Left Coast Cowboys

Today was my day to become part of the permanent collection at the De Young Museum. Seriously! I detailed how I was approached for this project in the last post.

But I honestly didn’t think it would come to anything. Then last week, the De Young Artist in Residence, Shimon Attie (read more about him here) contacted me and said he was ready for my close-up.

He’s working on a multi-media installation for the De Young that will include museum patrons interacting with pieces from the permanent collection. He found me as I was laughing my way hysterically through the Gilbert and George collection, so obviously, he must have thought I had a unique approach to Art.

So armed with the required several changes of wardrobe, I showed up at the De Young for a four hour session “interacting with artwork”. He had told me that the premise was to match specific patrons with artwork that “spoke to them”, and since he’d seen me laughing hysterically at Gilbert & George, I thought for sure I’d be “interacting” with a huge piece of poo. Or maybe a Gilbey’s Gin bottle.

Instead, my “piece” was a giant mastodon’s tusk that had been carved by Inuits sometime in the early 1800s. That’s what you are looking at in this picture — and I apologize for the quality. It is completely VERBOTEN to photograph the artwork, so I had to whip out a point and shoot camera and grab this shot when Shimon and his camera man had their backs turned. (You can see the camera crew in the background.)

Anyway, my “part” consisted of me and the artwork in a velvet lined room, standing on a giant turntable which slowly revolved as I contemplated the artwork and responded to Shimon’s directives to “apprehend meaning NOW.”

Weird and fun and the big gala unveiling is October 17th.

In the meantime, if you go to the De Young and see a giant carved mastodon tusk in the Native People’s Collection. Hey, that’s MINE!

If you haven’t seen the big Gilbert & George exhibit, run don’t walk down to the De Young in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. This may be the most fun art exhibit you see this decade.

Did say “fun”? Yes, I mean fun. Gilbert & George, that strange Anglo/Italian art duo, have been making their art since the Sixties under the premise that art should be accessible to everyone.

In their words:

“We want our art to speak across the barriers of knowledge directly to People about their Life and not about their knowledge of art. The 20th century has been cursed with an art that cannot be understood. The decadent artists stand for themselves and their chosen few, laughing at and dismissing the normal outsider. We say that puzzling, obscure and form-obsessed art is decadent and a cruel denial of the Life of People”.

To that end, they have inserted ordinary urban imagery and found pieces — including themselves — into every piece they do. Then they’ve rendered their images in boldly colored and outlined large panels, reminiscent of stained glass windows. And as an added touch, every piece is labeled with helpful titles that tell you exactly what the picture is about.

In one of their early pieces, they had just sold a piece of art for what, to them, seemed like a huge sum. What did they do with the money? They got drunk for nights on end at the pub. Then made a piece of art called “Gibson’s Makes Us Drunk”, including images of Gibson’s Gin, pub imagery and themselves in various states of inebriation. Since they call themselves “living sculpture” and claim their whole lives are art, they maintain that the drunken celebration was part of the consequences of Art, and therefore Art in itself. I’ll tell you, a bender has never been so beautifully rendered!

But I’m not giving you any idea how oddly beautiful so much of their work is. And thought provoking. Even the pictures where they include large representations of beautifully stylized pieces of poo. (Such as the one piece with an artfully coiled piece of poo on a globe, entitled “Shit World”. Or the piece featuring naked G&G standing on a beautifully stylized mound of poo, called “In the Shit”. I have to emphasize, the images are not shocking so much as quite beautiful. As G&G say, “you can’t have life without poo, so poo becomes a kind of art in and of itself.”) Georgia O’Keefe famously said that most people dismiss flowers as small and insignificant, so she had to paint them very large so that people would really look at them. Gilbert & George have done for poo what O’Keefe did for jimson weed. You’ll laugh, but you’ll also think. And you’ll never find poo so beautifully rendered.

Now I’m making it all sound frivolous and, surprisingly, it’s not. In one particularly effective piece, in response to the recent horrific tube station bombings in London, G&G make a stained glass montage of dozens of headlines and teasers from those newspaper easels that you see around London with their unique lettering. Rendered in a blood red, and juxtaposed with Gilbert & George’s horrified faces, it says all you need to know about the bombing and what it did to London.

So there I was, a few days after I sliced my Achilles Tendon, limping through the exhibit with a huge bulky bandage on my leg. Since I’ve only been able to take sponge baths to preserve the stitches, my hair was a mass of cowlicks and swirls. I was in that bubble you enter when you wear those museum audio guide headphones. And I was laughing hysterically at the art and especially at the commentary by Gilbert & George themselves. If old G&G had been making art from my image, it would have been called “Crazed Art Patron”.

Suddenly I was approached by an earnest young man who identified himself as “Shimon” and presented me with his De Young Visiting Artist press pass and credentials.

“I’m working on an art installation that involves showing patrons reacting to artwork in the De Young’s permanent collection. We want to match up various patrons with specific pieces of art that speak to them. We’ll put both on a large rotating platform and video them with a light show in the background. I’d really like you to be involved as you seem to have a unique connection with the art here.” Then he took a few test shots and informed me that his assistants would be contacting me. When questioned, Shimon wouldn’t tell me why he’d picked me, but he did say he was going to want me to “dress the same”. Hmmmm.

