Weekend Getaway to Washington, D.C.: Restaurant Nora, Richard Diebenkorn & kayaking on the Potomac

Toss the guidebook to D.C. If you are looking for a weekend getaway with fine dining, superb art and outdoor adventure, then the following itinerary is for you!

The Scoop
Saturday morning train from Penn Station in Manhattan to Union Station in D.C. Take the Metro to the Foggy Bottom station.

Hotel: The River Inn, which is on a quiet residential street in Foggy Bottom. The hotel has reasonable rates and I recommend booking a junior suite, which has a full kitchen. My room needed to be updated but it was commodious and clean. Trader Joe's and Whole Foods are nearby if you want to pick up some groceries.

Saturday Dinner: Restaurant Nora, which features high-end American organic cuisine in Dupont Circle. Order the scallops for your starter and the soft shell crab for your main course. Enjoy a bowl of berries and homemade whipped cream for dessert.

Sunday Morning: Go kayaking on the Potomac. Rent a kayak at the Thompson Boat Center, which is a 10-minute walk from the hotel. This is a relaxing and different way to experience D.C. After kayaking, order a crepe and bubble tea at Snap in Georgetown.

Sunday Afternoon: Stroll down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. Then walk over to the Corcoran Gallery of Art to view Richard Diebenkorn: The Ocean Park Series. Have a drink on the P.O.V. Roof Terrace at the W Hotel.

Evening train to Penn Station.

For more info.:
www.amtrak.com
www.theriverinn.com
www.noras.com
www.thompsonboatcenter.com
www.corcoran.org
www.wwashingtondc.com

Summer Art in New York: Josef Albers, Robert Rauschenberg & Frank Stella

Don't miss Josef Albers in America: Painting on Paper at The Morgan Library & Museum. It is a gem of a show. Sixty oil studies on paper include sketches from the 1930s-early 1940s for his Adobe series and preparatory works for Homage to the Square from the 1950s-1970s. The painterly quality, intimate scale and color experimentation reveal a rarely seen side of Albers's work. The studies are strikingly different from the cool and austere paintings that represent the final stage of the artist's process. The Morgan is the only U.S. venue for the exhibition.

Also check out two superb gallery exhibitions on the same block on the Upper East Side: Robert Rauschenberg: North African Collages and Scatole Personali c. 1952 at the Craig F. Starr Gallery and Frank Stella: New Work at FreedmanArt. Then stop by Via Quadronno for a cappuccino and panini.
Enjoy!

The Morgan Library & Museum
225 Madison Avenue
http://www.themorgan.org
Albers on view through October 14, 2012

Craig F. Starr Gallery
5 E. 73rd St.
http://www.starr-art.com
Rauschenberg on view through August 10, 2012

FreedmanArt
25 E. 73rd St., 3rd Floor
http://www.freedmanart.com
Stella on view through September 27, 2012

Via Quadronno
25 E. 73rd St., 1st Floor
http://viaquadronno.com

Architecture Getaway to Philadelphia: The Barnes Foundation

As I walked through the entrance gate of the newly relocated Barnes Foundation in downtown Philadelphia, I wondered if I were about to enter a contemporary art museum. But, no, this was actually the Barnes with the astounding collection of 181 Renoirs, 69 Cézannes, 46 Picassos, 59 Matisses, 18 Rousseaus, extensive Asian, African and American Indian artifacts and decorative ironwork. The architects, Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, tried hard to match the aesthetic magnificence on display in the new building, but substantially missed the mark.
I was familiar with the extraordinary collection and controversy about its relocation. The major conflict about moving the art to downtown Philadelphia from the suburb of Merion was the subject of a superb documentary titled, The Art of the Steal. The new building opened in May, 2012 along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and within walking distance of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and Rodin Museum.

Dr. Albert Barnes grew up in Philadelphia and died in 1951. His pharmaceutical company invented Argyrol, which prevented eye infections and blindness in newborns. It was the source of his wealth and he sold his company before the crash of 1929 so that he could focus on art, which he began to collect in 1912.


Driveway entrance

The driveway entrance at the new site was quite understated. Once inside the gate, I did not expect to see a 40-foot stainless-steel sculpture by Ellsworth Kelly at the head of the reflecting pool. What was the Kelly piece doing there? It was not created for the Barnes. It was donated by the Neubauer Family Foundation. 

Tree-lined path and reflecting pool leading to museum entrance

My first view of the museum was in profile. Negev stone panels with bronze accents formed the exterior walls of the building. I walked along a tree-lined path that paralleled the museum and pool. When I reached the low bridge to the main entrance, I paused to contemplate the imposing void in front of me with an offset door and stone panels that surrounded the entry. Barnes was known for juxtaposing his art in unorthodox hangings and so I started to form a theory that perhaps the architects wanted to create their own juxtaposition between the museum and the collection.

Museum entrance

This Barnesian concept was severely tested once I stepped inside the building. The circulation and signage (or lack thereof) were a disaster. The foyer consisted of a redundant reception desk (the first was at the main gate), poorly marked restaurant entrance, stairway to the Lower Level, projected "welcome" sign in multiple languages on a concrete wall...where was the entrance to the galleries? I showed my timed ticket to a woman who failed the hospitality test of anticipating a visitor's needs and then I walked over to a security person, who said that I had to go downstairs to check my bag first. Here's a tip for visiting the Barnes: If you need to use the restroom, you will have to go to the Lower Level because there are no bathroom facilities in the exhibition area of the museum. The coffee bar was also located on this level. It appeared to be a design afterthought because it was tucked away in a corner and did not even have an espresso machine. 

When I returned upstairs to the main level, I had to traverse a cavernous "indoor court" that was pure wasted space. At that moment, I knew that this building could be summed up as big budget+big impression+misdirected focus=major disappointment. Who would want to sit down and linger in this soulless space? I observed only a few visitors on the sofas. How many people noticed the narrow, elevated water feature along one wall? Why do enormous panels block the view of the terrace? Was the ceiling "lightbox" supposed to engender awe at the diffused light?

The 12,000 square feet of exhibition galleries were recreated as they appeared in the original Merion location. In his will, Barnes stipulated that the art should always remain in Merion (which it obviously did not) and be displayed in the same way. The beautiful collection enabled me to forget about the rest of the building and concentrate on the art. After I finished viewing the first floor, I asked where I could find a restroom. I was told that I would have to leave the galleries and go to the Lower Level. Instead, I continued viewing the collection on the second floor. The art was visually overwhelming. Barnes would often rehang the works in groupings that he called ensembles. These juxtapositions were puzzles for the viewer to solve by discovering the connections between the works. The Card Players, The Dance, The Postman and Leaving the Conservatory will always draw the crowds, but there were other pieces that I thoroughly enjoyed viewing as well. The African sculptures, unfortunately assembled tightly together in display cases, were riveting and the small Pennsylvania Dutch works were charming.

When I finished viewing all of the galleries, I had a bite to eat at the Garden Restaurant. I had a delicious quiche and small salad. The museum should have done a better job in promoting the restaurant.

Irrespective of how hard Williams and Tsien may have tried to create an architecturally important structure for the display of the Barnes collection, they failed. The building could have been built anywhere. What a pity that it was for the Barnes.

Exterior of museum