Category Archives: Art

Day 271 in Beijing: Sky Scenes.

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The Northern Lights from Scotland.

The Northern Lights from Scotland.

So, the airpocalypse seems to have ended as of today.

The air quality is quite nice again and I actually ran 6.6 kilometers today in Beijing and it was wonderful.

It is pretty amazing how different a few days can be in Beijing.

My mom, Judy Tuwaletstiwa, is on the other side of the world right now.

She’s been an artist and writer basically all of her life and she is spending time in the very northern part of Scotland because she and her husband, Philip, are writing a novel.

She has worked with Dan and Lani McGregor, who own Bullseye Glass Company and they were nice enough to let her stay at their place there.

They are incredibly kind people and if you are ever interested in learning how to blow glass, be sure to check them out.  They have locations in Portland, Emeryville, New York and Scotland.

Since the airpocalypse has ended, the sunrises have been quite nice in Beijing.

I managed to get a few shot of it today.

However, as nice as they were, they were blown away by my mom’s pictures of the Northern Lights over Scotland.

Supposedly this has been the best Northern Lights show in the last 20 years.

Some of the pictures are a bit blurry since she was holding the camera, without a tripod, and that made it difficult to keep the camera steady.

What interests me is that one is caused by the environment and nature while the other is, at least partially, caused by the destruction of the environment.

In any case, both events are quite beautiful.

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Day 258 in Beijing: Geographer Cafe.

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Welcome to the Geographer Cafe!

Welcome to the Geographer Cafe!

After walking around for a while, we decided to grab a bite to eat.

We love Malaysian food and we decided, on New Year’s Day, to start being vegetarian.

This is somewhat difficult in China because we can’t speak Mandarin and there is so much meat in the food in most restaurants.

However, in Malaysia, where English is a primary language, it is quite simple.

We walked into the Geographer Cafe and thought it looked like a good place to have a nosh.

So, we ordered up some vegetarian spring rolls and some other Malaysian food that was delicious.

As we looked around the place, we noticed how it was a “world traveler” kind of cafe and we asked to go upstairs and into the closed areas of the restaurant.

The staff smiled and agreed.

We really enjoyed checking out this place and definitely recommend stopping by if you ever get a chance.

Heck, they even had an tango floor upstairs!

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Day 251 in Beijing: Christ Church of Melaka.

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The Christ Church of Melaka.

The Christ Church of Melaka.

Jill, Dipesh and I continued on our tour of Melaka and came across the famous Christ Church of Melaka.

It is the oldest functioning Protestant Church in Malaysia.

The Dutch conquered Melaka from the Portuguese in 1641 and turned the churches into Dutch Reform.

For the celebration of the centenary capture of Melaka, the Dutch built a new church which is the Christ Church of Melaka.

In 1824, the Dutch and British signed a treaty which then gave control of Melaka to the British and the Christ Church became the property of the Church of England.

It was originally painted white but was painted red, with many other nearby buildings, to remind people of the original Dutch heritage.

The paving stones have inscriptions in Portuguese and Armenian.  One in particular, captures a bit of the history of Melaka and the person buried within the tomb.

Greetings, you who are reading this tablet of my tomb in which I now sleep. Give me the news, the freedom of my countrymen, for them I did much weep. If there arose among them one good guardian to govern and keep. Vainly I expected the world to see a good shepherd came to look after the scattered sheep.

I, Jacob, grandson of Shamier, an Armenian of a respectable family whose name I keep, was born in Persia near Inefa, where my parents now forever sleep. Fortune brought me to distant Malacca, which my remains in bondage to keep. Separated from the world on 7th July 1774 A.D. at the age of twenty-nine, my mortal remains were deposited in this spot of the ground which I purchased.

 

An interesting fact of the Christ Church of Melaka is that it was built without any nails.  We guessed it was because the nails would rust in the tropical air but were wrong.

They built it without nails because Jesus Christ had been crucified and they didn’t want to remember him with the nails in his hands and feet.  Therefore, they built a church that would not have any nails in it.

 

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Day 244 in Beijing: Not To Be Cryptic.

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Head stones.

Head stones.

Not being cryptic, but I like graves.

I always have.

I find them intriguing, interesting and artistic.

I’m not afraid of walking through them or superstitions so I just simply enjoy the beauty of them and respect how people choose to show love to the ones that have left this world.

As Jill and I were walking around Johor Bahru, Malaysia, we wanted to see the Sultan’s Mausoleum.

We walked through a rather massive graveyard to get to it and took our time looking at the other grave sites.

Some are very ornate, while others are very simple with only a marker for a headstone.

When we reached the Sultan’s Mausoleum, it was closed and we wouldn’t be able to visit it again on this trip so we walked around it and enjoyed the silence and peacefulness of the graveyard.

 

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Day 233 in Beijing: Flor de la Mar Museum.

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My favorite shot of the day.

My favorite shot of the day.

Jill and I decided to explore some of Melaka’s museums today.

One of the most famous museums, and there are 34 museums in Melake presently, is the Flor de la Mar Museum.

It is located inside the replica of the Flor de la Mar ship that helped the Portugese conquer Melake in 1511.

The ship seems to have been the largest ship in the fleet and, because of that reason, was able to carry lots of cargo and treasure.