How can I resist an offer like that? I’ll join Gilbert & George as a living sculpture. See G & G are right! Your life can be art. Just hope I’m not photographed observing a large pile of poo.

PS — Catch Gilbert & George as “singing sculptures in “Bend It”. My theory on this? They make themselves ridiculous and silly in order to break down the barrier between ordinary person and artist. If you don’t approach them as “artistes” but as “those crazy guys”, you may be more open to looking at their art without feeling you have to have reverence for every aspect of it.

On a less silly note, here are Gilbert and George talking with their gallery manager about the retrospective and their theories of Art. (This clip also gives you a bit of preview of some of the pieces.) The show travels to Milwaukee and Brooklyn later in the year. See it!

Just a quick post to all and sundry that the Golden Girls left San Francisco and arrived in Sarasota, Florida and Hidden Valley Lake, California safe and sound. It was agreed that a good time was had by all. In fact, I propose an annual Golden Girls Trip. And my first proposal is New Orleans off season. Cast your vote by adding a comment.

The minute we got back, people started asking us, “What was the best part?” How do you define “best” when everything was so different and beyond comparison. I guess the only fair way to answer that is to name the best by category. And even then it wouldn’t be fair. How do you compare hiking the rim of the Grand Canyon to walking the streets of New Orleans? Both are equally wonderful, yet so completely unalike.

Favorite City: Hands down, New Orleans!

Biggest Unexpected Surprise: Tennessee. An absolutely beautiful state with the Smoky Mountains, lovely rolling farmland, Civil War battlefields and some of the friendliest people anywhere.

Most Musical Cities: A three-way tie between Nashville, Memphis and New Orleans. These are places where even Our trip went through some incredible natural beauty like this Yosemite lake.street people and performers in Karaoke Bars sound like Johnny Cash, B.B. King and Harry Connick, Jr.

Best Place to Take a Picture as Defined by the “No Bad Angles” Rule: Monument Valley with the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and New Orleans as close seconds.

Friendliest People: Below the Mason-Dixon Line and on out West with special mention for Tennessee, Oklahoma and the Panhandle of Texas.

Best Place to Be Brought to Tears: A three-way tie between The Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, the Ninth Ward in New Orleans and the Oklahoma City Bombing Memorial.

Best Place to See Cowboys: The panhandle of Texas and Northern Oklahoma. We’re talking Stetsons, We met some great characters like Grandpa, the retiree who was biking across America.bolo ties, boots, Western shirts and Wranglers — and not worn as costumes, but as comfortable everyday clothes.

Best Entertainment for Your Buck: The Ryman Auditorium, original home of the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville. For less than $30 bucks for any seat (and there are no bad seats in the house) you’ll see top notch Bluegrass and Country stars in an intimate and traditional setting.

Best Food: It would be tempting to say New Orleans, but the farm-stands and fresh produce of California’s San Joaquin Valley win out. Special mention would have to go to Mississippi for the excellent meal at Monmouth Plantation and to Tennessee for the great meals at The Dancing Bear Lodge.

Best Place to See Traditional Living: The Four Corners Area where New Mexico, Utah, Colorado and Arizona meet. Especially on the sprawling Navaho Reservation where even most modern houses have a sweat lodge or hogan in the back yard, where the convenience stores roast saddles of You’ll hear a lot of great music across America, much of it still traditional.lamb instead of selling hotdogs, and where traditional crafts are still sold from roadside stands.

Most Pride in Native Sons and Daughters: Oklahoma where every town sign brags of the famous and accomplished who came from there. We drove through or by the homes of Woodie Guthrie, an Apollo Astronaut, an NFL quarterback, Mickey Mantle, an American Idol winner and countless country music stars who were all immortalized on billboards leading into town or even on the town water tower.

Best Place to Rest and Rejuvenate: The Ojo Caliente Hot Springs just north of Santa Fe.

Strangest Surreal Experience: Las Vegas, especially after the isolation and beauty of The Grand Canyon’s North rim. But it’s got to be seen, especially if an Elvis impersonator is part of the package.
Special Category: Best American has to go to Thomas Jefferson (don’t miss his Monticello) who as my friend Susi says, was the last man who knew everything there was to know in his time.
Most Scenic Highways: Arizona. With buttes, mesas, colored sands and Western landscapes, most of the roads we traveled here were right out of a John Ford Western.

Most Entertaining Dining: The Big Texan Steak Ranch in Amarillo. Home of the 72 ounce steak dinner. Eat it in an hour and it’s free. Need a lift? A free limousine sporting Texas long horns on the front will pick you up at your campsite or hotel.

Best Place to Channel Your Inner Scarlet O’Hara: Plantation Alley along the The Great River Road in Louisiana. We think Oak Alley Plantation is the best but you have at least a dozen to choose from.

Most Characters Per Square Inch: Impossible to say definitively, but the North End of Boston has to be near the top.

