Help With My Yiddish Americanisms, Please?

Does anyone know how we got from tchotchke meaning "an inexpensive souvenir, trinket or ornament" to tchotchkeleh meaning "an attractive, unconventional woman?"

Is this right? Am I understanding these words correctly?

The Civil War Exhibit

At the last continuing education, I mentioned that for older men who are bored by the house tour I bring up something that has to do with the Civil War and often (but not always) elicit some interest from them. With the Civil War exhibit coming in December, we will definitely be getting in people who have that interest.

Here are some things on the tour which have a tie-in to the Civil War:

portrait of Benjamin Gratz: his stepson fought for the South, his youngest son for the North; they were both at the Battle of Wilson's Creek, where his son died. Ben took care of his stepson's family during the war. This stepson was Jo Shelby, who is known as one of the South's greatest cavalry officers. (There's more -- but this story is the most representative one.) Benjamin was, by the way, a Unionist slaveholder.

portrait of Rebecca Gratz: Eighty at the beginning of the War, she wished for the days of her strength when she could still have nursed the wounded. She lost her nephew, Cary Gratz (see above) at the beginning of the war and three weeks before it ended, her great-nephew Gratz Cohen who fought for the South.

Fanny Kemble portrait -- which you probably already talk about.

Marianne Moore's grandparents (pictures on either side of the mantel in her livingroom): her grandfather was a Presbyterian minister in Gettysburg in 1863. His young wife died a couple of months after the Battle of typhoid fever. The epidemic was due to the 50,000 bodies from the Battle which could not be buried quickly enough to avoid the contamination of the water supply.

Does anyone else know of a Civil War tie-in?

Drac Fest at the Rosenbach

I have been so busy I have neglected to report the DIY crafts at the Rosenbach on Oct. 23rd. Babs and Jesse were my coworkers and since good company breeds good spirits, I had a fine time.

It was good to see, along with the families, a lot of young people (teens, 20 & 30-somethings).

My job ( three hours of giving out free cupcakes) was not arduous. Everyone was already acquainted with the concept of cupcake decoration, and people just sat down and created. What was surprising to me is that so many didn't want to eat their creations, but left them to be exhibited on our table.

Recommendations for next year: a larger supply of gummy worms and tombstone cookies so Farrah doesn't have to run out for more. In the presence of the nice bakery cupcakes, some people still chose Tastykakes, but maybe we should decrease slightly the number of T's and add to the bakery cakes. Perhaps we should consider a competition for best decorated cupcake.

A lot of people enjoyed the crafting of necklaces as well as the cupcakes, but I think that the presence of the photographer added to the general enjoyment -- the hospitality would have seemed a little thin without him. We should definitely try to have photos again, and perhaps look for some other pastime which like getting photographed in funny costumes or decorating cupcakes has a broad appeal.

20 Questions Round 2

There are 6 degrees of separation between Greta Garbo and James Joyce. Can you name them?

PAFA After Dark

Just saw this listed on Philly Funsavers. Looks like fun. Any Rosie folks want to meet-up at this event. Cheap also.

PAFA After Dark: Full Frontal

Presented by Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) at Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA)

November 4, 2010

Come out for PAFA After Dark on Thursday evenings for a night of fun, flavor and friendship. You can experience the magic of PAFA’s art and atmosphere under the provocative blanket of night. Drink a cocktail, revel in live music, explore new exhibitions and make new art and new friends – all with a different theme each month.

This first event will showcase all of PAFA’s “choicest bits” during its program premier, proving the naked awesomeness of what a museum can be when it reveals itself fully to visitors. Taking place within the galleries of the museum’s recently-opened exhibition Narcissus in the Studio, composed entirely of artist’s self-portraits and portraits of each other, the evening will feature a Naked at Night Scavenger Hunt, signature cocktails sponsored by Capital Wine and Spirits, a Full Frontal Nerdity Gallery Talk, and a one night only art project organized by the artist collective Space 1026. A musical performance by the West Philly Orchestra will strip audiences of their perceptions of what an “orchestra” really is, with a bold, unflinching sound rooted in Eastern European folk music traditions, but dressed in the sounds of twenty-first century Philadelphia, voices nourished by our jazz heritage, tinged with punk rock, soul, and cheesesteaks.

