Saturday, October 09, 2004
Confluence
The Wabash Riverkeeper, a group that says it is for clean air, safe water and wild places, hosted a hors d'oeuvres, a cash bar and live bluegrass music at the Swope for those interested in the Wabash River.
I tolerate eating elaborate little snacks and listening to stringed instruments but I really like being in the Swope Art Gallery. In the 70s when I still had dreams of becoming very rich, I allowed myself the fantasy of buying the Swope and living there in an apartment that looked like the final scene of 2001 A Space Odyssey.
I'll never get over some of the pictures that hang in that place and have since I first saw them as a child. That forlorn man seated with a slouch that hints at defeat, bony hands and wrists extending beyond his sleeves and his coat hanging on the wall with a folded classified section showing in the newspaper in the pocket. The man has been waiting for a job for 70 years without a break. He is the picture that comes to my mind when unemployment figures are discussed.
Another picture that hangs in the Swope is the landscape/skyscape by John Rogers Cox - the one with the dark sky and a single white cloud over perfectly contoured rows of plowed earth. In the old days there was a barn on the horizon but, late in life, the artist took the canvas back and wiped out the barn and replaced it with a brick house. It is remarkable and, by itself, worth a trip to the Swope.
The small special display room near the elevator (2d floor) was devoted to a dozen or so Wabash River paintings and drawings. The Gookins painting was my favorite until I saw the one on the back wall, center-left. The gilded frame drew my eye to the Wabash at Terre Haute with a stern wheel paddle steam boat approaching a landing.
I found out, from Rae Schnapp the Water Policy Director that the Wabash River Keeper organization is about protecting all the tributaries and that includes every creek we kayaked this summer. More about that later or perhaps on the kayaking blog.
I tolerate eating elaborate little snacks and listening to stringed instruments but I really like being in the Swope Art Gallery. In the 70s when I still had dreams of becoming very rich, I allowed myself the fantasy of buying the Swope and living there in an apartment that looked like the final scene of 2001 A Space Odyssey.
I'll never get over some of the pictures that hang in that place and have since I first saw them as a child. That forlorn man seated with a slouch that hints at defeat, bony hands and wrists extending beyond his sleeves and his coat hanging on the wall with a folded classified section showing in the newspaper in the pocket. The man has been waiting for a job for 70 years without a break. He is the picture that comes to my mind when unemployment figures are discussed.
Another picture that hangs in the Swope is the landscape/skyscape by John Rogers Cox - the one with the dark sky and a single white cloud over perfectly contoured rows of plowed earth. In the old days there was a barn on the horizon but, late in life, the artist took the canvas back and wiped out the barn and replaced it with a brick house. It is remarkable and, by itself, worth a trip to the Swope.
The small special display room near the elevator (2d floor) was devoted to a dozen or so Wabash River paintings and drawings. The Gookins painting was my favorite until I saw the one on the back wall, center-left. The gilded frame drew my eye to the Wabash at Terre Haute with a stern wheel paddle steam boat approaching a landing.
I found out, from Rae Schnapp the Water Policy Director that the Wabash River Keeper organization is about protecting all the tributaries and that includes every creek we kayaked this summer. More about that later or perhaps on the kayaking blog.
