Andare, Partire, Tornare

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Bite me, impressionists

So, yesterday night. Yesterday, which was a day of rain, and coolness, and open windows with cross-ventilation, apparently induced me to do something I haven't been doing enough recently. I slept. I was *supposed* to be only having a nap, and I plopped into bed at about six pm. And aside from a couple of potty breaks, I stayed in bed until my alarm went off at seven the next morning. Thirteen hours of blissful sleep, baby. And it felt goooood.

Today, I took care of a few odds and ends, and then went with my co-worker, FlirtyFeminist, to the Corcoran to see a show on Sienese paintings from the 11th to 13th century, all dealing with banking and financial matters (in some cases, the subject was religious, but they were painted on the wooden bookcovers of financial records). I was oohing and aahing, and also complaining that there probably wouldn't be any postcards of these beautiful works of art. FlirtyFeminist agreed, and said with disgust, "They always have postcards of Impressionist works. Your luck, they'll have one of these paintings redone as an Impressionist work and sold as a postcard!" I grumbled in response. We both have a certain grudge against Impressionism - not me so much as her, although we both share the jaded museum professional's distaste in the public's overwhelming lust for Impressionist art in the face of less strenuous, less "pretty" works. Anyway. We wander into the gift shop. Sure enough, the Jackie O section has a huge wall to itself (I'll rant about that exhibit later, if I remember to), the Gilded Cage exhibit has a middle table stocked with stuff, and the Sienese painting section had - three books and two postcards, displayed on the same counter as the cash register. One postcard was of a Corcoran triptych that is one of their big ticket pieces, so they had that anyway. The second postcard? AN IMPRESSIONIST VIEW OF SIENA. I nearly had a seizure in the middle of the gift shop. I'm afraid I ranted, loudly. A whole show with gorgeous medieval images, and the best they can do is one nice postcard and ONE PIECE OF CRAP IMPRESSIONIST POSTCARD. I was so disillusioned. Well, I'm pretty disillusioned anyway, but this didn't friggin help.

Just so you know my views on the Jackie Kennedy exhibit: it fucking sucks. (no, don't hold back, how do you really feel?) It's one of the worst examples of a blockbuster show, all sparkle, no substance. (or, as they say in Texas, "big hat, no cattle.") The show could be a lot of things. It could discuss the role of the first lady as a trend-setter. They could discuss her love of French fashion and how it affected American fashion houses. They could have done a lot with it. But the show can be summed up this way: Jackie Kennedy sure was pretty. She wore pretty dresses. Here are the pretty dresses she wore, and photos of her looking pretty in them. Wow, I learned soooo much, didn't you? Jesus.

Cherbear leaves for Oxford on Sept. three. Wahhhhh....I wanna go to Oxford, damnit. *sniff*

7:01 p.m. - 2002-08-29

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