Doug arranged that we go into London to meet a friend of his and go to the theater. We were able to go to the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery after getting the tickets - there's a half-price booth in the area - and before the play.
Both galleries had no photo rules, but we're headed off to Kent soon, so I don' t have time to do the photos I did take. [photos added later]
My impressions of London as a chaotic jumble of monumental buildings with lots of walkways in-between and millions of walkers using them was reinforced. All these pictures were taken within 1/4 mile or less of each other.
The portrait gallery [left] had some interesting new stuff - including computer generated portraits that were not static and one artist made a bust of his head using various materials including his own blood which is kept in a temperature controlled glass box. There was also an exhibit of Indian Portraits from 1560 - 1860, . From their website:
"This outstanding exhibition, the first of its kind in the UK, tells the story of the Indian portrait over three centuries, exploring the fascinating ways in which Indian artists have approached the depiction of the human form and the changing role of portraiture in Indian history. Bringing together 60 stunning works from international collections, the exhibition will celebrate the beauty, power and humanity of these works of art."
Then we walked out - across the street was St. Martin's in the Field and then around the corner was Trafalgar Square.
The national museum, which looks out onto Trafalgar Square, had room after elegant room of paintings of Christ at different ages (mostly babies or on the cross) by artists of different times and different European traditions.
As you can see from the banner, the National Gallery has free admission, as did the National Portrait Gallery, and the British museum. They only charge for some special exhibits. The Smithsonian in Washington DC is all free as well. In Berlin, there was an admission fee for all the museums.
Here's Trafalgar Square from the steps of the National Gallery as we came out.
The play, a George Bernard Shaw classic written in 1894, was well acted, but not terribly exciting. I did like being in a theater where no mics were used. The story - a young woman who barely knows her mother finds out the source of the income that has paid for her upbringing and education - still has observations of society that are relevant, but I thought the daughter's reaction to be the most dated. Also, the daughter, Miss Warren, was the actress who did not project her voice as well as the other actors.
Watchable and interesting from a historical perspective, and brave for its time, our views about morality have changed significantly, making 'Mrs Warren's Profession' seem rather tame and quaint.
I was taking pictures in the farmers' market at DuPont Circle in DC and I was looking at the street musician through my camera when he let me know he wasn't happy. I'm generally pretty easy going about photos. The people are far more important than the photo.
So we talked a while and so I suggested he get his advice to photographers on video so here it is.
Just out of curiousity, let's see how the YouTube video compares to the Viddler.
When it was over, I sat there slightly stunned. This was, for me anyway, a totally original play. The acting was outstanding. The Barbara character - what can I say? That such a person could actually exist is beyond imagination, yet she was frighteningly familiar.
We knew nothing about what we were going to see other than it was supposed to be good. For me that's the best way to see something that is good the first time. So I won't say much more, and nothing that will give anything away.
We got there early - we went with friends who have a car. It's amazing how much smaller Juneau seems when you are in a car. Mind you it doesn't seem big on foot. Anyway, we walked down to the Douglas boat harbor which wasn't far from the Perseverance Theater.
Daylight savings time combined with almost being the equinox has really made a difference in the amount of evening light we have. This was about 7:15 on a cloudy evening.
This is what you walk into.
This is the last weekend. If you miss this, you can only blame yourself.
This dark stage served as the underground in Perseverance Theater's production of Eurydice Wednesday night. J and I had planned to go Friday last week until we found out it was in Douglas, 3.5 miles away according to Google Maps. And then I found out all legislators and staff had been invited to a special showing Wednesday. (I was transitioning from staff to blogger that evening.) And we were able to get a ride over there.
We'd heard great things about Preservation Theater and ultimately those expectations were fulfilled. But I have to say the story itself was more like the story in an opera - an excuse for the music and the visual spectacle on stage.
I like what most consider bizarre electronic music in which the pauses can be as important as the sounds. The instruments in this play leaned heavily Asian. The three stones - a sort of zombie-clown costumed chorus - undulated across the stage individually and then collapsed into an intertwined lump as the scene progressed. They were wonderful.
Two of the stones are on the left of the picture and the third is on the right.
I was completely absorbed when the father created a room in the underground by wrapping white string around the black frame in the pictures. It went on for a long time and had a lyrical beauty. If a strong narrative is your thing, then you might react like one of the people near me who said, "There were two tragedies tonight, one on the stage and the other was that I had to be there." But I walked out exhilarated by the beauty of the visuals and the audios.
