Today's big going-on: Daisy went to get spayed. Get home soon, girl!
Julia and I were a little late to the party for the box-office hit (and Oscar hopeful) The Help. What a wonderful, satisfying film, full of humor and heartbreak. The cast was, to a person, outstanding: Viola Davis, peerless, as the maid whose years of devotion and service belie a wounded, angry heart; Octavia Spencer as the big-eyed, sassy help who backs down to no one; Emma Stone as the budding writer whose idea it is to publish a book recounting the relationship between the black maids and their white employers in 1963 Mississippi; Bryce Dallas Howard (playing a caricature but doing so with razor-sharp, unnerving nastiness) as the snobbiest white woman around; Jessica Chastain as a vivacious, sunny newlywed shunned by the other wives. In the two reviews I read of the film, I don't recall any mention of what a nice job writer-director Tate Taylor did adapting Kathryn Stockett's hugely popular bestselling, book club staple. Taylor forgoes civics-lesson preachiness for the most part but doesn't do disservice to the black characters by turning them into disenfranchised saints either. I suppose Howard's character is too one-dimensional of a villain, though, and some of the white characters aren't as well-drawn as the black characters are; the men remain blank-faced, largely muted ciphers. The plot moves well and the sentiment is generally well-earned, however.
Horse Drawn Cabs at Evening, c1890.
Today, I was inspired by the artwork on Julia's daily calendar by Childe Hassam, one of the most well-known of all the American Impressionists in the early 20th century. Hassam ((1859-1935) was the very definition of prolific and was one of the founding members of The Ten, an influential circle of American painters (John Twachtman and Edmund Tarbell were among the others). Hassam was born in Massachusettes but studied in Paris during the height of Impressionism. Hassam wanted to bring Impressionism to America and to do away with conventionally accepted academic styles - such as classicism and romantic realism, not to mention the use of outdated exhibition installations. Hassam's favorite subjects were the streets of New York City, imbuing the buildings and sidewalks with an Impressionistic, bright light. He painted the New York and New England countrysides as well. He declared that he was more invested in the emotional content of the painting than the color-application techniques. He's most famous today, however, for his Flag Paintings, which became to him what Haystacks were to Monet. From 1916 to 1918, Hassam completed a series of over twenty flag paintings as a way of commemorating the flags of all the Allied Force countries during World War I. Before he died, he was working a lot as a graphic artist, completing hundreds of lithographs and and etchings. Below is Allies Day, May 1917. This painting served as a commemoration of the visit of both the French and British war commissioners to America after the U.S. had entered the war. It was the first time the flags of three nations had hung together in public.
A note before I proceed. In case you were wondering where I get my information, I'll tell you. I use a variety of non-Wikipedia websites, paraphrasing and re-wording facts and information from history websites, academic journals, artist home pages, newspapers and magazines. I get as much information as I possibly can, parse out the most concise, important information I want to get across, and then voila! I make sure I go to reputable, encyclopedic sites. If I ever have to quote directly from a source, I would surely do so.
Robert Irvine, chef from Restaurant: Impossible, has a restaurant on Hilton Head Island. Here is its website: http://www.eathhi.com/ Irvine has lived on Hilton Head since 2007 - that is, when he's not on the road 300 days a year, often consumed with the Food Network shows he appears on. Here's a list of other dishes he recommends on the island: http://www.foodnetwork.com/chefs/robert-irvines-top-five/index.html
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