A new project

In preparation for this whole wedding thing, we've delegated responsibilities to each other in a very Marxian system of wedding planning. Naturally, invitations fall squarely into the category of my abilities. The obvious thing for me to do would be to go to the print shop and whip something up. I just couldn't think of what. So I spent an evening drawing ideas, and came up with something that I liked.
Something that requires me to design my own typeface.
Yeah, I know.

This is a great project. I spent 12 hours working on it yesterday, taking a quick break to ride my bike to school so I could practice for an hour before the building closed. The idea is not for the letters to be perfect; I still want the project to look hand-drawn, so rather than "fix" my drawings so they're perfect in one of my computer programs, I'm keeping them basically as they are. How am I going to print this? I'm still thinking about it. There's the option to make a plate and print it from the letterpress, but of course that's not the only option; I might also get them printed onto a high-quality paper, and then letterpress some color over them. Oh, we'll see.
Here's the original drawing:

Realized yesterday I'm following in my father's footsteps - he also designed a typeface for their wedding invitations, which they silkscreened at their house in Pacifica, then hung on lines in the living room. I would say mine is more "modern" than theirs, but it was the 70s, after all.

I know, there are easier ways I could be doing this. Like printing from lead at the shop, for example. But I could also just make the drawing, hand-letter the whole thing, and then go from there. But this way, I'll have the letters... I don't know. Don't try to dissuade me. I'm having fun.

By the way - it was 28 degrees (-2˙C) here last night. COLD!!

Alright, you disgruntled blog followers! Your delinquent author rouses herself.

But incompletely. Still distracted, I shoot nervous glances around the room, out the window, at the shiny ring on my finger. (An engagement ring? It is.) I think about going to the grocery store, about buying some more socks downtown. I feel grateful that my agony at being pinned here at this laptop will be soon interrupted by an appointment at school, where I'll be accompanying a singing class, as part of a renaissance consort.

School has been largely absent from my life so far this year. I have a total of 2 hours of lessons every week, and all on the same day. And nothing else for the rest of the week. Also, my fall has been largely devoid of work projects. This is an amazing opportunity for both extreme productivity, outside of school, and truly epic laziness. Take a moment to guess in which category I more often find myself. I'll give you a hint: not the first. I've lost track of how many books I've read. Of all types. Just finished another one today. My dearth of work has afforded an opportunity to spend some time at the print shop, where I met and was befriended by an American artist named Elana Gutmann, who has been working here for the last few months. She's an interesting person, and makes really beautiful prints. (http://elanagutmann.com/) She also introduced me to some chocolate cake at a hidden cafe not so far from my house.

In the next few weeks I'll start work on a really interesting collaborative print project, organized in part by a printer friend I made last February at Codex. She and a friend have cut their own wood type, and are recruiting artists from all over to make art prints from the type, which will be included in an exhibit and a catalog. More information can be found here, including pictures of the type being cut with a router, and some prints off the first letter.

Also, the wave of work begins, in November. Thank goodness. I've been feeling a little high and dry here. First week of November has three projects, all overlapping each other. Bass on a Train! In the in-between-moments, I think of all the things I hope to fit in when Andrew and I go to California and Texas this December. Really Looking Forward. (Tacos. Ocean. Family, Friends. Clothes Shopping [I Am Shallow]. Maybe some more of these caramels that Maggie sent me for my birthday, if she'll tell me where she got them.)

Pictures, you say? OK. Here is the scene of a nice bike ride & picnic we had last time Andrew was in town (yes - we found him the same kind of bicycle as me, a Cilo! Here in Switzerland they call that "partner-look"),

some strawflowers from my late summer garden,

pumpkins (kurbis) from the farmer's market,

and the strangest little bug I've ever seen - found it on my wall. Any clue what it could be?

 

Maybe you can see, it walks like a crab. About the size of a grain of rice. Appeared to be completely covered in dust, but I think it was its natural state. Weird! Cute! Creepy! Fascinating!!

Oh yeah, also, here I am, tending to the basil plant.

Trains. Plains. Boats. And a taxi or two.

