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“Speakeasy” Selections
Category Archives: Two-fisted Touristing
Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris
4/15/19 – 4:40pm EDT I am watching with horror and sadness the incredible destruction by fire of Paris’ iconic Notre Dame cathedral. In grief and helplessness I decided to go through the pictures I took when Ed and I visited … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged art, Cathedral, Notre Dame, Paris, photography, religious, sculpture, stain glass
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VERSAILLES – A Walk in the Park (and what a Park!)
A detailed guided tour through the baroque mythological splendors and eye popping and head scratching extravagance of the park of Versailles. The park grounds of Versailles are immense and splendid. Below a map of the whole park: Only the bottom … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged Apollo, Apollo's Bath Grove, Bacchus, ballroom, Ceres, Chateau, Colonnade, cove, dragon, Ed Elder, Enceladus, Flora Fountain, Fountain, gardens, Girandole, Grand Canal, Hades, Hermitage, King's Garden, Latona, Louis XIV, Marie Antoinette, Mirror Fountain, mythology, Neptune, Orangery, park, Parterre, Persephone, sensuality, statues, Sun King, Trianon, Versailles, water, Water Theatre Fountain
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MARK TWAIN NEVER GOT TO THE LOUVRE (but I did)
A trip to the magnificent Louvre museum with Mark Twain. Well actually Mark Twain himself never got there, but he wrote about not getting there in “The Innocents Abroad”, and that satirical anecdote about what happens to unwary, blustery Americans … Continue reading
SENSUAL RODIN
We start with a famous thought. We end with a famous kiss. Rodin’s Thinker greats you in the courtyard of the Rodin House in Paris. And so he will be the introduction to this post of some of Rodin’s … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Melodies Linger On, Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged classical music, Impromptu, Kiss, Paris, Pavane, photography, Ravel, Rodin, Schubert, sensual, sensual classics, sensuality, statues, Thinker
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VERSAILLES – Reflections in the Hall of Mirrors
Paris provided a wealth of imagery and perspectives for me to share – it’ll probably take me a year to process it all in blog post sized bits (here the first one two three four five posts). Why, alone the long … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged art, gold, Hall of Mirrors, mirrors, photography, reflections, statues, Versailles
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Sensual Statues of the Musée D’Orsay
Tensions of the world making you anxious? Here is much soothing, sculptural sensuality but also some less comforting, chiseled objectification Continuing my fascination with sensual statuary in Paris, the greatest concentration of such aesthetically, artistically, and, let’s admit it, amorously … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Melodies Linger On, Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged Brahms, Chopin, classics, Degas, female, male, marble, Musee D'Orsay, museum, nature, Nocturne, objectification, Paris, Sappho, Science, sensual, statue, Symphony #3
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Sensual Statues in the Streets of Paris
Nude statues are all over Paris. I don’t know if statistically there are more nude statues there than in other European cultural capitals, or if the nude statues of Paris are particularly more sensual than elsewhere, or if it is … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Melodies Linger On, Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged angel, Arts and Metiers, Bacchus, bastille, Beethoven, church, classical music, Fountain of Medici, jardin, Like a Prayer, Louvre, Luxembourg, Madonna, nudes, Opera, Paris, pieta, Romance, sculpture, Seine, sensual, sensual classics, Tuileries
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AH, PARIS!
The EIFFEL TOWER, as seen from many different Paris neighborhoods, constitutes the official kick off to a whole lot of Paris infused blog posts (even if it is actually the third of such blog posts – I’ll just call those first … Continue reading
MONA LISA & ME
Yep that’s me. And that’s the Mona Lisa. And this is a little tale of how I spent some time with her. It starts with a trip to Paris. And a whole day set aside for the Louvre, the immense … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged I M Pei, Leonardo Da Vinci, Louis XIV, Louvre, Michelangelo, Mona Lisa, Painting, palace, Paris, Pyramid, Versailles, Wedding at Cana
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ISADORA DUNCAN (?) and the View from Pompidou
A pioneer of modern dance. A preserved treasure of early film. Ed and I are spending two weeks in Paris (don’t feel sorry for me) and Monday we went to the Pompidou museum, where this little treasure of dance and … Continue reading
Posted in Cinema Scope, Live! On Stage, Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged dance, early film, Eiffel Tower, Isadora Duncan, modern, Montmartre, Paris, Pompidou, Serpentine
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Museum Impressions
Yesterday at the Brooklyn Museum with an unwitting special focus on the feminine
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged brooklyn, Female form, feminine, feminism, mirrors, museum, nudes, photography, reflections
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These Roses are Ready for their Close-Up, Mr. DeMille!
Another year… another June… This year the rose garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden had received a “hard cut”, as we heard a passerby explain. Which made it still lovely but less lush than in years past. So I’ll focus … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged A Rose by any Name, Angela Lansbury, Bernadette Peters, Beth Ditto, Bette Midler, Blondie, botanic garden, brooklyn, Debbie Harry, Ethel Merman, For the Boys, Imelda Staunton, James Horner, June, Kate Winslet, Linda Lavin, Makin' Whoopee, Patti LuPone, Rosalind Russell, Rose, Roses, The Rose, Titanic, Tyne Daly
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The Views from THE VIEW
Ed and I were treated to dinner at The View restaurant on the top of the Marriott Hotel in Times Square. 48 stories high, the whole restaurant is perched on a circular platform that, like a very slowly rotating record, … Continue reading
Posted in Arts-a-Poppin', Melodies Linger On, Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged ABBA, Billy Idol, Billy Joel, Charlie Chaplin, Chrysler Building, City Lights, City of Stars, Cole Porter, Down in the Depths (in the 90th floor), Hot in the City, Hudson River, I am the City, Kate Bush, La La Land, Manhattan, Marriott, Miami 2017 (Seen the Lights Go Out on Broadway), Portia Nelson, restaurant, Ryan Gosling, skyscraper, The Lion King, The View, Times Square, Top of the City
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GETTING KINKY WITH JAKE AND WAYNE
Ed and I originally saw “Kinky Boots” when it was still in previews. We had treated each other with reciprocal Broadway tickets for Xmas, because we had high hopes for a Harvey Fierstein / Cyndi Lauper musical collaboration. The performance … Continue reading
Posted in LGBTQ Alphabet Soup, Literary Lyricism, Live! On Stage, Melodies Linger On, Two-fisted Touristing
Tagged Al Hirschfeld, Armistead Maupin, Boys Keep Swinging, Broadway, Bye Bye Birdie, Chita Rivera, Cyndi Lauper, Dick van Dyke, drag queen, Gesamtkunstwerk, Harvey Fierstein, House of David, Jake Shears, Kinky Boots, Lea DeLaria, LGBTQ, musical, Wayne Brady, Whose Line is it Anyway
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