I was reminded recently that I was ‘connected’ — by marriage — to Sam Houston. I remember hearing this in some very vague way and knowing that it was a bit of a joke to whoever was saying it to me. However, in the course of various researches I’ve been doing, I stumbled across Isabel [...]
Raphael at the Met
A friend sent me a YouTube video for an art exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, devoted to the artist Raphael. It is one of the largest exhibitions of his work ever put on. It is exquisite. Watch the video. https://youtu.be/y5vnCnB4JcE?si=M3snocb7Aeo2wJY5 Lots of paintings are on view but also, lots of drawings and [...]
Scattered writer!
I’m having a bit of a struggle with my writing. I invented a setting where I think about choices that people make, and how they work out what they are willing to do to make their choices real. Written like that it sounds like any long novel, but in fact I’m writing short stories about [...]
Things I learned this week…
I went look for beautiful cat pictures and the Art Institute of Chicago had several prints of Japanese woman playing with cats. Cats were brought in to help control rats and mice at some point during the 1700's. As a result the silk industry, under the control of women, grew tremendously. So, art! Courtesan and [...]
In honor of Minnie the cat
... who once pushed open a door that had heavy weights against it, to wake her oversleeping owner. You might think it was about food but ... it wasn't. Here is a Woman with a Cat, Auguste Renoir, 1875. Here is Julie Manet Holding a Cat by Berthe Morisot, 1889, printed by someone else in [...]