after a month of doing and attending artsy stuff for inspiration, I think, I'm all cultured out... now I sort feel like I just want to do my own thing, my own art whether writing or drawing...
Last Friday, I finished the DanceBOOM festivities...I saw more dance films both liberating- the modern/contemporary is of course weird, I learned from the choreographer the importance of having a vision, believing in it... I attended BalletX-- the dancers are classically trained in Ballet but their repetoire are modern works and lyrical choreography... they are making their 200702008 home at the Wilma Theater, where they'll be performing new interpretations of classic ballet show, such as the Sleeping Beauty, etc.... one of the modern movement they did is flexing their ankle (it looks really awful and awkward because it breaks away the stretched look of the graceful and elongated leg-- HOWEVER this move is considered very difficult according to my former dance teacher- I have my opinions)...
prior to this, there were some dancers doing a folk dance on broad street... the interesting thing I learned from this is the interplay between the drums/beats and the dancer, where each one sort of compliment each other while trying to outdo each other...
A couple of days before DanceBOOM, I went to two museums...
the frist is the PLEASE Touch Museum, a museum for kids... I went because I was going to attend the exhibit on Vietnam Folktales... however I came too early, the exhibit wasn't going begin until June 22... the ticket guy was nice enough not to charge my friend and I , and we got a chance to just walk around the museum... my four years old godchild would definitely love this museum... I found it cute and imaginative... it's an educational play-pen-- there's a corner for stroytelling... there's walk-in/ human size models of Alice in the Wonderland scenes, Maurice Sendak... there's a mini grcery store, public transportation... children can interact with literature or develop their motor skills.. play and learn....---
back to why me, a college graduate, is there, what am I doing in this place? good question! it has something to do with my master's program- three weeks ago I visited my new school's website, I read a section about finishing my program on time... one of the things I'm supposed to do in my first semester is to think about "graduating already (envisioning graduation as form of motivation)" and to start thinking about my "master's project" (can you believe that? I haven't even taken a class yet, I haven't even set foot on the campus yet, I haven't met my adviser, and I'm supposed to start thinking about this stuff already... the goood news is at least, I have an idea of what classes I need to take).... I'm hoping that if I return to the Please Touch Museum to see the Vietnam Folktale exhibit, I hope the ticket guy doesn't charge me... but I will defintely bring my godchild here, next time if he isn't too old...
the next museum I visited with my friend is the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (located around city hall)... this is the first time I wnet here.. I aways forget about this museum because I don't see it... there were a lot of American art, especially from Philadelphia's own Charles Willson Peale, and this museum housed the famous "the Gross Clinic" by Thomas Eakins... it's a beautiful museum and easy to get around, the works are all located in the second floor... one of the unique things I saw in this musuem was an art student copying one of the paintings - there's a close resemblance to the original, but you can still tell that the student's copy is not exact...
Afterwards, my friend and I chilled in Zen tea house- ordered almond and taro Boba tea with leche and tapioca, fried wasabi pork dumpling and calamari (expensive but good not the cheap rubbery kind)...
in the movie world
I saw a Russian film with English subtitles, called Day Watch (this is also a sequel to Night Watch)-- this film is fantastical, comedic and action-filled.
I was impressed with the effects- there's something refreshing about them even though they are overused in today's blockbust (what may have contributed to this maybe a different culture's use of it)- cars driving on side of buildings...
this movie definitely have Russia's famous twisted plots and family conflict: in a nutshell this movie is about good versus evil-- for centuries they've been fighting then suddenly they had a truce... evil can still do evil but it has to be controlled, the good people make sure that evil doesn't surpass its quota... in Day Watch, the truce is in danger of being broken... the main leader of the evil people want to have this balance broken of course... the main protagonist is caught in the middle between two powerful beings: his son, who decided to side with the evil, and his girlfriend, who training to be a powerful psychic to the good... this world is full of spirits, vampires, werewolves, telepathics, shapeshifters and more magic-- this is the backdrop for the main character, Anton, and his journey...
the movie succussfully combine courage and humor... Anton is very human and he has a l ot of faults... the thing that saves him is a piece of chalk that could be found near him and all he has to do is ask...
it's a very entertaining movie... all I can say is that I can't believe this only the second installment in the trilogy, it seems complete in itself- I can't wait to see the third one (and also the first one since I missed it last summer)...
I saw Fantastic Four- it wasn't as bad as Spiderman 3, it was more complete and cohesive-- as Silver Surfer concurs with Invicible Woman, we have a choice- so you can choose to see this movie or not!
Food
I went to Vietnam last night, and it was only 20 minutes away from my house 3 blocks from 12th street from Center City... I'm talking about Vietnam Restaurant on the edge of Chinatown. Like I said before, I really like their fresh vegetables and tasty entrees... so I tried a soup this time (which cost around $7- worth it, I was full in the end), it wasn't in a rush to get to DanceBOOM, I probably would get dessert -- next time! :)
Posted by Michael Diezmos at June 19, 2007 12:58 PM