20 Questions Anyone?

I have a riddle challenge for you all. I'll allow you collectively 20 questions to post as comments hereto, to which I will post "yes" or "no" answers. If you can figure out the answer in that time, you win. If not, be prepared to pay up. Here's the riddle:

"What do the American Jewish Historical Society, the Congregation Kaal Kadosh Mikveh Israel of Philadelphia, and John Fleming all have in common."

I await your questions with anticipation.

JRR

Canaletto Exhibition coming to DC

By chance was anyone else up late last night listening to BBC World Service radio? There was a story on about the current Canaletto exhibition at the National Gallery in London (titled "Venice: Canaletto and his Rivals") which also features other interpretations of the famous city by his contemporaries. The exhibition includes many of Canaletto's well-known masterpieces, such as The Stonemason's Yard. The exhibition will run in London until January 2011, at which time it will move to our National Gallery in D.C.

Anyone up for a road trip in, say, February (weather permitting) to view the same?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8161597.stm

Literary Coincidences: Marianne Moore and Buck Mulligan

In 1943 when the quarterly Contemporary Poetry published Marianne Moore's "It Can Wait, It Is Late" (vol 3, no. 2), one of the members of the Advisory Board was none other than Joyce's old friend
Oliver St. John Gogarty.

Canaletto: Propaganda in Painting

Andrew Sullivan, who blogs at The Atlantic, always has something entertaining to say, though not often about Canaletto. Interesting comments here about the current exhibit at London's National Gallery. 

Free Admission to Saturday's Poetry Writing Workshop

I’d like to offer all docents free admission to a what I know will be a fantastically fantastical writing workshop led by Nathalie Anderson this Saturday, Oct 16. The workshop will run from 10 am to 3 pm. I’d be so pleased if some of you could make it. The description of the workshop is below. If you have any questions or would like to register, please just send me an email (eparker@rosenbach.org), give me a call (215-732-1600, ext 120) or post it to the blog. Hope to see you Saturday!

Emilie

Ghastly Pale: Poets Shivering the Page 10:00 am - 3:00 pm

Create your own fantastic, creepy or just plain peculiar poems inspired by the works of Bram Stoker and the brothers Grimm. Nathalie Anderson, the Rosenbach’s Poet-in-Residence whose work has twice been included in The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror, will guide your own spine-chilling verse using strategies perfected by practitioners of the eerie such as Edgar Allan Poe and Helen Adam.

Photos.....

Photos.....

Sam continued, The Limericks!

There once was a man we called Sam

Who deep down inside was a ham

As he quoted the Bard

We docents tried hard

Not to snicker and get in a jam.

There was an old gent at the desk

Who said, “You Docents are all such a mess!”

“You leave the lights on,

And set off the alarm,

And give to me nothing but stress!”

There once was a man who loved Joyce

He would quote from his works with good voice

And on each June sixteen

He would grow very keen,

To throw up his armss and rejoice!

We all know the gent known as Sam

Who is quite a Renaissance man.

From Shakespeare to Dickens

They make his pulse quicken

He reads them as fast as he can!

There once was a wise man named Sam

Who loved to read books that were banned

From Cervantes to Joyce

They all have a voice

On this he will take a firm stand!

We all know a great guy named SAM,

Who deep down inside is a lamb,

Though he rumbles and roars,

He’s the one we adore,

He’s the Rosenbach’s own, “Sam I Am”!

Barbara Zimmerman, 9/24/2010

Tributes to Sam

Sorry this has taken me so long to post! Better late than never!

A Tribute to Sam on the Occasion of His Birthday

Let’s hear a cheer for our pal Sam

Whose intellect is weighty.

Now would you think to look at him

That he has just turned eighty?

He’s sharp as Occam’s razor,

And his wit’s beyond compare.

His barbs hit like a taser,

And his memory is rare.

All praises to this paragon

Who doesn’t look his age.

He helps us all to carry on,

The Rosenbach’s own sage.

Janet Heller, September 24, 2010

Docents Brush Up Their Guiding Techniques

On Monday afternoon Emilie Parker led a group of docents in a discussion of two new guiding techniques. To help entertain young visitors who are brought along on tours by a parent, Emilie has prepared a visual search game for parents to do with children while others attend to the docent's tour.  This new interactive will be available in the Orientation Gallery.  Emilie also suggested that one way to take the pulse of the group without directly asking what individuals are interested in, might be to pause in the hall for a few minutes and let visitors look around without guidance.  This will give you the opportunity to observe what objects individual visitors are drawn to and approach them individually to help them make a personal connection to the collection.  For instance, if you see a visitor closely examine the carving on one of the gaming tables in the hall, you might mention the decorative work they will find through out the house....You get the point.  The idea is to slow down and give the visitors a chance to reveal their interests to you.