Venice, Bremen, Copenhagen. Basel, of course, though briefly. Right now I'm sitting at a yellow desk, with the patchy blue Danish sky out the window. Andrew is working, I'm faffing on the internet, watching Deadwood (for the second time. Highly recommended!), reading Wallace Stegner. Snacking. Sounds like vacation. After Bremen, I don't feel guilty; it was a week of all-day rehearsals, a concert, and then three intense days of recording. On the last day, the baroque guitar player asked me if I was tired. I, somewhat unable to put complete sentences together, said, Hm, yes, I'm tired. "I'm not tired," he told me. "I'm destroyed." Summed it up pretty well. Though I find it helps me to have a good book during those kinds of things, and I did. Arthur & George by Julian Barnes. Also, the music was nice - Handel and Hasse arias and overtures. That day I took a train home to Basel, only 6.5 hours, and got in around 01:30. The next morning, trying to pack for Copenhagen, I found myself at a complete loss. So sleeping in and watching tv on dvd feels just about right.

Venice. Was a mixed experience. As the only time all year I get to devote all my time to printing, I had high hopes. I prepared. I read books, brainstormed ideas, experimented on the press in Basel. Spent time just hanging around the print shop in Basel so that I could get used to the atmosphere. Stared at the wall, or the ceiling, or out the window, to vacate my brain enough that good ideas could make themselves known. Took the train through the Alps, the breathtaking Italian canton of Switzerland, through Milan, and across the bridge that links the mainland to the island of Venice. Saw friends, made a big dinner, talked about California, drank cheap and delicious Italian wine. Went, on the second day, to the print shop; discovered that our ideas and expectations of the upcoming week and a half were different from the ideas of the man who ran the shop. My impression is that he was expecting a teacher and her students, all of whom would be working in the same medium. He had prepared zinc plates for us to do our etching, and knew what size paper we should be using. As he had thought, all of us were associated with a university (the Academy of Art, where I used to teach), but we were all experienced printmakers already, and wanted the freedom to use the print media of our choice. We got yelled at. Michelle, the print assistant and the girl who made everything about our stay possible, got yelled at. Again, and again. The air was thick with hostility. We all made concessions, and tried to smooth things over, but he wasn't having any of it. ("Why would you want to do your artwork on the letterpress?" he asked me. And, later, "Never in my 50 years printing have I seen someone want to ____!" Blank filled in with any of a variety of things.) The next day, more of the same, before he disappeared into a room in the back of the shop. The day after that, we arrived to find a cover over the letterpress, with news that it was "broken." I was tempted to return to Basel; I'm not interested in being yelled at, and besides, I wanted to get some work done. But I stayed, and over the next few days it was clear that he was going to stay out of our way, that I was going to be able to use the (obviously perfectly sound) press, and we'd all be able to work in peace. But that start was disruptive, and I think everyone's work and state of mind suffered. I'm still glad that I went, because it was great to see my friends, and to discover a part of Venice away from the giant crowds of camera-weilding, sunburnt tourists that clogged the streets every hour of the day. It took a while to convince me that Venice was more than a shell of itself, made for people who don't want to visit a real city, but finally, on the last day, I saw it - that mythical Venice, stone rising from the sea, a miracle of bridges and water.

The water everywhere reflects the bright, hot sunlight and so unshaded areas are nearly blinding, but somehow in a good way. When I look at my print now I still like it very much, but the colors don't look as vivid as they did in that studio, surrounded by light.

Reduction lino cuts, printed on the letterpress. A total of 27 runs (you can see 7 in the blue there, AKA "lagoon #2"), and an edition of 18. One to the city of Venice, one to the region, and one to the archives of the Venice Printmaking Studio; one to the Academy of Art, for supporting us, and a full set of prints to each artist. Which leaves me with 5. One of which is getting framed sometime this week. Someone has offered to keep it in a frame at his house for me. How generous.