We made it on time to Out North last night for Under 30. (Under 30 refers to the time (minutes) of the performance, not the age of the performers. It seems they now spell it Under :30 which I thought was a typo, but now see it's trying to clarify the meaning.) Last week we got to Santaland Diaries a few minutes late and it had already begun and was full, so we weren't allowed in, although we had purchased tickets in advance online. We were able to transfer our payment to this show. So we got there early enough this time to check ou the retrospective exhibit of the Under 30: Sweet Sixteen Archive Exhibit.
The exhibit has a wall length time line of the Under 30 programs from the beginning. And then there were these various props from different shows over the years. We've been to a fair number of them and they are always interesting, and usually there's at least one performer we know.
The last page of the program has a recruitment ad for next year's Under 30.
Many of the performances over the years have been done by people who don't normally do theatrical work. It seems like as good a way as possible to work on and present something important to the world. A lot of the work is still in the development stage. This is the first public showing and gets important feedback for the next stage, if the person wants to go further with it. Some manage to work well even at this stage.
The performances were introduced by Scott Turner Schofield who is a visiting performer who will be putting on Debutante Balls Jan. 14 -17. He seemed totally comfortable onstage and I'm sorry we're going to miss his show, but we leave for Juneau on the 11th.
Given that taking pictures in the middle of the show is often forbidden I'm filling in with these pictures from the exhibit.
All four performances last night kept my attention, though for me the third one - Jonathan Lang's "Radio" - worked most fully. It was a retrospective of radio in Alaska, starting from when Jonathan's family arrived in Alaska through his days on radio in Anchorage. The juxtaposition of taped 'radio' in the background, some props on stage, and probably the relatively uncomplicated content, made it the most complete and unified piece for me.
Van Le's "Letters to Ho Chi Minh" represented, perhaps, the most ambitious work, as she tried to articulate her family's experiences as refugees who survived smugglers, pirates, refugee camp in Malaysia on the way to the United States and the cross generational conflicts of children who want to know what happened and parents who want to forget. Some of the obstacles she still has to work out in the piece are technical ones - jumping back and forth between different time periods. Others are probably more emotional - I think more reenactment rather than telling of the stories would be more powerful. I got to meet Van Le when she was volunteering for the Anchorage International Film Festival and so it was particularly fun to be able to see how she put this together. The photo was taken after her performance, but before they moved things off the stage for the next performance.
Don Decker's piece integrated video into the performance. I liked a lot of the parts - particularly the extreme closeups of the lines in the videos. And he had some audience members laughing almost non-stop. I just didn't follow how all the pieces came together as one coherent statement. But maybe that wasn't intended.
Mark Muro's monologue started shakey, then got into gear, and then seemed to veer into different directions. Mark's done the Under 30 thing four times before according to the program and he could talk off the top of his head and it could be interesting and provocative. And I've heard him do that more effectively than his piece last night - but then last night he had to carry it off for thirty minutes. But Mark took the challenge and stood up and did his thing.
That's one reason people should go to the performance this afternoon at 3 or next weekend. The challenge is out there for next year's Under 30. This is something anyone could actually do. The only thing different from those on stage and you and me is that they put in their proposals. So, being in the audience is also a personal challenge. What do you have to say and how could you say it so it would keep an audience's attention for 30 minutes?
The first time I saw Chinese Opera was sometime in 1967 or 1968. I was teaching English at the Boys High School in Kamphaengphet, Thailand and the Chinese community had hired a group from Singapore to perform for some special occasion. There was a trailer that converted into a stage that was set up in a public area in town. The folding chairs were set out for the members of the Chinese community who sponsored the opera. The rest of the town could stand behind the chairs and watch. In a small town like that I got to visit backstage and meet with the actors. [I started this on Saturday and turned the house upside down trying to find some pictures of that first encounter with Chinese opera. In vain. But when I find them one day, I'll post them. This picture here is from UAA's website.]
Chinese opera is like asparagus. It's an acquired taste that requires small samples over time. I've had various opportunities over the years, to see bits and pieces of Chinese opera. Several more times in Thailand. Then when we lived in Hong Kong for a year, at the night market there were always small groups of actors/singers who would perform a scene or two on the street.
