I am good—pretty good—at keeping my hands in my pockets or clasped behind my back…
Lisboa 2: The Beauty and the Shame
I left the Gulbenkian Foundation astonished, moved, and thoroughly ashamed of what my country has become politically, morally, and culturally. The art I saw returned me to the politics that I had hoped, to some degree, to ignore for a few days. When I was there,...
Trump Redux 3: Disturb the Comfortable
Banksy didn’t say it first. “To Comfort the Disturbed, and to Disturb the Comfortable” is the title of a poem published by poet, activist, and educator César A. Cruz in 1997. It makes sense, however, that Banksy’s murals do exactly that. Tyrants hate art. Real art,...
Trump Redux 2: Independence from Tyranny
April 18 was the 250th anniversary of that day, when, in the literary imagination of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) Paul Revere “spread the alarm.” He said to his friend, “If the British march By land or sea from the town to-night, Hang a lantern aloft in the...
Trump Redux: Our Democracy is His Heresy
On March 25, 2002, my husband Dan and I stopped in the town of Béziers during a tour through France. It’s a wonderful spot in the Languedoc, buildings crowding up the steep hill that borders the Orb River. The Cathedral of St.-Nazaire is visible from every side,...