The photo above is a video still on the back cover of a gallery handout celebrating The Plains of Sweet Regret, a video installation at Lennon, Weinberg, Inc., 514 West 25th Street, New York, NY 10001. Mary Lucier, an American video artist whose work is known internationally, created this installation on commission from the North Dakota Museum of Art. Saturday, April 28, was the last day of the show, so Cathy and I went up there to see it. Sally joined us, as did Naomi Dagen Bloom, known to knitters, peace activists, and bloggers as A Little Red Hen.
Mary Lucier's subject in The Plains of Sweet Regret is North Dakota, where I was raised and Sally was born. The videography of the plains and its present (shown in vivid shots of local rodeos, wheat fields, and farm animals) and former life (shown in the weathered, abandoned farmhouses and barns) was very moving.
I especially loved Lucier's video of a grasshopper, sitting at once alert and calm in a man's hand. We played a lot with grasshoppers as kids in North Dakota, and the brief, sunlit closeups of the insect captured for me the essence of North Dakota: the simplicity of the landscape and the life, the intimate relationship between people and creatures, and the peculiar luminosity of the light, which is very much like the light you see in the New England sky as you approach the ocean.
Naomi, also an installation artist (see CityWorm) and variously described in Google as an "environmental and performance artist" and a "mixed media environmental artist," brought along a copy of her handmade book, Condom Amulets.
The book evolved from one of her present concerns, safe sex for seniors. She promotes condom use (no longer necessary for prevention of pregnancy) for women over 50. She also celebrated Valentine's Day this year by distributing the free NYC Condoms at an icy subway stop near her home.
Sally and Cathy kept the conversation going with Naomi....I was in a new environment nobody told me about at the audiologist's office: New York City. The city pretty much overwhelmed the computer chips in my CI processor, and I didn't know how to adjust it. So...back to smiling and nodding and responding to anything that sounded like English. It was so bad that, at first, I thought I'd wrecked my processor when it fell on the sidewalk yesterday as I changed batteries, thinking that was the problem. But this morning after a quiet night in its dry box, the processor was working again. Scary to be so dependent on such a little object, but that was a good lesson to learn among friendly companions. Thanks, you guys....I could have asked Cathy to interpret for me, but I thought I'd just wade right in and experience the conversation as best I could. Dumb, huh?
I'm sorry you had such an overload in NYC. At least you were with people who love you and understood.
ReplyDeleteI have always thought that the North Dakota landscape is one of the most beautiful. Perhaps it is because it is the first landscape I can remember and it has imprinted on me. I had to smile about the grasshoppers. I haven't played with a grasshopper in years, possibly since we lived in Bismarck.
m.e., waiting till i had also posted about the wonderful afternoon with all of you, i now have. thanks for your very good photos (sigh) and sharing your lively daughter and friend with me.
ReplyDeletehope we do it again! yours, naomi
peggy:
ReplyDeletethat grasshopper just blew me away. so wonderful! i love the ND landscape. just love it.
naomi:
you betcha we'll do it again! keep your eyes peeled up there for more ND stuff....
Peggy:
ReplyDeletecheck out www.alittleredhen.com for "North Dakota Brought Closer."
I enjoyed these comments bec I tend to overthinkthings...I thought that the grasshopper was some kinda symbol of abandonment, some kinda symbol of death. Something about the starkness of the landscape in those stills..."Only natural life here is grasshopper--and 'member what grasshoppers did to the Hebrews."
ReplyDeleteAs the video progressed, I also thought about this documentary about a starving group of people. When grasshoppers invaded, I thought that they would eat their feeble crop, that real famine was brewing. Instead the kids all ran out, snatched the little insects (they are insects, right?) from the air, and ate them. A feast pulled from the skies. And meanwhile the crops continued to ripen. If only the Hebrews had known...of course then we may never have had Moses.
The only time I held a grasshopper, the rude little critter spit on me. ME says it wasn't saliva, but its poop, but I coulda sworn it came out of its mouth. Didn't matter, outcome was the same. I threw the tiny beast into the air and he partly flew partly hopped away.
And so did I.
Kat
sweet regret - yeah - leaving north dakota was a bit of a regret. i left everything i had ever known. sweet because i never knew life could be so rich without jumping into the world headfirst.
ReplyDeletesadly - i used to hunt grasshoppers with my BB gun - not play with them.
We weren't allowed are own bb guns.
ReplyDelete"You'll put your eye out!"
We probably would have.
I could have asked Cathy to interpret for me, but I thought I'd just wade right in and experience the conversation as best I could. Dumb, huh?
ReplyDeleteAs I wrote you in email, as one CI recipient to another, you were not dumb, you were super brave! We have to keep testing the limits of the darned things - it's all part of the learning process.
Sounds like you had a wonderful day with some good girlfriends - good on all of you!
I nearly did put my eye out whilst hunting spiders in the barn. Dumb, dumb, dumb. (no, i never shot a mammal or other warm-blooded creature)
ReplyDelete