Art, Architecture and Knitting

I finally went to the newly re-opened Minneapolis Sculpture Garden. It's wonderful.  I'm so glad it's open again.

There's a new section up the hill next to the Walker building with some nice views.

It feels like you're out of the city in some spots.

My favorite new sculpture is Black Vessel for a Saint

Not only because it's St. Jerome, but partly because, being he's the patron saint of librarians.

There's a wind chime tree that is lovely.

I also did a walking tour of the Basilica recently.  I don't think I'd ever been in the building before.  It was a fun outing.

They have a mosaic piece with Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe there.

It's not my favorite style of architecture, to be perfectly honest.  That said, the tour was of "behind the scenes" with Preserve Minneapolis and it was very enjoyable.

I also finished the Goldfish Memory shawl relatively recently.  I'm very happy with the way it turned out.

And I ran into a woman on the bus the other day who was knitting.  Some guy was talking with her and said he'd tried knitting but his hands were too big.  She had pretty meaty hands so I thought his argument was very weak.

OH!  And I found a copy of this book at the Walker shop!

The Train

I took the train to New York when I was done in D.C.  I figure what with security and getting from LaGuardia to the city it took about the same amount of time as a flight would have.

The station is nice.   Well, was once nice.  It's pretty chopped up now but there were some old style grand station bits still visible.

There was good people watching too.  I'm not sure how these stockings work, but they were impressive.

There was tagging along the way :)

More than anything else I was impressed by the number of states you cross on such a short train ride.  

The South Bank

I first discovered the South Bank in London when I went on a similar trip with Girl-child. We walked from the Globe Theatre to The Eye that day, and enjoyed the graffiti, the performance art and the beautiful views of the city.

This time I walked from the Tate Modern to iKnit London.

This guy was really good.

These were fun - lined up along a wall that would otherwise be gray and dreary.

I thought we had a lot of bridges, but they have lots and lots of bridges.

This ship is from WWI - an art installation piece with history.

I stopped at The Slug and Lettuce for a bite to eat.

This guy's shirt reminded me of what I saw the first time I was in London (1974).

Walking

I've been walking about.  We're doing that thing at work, where you are supposed to walk 10,000 steps per day.  I've been trying to have fun whilst I walk.

If you haven't been to the MIA for the Leonardo exhibit, The Codex Leicester, I would encourage you to go. It's Leonardo with crochet. Really, I kid you not.

And BTW, there's a new guy at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. 

One must not get too high and mighty with the highbrow art, imho.  I'll call this photo, "Self-portrait with dinosaur."

And I love what they do with those boxes - I don't know if they're electrical boxes in general or just for the semaphores, but they're dressed up pretty nice, even in the shoddy parts of town.

An African-American woman was railing against the East African immigrants as we waited for the bus.  I did not take her bait.

Tonight I happened by the Weisman Museum on the University campus just at the right moment, when the sun was hitting it.

At home the succulents and moss roses are thriving on the balcony.

Instagram

I realized the other night while chatting with Boy-child that Instagram does not work for keeping my children up to date on my activities. We are a family with dumb phones. So here are a few shots of the past few weeks:

The Greenway in the morning.  I got the bike dusted off and have been going out for an occasional spin.

Lakewood Chapel, which I love.

The main post office downtown, which is also architecturally beautiful in a completely different way.

Ant tags at Lake of the Isles.

Summertime is lovely in the city.

Pillars of the Earth, Anyone?

Also found on Mental Floss yesterday:

There's info on it here and here.

I think it's pretty amazing; it would be lots of fun to visit...

Fire Escapes

Some Chicago Architecture

We took an architecture tour on the river on Friday night and we had a great guide/docent. He had a lot of interesting history tidbits in addition to the architectural information.
This was an experimental community built on the river -if I remember right it was built in the 1970s - the first phase of a grand plan (and the only phase completed). I love the parking lot for boats:
And this is a small set of very cool townhouses on the river:
I thought we had a lot of bridges in the Twin Cities, but Chicago has an unbelievable number of bridges. Most of them are that meshy metal and they open up for river traffic to pass:

But really there are a ton of skyscrapers. When we flew in to Minneapolis there was a great view of downtown which looked puny by comparison.
And and occasional surprise - low brick with vines:
The Sears Tower (which has a new name now but who cares?) which is the ugly one in the middle:
This is one of my personal favorites:

This is a newly refurbished building, now the Hard Rock Hotel - complete with a gilded phallus on top:
These fountains in Millennium Park cool you off just by looking at them:
On our last night we went to Branch 27 restaurant - it used to be a branch of the public library:
It's very nice and open inside:
And although the American Gothic painting has always been on loan from the Institute when I've been there before, there was a way to see it this time (I didn't get to the museum - no time - but I will go back to look for the painting as well as to see the new Modern Wing):