It also wasn’t particularly seaworthy and it was very difficult to manage her in the waters.

On the day of November 20th, she sailed into a storm and was lost.  She had been sailing home with a large trove of treasure and a full crew.  Much of it was lost and many of the crew died because of this wreck.

The museum houses a large collection of arms, statues of famous people, and information on different ships and why they were important.

We spent about 1 hour or so in it and had fun seeing how the world was “discovered” and thinking about how difficult it would have been to live a life of a sailor during that time.

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Day 226 in Beijing: BEAT IT!

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Michael Jackson lives in Melaka, Malaysia.

Michael Jackson lives in Melaka, Malaysia.

I can almost hear him singing, "Heeee-heeeeeee!"

I can almost hear him singing, “Heeee-heeeeeee!”

Jill and I were walking around the historic city of Melaka, Malaysia and noticed this bright red hotel.

Actually, we noticed the figure painted onto the bright red hotel.

We have no idea why Michael Jackson was painted on this hotel and we couldn’t find any information after googling it.

All I can say is that it seemed to have seen better days and looked as if it was closed or maybe that people were living in it but that the upkeep was, how can I say nicely, substandard.

The advertisement in the upper left corner is from AirAsia, who we used to fly down to Malaysia and back to Beijing, but there doesn’t seem to be any connection from what we could search for and find out.

Michael just seems to be hanging out, doing his last dance move in Malaysia, and biding his time until someone comes by.

It all seemed sort of sad to me.

Day 216 in Beijing: Artistic Building.

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Long shot of the building with unfinished remodeling.

Long shot of the building with unfinished remodeling.

Much of the architecture in Singapore is incredibly new and modern.

However, they are also trying to keep the old style buildings and refurbish them.

This building was about half done and I took some pictures of the parts of it that were already fixed.

I found them to be quite beautiful and I love the colors in them.

 

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Day 181 in Beijing: Happy Birthday, Janice! Scottish Style.

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Our friend Janice had a birthday party in Beijing a few days ago.

It was a blast.

The only problem: We didn’t have any tartan, and since Janice is Scottish, tartan was a requirement.

Luckily she gave us some ribbon and we wore the ribbons like a sash across our chests.

She informed us that she had hired body painters to come over and paint people’s hands, arms and faces later that night.

I thought this was a brilliant idea.

When the face painters arrived and they asked if I wanted one, I could not wait to sit down and let them get started working on me.

The woman that did the painting, Meghan, was very sweet and had a great sense of humor.

She took about 10 minutes or so and then Jill sat down and had her hand worked on for about the same amount of time.

I was very pleased with the results and so was Jill.

Trust me, we got some interesting looks when we left the party and tried to hail a cab home.

Nina Griffee is the owner of the body painting company and they were very professional and I’d hired them for a party if I ever need a body painter.

The restaurant, by the way, is Palette Vino and the owner, John Gai, is incredibly kind and a lot of fun.

My friend, Jim “Beijing” Boyce, did a review of Palette Vino in 2009 and I would have to say that it is spot on!

We had a whiskey tasting, also set up Janice, here last month and both times the food and drinks have been superb.

We are looking forward to going to eat there for a sit down dinner soon!

Day 98 in Beijing: River Walk, Part 3

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I continued to ponder the idea of choice and circumstance as I wondered around the sculptures.

How does one decide to do art?

My mother, Judy Tuwalestiwa, is an artist.

And, I’m biased, but I’d say she is an amazing artist.

Her skill, work ethic, and depth of knowledge, always blows me away.  She works, on average 10 to 12 hours a day in her studio.  It is work.  Not play.

I always learn from her when we got to museums together because she has an understanding of why an artist, and it may be an artist with whose art she doesn’t particularly connect, was important or caused some change in the world by making their art.

I have very little knowledge of art history and so it allows me to see the world through her eyes while also learning and being able to change my perspective.

I remember going to the SFMOMA with my mom, about 7 years ago, and seeing the Phillip Guston: Contemporary Art from the Edward R. Broida Collection.  When I first saw it, I thought it was almost childlike in the “artistic sense.”  It is not like Picasso, Matisse or Manet in that the talent is automatically noticed.  At least not by me.

She explained to me why he was important, why so many of his characters were the hoods of the KKK and why they smoked their cigarettes and always wore big boots.

My mom mentioned in passing that Edward Broida had also bought a painting of her’s.  Maybe two.  I can’t remember.  She said that his uncle had made a lot of money and he had started an amazing collection of classical art.  As Edward Broida made his own money, he asked his uncle what he should do with it.  His uncle suggested he started his own collection, although he should start one by buying the type of art Edward loved.  Edward loved contemporary art and seemed to have a fantastic eye for it.  He started buying pieces that weren’t expensive, but he felt they were important pieces.  As he made more money, he

I have forgotten many of the reasons why but the memories still remain of my becoming more enlightened, knowledgeable and feeling as if I was finally on the “inside” of the artist’s mind and allowed to see his vision, hear his thoughts, and understand what he wanted me to know about his art.

This, to me, is what art is about.  It is about choice.  The choice to let others feel, see, and be a part of your world.  To amaze and open reality to others.   To let them touch your dreams in a way that most others are unable to make happen.

To create life out of lifelessness.