A Surprise at the Beach Tonight

We had such a surprise on our walk along the beach sidewalk just around sunset today!  This first photograph shows what we saw at first.  I have figured out, after shooting this shot, that we are looking at the backs of the newly engaged couple and they are looking at photographs taken by a young woman and young man on the backs of their cameras.  We were not sure if they were just starting, or whether they were finished.

Turns out they were finished and they walked away from this pretty setup at the water's edge.  A little bit later, two cars drove up here and two men disassembled the whole setup and packed everything into their cars.  I wished we had seen the shoot going on, just for fun.  But it was nice to see this.  A very fancy proposal and engagement, I think!

 

Another August Sunset at the Beach

We did our walk along the beach again tonight, and were rewarded, once again, with a stunning sunset!  I immediately started shooting, and most of the photographs look like the one below, a wide angle view of the beach and the water and the clouds.  And I think that is an interesting photo and beautiful as well, but I chose as my first photograph, this view of a single woman on the beach photographing the sunset with her cellphone, I think.  It just seems so much more dramatic with a single figure.

This is an earlier photograph and what makes it interesting I think are all the specks of people that can be seen against the water in the harbot which is orange because it is reflecting the sky.  Really wonderful that we got two spectacular sunsets in three days!  I would be interested in having you all vote for which photograph is the more interesting to you.  Thanks!

 

The Betty Crocker Cookbook

We were having Pizza with our friends at their house tonight so Kathy wanted to bring a blueberry pie for dessert.  She got out her absolute best reference cookbook to find the recipe she needed.  This old standby, the Betty Crocker Cookbook!  She has had it forever, I think it was a shower gift before we were married.  I glanced at the book on the kitchen shelf and realized I had never seen it closely!  Look at how you can see how much use this book has had since it was new back in the 1960's!

And this is the cover, showing its use as well.  The covers have come undone and are now held in place by some bright yellow tape. This cookbook is a treasure, because it has been used so much, an because it has been in our house since before we bought it in 1970. This cookbook is a wonderful record showing how much it has been used in our life.

 

An August Sunset at the Beach

We have been going to the Dunkin' beach each evening when the weather is good so that Kathy can walk on the level sidewalk as she recovers from her knee replacement.  So tonight after dinner we were stunned with the sunset as we walked along the beach.  It was a gorgeous, colorful sunset!  As many of you will recognize, I have photographed this tree against the sky so many times. But rarely with people in it.  It was a pleasant evening and the parking lot was nearly full, with people just sitting on the beach enjoying the weather.  After I got this photograph I walked right up to the tree and was surprised to see something.

A group of young boys with some adults present were busy doing something and when they all walked away from their project, I saw this!  And it is perfect with the clouds from the sunset.  They had built a cairn, which in the original Scottish Gaelic meaning is "A pile of rocks."  Cairns are originally designed to mark points along a trail, so that people can find their way.  Recently there have been complaints on mountail trails that some hikers have built their own cairns which is a problem because they can confuse other hikers and cause them to lose track of the trail, which is hazardous.  That is not a problem here, of course because there is no trail, just a pile of rocks on the land near a beach.  I do love this photograph the best, for today's shots!

 

"Asterisk"

This architectural installation by Sam Frésquez’ is titled "Asterisk."  It is a very small kitchen in the middle of this large gallery.  As you approach it, you realize that it is more than one kitchen.  When you get right up to the low railing you can see that there is another kitchen, which is smaller than the first and it is an exact copy.  Then you notice that there is another one beyond that one, and smaller yet!  Each kitchen is fitted out with the same appliances and lights, but those items are also smaller.

Ranging from life-size to miniature, the telescoping rooms unfold into a sequence of six miniaturized versions of the same room, prompting viewers to contemplate the compression and expansion of lived histories.  The title of the work, * , a typographic symbol that connects one text to another, underscores the work’s function as a portal, connecting one plane, one moment, to another.

And an extra added bonus is when you leave the front of the piece and look from behind at how the rooms were constructed.  This carpentry is absolutely fascinating, and a work of art by itself.  It was so much fun to walk from front to back, really close to the whole structure and see how it was built.  There is a secret - if you go to the smallest part, on the left hand end of the structure, there is a tiny window that lets you see backward, from the back of the smallest kitchen to the front.  This was such an interesting piece of work to study and to contemplate.

 

Mass MoCA

I went to Mass MoCA of course as I always do when in Vermont.  Mass MoCA is in North Adams, Mass, and is about an hour and twenty minute drive.  There are always wonderful surprises each year when I visit.  This is the first sculpture you see when you enter the first gallery.  It is a huge sculpture and hangs in a three-story gallery - it goes up to the ceiling.  The sculpture is by Cecilia Vicuna, and is titled Quipu desaparecido.  It is made from unspun wool and climbing rope inside.  Here is a closer view...

When you view it and walk around it, and actually you are encouraged to gently walk through it, it is an amazing thing to see and contemplate.  There are very powerful feelings evoked when you are close to it.

As you walk around it, the color of the light illuminating it changes it when you watch from a different direction.  This was a joy to see and a pleasure to contemplate and I spent perhaps half an hour photographing it and looking at it.  It was the most interesting artwork in the museum this year. Cecilia Vicuna is based in New York, NY and Santiago, Chile.  Her quipu installations, of which this is one, are woven metaphors for the cosmos and resilience.  There was so much more information about her and the sculpture, but I thought I would include one sentence so you might get some sense of what this is about.  But I found I didn't need to know that.  I just needed to be in the presence of it and feel "something" from it that was such a nice experience.

 

The Morning After

"The Morning After" is a funny name for this photograph, but it is definitely appropriate!  At the Bed & Breakfast where I stay, there are a whole bunch of other amateur astronomers who stay there as well.  When it is time for observing, I stay up on the hill at Stellafane.  But a few of them stay down here at the inn because the owner keeps a large area of grass mowed short so they can set up their telescopes right here, and after they are done, they cover them with waterproof fabric to keep them from getting wet from dew.  I have to unload my telescope, carry is some distance, set it up, and when I am done I carry it back down to my car and then drive back to the B&B.  Anyhow when they are done, they just leave the scopes where they are and go inside and sleep!  So here are two scopes in the morning after being out all night after an observing session.  I got to spend some time looking through the black shrouded telescope to the left and the views were fantastic.