Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Lesser known symbolism of the color yellow

(Looking at a Mark Rothko)

Papa, does red mean Rothko is warm?
-Maybe
Does blue mean cold and maybe lonely?
-It can, yeah.
-What would you paint if you were an abstract expressionist?
I would paint a yellow painting. It means bananas and also you feel kind of weak.... or weaky........ or something?

Surrealist Poetry Night at the Cabaret Voltaire

Papa, come quick!
My bathwater smells like diamonds!

Saturday, November 10, 2007

Provenance can be hard to establish



Grant asked me to take this picture to document what we assumed was an unknown Claus Oldenburg in Baker City, Oregon. It turns out that it is not one of Oldenburg's giant public sculptures of everyday objects, but an actual 20' tall swingset. Whoever designed this thing either shared Claus's interest in gigantism, or seriously has never stood next to a child. Do you see that the seat is at about the height of Grant's head? I tried it out and could barely handle the G-force generated by mellow swinging, so we hopped back in the car and headed for Olympia before any enormous Eastern Oregon children saw us in their park.