Did this post live up to its title? I think I wanted to tell about my train ride back to Basel, during which the train was delayed by a track fire, and I arrived nearly 5 hours late, at 05:30. But to talk about that would sound like complaining. So I'll leave it there.

preparation report

Off to Venice in one week, to do some printmaking about Venice. Since I've never been there, I've been spending my free time with some books. Started out with 'Venice: Pure City' by Peter Ackroyd. He's kind of a know-it-all goody-goody who likes telling his readers what to think. Which is fine, I guess, if you like that kind of thing. To try and find something a little more objective, I went to the university library. Quite a perplexing experience. I hope you people appreciate your Dewey Decimal System, because it is Excellent. Here, books are grouped into general categories with a letter label (eh, kk, and AB being a few of them, and standing for Geography, Music History, or Architecture) then organized by Date Acquired. Date Acquired. Seriously? So, they're just in numerical order. But not left to right, top to bottom; these numbers run bottom to top. I was muttering obscenities before I found my first book, 'Paradise of Cities,' by John Julius Norwich, which was on the bottom shelf, at the end of the 10,990s, just under the 11,000s.

If I have to make a library confession I will tell you that I'm not very good at using them. They overwhelm me. This is an embarrassing thing to admit, as someone who loves reading. I hate to use the computers and the catalogs and I feel unenthusiastic about cross-referencing or using a bibliography. Really, I enjoy them about as much as I enjoy cooking with a recipe. Spoils the fun. I've done my best work in libraries by grubbing around in the specific section I need (Geography: Italy: Memoirs) and coming up with things I never could have found on a computer. I like seeing the way that librarians have decided to order and classify things. I enjoy looking at groups of books, they're like rocks of a similar color or those US stamps that have cross-sections of different ecosystems. I can recognize that my method has serious flaws, and would be woefully inefficient if I were trying to write a serious research paper. That doesn't make me less stubborn about liking it, though.

Apparently, there was one more level of difficulty I would have had to face at this library only half a year ago: in order to get any books, you had to look them up on the computer, then order them at a desk. You couldn't go into the stacks yourselves. Like a giant special collections library made up of EVERY BOOK EVER. Fortunately it's not like that any more, but the library's history meant that I had to ask two different people before I figured out how to go through the tiny little passageway to the left of, and behind, the check-out desk; past the copiers; and finally into the long, low collection of books. Is this kind of thing normal? It's not what I'm used to from the various public and university libraries I'm familiar with. With the exception, I guess, of Stanford. Their stacks are in similarly long, cramped quarters with low ceilings made hazardous by pipes and sprinkler heads. I think of my tall coworker risking his life every time he'd walk through those tight mazes of books.

I was successful, though, in the end, so you can breathe that sigh of relief. Do you know that thing that happens, when you finally begin to penetrate the mystery of a library? it's a kind of impression of wonder, that it can even exist, that people have been writing things down for so many hundreds and hundreds of years, and an enthusiasm or giddy excitement, that it's all available to me. Then, not long after the giddiness, I start to get a little sleepy from the warm, musty air.

Postscript, regarding the Ackroyd book: I've been reading one or two others of the books I brought home from the library, and I'm ready to admit that the way his book is organized is more-- well, okay, I think because it's trashier, it's a lot easier to read. He doesn't use a lot of dates, and with my limited amount of time to get all this information, it's more what I need. I hereby rescind my earlier disparaging remark.

I leave you with a picture of all that was left this afternoon of the birthday cake that one of my friends in Basel made me. It's some kind of Transylvanian nut cake. I took to eating a little bit of it for every meal. I will miss it, now that it's gone.

There's no pool at home

but it's still nice to be here. Hello, Basel. I'm back from Aix, my visiting friends are on their way to Paris, and I've got two weeks of completely unscheduled time to faff away. Thought it might be nice to faff some pictures up onto the interwebs. After debating the virtues of chronology, I've decided to throw order out the window and go for a random selection.

Starting here with a little video I took of some of the trees in the park behind the Grand Saint-Jean in Aix. Though you can mostly hear the sound of the camera's inner workings, the trees made a particular sound, I'm sure you can imagine it, of all their leaves clattering together in the whooshing wind. You could hear it during the performance sometimes. Oh yeah, the performances! I haven't forgotten, since the music is still in my head nearly constantly, but it's growing fainter. There's a video online where you can watch the whole opera, and see my bass scroll in silhouette against the bright stage a few times. It's only an hour and a half, maybe you could watch it on a lazy evening indoors? It'll be online til sometime in early October. 100 days from the original performance, July 17. And, here's the link.

