Museum People: Rothko Contemplation

The Frida Kahlo-loving throngs / SFMoMA  

I like to watch people.  Even more so, I really like to watch people in museums.  I like to see how people respond to art.  What draws some people to take a closer look while others can’t stand to look at all? 

Last Thursday, I spent the entire evening at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.  I was by myself with no particular agenda or time limits.  It was one of the few times when I can say that I went through the whole museum - all of the special exhibits as well as the permanent collection.  It was bliss.  I attended that particular night to catch the Frida Kahlo exhibition.  It has been running all summer, so I was pleasantly surprised to see the huge crowds in the galleries.  There were timed tickets, but it still took a little energy to get close enough to the artwork in order to actually read the placards.  [More SFMoMA photos here]

Frida Kahlo’s work clearly had a large following, but I also enjoyed some of the other ongoing exhibits. Those galleries were quieter and allowed more time for study and reflection: particularly that of Lee Miller, one of the first female war correspondents / photojournalists on the European front during WWII.   Her photography is quite haunting; a series of images that stays with me is her photographs from Hitler’s apartment, taken after his suicide in 1945.  Everyday items, but in the context of events, so much more. 

…perhaps this whole “people watching” thing is what lead me to enjoy photography so much…

Earlier in the week, I enjoyed watching and photographing my friends as they worked on their knitting projects.  As we sat in the small cafe, we each had a project in hand. 

Rangsiwan’s finished hat  / BrooklynTweed’s Habitat Hat 

Nova’s new square / Barn Raising Quilt 

I started a new project before I headed out west - a simple slip stitch scarf in a luscious yarn.

Much longer now and almost complete.  Once I finish, I will tell you more about it.

**Have you seen any good museum exhibitions lately? 
  Where is your favorite place to people watch?

You see, technically it started on Tuesday night…

Risa and I met up to knit for a little while before meeting Nova and Steph and heading over to the restaurant (the fabulous Khan Toke Thai House) to meet Rangsiwan and Vanessa.

In our cozy dining room!

Over a delicious five-course meal, the six of us shared numerous stories and upcoming plans.  Minutes turned in to hours and the night slipped away…

Going home, we made elaborate plans for the next day… plans that spanned the San Francisco Bay even! We started early with a yummy breakfast at Stacks in Hayes Valley and a little photo shoot with the sculpture in the park across the street.  We formulated a plan, and jumped into Rangsiwan’s sweet ride and headed over the Bay Bridge to visit an amazing little shop in Berkeley:  Stonemountain and Daughter.  It is primarily a fabric shop, but they had quite a beautiful supply of notions and even some yarn for knitters too.

The store name button mosaic

I spent a long time looking at buttons. There were hundreds to choose from, and I was looking for something special for my Moldova Coat… and I found a couple of choices, so I got them both! (and a few other pretties too for future cardigans and pullovers.)

Everyone else came away with lovely fabrics and elaborate plans for quilts and garments.  I really can’t wait to see what comes of all of the lovely inspirations!  One day, I would love to devote more time to sewing (and this would be such a great place to go for all of that inspiration!) but I feel like knitting and weaving are keeping me busy now.

We drove through Berkeley and headed back to Oakland towards the storied Article Pract store:  the shop’s reputation proceeded it, and it lived up 100%.  Especially when I saw their sale room with 40% off bagged yarn… I picked up 2 bags and the new Vogue.  Evidently I was in a tweed frame of mind… Rowan Summer Tweed and Elsebeth Lavold Silky Tweed came home with me! (click for photos).

The Bay Area had higher than average temperatures last wee, so we were all looking for some refreshment.  We headed back to San Francisco and went to the MIssion neighborhood, anticipating our next yarn shop stop at Imagiknit… but first, we needed some sustenance.

Aloe Juice at Samovar (I want to find a recipe for this!)

Once we cooled off and filled our bellies, we were ready for more yarn shopping/browsing.  We walked across the street to Imagiknit… we all seemed to have agendas to look at yarn, books, magazines, and in my case, the sales wall.  I am happy to report that they had an amazing selection of sale yarns. In fact, the owner Allison was begging us to help her make some room for all of the new autumn yarns that were sitting on boxes on the floor.  I did my best to oblige.