In China, Chinese opera was on television every night and once when I was there for a conference they took us to a performance for tourists. It was interesting because they explained things in English and they only showed short scenes. I'm sure the tourist agencies had discovered that most tourists couldn't last through too much Chinese opera. Besides the fact that it is all in a foreign language, the screechy singing and scratchy sounds of the stringed instruments, well, that's the part that takes getting used to.
Now it's a relatively familiar sound that brings back good memories.But I'm confident that at this performance they will give short glimpses of different operas with English explanations so that it should be easier for novices to understand what is happening.
So, come Tuesday, November 3, 2009
UAA's Wendy Williamson Auditorium 7pm (doors open at 6:30) Free!
Well, nothing is free. This is offered by the Confucius Institute at UAA. As I've said in an earlier post, this is sponsored by the Chinese government to promote Chinese language and culture around the world. And people speculate less savory agendas, but no more, I'm sure, than the US and other governments promote with their cultural outreach into other countries. If the Confucius Institute is merely a cultural exchange or a branch of the Chinese takeover of the world*, your taking this opportunity won't have much of an impact on their agenda, but you'll get to experience an art form that has been around for a thousand years or more. [*I'm mostly joking. Even if the worst fears about Confucius Institutes as outposts to monitor overseas Chinese is true, they will play only the tiniest role in China's increasingly important role in the world. And if you take the threat seriously, consider this an opportunity to get to know your enemy.]
The UAA website has a detailed description of the scenes they will be playing so I encourage you to visit that, even print out some of the descriptions before you go. If you take kids, and by all means do, letting them act out the scenes before you go would be great preparation. Let them watch some Chinese Opera videos on line (there are two below). The makeup and the costumes will be spectacular. I think kids can relate to the music better than adults who already have formed notions of what proper music is.
The first video looks like a Chinese television show about modern kids who are studying Chinese Opera. It's all in Chinese, but it shows practicing, putting on makeup, some performances. I think kids can relate to other kids even if it isn't in English. If they don't like this one, find another one and let them dance to the music and play one or two of the scenes described on the UAA website. They'll be a lot more interested when they see the real thing.
From the Illuminated Lantern, a site that reviews Asian movies, I've excerpted this description of the form of Chinese opera, but the whole piece, which is a description of the historic forms of Chinese opera is well worth a peek.
Although there are many different regional styles, they all share many similarities. Each have the same four role types: the female, the male, the painted-face, and the clown. Performances consist of singing, poetry, music, dance, and gesture. Emphasis is on costume and makeup rather than props or scenery. The operas often tell the same stories, though with various regional differences, such as alternate endings or additional characters. The information described within this article will, unless otherwise noted, pertain to Peking Opera specifically, and the regional operas more generally.
We can see four roles here in this description of one of the pieces to be presented Tuesday (from the UAA website.)
Autumn River 京剧《秋江》片段
This story happened during the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279). Scholar Pan Bizheng is staying with his aunt at a Taoist temple when he falls in love with the Taoist nun Chen Miaochang. His aunt finds out and forces him to leave his love behind and go to Beijing to take the imperial examination. When Chen Miaochang learns that Pan is leaving, she runs to the bank of the Autumn River and hires an old fisherman to follow him. The two meet on the road, travel to Beijing and get married. The role of Chen Miaochang is played by Hua Shan.
Clearly Scholar Pan is the male role and Taoist nun Chen is the female role. I'm guessing the old fisherman is the clown and that leaves the aunt as the painted face, but I'm just guessing.
Don't miss this. Bring the kids. Sit as close as you can or bring binoculars. And since it's free, if you tire quickly, you can leave without feeling you've lost your money. And you'll forever be able to say you've seen Chinese Opera live, and if you're lucky, you'll get hooked.
If you've never heard it before, it is a bit of a shock to Western ears, so check out this video of Teochew dialect opera (the kind I first heard in Thailand) so it will be a bit familiar when you come Tuesday night. This is from yeohts8192289 at Veoh, he's from Penang, Malaysia.