Enrique Chagoya's work attacked in Colorado.

Controversy is not new to artist Enrique Chagoya, whom you may remember from his appearance at the Rosenbach as part of the Philagrafica 2010 festival, but his work is literally under attack in Colorado where they take the culture wars seriously.  A woman armed with a crowbar entered the Loveland Museum/Gallery earlier this week and destroyed a lithograph that some said shows Jesus Christ engaged in a sex act. View Full Story

There's a picture in this newspaper story from New Zealand

Sunnyside in Tarrytown

This time of year, I need to take a trip up the mighty Hudson to view my beloved Palisades. I went with a girlfriend who had never been there before so as a treat, we stopped at Tarrytown so she could visit Washington Irving's home, "Sunnyside". With Halloween on the horizon it was a perfect time to visit. I ended up having a lovely conversation with the site's librarian who has been to the RML and we had a great chat about Irving, Gratz and Scott. If you've never visited there, it is a great place and of course, there are so many, too many great places in that area to begin to choose a favorite...I guess one of mine is Storm King Art Center!

Questions from Chris Gradel regarding the new partner desk installation

Why was this Sacramental banned by the Inquisition

I don’t know. In my research I found very few English-language sources dealing with the substance of the text (as opposed to the fact that it’s the first book by Spanish printers), one of them mentioned that it had been banned, but did not mention why. Presumably something in it was theologically unsound./unpopular, but I don’t know what.

Kathy Haas

The Jane Austen note is interesting. Just curious-- when did this library triple decker publishing of novels stop. Was it mainly British publishers .

A good question, which I had to hunt for an answer too. It does seem to have been a primarily British phenomenon, because it was driven by the power of the circulating libraries, which were more prevalent and powerful there than elsewhere. The short answer is that the form collapsed pretty abruptly in 1894, when the two largest of these businesses announced a new limit on the price they would pay to publishers, who decided they couldn’t afford it and just stopped issuing them. Two reliable web pages that cover this in fairly brief form are

http://www.bl.uk/collections/early/victorian/pu_novel.html (a section of a British Library online exhibition Aspects of the Victorian Book)

http://www.victorianweb.org/economics/mudie.html (from the Victorian Web, a great resource which grew from a project at Brown)

I reached these pages in a roundabout way from things found via the web site of The Society for the History of Authorship, Reading, and Publishing (SHARP), (http://www.sharpweb.org), which is a good place to start for questions of this sort. If Chris wants to pursue other aspects of this question she’ll find useful leads on all of these sites. I’d also recommend them to other docents who’re interested in pursuing their own researches, and will always be happy to discuss what they find there.

Elizabeth Fuller

ICA: Conversation: On Conservation

Wednesday, November 3 @ 6:30pm

Ponder the future of contemporary art from the perspective of those who care for and repair it. A panel of fine art conservators will speak about the intriguing problems created over time by un-traditional materials and new technologies.

ICA: Conversation: On Conservation

Let's go!

The Rosen-blog

If you haven't been looking at the RML's Rosen-blog, you are missing an insider view of the collections and exhibits. Head blogger is Kathy Haas who knows where all the objects and books are buried and brings some interesting ones out for our enjoyment. Her posts are always enlightening -- I don't know how she finds time, but I am grateful that she is doing this work.

P.S. I just noticed that Patrick has written the most recent post -- glad Kathy is getting some good assistance.

Docent Socials

A few of us (Jesse, Andrea, Susan, Barbara, Shawn) enjoyed good food and good company last Wednesday night at the Pub & Kitchen.  We try to get together the last Wednesday of every month, but there's no reason why it couldn't be more regular or a different day of the week.  I have just - belatedly - discovered the World Cafe Live. I was there this morning for a classical brunch of cross-genre music that was fantastic.  Apparently they do a Happy Hour there M-F. The drinks are cheap, the food is good and sometimes musicians appear. I'm game to go if anyone else is looking for an early night out. Let me know.