Since the last blog post, I saw that Shostakovitch opera, The Nose, it was crazy and interesting - Shostakovitch was 22 when he wrote it, and it's clearly his work, and also loud and difficult. There aren't so many moments of rest in the production, and the sets, designed in part by Wm Kentridge, reflected the action. Sometimes a wall, tall as the entire stage, would move forward or back, would open up with doors or windows in which the action would happen, would disappear. I brought with me the libretto on an iphone and followed it for the whole performance, which really helped; otherwise the constant stream of conversational and theatrical Russian (why aren't there repeats and da capo arias, like in Baroque opera??), clarified by French supertitles, would have pretty much left me in the dark.

An orchestra from Lyon was down there in the pit. They did a good job. I saw one other performance during the festival, a dramatic staging of my favorite book, Austerlitz, by WG Sebald. It was all in French with no supertitles, but having anticipated that I read the book again before going to see it. The staging was simple, there was only one actor, and he half acted, half spoke text directly from the book. In the back of the stage was a contemporary music group, Ensemble Ictus, based in Belgium, made up of clarinet, prepared piano, flute, trombone, viola and cello. They were playing music composed for the production, and it was mostly a succession of rhythmic chords in clusters. The whole production exuded anxiety. There is anxiety in the book, it's essentially the story of a man discovering his identity and uncovering the fate of his parents, both of whom were forced to leave their homes during the war and ultimately perished in concentration camps, but the book is so much more than that story: it's a meditation on architecture, moths, libraries, human nature. Discovery and wonder. The production did have a spare and architecturally evocative set, and it used images from the book and images from the director, who had followed the same path of the protagonist in the book, and taken his own photographs; these were all well done. But for anyone who hadn't read the book and didn't speak French, I think it was mostly an opportunity to space out and think about things. Way to hang in there, Andrew. Props to Andrew also for his zen-like patience during the several performances of Acis & Galatea for which we couldn't get him a ticket, spent sitting backstage while singers darted in and out and the music was piped in on tinny speakers.

We did do some things aside from opera performances while Andrew was in Aix, of course. There was plenty of obligatory eating of beautiful farmer's market food and poolside relaxing,

and we also took advantage of my one day off to rent a car and drive all around the area. We looked at the sea from the top of a cliff, while lunching on goat cheese spread on fruit bread and sweet ripe apricots and nectarines. We drove north in the direction of Gap and looked at a river, and an abandoned chapel. We wandered around the "ancient" part of a town in Provence in which every charming old building, including something that looked like a castle and the city hall, had been converted into residential units, either by adding a block of mailboxes outside or by building a mismatched structure (apartments, a corner store, nothing classy or matching) directly into the side of the hill or the old brick. There were TV antennae attached to the battlements of an ancient stone tower, and xmas lights strung around the oldest chapel in the city. We kept walking around thinking, oh, here, maybe now we've found the historical center! and instead of Good King René's castle, we'd find laundry strung between houses and deserted streets. Weird. I'm hoping my understanding of the situation there will change or develop though I'm not sure how I'd add more information to my confusingly incomplete picture. Wait and see, I guess.

Lest it seem I only swam in the pool while 30 km from the Southern coast of France, here are a couple shots from a delightful day spent with my housemates and one of the singers on an island called Frioul, a short ferry ride away from Marseille, swimming and floating in the clear, salty water.