Our Favorite Character: Grandpa from Oklahoma, the retiree who was biking across America and blogging about it on his site: Grandpa Lost His Mind (dot com).
Las Vegas is s whole different type of American landscape, but you’ve got to see it.
Best Hotel: A tie between the Peabody Memphis and The Dancing Bear Lodge in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee.

Best Place to Understand How the Blues Were Made: Travel down Highway 61 through country that looks as if the plantation system and Jim Crow South were still in place. Don’t forget to stop at the crossroads where Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul to the Devil. And keep a steady stream of Blues on the iPod.

Scariest Place that You Must See: Death Valley. Especially in mid-summer, you’ll wonder if you can escape with your life. But it’s like traveling the surface of the moon or a very hot asteroid.

Places to Get Most for Your Buck: KOA Campgrounds. They seem to be largely We saw few museums. We found more of America in the great people we met like these friendly Memphis firemen.locally owned by families who live on site, take great pride in their facilities and are happy to make sure you know all the places to go.

Place to Avoid Like the Plague: Hot Springs, in fact anywhere in Arkansas. Scary places, run down towns and the only unfriendly people we found in the South.

Our advice to you now: Go out, see America and make your own list! Thanks for joining us on the ride.

FINAL TRAVELERS’ NOTES:

1. Go in the off season. Or don’t. Just go.

2. Take twice as many pictures as you think you should. And you’ll still not have all the pictures you wish you had.

3. Blog or journal or it will all run together and you’ll have a hard time remembering the highlights.

4. Eat locally and talk to people. You’ll get great advice and lots of local info.

5. Create a soundtrack for each region on your iPod i.e. Blues for the South, country music for Tennessee. It sets the mood.

6. Don’t listen to the iPod with headphones! Don’t read or sleep in the passenger seat. Stay alert and in the moment. Some of the best things are what you see from the side of the road.

7. Pull off that road every time you see an interesting site, a historical marker or a photo op.

8. If at all possible, schedule twice as much time as you think you need. You’ll still only see half what you wish you could have.

9. Try to see local shows and entertainment. Even if it’s a nightmare, like the Bath House Show in Arkansas, you’ll get a real sense of the place.

10.Have fun and see each place as if it’s your only opportunity to see it. But make plans to go back to your favorite places.

Having crossed the US in a somewhat zigzag pattern from Boston to San Francisco, my first thoughts are that we saw so little of it. Only when we veered up to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon did we get above the line of the old Rte. 66. That leaves states such as Montana, Wyoming, Minnesota and Oregon — the original route of Lewis and Clark — untouched and unseen. Even in the states and cities we passed through, we really only got a taste. Given that this is about the 8th time I’ve done a cross-country trip and after years of extensive traveling, I’m amazed at what I still haven’t seen in America.

One of my fears was that much of the natural beauty and small town charm I remembered from my last trip twenty years ago would be gone. It’s still there. Sadly, in some towns, you have to drive through a gauntlet of fast food places to get to the core of the old town. But the old towns are there, sometimes even more restored than they were when I last saw them. And it’s still possible to avoid fast food and still eat in America. Except for the occasional Starbucks coffee in cities, we stopped at no fast food restaurants. Well, we did stop at a Shoney’s (think a low-rent Southern Denny’s), but we rationalized that as a America’s Got Talent! Especially people like Hack Bartholomew who’s playing his trumpet and singing gospel in New Orleans to help rebuild his Katrina-devastated church. In fact, in some places like Memphis, Nashville and New Orleans, even the street people and the Karaoke singers had star quality and perfect harmony.cultural experience.

And despite the homogenization of the world through YouTube, MTV, Fox Channel, and the Internet, each state really does still retain it’s own special character. Once we were in Oklahoma, we knew it and could sense the difference the minute we crossed the border from Arkansas. The same with Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Arizona and California.

One common denominator, especially as we headed south of Washington D.C. and then turned West: people were unbelievably friendly, welcoming and helpful. With the possible exception of Bali, I can’t think of a country where two travelers would be treated so warmly, respectfully and encounter so much genuine friendliness.

Finally, the West, especially, is still very much the West. Different from the rest of America, somewhat wild and with a frontier sense of hospitality and friendliness. It also seems to have escaped a lot of the obesity trend that plagues much of America. As soon as we crossed into Oklahoma and as we continuedWhen you start seeing characters like this little buckaroo we met in Oklahoma City, you know you’ve reached the West. Cowboy style and lean rangey types are everywhere — with frontier friendliness to match.through Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, we saw mostly rangey, lean, cowboy types. And they all dress like cowboys. You’d never know what they are wearing on MTV when you are in the real West. Because they’re still sporting cowboy boots, bolo ties and Western shirts.

It’s elements like these that make traveling across America akin to traveling through a lot of unique countries. And while there is a lot of world to see out there — and I always advocate seeing and experiencing foreign cultures — I’d say save one vacation a year to see something of America. You won’t be disappointed.
A prime reason to travel America: it’s filled with some of the most breathtaking natural beauty anywhere in the world. Think of another country that could boast Monument Valley, the Grand Canyon, the Smokey Mountains, the High Sierras, the Mississippi and thousands of other natural wonders!