Gossip Central

Hamptons Journal: Bay Street’s Camelot, Robert Longo at Guild Hall, Diana Frank at Tripoli Gallery

Legends of King Arthur and his court are having a moment: The Green Knight in theaters, and out east, Bay Street Theater’s production of Lerner & Loewe’s Camelot --under the stars! Now a classic, its signature song “If Ever I Would Leave You” sends a particular nostalgic chill—ah love—especially for the musical theater genre that Bay Street does so well! Remember the glorious revival of Annie Get Your Gun, Bay Street’s very last production before the COVID shut down? Or the intimate production of Evita a year before? With Camelot--outdoors—BayStreet’s setting conveys less castle and more country as Camelot wields its special charms.

King Arthur in this imagining is a fair and just ruler, looking for equal representation in his governance, hence the knights’ round table. His liberal ideas come after he meets and weds Guenevere; at first, a dated gender bias marks the musical’s first act, especially brow-raising in our current discourse on the roles of men and women. The king’s attitudes progress when Sir Lancelot enters the story, as Arthur (Jeremy Kushnier), “Jen” (Britney Coleman), and “Lance” (Deven Kolluri) sing about good leadership, marriage, and loyalty, all performances solid and square. But, in this three-way expression of courtly love, a stylized representation of king and his knight/ knight and the queen --where the younger pair fall in love at their own peril, heat would be good. But that does not come till the second act.

Hamptons Journal: Graham Nash in Montauk/ Longhouse/ Chuck Manion’s Paintings at Duck Creek

OM—though that’s not my mantra. Dan and Maureen Cahill hosted an event for the David Lynch foundation to support veterans by providing them with TM—transcendental meditation-- life changing according to most practitioners, some of whom attended the concert and sit-down dinner on a gorgeous property between the old and new highways leading into the town of Montauk, with an ocean view, a large vegetable garden, and a chicken coop. 

Milling about on the manicured lawn, drinking wine, munching on canapes, attendees—among them Drew Barrymoore in an oversized hat pulled down (I took her for Julianne Moore at first, who really does live in Montauk) and Paul Jarrod Frank, MD, author of The Pro-Aging Playbook—(can’t miss the irony of that)--the night recalled Edenic times. Bob Roth led a meditation.

The Garden as Art: Longhouse/ The Return of Guild Hall’s Popular Tour

Textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen died in December of 2020, but Longhouse, the spectacular arts reserve off East Hampton’s Northwest Woods continues his tradition with an exhibition of his work. Influenced by his travels, the show is a glimpse into the adaptation of worldly visions into a uniquely American aesthetic. Of course, that’s only one reason to visit Longhouse, which features sculpture throughout, such as an iconic geodesic dome from Buckminster Fuller and Yoko Ono’s “Wishing Tree.” And what about the gardens, and arches of bright baby pink roses!!!!

Guild Hall returned to its tradition, “The Garden as Art” tour featuring artists’ work on the grounds of their East End sanctuaries. I’d like to tell you that Tony Ingrao and Randy Kemper’s gorgeous grounds with its statuary and expert landscaping was my favorite. Or the artist Ross Bleckner’s studio left open for all to see, particularly showcasing the paintings so influenced by gardens. The “best” distinction goes to Tucker Marder who took visitors around his “Folly Tree Arboretum,” speaking of each tree and its specific ecological distinction: the “Moon Tree,” for example, a clone of a Sycamore that went to the moon as a seed with astronaut Stuart Roosa in 1971 as part of the Apollo 14 mission.

Christmas at Moran Studio: Peaceful Holiday Cheer

When he wasn’t in a brownstone in Chelsea, the painter Thomas Moran occupied a studio on Main Street in East Hampton. “A shingled two-story boardinghouse with a smoking chimney” facing the pond, described the late Robert Long in his 2005 book, De Kooning’s Bicycle. In the late 1870’s, “Moran thought that this could be his Fountainebleau.” Visible from Montauk Highway, the stately “cottage” was in disrepair for years, and has been restored as an exhibition space for Moran’s etchings, and this year, for a Victorian Christmas.

Denzel Washington’s Vision: The Museum of the Moving Image Honors Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom

Blues singer Ma Rainey was plus sized in many ways, most especially her voice. In a new film based on August Wilson’s play Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Viola Davis gives her Ma a grimace to go with her mega-sound, as large as life for blacks in America. Davis’s Ma is a grand performance balanced by that of one of her horns-men, lithe Levee, played with charm cum mischief and madness by Chadwick Boseman. Ruben Santiago-Hudson adapted Wilson to perfection in this gem, and this week, the movie, to air on Netflix, had its premiere at the Museum of the Moving Image gala. Virtual, this event was a state-of-the-art forum on the movie’s production, starring Viola Davis and cast, costume designer Ann Roth, director George C. Wolfe who accepted an award from producer Denzel Washington.

Washington, a longtime interpreter of August Wilson’s art, vowed to make the playwrights’10- play cycle, one for every decade of the 20^th century, into film. That vision started with his direction of Fences in 2016, an Oscar nominated film in which he starred with Davis. While Fences does not take place in a recording studio, Wilson's dialogue is always rhythmic. Speaking about the musicality of Ma Rainey, the actors talked about filming with rehearsal time as if this were a staged production, and the bond created among the players. The actor Glynn Turman, Toledo in Ma Rainey, recounted Denzel seeing him in a production of the play and saying, “Stay ready. I stayed ready.”