Oh, good weather, aren't you grand. (Just looked up and out the window at the pokey, puffy gray things in the sky out there.) Summer continues anyway. I spent the last three days with friends in town from NYC, we climbed an Alp (more on that later), and in about two weeks I'll travel to Venice to do 11 days of printmaking. Summers are nice, it's great to have a job with a distinct season. Will this change? Let's hope not.

festival time

Hi from France - I'm in Aix-en-Provence for the month, playing at one of the world's largest opera festivals. My production is of Handel's most popular opera, Acis and Galatea, written on a pastoral, mythological theme. Acis is a shepherd, Galatea a nymph. They've seen one another before the opera begins and spend the first few arias talking about their love, and trying to find each other. They're reunited, and sing a couple lovey-dovey arias - "Love in her eyes sits playing", and "Happy we". But alas, "no joy shall last" - Polyphemus the Cyclops sees Galatea and falls in love with her ("O ruddier than the cherry, O sweeter than the berry"), then pursues her. Acis stands up to the monster and is killed when Polyphemus hits him on the head with a rock. Galatea is heartbroken, but uses her powers to give her lover immortal life, as a spring - the source of a river. (Here is a link to the libretto.)

The venue is in the middle of the countryside, at the site of a derelict stone house; the stage is attached to the side of the building, and is in the open air. Behind the stage is a big field, with several disused ponds and stands of trees. This is a shot of the stage from the field. Below, a terrible picture of Galatea on stage, with dusk and trees in the background:

 

looking past the side of the stage, to the field; and

 

a view of the continuo section, with the stage above/behind them.

It gets quite cold at night here, and can be very windy, so many layers of clothes are necessary. More layers even than I brought, so sometime this week I'll do some searching for one more long-sleeve black thing for the concerts. If I can't find anything I may end up wearing my black raincoat during performances.

The music is really, really nice. It's clear why the opera has remained popular for the past (nearly) 300 years. Handel was born in 1685, the same year as Bach, also in Germany, and after many years of schooling, traveling, and working in many different places in Europe, he settled in England, and in fact became a naturalized English citizen. That's why so many of his pieces are in English - this opera, and of course works like the Messiah. The longer I live in Europe, and work and travel throughout the continent, I understand how old this tradition is, and how many peripatetic musicians there have been throughout the centuries. In many ways I think it must be at least similar now to how it was in Handel's time, in that you follow the work through the different countries, and meet an international crowd of musicians doing the same thing. It's nice, actually, to find myself inside that tradition.

Wretched lovers, view from the pit.

Aix-en-Provence is a charming town around 30 km from the sea. Marseille is the closest big town. It has a well-preserved old center, and while many of the shops are geared towards tourists, it seems overall to be focused on pleasant summer living. Cafés in squares, plane trees, restaurants everywhere. A big Saturday market, with perfect ripe nectarines, fresh goat cheese, gorgeous olives. Beautiful bread. Did I mention that it's nice here? I'm staying with five other members of the orchestra in a house just outside the city center, it's got a pool (!) and plenty of space to lounge around. With the big backyard and stone floors it feels like some kind of villa. In the backyard we've got a fig tree (nearly ripe), olive trees, a pomegranate bush, lavender, rosemary, and some small palms. The only downside I've found so far are the hordes of mosquitoes waiting to bite me any time I let down my guard - the first night I got bitten on my eyelid, and had to spend the first rehearsal (Hi everyone, I'm Megan, don't mind my half-closed eye) squinting at the music and trying not to scratch my face. Little jerks. I've bought a fan, though, and started wearing bug spray to bed, and that's helped.

Everyone is really nice. The orchestra is an extremely friendly bunch of people, I'm among the oldest but not out of place. I think the youngest is 21. The singers, too - occasionally charmingly obnoxious, but very very nice. Yesterday we had a wildly successful party at the house and most of the people from our production came over. Nothing like a pool and a bunch of bottles of rosé to make a good party. By the end we were dancing in the living room to French radio.

I'm looking forward to the beginning of the productions. The rehearsal schedule has been really long and taxing; on Saturday, and also today, we rehearse at the outdoor venue until 12:30 AM. Goodness me, I'm not used to this schedule. The opera is only an hour and a half long, so once the run begins we'll be done at 11 every night. Fortunately we rarely have anything during the day, so it's possible to sleep as much as we need. There are a number of other interesting operas up this week, and we have the chance to attend dress rehearsals for free. I'm planning on going to see The Nose, an opera by Shostakovich, based on a Gogol story, directed by the South African artist William Kentridge, who also helped with set design and created videos to accompany the production. (Link to a NY Times article about it.)

