September 20, 2010

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Quote of the Day
Let him that would move the world first move himself.
Socrates

Image ... The Mansard Roof. Edward Hopper, 1923. The Brooklyn Museum, New York.

August 16, 2010

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Quote of the Day
There are many men of principle in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle.

Image ... Sketch for painting Cape Cod Evening. Edward Hopper.

August 10, 2010

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Edward Hopper met his wife, Josephine Nivison, during a painting trip to Gloucester. She later remarked about her reclusive husband ...

Sometimes talking to Eddie is just like dropping a stone in a well, except that it doesn’t thump when it hits bottom.

Woth her help the watercolors he made in Gloucester became the turning point in his career in 1928 when he was in his early 40's.

Hopper later remarked about his central passion in painting ...

Maybe I am not very human - what I wanted to do was to paint sunlight on the side of a house.

Clearly he's done that here, along with sunlight on sails and over the city. His self-assessment is probably accurate from what I've heard.

Late night sounds. Crickets. Gun shots. Baseline hum of the city. Motorcycles. Distant voices. Two more gunshots, closer by. Far off siren. Cat sex. Jet sweep. Passing car. Crickets. Late city sounds.

Look out girl the saints are coming through. Tap of rain on the tree leaves. Email from a friend. Shadows on the wall. The dark sacred night, as Louis says. And he knows.

Quote of the Day
Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.
Dalai Lama

Image ... Gloucester Harbor. Edward Hopper.
Click on image for a larger view.

August 4, 2010

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I only recently discovered this Hopper painting. It's certainly never shown as one of his canonical works - which snyway I think are the weakest, or maybe over-familiarity breeds blindness - but it may be one of my favorites. Nice and simple, suggestive. You can project on it as you will, make it your own. The modern method. Maximal minimalism.

Well, I've always been interested in approaching a big city in a train, and I can't exactly describe the sensations, but they're entirely human and perhaps have nothing to do with aesthetics.

No northern lights last night. Overcast sky. Not sure we'd see them over city lights anyway. I haven't seen them since I was a kid, but I do remember the time. And the Milky Way, I can't even recall. Venus has been blazing bright recently, seeming to pull the moon across the sky.

Hot and humid, in the 90's, SW wind. Biked back and forth and worked outdoors all day though and felt fine. On Beacon Hill again renovating a backyard garden.

Visited mine in the early morning, read and watered. Things have gone wild, as they often do at this time of year. Many tomatoes. Collards have all filled back in after their recent scalping. The grapes can now be popped between two fingers. Cicadas chorusing.

In the evening a low, revealing, lemon colored light. Complex shadows flickering on the wall mapped on a fine grid cast by the window screen. Wind chimes playing their pleasant aleatory melodies together - tubular metal, bamboo and sea shells.

Quote of the Day
The less you know, the more you believe.
Bono

Approaching a City. Edward Hopper, 1946.

July 10, 2010

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Image ... Summer Interior. Edward Hopper, 1908.

February 26, 2010

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Worked on Dr. King in Boston. Writing about the Dialectical Society, the informal group of fellow black graduate students interested in philosophy and religion, that ML founded and continued throughout his three years at B.U. Organized the reference books, thanks to a pad of PostIt notes that Charles gave me. Went through the King file, organized and read all new material. Cleaned up MLK notes in laptop notebook (Personal Organizer, a great if rather unlovely app), which I'm going to use for all research now. I feel on top of things now, finally in control of this project. An article which it looks like will turn into a book.

A day of in/out sun and on/off rain. Watering my plants. The office is so dry. Remembering they need to be misted and a fan run part of the day to circulate air around them. Need to find a spray bottle.

The police caught the two hood rats who murdered the convenience store clerk at Hermanos Unidos on Sunday and they were arraigned in Roxbury District Court yesterday. The punks, 16 and 17, live(d) only a few blocks away on Hartford Street. Just what I suspected. I knew they were from the nabe. The DA says he will prosecute them as adults. An anonymous tip, a call from one of their mothers voicing her suspicions and the unusual immediate use of a grand jury broke the case wide open with almost unprecedented speed. Everyone's breathing a big sigh of relief, especially the merchants on Dudley Street, at least according to one shopkeeper I spoke with.

Image ... House Tops. Edward Hopper.