Last night we were having dinner at the Orchards Bistro in McMinnville, Oregon. We'd stopped at the Gallery Theater a few blocks away before dinner to try to buy tickets for the play "Angel Street" but it was closed. Our terrific waitress asked if we wanted dessert. We had an hour to curtain time. So I said, "Well, if you could call the Gallery Theater and ask them if they can hold two tickets for us, we'd love to have a little dessert." She brought me her cell phone with the number punched in. I hit the green button, but nobody answered. "Hi, this is Steve, we're at the Orchard Bistro and would like to have dessert, can you hold two tickets for us for tonight?" Five minutes later the phone rang. "Hi Steve, this is Paula. I've got two tickets for you, enjoy your dessert." And Paula was in the ticket booth when we came and had our tickets. She's also the director and showed us around. The play was written in 1938 and was the basis for the movie Gaslight in which a husband is trying to drive his wife crazy. The set was really well done. The husband and wife were both excellent actors and it was done with English accents, including the two servants, one of whom sounded like she had studied old Upstairs Downstairs episodes and one who had a believable Cockney accent I believe. The actor who played the inspector was, if I read the program right, in his first major role and he showed us why the other two were so good. He accent, elocution, mastery of the script were all of a much lower level. But it didn't ruin the experience. For $13 a person, this is live theater for just a little more than a movie. I took this about 15 minutes before curtain time so this isn't the whole audience. We had a delightful evening.
We're at Portland International airport right now which still has free wifi and, if all goes well, will sleep in our own bed tonight.
University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA) art professor, Mariano Gonzales, has a show at Alaska Pacific University (APU) which asks the question "Why are Americans still dying in the Middle East?" and asks visitors to put up their answers on a large white poster. According to Phil at Progressive Alaska, apparently this has embarrassed the President of APU who got his own paper to write a response. No, the question isn't neutral, but for those who believe those deaths are serving an important purpose, Professor Gonzales offered a big piece of paper to convince the world they are right.
War does set up a dilemma. People generally justify their enlisting to patriotic reasons - for those who aren't drafted - and then when they die, their families have the choice of believing their soldier died a hero or died in vain (or worse.) For most, that choice is easy. Even if it doesn't match reality. Anything that challenges that choice pushes a very strong emotional button.
Alaska Report blogger Dennis Zaki reports in an email that he keeps having problems with people using his photos without permission. I've written a bit here about photos and copyrights. It seems Dennis got ticked off enough with Dan Fagan for putting up his (Dennis') pictures without permission that he got Fagan's website (the Alaska Standard) suspended for a bit until the offending picture was taken down. Here's what I got when I went to Alaska Standard on Wednesday.
The site was back up when I checked on Thursday.
A final brief note. I saw in the LA Times yesterday a short piece on Levi Johnston's deal with Playgirl to take off his clothes. I'm a little sheltered here in the big city so I hadn't seen this bit of 'news' when it hit the ADN. With all the free nudes available on line, we know that Playgirl isn't just paying him for skin shots, but for Palin related skin shots. Let's see now - abstinence only education leads to teenage moms leads to teenage dad getting paid to pose nude. Isn't America great?
My mom had a dentist appointment in Beverly Hills. We found a parking place right in front of the building and went up with her.
We left her as she was getting into the chair. She's walking better each day, but it still hurts sitting down and getting up.
Then we went walking around the block.
And then down into a residential neighborhood. This cactus was in a little buffer park between Santa Monica Blvd. and the houses.
The rose was in someone's yard.
Home security is a booming business here.
The street was lined with magnolia trees.
These looked like plumeria trees with fat trunks. Not sure what they were, but I liked the whole effect.
We wandered back part way down an alley just to see what things looked like from the back door.
This house wall was much more interesting from the alley side than from the street side.
We picked up my mom and walked a couple shops down to the Camden House which turned out to have great Iranian food.
We assumed eating in downtown Beverly Hills would be very pricey. My lunch was $9.
Lunch would have been perfect except for this woman who used the restaurant as her office and spent most of lunch working out classroom arrangements for a French professor - who apparently was negotiating on the other side in her car - in a voice so loud that it was hard for us to talk. She had no shame whatsoever. WLA College, find some office space for your employees.
My mom said that if you have your handicapped sticker you didn't have to worry about putting money in the meter. She certainly qualifies for the sticker, but I still put money in. But she persuaded me not to put in more for lunch. I noticed all the cars that were there for a long time, including this one, had handicapped stickers and no money in the meters.
Thursday night I walked over to the Wendy Williamson Auditorium at UAA to see the performances celebrating the opening of the Confucius Institute. I've been busy with a number of things today - including computer problems following the installation of Snow Leopard which I think may now finally be over - so I had trouble getting the video completed. [Update Oct. 3 - see this later post for what the Snow Leopard problem was for me. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but it seems to have solved my problem.]
I'll try to do another post or two - one on Confucius and one on Confucius Institutes - but in the meantime here's a glimpse of the celebration. There were entertainers from Anchorage, other parts of the US, and some brought over from China.