Audrey Flack and Amy Zerner: The Goddess and her Wiles at M & M Fine Arts

In her 1986 book, Art & Soul: Notes on Creating, the artist Audrey Flack recounts a time when, housebound in East Hampton, she listened to “Candle in the Wind,” Elton John’s elegy to Marilyn Monroe, allowing the muse to infuse the painting of Marilyn she was working on. Now two drawings of Marilyn, still evocative to the artist, as muse and goddess, are a compelling part of a show at M & M Fine Arts in Southampton: “Smiling Marilyn with JFK” and “Marilyn Phantom of Delight” (2014). The Marilyns, exhibited among many other works by Flack, are paired perfectly with art from Springs resident Amy Zerner. Using “goddess” as their theme, the artists occupy adjoining spaces with paintings, drawings, and tapestries that are distinctly feminist, strongly narrative, featuring bold female entities, provocative and beautiful.

A world class artist, a pioneer in photorealism, a master sculptor, Flack’s expansive career includes a 1974 painting, “Leonardo’s Lady,” currently on view at MoMA. Goddesses are Flack’s metiere, including “Medusa,” depending on how you view the snakes adorning her hair. For me she’s beatific, radiating otherworldliness.

Blair Underwood’s Ecstatic Face in The Pack, a Virtual Premiere at Guild Hall

The season would not be eh, the season without all-star comedy from Eugene Pack. He was back virtually on Sunday premiering a program of 3 short works to benefit Guild Hall, starring Matthew Broderick and John Leguizamo performing together for the first time, Blair Underwood and Sherri Shepherd, and Rachel Dratch, Cecily Strong, Andrea Martin, Santino Fontana and Maulik Pancholy. The talented Dayle Reyfel, Pack’s partner and frequent ensemble player, appeared in an unusual way. The playlets inaugurated the final leg of a series that will include some live, distanced, performances in the Guild Hall garden, all sold out. Reached by phone in LA, playwright/ performer, Eugene Pack said he is busy bringing actors together, but he wants everyone to know The Pack owes more to film, although it sounds more like an innovative hybrid, reflecting our current states of creativity.

South Etna: A Pop-Up Provides Food for Thought in Montauk

If it is true, you are what you eat, at South Etna’s inaugural show in Montauk, “Painting is Painting’s Favorite Food: Art History as Muse,” art was most nourishing. At this week’s official gallery opening, a masked affair of course, scenesters and artists alike gathered in the outdoor space beside the exhibition space to talk art, to see each other, and queue up to view the work, only four at a time in the two-room faux Tudor space. Over Pimm’s and iced tea, a lively group including Cynthia Rowley, Ugo Rondinone, Stella Schnabel and many others congratulated Amalia Dayan and Adam Lindemann on this tasteful pop-up gallery. As joyful as the art is colorful and fresh, curated by Alison M. Gingeras, the event was a nostalgic nod to our pre-pandemic celebrations.

As you enter the gallery on the right, a post-expressionist painting, “The Seated Painter (After Vermeer),” illustrates at once the quality of work in the exhibition, and its theme, the way in which art inspires art. A figure seated at an easel has his back to us, perhaps the artist known as Maryan himself in 17^th century dress, from 1966. Born Pinchas Burstein, Maryan survived Auschwitz and lived for a time in New York, famed among artists.

Remembering Milton Glaser in Tangier

By the summer of 1983 when I met him, designer/ illustrator Milton Glaser, who died this week at age 91, was already famous. The founder of Push Pin Studios, a founder of New York Magazine, had already created the iconic sign, I [heart] New York, as well as so many other memorable designs, you knew his work before you knew who made it. Glaser was a friend of Silas Rhodes,  the founder of The School of Visual Arts, and taught graphic design at the school, participating in a summer program in Tangier, Morocco.

Silas liked to surround himself with talented people, and knowing that the writer Paul Bowles resided there, added creative writing to the program that already offered photography, fine arts, and graphic design. Paul, however, did not teach. That’s where I came in, with a freshly minted Ph.D. in American literature, having written a dissertation on Jack Kerouac, who Paul knew in the New York literary circles he occupied when he visited New York. More often, Kerouac, Burroughs, Ginsberg, Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams, all came to see Paul. That summer, our group included, aside from Milton, Brice Marden, Mary Ellen Mark, Louise Bourgeois, Marshall Arisman, Ed Benguiat, Duane Michals, and guests passing through, Pete Hamill, and Francine du Plessix Gray.

Remembering Photographer Elsa Dorfman

A longtime collaborator with Allen Ginsberg, Robert Creeley, and other literary figures, photographer Elsa Dorfman was a true American original. A portrait artist often associated with her main instrument, the large format 20" x 24" inch Polaroid camera, Dorfman, an influence to poets, and, from all reports, a great friend, died this week at 83.

In 2017, I met her when her pal Errol Morris made a film about her, The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman’s Portrait Photography, his most intimate documentary. Usually working with out-sized personalities, McNamara to Rumsfeld, the murderous gasman of Zyklon B, to name a few, documentarian Errol Morris has the further distinction with his 1985 The Thin Blue Line, of having changed the course of one man’s destiny with his investigative work, unearthing evidence that showed he was innocent of murder.

Elsa Dorfman, a neighborhood friend seems a smaller portrait indeed, but the filmmaker caught up with this mild-mannered photographer just as the Gentle Giant movers were removing some large-scale Polaroids for storage, so his picture of her surprises as it covers the technical aspect of Polaroid photography, and perhaps, the end of an era. This conversation from that time, as the film was about to open after a distinguished festival run including the New York Film Festival, reveals something of Dorfman’s charm. Errol and Elsa complete one another’s sentences.