Well. This post seems to be going on forever. I'll add a few more pics and leave it at that.

 

summer things

Last summer was a Salad Summer. This one, so far, is a Pizza Summer. How many delicious variations can I make? Tonight's is a Pizza Mandala. Potatoes spiral inwards. Second level, tomatoes to infinity. Then cheese, gently. Salt. And I'm going out to pick some of the chard I've grown, to saute with olive oil and white wine, and then put on top. Chard:

With drops from a recent rain shower. I had a rehearsal this afternoon, and during a break we opened a window, and there was rain, but there was also thunder like I've never heard. For several minutes I asked my colleagues if it was thunder, or someone rolling a dumpster down the street, because it just didn't stop. On and on, rumbling, no cracking, and nearly constant. I really thought it was someone with a dumpster. But then I looked, and the street was deserted. The sound seemed to be coming from all around. The it started to hail. Summer! The rehearsal was for a recital in which I'll be playing, of renaissance consort music. It's great. I'm playing "consort bass" which is the renaissance equivalent of the g-violone from a couple posts ago; it's got 5 strings, instead of 6, but the string order, and fingering, is the same. All the viols were made by the same maker, and I'm sorry to say it but they've got faces that only a mother would love. They sound great, though! Playing in a consort is amazing. It's so different from anything else I've ever done. My part is equal to the other parts, and there are only 5 of us. Rhythm and melody are much different from later music, and playing the instrument is challenging but in a way that helps me play better. I can feel myself becoming more adept throughout the course of a rehearsal. Skills! Happening.

Since I won't have the chance to go home for the summer, my mom will come for two weeks. She arrives on Tuesday, and though I'll be pretty busy while she's here I think we'll be able to do some fun things. Especially if she enjoys all the concerts I'll be playing. The day after she gets here I'll be playing in Thun, a very beautiful town on a picturesque lake, surrounded by Alps, in what is known as the Berner Oberland (the high land near Bern). She'll also get a chance to see the consort concert (I've been waiting for the chance to write that). And to eat some of my chard. Maybe I'll have peas by then?

I have some more pictures for you. We get a lot of moths flying in the windows at night, this was one of them, in a jar, just before I released it out of a window on the other side of the house:

Last night my roommate Diego had his Master's recital. Someone gave him some incredibly beautiful flowers. Peonies?

 

I spent some time in Copenhagen recently visiting Andrew, and then he came to see me here. We had some really nice weather, in both places.

Copenhagen spring is a little behind Basel spring. It's still pretty nice.

 And, what's that? BABY DUCKS? Yes.

Back in Basel, we found this bike that hasn't seen a lot of action recently.

Then we took a walk in the big hike & bike area near my house, the Lange Erlen. Look, it's me.

Sorry this blog is nothing but news lately. It's not that I don't have as much to say. I think going on those tours made me a little anti-computer and I've never really gotten back into it. In other news, I got a pretty cool bloodstain on the book I'm reading when I crushed a mosquito against the wall at 5:30 this morning. Take THAT, you little jerk. 

Promising, again, to write more, better, sooner. Or, at least, imagining that might be a nice thing to do. Encourage me? It helps.

first swim!

Is it unseasonably warm? You could ask me, is it the perfect temperature? I would say yes. Apparently summer has come about 4 weeks early here. Cheers to that! Today I walked over to the swimming pool near my house, Eglisee, which is celebrating its 100th year of existence. It's a complex of several pools, for kids, and laps, and even an area just for women. (Nur für Frauen!) The water was cold still, obviously, but by the third time I got in I felt well adjusted to it. Then, I came home and started prepping for a taco party with some kammer orchester basel people. Fun fun! Also I took some photos of the little sprouts from all the seeds I planted. They're so cute.

planter boxes, with some strawberries in pots

 someone left their stanley knife to rust on the roof.

 peas and cornflowers

 nusslisalat

 chard! it already has red stalks.

 hmm, tomato, i think, and red leaf lettuce.

 my house, the trees, and what looks like a storm cloud.

 some mourning doves (wood pigeons) being pigeon-y

view from the terrace

view of the terrace

(look at all those planter boxes waiting for plants!)