Rangsiwan, Steph, and Risa picked up a few things too…

The shop has such an amazing selection of yarns and such a great space - everything is so well-lit and the people are very friendly.  My basket was filled a few times as my eyes tended to gravitate towards all of the pretty colors with no real plan for patterns.  So, I pulled out a little list that I made earlier when consulting some patterns on Ravelry.  So, I got 3 bunches of yarn that will make some great things.

Hemp for Knitting Hempwol - also Kraemer Tatamy Tweed and EL Silky Flammé

And just when you think “how can they fit any more in?”  well, I told you we got an early start, so by the time we were finished with Imagiknit, it was still early afternoon.  We had plenty of time to spare… and after stopping by Tartine for a spot of tea and some knitting (Nova was craving one of their pastries) and we all agreed that it was photo time.  Everyone in the group is into Flickr as much as I am, and we wanted some fun shots to document our day.  We headed to a nearby high school and set up my camera and remote for the infamous JUMP shots!

(Risa, Steph, Nova +baby, Rangsiwan, and me in air!)

Jump shots are known to induce laughing fits, so if you attempt such things at home, BE READY!  We did about 6 of these, and this was the best one where we were all in the air.  Rangsiwan even went for the pirouette!  We also posed for some fun shots that Rangsiwan turned into clone shots on Flickr.

We headed north to Japantown to check out Kinokuniya’s craft books - so many great things (but I left empty handed, you may recall my little spree at the NYC location back in April) and then we ended the amazing day at the delicous Cafe Lettüs.  We were a tired bunch, but so happy.  I think we all had tired grins on our face as we said our good byes.

As I entered the elevator in my hotel, it became very obvious that I would need another bag to get all of the yarn home!  I sat in my room with that familiar “afterglow” feeling: amazing people and an amazing city!

…and lest you think it was fun and games all the time - this free day aside - I worked diligently for the rest of the week in my work conference.  I made some great connections with other archivists (a few knitting archivists even!) and attended some enlightening sessions that got me “fired” up about my own work at my institution. That is a good feeling.

One more post about SF coming - all knitting and art related!

Last year it was Chicago - this year it was San Francisco - Archivists really know how to live it up in some great cities!  This trip was a little “iffy” up until the week before, but after feeling great for two straight weeks, I felt that I could handle the travel.  I am so glad I made the trip!

San Francisco Bay Bridge

When I got in town last Saturday, I immediately headed down to the great farmers’ market at the Ferry Building.  I wanted to stock up on veggies and fruits for the week.   Californians don’t realize how great they have it with the whole fresh local food thing - I was amazed at the variety and the freshness of many of the fruits and nuts.

Before leaving Maryland, Risa and I planned to meet up at the market that afternoon… she and her husband, M, met me there  and we ended up spending an amazing day together!  We saw the parrots of Telegraph Hill (we heard them first!) and we had the blisters and sunburn to prove it!

(Risa and Martin - see her amazing Salina!)

We climbed huge hills, took loads of photos, and ate some delicious vegan foods at Herbivore. (I think they loved the food as much as I did and they aren’t even vegetarians!)  After a wonderful day, we made plans for the next day too…

I spent the majority of a beautiful Sunday indoors at the conference hotel looking at PowerPoint slides - but it wasn’t bad, actually.  I was in an archival cataloging seminar with two instructors from a large university’s manuscripts division.  We got to do some original cataloging on [facsimiles of] very cool documents:  seventeenth-century English poetry papers, an American Civil War diary, and even a early modern French marriage contract.

After my seminar, I met up with R and M again for Indian food and a night walk in Union Square.

After all that fun, I did some penance by sitting in a stuffy office building learning about XML for the next two days… but I did have some fun activities after hours…  I met two other knitting archivists in my class, and we decided to head to ArtFibers after class.  Oh my.

An amazing shop with SO many beautiful and unique yarns - and sample swatches for EACH one!  As you can imagine, it was quite difficult to make a decision… Abigail, one of the other archivists, came away with a beautiful lace weight wool/silk blend.  After a whole back and forth between four of five different cones,  I decided to get some very pretty nylon paper yarn, Origami.

