in bed with my coffee listening to Chopin’s complete nocturnes playing on my phone beside me. …
