Bartok and the Geranium

My friend Michael Steinberg died this morning. When you first met Michael, he could seem a bit formidable. His knowledge, especially of classical music, went deep and his opinions were strong. For years I worked in classical music, but without any of the knowledge that comes from musicianship or even scholarship, and it was easy to feel intimidated around him.

But I soon learned that that intimidation was my problem. If I could get over it, I found in Michael a soul who was always curious, always passionate about helping musicians, especially young musicians and ever receptive to the always changing beauty of a classical work played in performance. He was truly generous and lived by his values.

We were at the inaugural weekend at Music at Menlo in 1992 together (with his wife Jorja Fleezanis, who has just retired as concertmaster of the Minnnesota Orchestra) and he was a regular there for six years after that. The festival has published a lovely tribute to him on their web site with special attention to the Poetry Reading Workshops he led there..workshops which were entirely unique to him.

These workshops were quite informal...a gathering of people in a semi-circle around Michael who had spread a number of photocopied poems across a closed grand piano. He would read one or two and then invite Menlo students, musicians, audience members or (in my case) radio producers to come up and choose a poem to read out loud. After we finished reading, we'd get a little gentle coaching about the text, our physical stance or the cadence in our voice...and then a chance to read again. His wife Jorja said about these workshops: "he believed that "rhythm, the gait, and the expression required to read poetry well are intimately linked to what is required to play music well." As a non-musician it was a chance for me to engage in the famous dynamic of coach and student which so many students at Menlo enjoyed with Michael.

So with great gratitude to Michael and love to his own beloved Jorja, I dedicate this poem by Dorothy Livesay, a poem that I picked up off of the grand piano at Menlo one day and learned to read out loud, thanks to Michael.

Bartok and Geranium

She lifts her green umbrellas
Towards the pane
Seeking her fill of sunlight
Or of rain;
Whatever falls
She has no commentary
Accepts, extends,
Blows out her furbelows,
Her bustling boughs;

And all the while he whirls
Explodes in space,
Never content with this small room:
Not even can he be
Confined to sky
But must speed high and higher still
From galaxy to galaxy,
Wrench from the stars their momentary notes
Steal music from the moon.

She's daylight
He is dark
She's heaven-half breath
He storms and crackles
Spits with hell's own spark.

Yet in this room this moment now
These together breathe and be:
She, essence of serenity,
He in a mad intensity
Soared beyond sight
Then hurls, lost Lucifer
From heaven's height.

And when he's done, he's out:
She leans a lip against the glass
And preens herself in light.

And the winner is...

The winner of the inaugural MCBA prize is Veronika Schäpers of Tokyo, Japan. You can read her artist statement here.

The evening event celebrating the finalists at MCBA was one of the nicest evenings I've experienced there. Live music, good food (and pomegranate martinis!) and everyone dressed up in their downtown best. It's a rather amazing experience to see your friends...normally in t-shirts, jeans and ponytails now wearing heels, jewelry and even make-up! As my mother would say, we all cleaned up nicely.

4 of the 5 finalists were on hand (sadly, Veronika was not...no cheap tickets from Tokyo). The books were out of their case and each one had a handler turning pages so we could see the whole book in person. After a lovely award presentation (Artistic Director Jeff Rathermel forgot the secret envelope at his desk, but turns out he knew the winner all along), there was sparkling wine and all kinds of chocolate.

The working studios of MCBA are, as someone said, "book arts heaven" and I completely concur with that statement. But MCBA is also an exhibition space, and the organization itself is located in the building called Open Book which holds an excellent coffee shop, The Loft (an amazing organization devoted to writers) and the nonprofit press Milkweed Editions. A staircase to the second floor is designed to represent the pages of a book and on the second floor is a small performance hall where we gathered to see the books and hear the award presentation. As we moved from space to space, I was reminded how lucky we are in Minnesota to have both MCBA and Open Book and to have a space that celebrates all the aspects of the book.

The MCBA Prize

I visited MCBA this afternoon to discuss the MCBA prize with MCBA Artistic Director Jeff Rathermel in preparation for an article I'm writing for Bonefolder (an e-journal for book artists). Because I came in the back door, I entirely missed the lobby exhibit of the five finalists' books. So Jeff and I walked back to the lobby and took a look at the books up close.
Capturing an artists' book through just a few images is a particular challenge. So it was epecially great to see the finalist books in person. Julie Chen's book Panorama is impressive first just in its size (in the case it is 41" across; it opens to 60"), but as is typical of her work, the size fits the message. There are no gimmicks in what she does.
Avalanche by Clifton Meador is a bit harder to grasp through the glass of the case. It has an intriguing layout and was printed offset which allows for some new possibilities in content and layout. Jan Owen's Requiem has all the beauty of a truly handmade object. The paper is from Cave Paper and the text is hand-calligraphed in gouache and ink. Bomb by Simon Eddington appears to be a classic in the tradition of woodblock layouts. Besides Julie Chen's book, I was most intrigued by Veronika Schäpers' Durs Grünbein: 26°57,3’N, 142º16,8’E. The size and format of the book are fairly standard, but she printed the book on papers which are almost luminous and so thin as to be impossible to get through a press. The book is complemented by a clear vellum cover and an acrylic box.

The really fun news is that the books will be out of the exhibit case on Saturday, July 25 when the MCBA prize is awarded. That means pages can be turned and the book truly explored. At the moment, the three jurors have been working off of images and conferencing by phone. They'll come in to Minneapolis on Friday, July 24 and see the books in person and make their final decision then.

You can see more pictures of the finalists' work here, as well as pictures of all of the books that were entered. The MCBA Prize will be given out every other year as part of the Book Art Biennial.

What happens in class

I finished my mixed media class at MCBA last night with Julie Baugnet. It was four Tuesday nights and as minimal as that was, I think we were all sad to see it end. Julie is a thoughtful and inspiring teacher and as we experimented with different media, she was adept at letting us find our own way and giving us good feedback at the same time.

I think that there were about nine of us in class: 3 people that I would describe as very experienced in book arts, and 6 that were either brand new to the book arts or nearly so. We spent a few minutes at the end of the evening last night going around the room, talking about our work and any other thoughts that we had. What I found notable was that, without exception, everyone had caught the book arts bug. And the three of us that were advanced also took big steps forward in new and exciting directions. In a good class with a generous teacher (and this was absolutely one of those), students often share techniques, supplies and information as much as the instructor. Community happens very quickly. I don't know if it's that way in other fields, but it's one of the reasons that I love taking classes.

The other reason I love taking a class is that...very surprisingly, as I'm a raging introvert...I find security in the class setting to take risks in my work. This happened consistently at Penland and it happened here as well. There is something about being in a room with people working intently, talking sometimes and being able to turn to friends or the instructor for feedback that frees me up. I work hard and fast and often start finding something very good in what I'm doing. Perhaps the community of class drowns out my own inner critic (who is way harsh)...I'm not sure why it works so well for me, but I do love it when it happens.