Asleep through NJ.

I should re-name this blog "www.asleepthroughnewjersey.blogspot.com" or something, due to the number of bus trips we've been making up to NYC (New Jersey pretty much taking up the entire trip between Philadelphia and Manhattan) and my ability to sleep soundly through every trip. So far it seems I'm taking advantage of proximity to NYC far more than the last time I lived in Philly ('93-'98), so that's a plus. Last night's trek northward was inspired by the discovery of a Recoil concert - only one of 2 in the U.S. on this spring's tour - taking place at Le Poisson Rouge in Greenwich Village. To explain: Recoil is a band/musical project undertaken since the late '80s by former Depeche Mode band member Alan Wilder. My husband John is quite enthusiastic about Depeche Mode (a vast understatement) and we have 4 or 5 of Recoil's albums... so we had to give this a go. It was a unique event, definitely worth the trip - and John got to say "hi" to Alan Wilder, and thank him for all the great music over the years, check it out:

...so I think that pretty much made John's day - possibly his week, maybe even his month. Maybe more. I, too, got a genuine and substantial thrill out of being in such close proximity to Mr. Wilder, enough to take several frenzied photos:
In short, it was excellent. Back to NYC tomorrow night for some visual art rather than music, to catch the group show at J. Cacciola Gallery... stay tuned for photos. In the meantime, here's a Recoil video from the 2000 album "Liquid" - the song is called "Strange Hours" and features the vocals of super-freaky and frankly terrifying singer and performer Diamanda Galás:

s p r i n g

Philadelphia looks great in the spring! Let's take a look:

Here's a view of the Delaware River (and New Jersey) from Penn Treaty Park, up here in Fishtown. So soothing! Ahhh.

Roses at Penn. Lovely!

Cool building at Drexel

Flowers down at Penn's Landing, where I went to check out the Art Star Craft Bazaar... gotta support the crafty folks!

I'm assuming this building (on Fairmount, between 4th and 5th) was... maybe a shrine to cows? Haha, probably not. Sadly, probably something involving the dismantling of cows for consumption. Poor cows.

Philadelphie, je t'aime.

Busy times! But now I will take a moment to post some of the loveliness of Philly of late:

Make way for ducklings! Here are a couple of photos from a cute little park nestled away in Penn's campus, which is profiled in this article.

VanGogh would have had a blast painting here…

Groovy waterfall, providing a nice shower for the birds

Giant, semi-frightening koi. Hopefully not carnivorous.

Here are a couple from Eastern State Penitentiary here in Philly:

Not unlike a tree grows in Brooklyn, a weed grows in Eastern State's wall:

Let’s hear a big cheer for Reading Terminal Market for having some young Nubian goats from Shellbark Hollow Farm in West Chester hanging out right outside the market on 12th Street. Yay! Goats! SO cute.

Back in our neighborhood, it seems that Shepard Fairey paid a little visit to Fishtown and left his mark on the side of Rocket Cat. Neat.

More info on this project can be found here. I love that ole Mural Arts Program here in Philly – good stuff. We're lucky to have it... I keep meaning to go on one of their tours. One day soon, I promise.

More pics and info soon! It's busy over here chez Feissel...

Gross!

Hey! Just found an article about the conservation of Thomas Eakins' painting The Gross Clinic – which I wrote about in this post - in advance of an exhibition of the painting at the Philadelphia Museum of Art this July. This is exciting news for me, because it means I'll finally get to see the painting in person – WHOO!! Here's the link to the article; here's a pic of the painting itself, in all its gruesome glory:

Thomas Eakins' The Gross Clinic

NYC encore.

I was back in NYC on Saturday for some more art-viewing and art-making (okay, just sketching at the Met, but still). I caught up with the lovely and talented Sarah Meredith, and took a peek at the Janus Collaborative. Unfortunately I missed catching up with Jason John and some other artists who were in town, but I did manage to catch up with some art shows I missed last weekend...

For example, Gallery Henoch had the latest Eric Zener show. There are, of course, many wonderful painters at Gallery Henoch – Kim Cogan, Gary Ruddell, David Baker, Sharon Sprung, Patti Oleon, Burton Silverman, amongst many many others; some of their work was showing on the first level, so I took a peek.

Here's a David Bakerpainting:

And a Patti Oleon painting:

And a Gary Ruddell painting:

Yeah, I love that gallery. I also went back to Claire Oliver Gallery exhibition of Jennifer Poon"s work, because it totally deserved a second look. Then I checked out George Billis Gallery, which had a show of Derek Buckner's paintings of white fabric, like the following:

There's also Axelle Fine Art, which focuses on European artists (largely French and Italian, it seems) and always seems to have good painters showing. I also went over to Arcadia in SoHo to check out the latest show there – it had changed already from the weekend prior, when we saw the Robert Liberace show. Currently there's a show by this guy Brad Reuben Kunkle, monochromatic female figures on gold leaf. It was apparently his first solo show, and it was almost sold out completely – whooo!! Good to know that consumer confidence is high enough that people are still inclined to purchase art. Hurrah.

In the evening I stopped by the opening of Shawn Barber's show at Joshua Liner Gallery. Given that the title of the show was "Tattooed Portraits: Chronicle," as one might guess, the vast majority of attendees at the show were heavily tatooed (with the exception of myself, of course). The paintings themselves were well-done, but I think my favorites were the small studies he did of a man with "HARD WORK" (or was it "WORK HARD"-? You choose) tatooed across his fingers:

Good stuff. Thanks for another round of good art viewin', NYC.

La vie en rose.

Sprung has sprung here in Philly. Seriously. As in, all over the sidewalks. I love it.

New! York! City! Again.

Hey, I've been sick - some kind of allergies, maybe? Not sure - but in any case, it's been laying me kind of low. Grr. I did manage to pull it together enough to go up to New York on Saturday to see some art,though. Yeah! Specifically, I was wanting to go to the opening of friend and San Francisco artist Jennifer Poon's show at Claire Oliver Gallery in Chelsea. Great stuff!! Here's a sample, one of my favorite pieces:

Whiteout, watercolor, gouache on cut paper, silk ribbons, thread, 51" x 37", by Jennifer Poon

We also headed to DFN Gallery to see the Alyssa Monks show... here are some pics:

Paintings at DFN Gallery, by Alyssa Monks. Yay for awesome painting! Thank you, NYC.