Fun NY weekend ahead! Tonight is a world premier ballet at the New York City Ballet (the last premier of this season’s Diamond Project of new ballets by contemporary choreographers). (I’m going to have SO much more free time when the NYCB and ABT seasons are both over in mid-July…)
Tomorrow is The Affordable Art Fair in Chelsea, which I’ve never been to, but looks exciting. Art priced between $100 and $5000 is being sold and there are going to be lectures on how poor people (like me!) can start their collections. My favorite gallery, DFN Gallery, is going to have a booth, and, according to their email, is going to be selling work by one of my favorites who regularly exhibits there, Dan Witz. I see Witz as someone who kind of turns Thomas Kincade (the “artist of light” with his cheesy nostalgia for quaint cottages, horse-drawn carriages and tourist landmarks) on his head. Witz uses light in his paintings (which are amazingly photo-like) to evoke shelter and community in urban settings. In one of my favorites of his, the light radiates out from the inside of a Brooklyn bodega on an otherwise desolate streetcorner late at night, signifying that inside is a place of warmth, safety, familiarity, and community. I have no idea how much any of his work is going for, but I took a post-card sized copy of that painting on the back of the press release from the gallery, framed it, and hung it in my apartment. So, thus far that is my idea of affordable art — extremely affordable seeing as how it’s free!
And Sunday, Father’s Day though it is, I’ve managed to get some friends together to go to a Brazilian restaurant to watch the game. Not exactly the Brazilian place I had in mind — which was in Astoria, where I used to live, and I figured out of the way enough that it would only attract locals and not tourists — but some of my friends are coming from Brooklyn, so it’s too much to ask them to go all the way up to Queens. So, we’re going to one of the Sushi Samba places in the Flatiron District. I know absolutely nothing of soccer, but because studying dance made me fall so in love with Samba, I’ve became intrigued by all things Brazilian. So, me and my crazy friends who humor me, are going to root for Brazil! Since I know nothing about the game, I figured I’d go buy that new book The Thinking Fan’s Guide. It was not very well received in Time Out New York, but that reviewer did give a thumbs up to the guy who wrote the piece on Brazil, as well as to Nick Hornby, my favorite author of lad lit, bloke lit, whatever they call it in England (actually, it’s really chick lit since it garners almost an all-female audience…). Hopefully by Sunday I’ll have some clue as to what I’m seeing…