Perhaps for the eponymous Origami Wrap Sweater? [Rav link]

I ended the first three days with a delicious Ethiopian dinner with a great friend - it was so great to see Leslie again!  We met up last time I was in San Francisco (in 2006) and this time we had a camera to document our meetup, and our knitting in hand.  I got to meet her beautiful family (+Ollie) and we talked yarn and politics late into the evening.

…much more to come…

…Making the best of a bad situation… that was the name of the game on our cross-country flight back from San Francisco. I have never had a bad airport/airplane experience, so I guess we were due.

We arrived with plenty of time to spare at the SFO airport - it takes about an hour to drive south to San Francisco from Napa Valley, and we did hit some morning rush hour traffic, but as Beltway drivers in DC, this was “old hat”. The weather was foggy and overcast. A harbinger, perhaps? We sat and chatted with family members on the cell phone and ate brunch before going to our departure gate.

The first sign that something was wrong: only two crew members from our flight were on time - and neither one of those two was the actual pilot or co-pilot. Evidently, their earlier flights had run into the fog and had a delayed arrival, causing our Baltimore-bound plane to have a delay as well. When the crew showed up, there were a few disgruntled passengers, but Kris and I were not among them, as we had just had a fabulous vacation, and were content to read and knit the time away.

Right after take-off, we noticed a very bad electrical/chemical smell. It was quite strong, and not the kind of smell you want to encounter when you are 37,000 feet above the earth’s surface. They narrowed the problem to the personal entertainment circuitry - which means no in-flight movies, or sound. However, due to regulations, they had to make an emergency stop for a mechanic to assess the situation. All in the name of safety.

We were diverted to Reno (I thought of you Nessie!) and sat on the tarmac for two hours while men in flame-retardant suits evacuated the first-class cabin to check on the circuitry. There was talk of switching planes, or possibly spending the night in Nevada, but things appeared to be fixed. By this time, there were some crying children and rumbling stomachs. The Reno airport was small, and could not handle an influx of 185 people descending on the one fast-food restaurant that happened to be open. A few passengers made a mad dash - Kris and I waited like good little citizens…

One of the attendants said they ran out to a discount store and bought granola bars for everyone. It was a nice gesture, but did not really alleviate the situation. Right before we left Reno, they made another announcement :

“We are going to be stopping in Denver. Due to FAA regulations, some of our crew must get off and be replaced by new crew members.”

So, we stopped in Denver. I completely understood the need for a replacement crew. Unfortunately, other passengers got rude, and began booing. The crew did the best job possible, and I was very impressed with their level of service.

After an hour of sitting on the tarmac in Denver, I began wondering what Cathi, and Wanda, and the other Mile High Knitters were doing… I want to go back to Colorado under better circumstances!

Needless to say, it was a bad situation. Our flight was supposed to get into Baltimore at 9:01pm. We got in around 3:00am. My parents were SO amazing, and came and picked us up in the middle of the night. They were even smiling, and greeted us with a warm hug. Thank you so much, Dad and Mom!!

And despite the rude woman in front of me who reclined her chair back all the way (she even had two feet of room for her legs because she was in an exit row! I seriously could have knit her hair - she was that close) leaving me only about 8 inches of room to maneuver, I managed to knit. A LOT. It kept me calm and collected. It kept me nice and sweet considering the jerkies that were all around.

I left San Francisco with one Kolsva sleeve, completed entirely on the flight west. On the flight going east, I completed another sleeve, and 9 inches of the body! And I even managed to “cut” my yarn from the sleeve with a plastic knife… no scissors allowed!

Sleeve one and two in the upper left corner, and the body in the foreground. I have three more skeins for the remainder of the back, the front, and the cowl.

Looks like I just may make Norovember!

I flew the friendly skies, and while it was not exactly a pleasant flight, it could have been so much worse… thank goodness for knitting!

Have a crazy air travel story to tell? Go ahead, entertain me!

Kris and I had a wonderful vacation in California, from our days in San Francisco (too short!) to our adventures in the beautiful Napa Valley. We are returning home today to our little dogs, cats, and fish.

It was truly a wonderful vacation!

Click on the picture to see details

I will have a lot of knitting time on the airplane - stay tuned for a weekend knitting progress update!