FRIED-BRAIN SUMMER

Here is something interesting I noted recently:

SEPARATED AT BIRTH?

---

–From the first Mass reading, July 30, 2024:

“Let my eyes stream with tears day and night, without rest, Over the great destruction which overwhelms the virgin daughter of my people, over her incurable wound.

If I walk out into the field, look! those slain by the sword; If I enter the city, look! those consumed by hunger. Even the prophet and the priest forage in a land they know not.”

–Jeremiah 14:17-18

Somehow, reading the news these days, this rings very true.

---

Two picture books to help while away those afternoon siestas:

Merchants, Printers and Painters: Silk Fabrics in Italian and Northern Paintings, 1300-1550 by Lisa Monnas. This is 115 bucks or so if you want to buy it. If you don’t you can borrow it for one-hour increments on the Internet Archive. Gorgeous, swoon-worthy fabrics, paintings, and colors.

The Life and Work of Luis Barragán, by Buendía Júlbez and José María, also expensive, also available to borrow from Internet Archive. Barragán, as you may know, was a noted 20th-century Mexican architect, and if you like moss-covered fountains, walls of faded hot pink, tangerine and old gold, shadowy alcoves, recessed lighting, and jungle-cactus plantings, coupled with clean modern, lines, take a look.

From a description of the ground floor living room of the much visited Luis Barragán House in Mexico City; “Within a few steps, the figure of a wood carved Madonna, a luminous cylinder-shaped floor lamp, and the first of the great reflecting spheres (a new spatial contraction captured in silver) appear, carefully placed so that they might be discovered.”

---

I am preparing to travel to NYC next week. Very much looking forward to churches that are open all day for prayer, rest, reflection, private tears, mental breakdowns, etc. It’s been slim pickings here in Tucson, though I am soldiering on.

Have selected a few galleries at the Met (am on an Edouard Vuillard kick) and will confine myself to those so as not to be overwhelmed. Will also visit the Cloisters and the American Folk Art Museum.

What do you want to see at the Folk Art Museum?” a friend asked.

“Oh they have an exhibit of French mental patients from the 40s,” I replied. “The second I saw it, I got on kayak and booked a flight.”

---