This really did have a Chinese feel to it. I was particularly interested in seeing the 'change of face' act. This is a particularly Chinese art form handed down from generation to generation. There's a great film about such an artist who is looking for an apprentice to teach his art to. And as part of the Opening Week celebration, the Confucius Institute will show the movie Saturday night. This is an amazing skill and Thursday night was the first time I saw it in person. It's at the end of the video.
The following is what UAA's website had about Thursday's show (there's a bit of all of the acts on the video)
A Celebration of Chinese Performing Arts
Thursday, Sept. 10, 7 p.m. at the Wendy Williamson Auditorium
Dr. J.D. Zhang, Sichuan Opera “Change of Face” artist and master of traditional Chinese magic [top picture]
Guoming Sun, Asia International Martial Arts Champion performing double Chain-whip and Drunk Sword [right]
Weiguang Dang, Famous Chinese Baritone
Dr. Yuxiang Wu, Classical Chinese Flute
There will be choral singers, dancers and other performances by members of the Alaska Chinese Association.
There was also some formal stuff. The Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences [left] spoke as did the director of the Institute and the the Vice Consul General from the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco [picture above.]
All the events are free. Friday night there was a talk on "Overcoming the Global Economic Crisis: The Chinese Gamble" which I missed because our (originally from Taiwan) guests got back from their trip to Kennecott Mine this evening.
Here's the Saturday schedule from the Institute website. I expect this too will be pretty genuine and worth attending. And it should be good for kids and it's free. This is not your every day fare, the Chinese government is using these Institutes to put a good face forward in the world, so this is probably as close to being in China as it gets at a public event in Alaska.
Chinese Adventure: A carnival of activities, games, performances and prizes
Saturday, Sept. 12, Noon to 4 p.m. at the UAA Student Union on the 1st Floor [parking is free on Saturdays, and if you don't know where the student union is, this is a good time to go looking for it (it's on Providence between Providence Hospital and Lake Otis) next to the sports center].
Come witness and participate in traditional dance and martial arts performances, calligraphy, paper cutting and folding, Chinese games and more. These opportunities made possible with assistance from the Alaska Chinese Association and the UAA Chinese Language Club.
And then in the evening the movie I mentioned above. This is a really interesting movie and if I recall right, appropriate for kids. [Let me amend this thought. It's probably good for mature kids about 12 or over. It probably has subtitles, but if you are one of those anti-subtitles people, try not to pass that prejudice on to your kids. It helps them improve their reading and gives access to many great films.] One of the key characters is the kid who is being trained. The Fine Arts Building is on the far east side of the campus. The street that comes out of the Providence Hospital onto Providence Dr. goes right into campus there. Turn right at the first corner.
Film Presentation: The King of Masks (1999) Sunday, Sept. 13, 6:30 p.m. in the Fine Arts Building 150 Directed by Wu Tian-Ming, The King of Masks is set in 1930s Sichuan Province and tells the tale of an aging master of the traditional Sichuan Opera art of Change of Face, rapid mask changes to display the emotions of varied players, and his quest to find a protégé to carry on his art. This is a simple, moving and well-acted film starring Zhang Zhigang and Xu Zhu.
We went to Modern Dwellers for the opening of Catherine and Joe Senungetuks show. My camera battery was dead, so these are from the cards that were given out. But the show was water colors, some collage, and ink. Birds. Actually, there were some bigger pieces too that were, Catherine help me, oil?
I think they're magical, but go see for yourself. This chocolate shop - Modern Dweller - is in the new strip mall on the NW corner of Old Seward and 36th.
Peter Dunlap-Shohl was there too. I'd gotten a bit of video of him talking about his animated film at the Anchorage International Film Festival last December. (He shows up about minute 7 on the video.) He has a blog about Parkinsons which is quite good. And a second blog of political cartoons. (Peter was a cartoonist with the ADN for 25 years.) I've linked both in amongst the Alaska blogs.
I also added Henkimaa and OMFGAlaska, both of which I find to be thoughtful blogs that look at their topics in depth and with knowledge. The Alaska Blog box only shows the ten blogs with the most recent posts. So the blogs on there will change as some get replaced by more recent posts. [Update, September 6: I forgot. I also added Alaskan Librarian.]
Update: September 5, 2009 - Since my camera battery was dead, I took some pictures with Joe's camera and he sent some today. Here are a couple:
