The Eiffel To

I've seen these pictures before, usually in some dorm room poster format, but I ran across them a few days ago and it got me thinking about how iconic the Eiffel Tower has become, and thus how strange it looks unfinished. It's also funny it is that the Eiffel Tower is never challenged these days. There aren't many people walking around say, "Gah, that Eiffel Tower really gets me down."

In fact, it's become a strange symbol for girlishness and romance, usually set against a pale pink background (at least in the states). It's a common Prom theme. This is strange.

Eiffel, an engineer, saw the work as an exercise in a new material--iron--and an example of well-executed craftsmanship.

Roland Barthes, a philosopher and all around badass, mocked the tower as a failure in his "The Eiffel Tower and Other Mythologies." He comments,

"Eiffel saw his Tower in the form of a serious object, rational, useful; men return it to him in the form of a great baroque dream which quite naturally touches on the borders of the irrational ... architecture is always dream and function, expression of a utopia and instrument of a convenience.”

Construction photos by Théophile Féau from 1887-1889

 Ah, Barthes. Eiffel made a building without walls. It can't count as architecture--it certainly wouldn't pass a building code. And yet, it became the tallest building in the world. It can't be sculpture--too huge, too different from the marble sculpture that still dominated the sculptural scene. It's not a monument, like the Statue of Liberty created a few years earlier--what does it symbolize? What is it then? It's useless.

That's one definition of art: useless.

It seems that this rational engineer who set out to build the world's tallest structure, made of new and completely exposed metals, gave Parisians, instead, a new orientation. The tower could be seen from all over Paris, and standing atop the tower allowed for a new view of their city--a sweeping, all encompassing, and universalizing view. I say universalizing, since when people are reduced to specks on the streets they are reduced to their essence, their simple humanity. Now that is why the Eiffel Tower is romantic.
 

 

Some Parisians hated it, Guy de Maupassant, an author, used to eat at the restaurant every day, because he claimed it was the only place in the city where you couldn't see the tower. Seems like Barthes was right, though; instead of acting as a exercise in rationality for the 1889 World's Fair that would be dismantled at it's close, it gave the 19th Century Parisians a new way of seeing their city and each other. I guess that's an ok Prom theme. It just needs a subtitle. "Paris: Seeing Your Classmates in a New Way, like Nineteenth Century Parisians did During the 1889 World's Fair."

When I visited Paris a few years (that long!) ago, I was blown away by the tower. See? I'm literally falling over. That jacket is still in France...somewhere.

I left visiting it until my last day in the city, since I thought something that had become such a strange symbol had to be a cheesy tourist fest. And it was. Then the tower started sparkling, and I shut up. Good mistake, Eiffel.  Here's my video from that day:

Downsides and Upsides

First downsides:

About a half an hour after class today, I went to the bathroom.

Good story, eh?

Anyway, there was somebody crying in one of the stalls. Crying a lot. This had never happened to me before, although I know that girls are supposed to do this all the time especially if they were killed by Voldemort.

I've encountered crying in practice rooms (music majors, you know?), lots of dorm room crying, booth for two crying (I once waited on a couple that were breaking up at Marie Callendars, they were both crying into their chicken pot pies...), but that's about it. I thought there might be something really wrong, so I asked if I could help or if I could get anyone and a little voice just said, "It's nothing; got a bad grade on the midterm and now I failed a quiz."

And then I quickly ran out of the bathroom before she could open the door and see me, the one with the red pen.

So that's the downside of teaching. Also, the Jazz keep hurting my feelings.

Upsides:

Since I've always been a glass-with-an-average-quantity-of-water person, I thought I would balance this post out by declaring that I made rosemary, ricotta gnocchi, and thus am the best.

Check it out, this blog rocks. I even froze some, although I probably could have eaten it all. I added rosemary, because I'm totally hardcore. Also I wore my apron that my mom made me, so I'm the coolest. Here's a picture of said apron from a few years ago, when I had very long hair and...a stiff neck (?).

DOMESTIC GODDESS -->

Pandas vs. Girl Scouts

My super cool boyfriend sent me some chocolate today. It's not just any chocolate, it's has more stamps on it than a VW van--fair trade, wrapper made from recycled paper, cruelty free, and--get this--ten percent of the sales go toward helping endangered species. Link here. There was a little slip in the box that says "look for our sales representatives at local grocery stores in the month of February."

Now, Girls Scout also stake out local grocery stores in the month of February. I should know, because I haven't been able to find any of them. Why are the Girl Scouts hiding from me? I want some Thin Mints. If I could just get a little one on her own, far from the pack...

Anyway the combination of thinking about girl scout cookies and endangered species chocolate led to an incredible image, which ended up being my favorite part of the present. I've recreated it below.

PS- check out this old commercial from the girl scout's website.

Chocolate Covered Bananagrams

It's Valentines Day in Spokane. Well, it is for us.Yesterday we went on a foggy, snowy hike and watched Moose race around. Moose tracks--everywhere. We got slightly lost, but while lost we saw a white-tailed deer which was very exotic for me. We also met two parties of hikers who were pretty cool. We couldn't believe there were only a few people on the hike (which is only five minutes from Spokane) on a Saturday...too busy doing meth I guess. Sometimes I feel bad about my life, and then I remember that I'm not addicted to meth.

Wow. That took a turn. Let's move on, shall we?

I forgot my camera, so I've documented our dinner instead of the pretty hike.

Note: I won Bananagrams.

Now we're watching Sleepless in Seattle or what Michael calls "my childhood." It's true, his mom really does look like Meg Ryan and this movie was a staple."Hoarses, hoarses, hoarses..."

Gah, we're so romantic.

Skirting Responsibilities

I maybe should be doing art history or pushups or something like that, but I'm taking a break from my day to brag about my skirt.

Check it:

There are two things I've learned from this exercise: I really have to work on my posing; I should start an early morning fashion blog.

Oh, did I mention that my mom made this skirt? With. Yarn.

Yeah, I don't blame you for being jealous.

Having a Bad Day?

I have no right to be laughing so much, while hanging out by myself grading papers, but seriously Bollywood gets me every time. My Uncle Dean, who's been to India a few times himself, sent me a whole case of Bollywood movies when I was in college and I made my roommates watch them all (Bollywood=extreme bonding).
I have this incredible fondness for them, mixed with thinking they're the most over-the-top things I've ever seen. I think it boils down to this: these movies are ridiculous...and I really want to be in one. They should have live productions of this stuff.

This clip doesn't have subtitles, but it's pretty much "Someday my Prince Will Come." There are so many things to look out for--astro turf, gokarts, precocious couch-jumping. My favorite moment comes at 2:32. I'm going to go watch it again.

You're welcome.

Just in Case

I promise that I'll start writing about my own life at some point in the near future, but lately all I've been thinking about on my walks home (which is when I connect with my inner-blog) is art history. It's lame and wonderful. The class that I'm helping out with the term continues to inspire me.

I want you, mom (since she may be the only person reading my blog) to guess who painted this. It's called First Communion from 1895.

Did you guess Picasso? Probably not.

Now guess how old he was when he painted it.

Did you guess fourteen? Probably not.

Did you see the detail on the carpet? Wowza.

I threw this up here, just in case anyone thought he was making "mistakes" in his later work.

Pablo Picasso, Dora Maar, 1937, Oil on Canvas

I'll take jaggedy portraits of Picasso's super cool photographer wife over first communions any day. I should probably mention that a similar portrait Dora Maar au Chat sold for about $100 million a few years ago. Art Historians never talk about money, but I secretly Google it all the time.

PS-I really think whoever bought Dora Maar au Chat is probably sitting alone in a room in a large velvet chair across from the painting, drinking brandy, and occasionally tossing piles of gold coins in the air.

Degas and Other Musings (that's the only possible title for this post)

Edward Degas (1834-1917)

Seated Violinist, 1977, oil on canvas

Edward Degas (1834-1917)

Ballerina in Blue, date unknown, oil on canvas

Jules Joseph Lefebvre (1836–1911)
Young Woman with Morning Glories in Her Hair, 1870, oil on canvas

Degas was a rebel. Isn't that funny? I'll never get over how fun it is to be a Modernist. It's called MODERN art, because it was so revolutionary and well, edgy. But now everyone has calendars of little French prostitutes skipping about and multicolored haystacks and their neighbors don't accuse them of Anarchy. How could waterlilies have been so subversive? I love it when someone tells me that they don't like Modern art--I get to have a little moment in my head when I say "Oh yeah, Monet really rubs you wrong?"

Degas was, in fact, a double rebel, because he defied the French Academie, who liked paintings like this one on the right -->
by Lefebvre (obviously chosen by men, while they smoked cigars and congratulated each other on their impressively large...fortunes.).

Claude Monet (1841-1926)
  Boulevard des Capucines, 1873, oil on canvas

 
 But, Degas also went against his buds, like Monet, Manet and Tippy-Tippy-Day-Day by returning to the figure. Most Impressionists, although they had very diverse subject matter, avoided figures except at a distance, like the image on the left, which is only about two feet wide.  Some of my favorite Impressionist paintings are the anomalies that have figures in them (like Monet's Girl with the Red Kerchief). Note: Please do not talk about the impressive work of Tippy-Tippy-Day-Day, that's a Seinfeild reference. I've promised myself, though, that if any student writes it (or "TTDD" for short) on a test, I'll give them bonus points.

Claude Monet (1841-1926)
Impression Sunrise, 1872, oil on canvas

I really enjoy abstract works (that is what I focus on when I do research) and even the occasional landscape, but I find portraits and other figural works the most captivating when I'm in museums. That's why I like Degas, I think.

I'm not a quote person. Some people are always throwing them up on facebook, buying diaries that have quote for each day, or putting them on their walls and such. I recently heard of a person (thank you Jackson) who puts their own quotes on their walls. Hmmmm....not so sure about that. Anyway, I like this quote from Degas, who didn't quite buy into the oft-taught-in-Art History 1010 tenants of Impressionism, such as interest in light on landscape, the new infusion of steam into the atmosphere of the city, and the idea that everything must be fundamentally new and unplanned. He says:

No art was ever less spontaneous than mine. What I do is the result of reflection and study of the great masters; of inspiration, spontaneity, temperament, I know nothing. 

 

Edward Degas (1834-1917)

Blue Dancers, 1989, oil on canvas

I've been studying (and thus getting really tired of) a lot of Abstract Expressionists who adopted the romantic idea of spontaneity and carefully. slowly. put it into practice over several years. I'm getting tired of fighting the idea that artists receive a bolt of genius, strip naked and start throwing paint at one another...although that does sound fun.  I think Degas had it about right.

I might also be hanging out with a young man (*cough* Michael) who has to write a thesis, but is struggling (even though he has a macbook--isn't it true that if you buy a mac, you'll be able to write the next, great American novel?) and thus, has to work on it everyday. But, hey, looks like all Tim Tebow has to do to be good at football is pray (not play football his whole life). Maybe if Michael just struck that pose between paragraphs everything would work out. 

Or, maybe this is what really happened:

Just watch for Gandalf Michael. 

I bet you didn't think this post was going to end with a picture of Gandalf and Tim Tebow, did you? I'm a multifaceted blogger.

Moose Met a French Moose

Today, Michael and I drove up to Coeur d'Alene. We visited a few art galleries in town and drove around the lake. I was very pretty, albeit very cold and very covered in dead fish.

 Moose is there, but it looks more like Michael's wearing a skirt. 

 Michael wonders why any settlers, upon seeing Coeur d'Alene, would continue on to Spokane. I tried to argue that early Spokanians didn't have a meth problem, like most of them do now, but after seeing Coeur d'Alene, I agree with him--it's beautiful and I kind of wish he lived there instead. We did avoid the turn off to the white suprematist camp, however.

We also saw a bald eagle, which made me wish I had a better camera. Really though, look how great this picture could be:

 Can you see the eagle in flight?

Suddenly! We noticed that Coeur d'Alene has a kind of film theme: MOOSE. So, we spent the rest of the day introducing Moose to moose.

Puppet Shows

This year, my dad and I built a puppet show theater and my mom made a curtain to give to Michael's nieces and nephews. I blame Pinterest for the idea.

I suppose I should say that my parents built a puppet show theater and I stood next to them being supportive. I did do a fair bit of sanding and occasionally asked to try different kinds of saws.

Shopping for the curtain was kind of frustrating though. Why is it so difficult to find gender neutral fabric? It seemed like everything was pink and sparkly or covered in transformers. And people say gender isn't constructed...

It reminded me of this video.

This little girl seems a little coached if you ask me, but I appreciate the sentiment. However, I read an article a while ago about a few families who gave their children gender ambiguous names, like "Sky" or "Fruitloop," and refused to tell friends and family the sex of their child. What do they do in public restrooms--use both men's and women's bathrooms equally? If their trying to mess up their kids in a creative way, then I bet they'll succeed. Alright, I made up the name "Fruitloop," but I kind of like it.

Anyway, puppet shows.

Here's the kids opening puppets and discovering the wooden stage. I'm the coolest fake aunt.

Ho, Ho, Home

Here it comes, the Christmas blog post. There are still plenty of games to be played, mountains to be snowshoed (if we could get some snow), and more family on the way, but here's the first week of Christmasness.

We went hiking with Michael's parents and the pups. It felt amazing to get out of the inversion for a little while. Personally, I think the inversion (or what the weather men euphemistically call "Haze")is the worst part about Utah. I was embarrassed when I flew in from New York, because I was sitting next to a guy from the South who'd never been to Salt Lake before. I was feeling sort of ambassadorial and telling him about the lights downtown and Park City's Main Street, the snow (I even mentioned the Winter Olympics which means the department of tourism should probably hire me)...and then we flew into a giant bog. I think I need to hire Yoda to Jedi the city out of the scummy swamp that is the inversion. See:

At least it's gone now. Get away, scum.

Moose looks fine, but Michael really flopped on this one. 

If you look closely you can see a Moose Dog wobbling around.

We fetched the tree, and decorated it. 

This tree selection might be a bit staged, since we all know Laura didn't really help carry the tree. Neither did I, but...

 We also decorated the dogs.

I took Michael out for his birthday. Those poor people with December birthdays have to share the spotlight with Christmas trees and such (and poor people who date people who were born in December and therefore have to come up with two presents in two weeks).

We went on another hike with my Dad and Michael's mom on Christmas Eve. Moose...struggled. He got lost a bit on the trail, which caused Michael to have a mild panic attack and start running up a mountain. He also totally embarrassed himself in front of Rusty and the Charlie, a dog we're babysitting, by facing the wrong way in the car. Hey, Moose, over here!

Don't Charlie and Rusty look disgusted?

I love winter hiking, with our trusty Rusty scouting out the way. In this picture Rusty is thinking, "Well, Moose is lost again. Can we please keep going up the trail." I'm realizing how much of my blog is now devoted to dogs and doggly activities. Hmmm, maybe I should just start Rusty his own blog. "Today I taught Moose how to check for ticks and stole a Cheeto from under the couch. xoxo -Rusty"

Christmas was great we opened presents, and visited all our families. We even got to Skype with Michael's little brother who's in England on an LDS mission. He's been gone for about five months, but he has an accent now. We spent the first few minutes of the phone call giggling at his "posh" new way of speaking. The people he was with kept laughing whenever he said "pants" instead of "trousers" since pants means underwear. Can't wait till he gets home, so we can make him say things like "Happy Christmas, Harry" and "I say, governor! Bang up job, that."

My parents got watches and then turned into fabulous watch models.  

 

 Moose got a studly new backpack. He ran right over to show Dad and Grandma Becky.

I got Michael a tennis racket, and he turned into a creative way to block other people out of pictures. Apparently Becky got replaced by Wilson. He got me a GPS, which is really a "let's not fight when we're lost in the car" present.

Laura got scarfed.

Tonight we went down to see the lights at Temple Square. My Aunt Barb and Uncle Dean hadn't been in a long time and Michael's family came too.

 I would like to point out what an extreme accomplishment it is to have a picture with no people in it. You'd need an solid offensive line blocking for you to accomplish that in a more popular spot.

Don't worry, he didn't propose, although bachelors were dropping like flies all around us.

Well, hope all your holidays are going well. I'm just happy that my break isn't over yet--I'm off to obliterate Michael even with his new tennis racket.