Belly's Wednesday Wine & Food Pairings

This week, BWW&FP is a day late, as those of you cognizant of the days of the week will have realized. My schedule was thrown off due to final exams, the last of which I administered today. That means my time in purgatory has ended; I have been emancipated, so to speak (a tasteless joke for those of you who know where I teach). What must not be tasteless, however, is the banquet I will enjoy to celebrate my long-awaited freedom. So, in that spirit, I picked up a bottle of Zardetto sparkling wine ($7.99, from Italy) from the liquor store this evening. I have paired the spumante with leftover ribs and jalapeno flavored kettle chips, which I found inexplicably in my glove compartment.

 

The cork has been popped: Let the celebration begin!

Hm. Now that I think about it, I don’t feel very much like celebrating. In fact, my mood can be encapsulated accurately by Andy Stott’s “Execution,” from his superb EP Passed Me By (which deserves a place on my Best Music of 2011 list; I just happened to favor We Stay Together on the day). As you might gather from the song, I don’t feel triumphant. I’m not even the least bit satisfied. Incidentally, what specifically about sparkling wine connotes celebration and revelry? The commonplace answer, I suppose, would be the bubbles. But why are bubbles regarded so gaily? Thanks to HBO’s The Wire, every time I hear the word “bubbles,” I think immediately of the gritty realities of heroin addiction illustrated by the character of that name.

Furthermore, consider critically some features of bubbles: At exactly the moment you think you have captured one, it bursts and is lost forever. That’s a wonderful feeling. Additionally, bubbles are hollow, empty, and insubstantial. And while I identify strongly with such a state of being, I derive no pleasure from doing so. In short, bubbles are rubbish.

Well, now that bubbles have been ruined, on to the meat: The slimy, lukewarm, two-day old meat. Coincidentally, I find myself identifying with this butchered rack of flesh as well. I feel as if I was flayed early on this semester and I’ve since been strung up and bled out slowly. Not unlike this fellow, who at least had the chance to spend some time with Rembrandt. Lucky.

(Rembrandt van Rijn, Carcass of Beef, 1657; oil on canvas; Paris, Musée du Louvre.)

Perhaps the glove compartment chips will be the Perseus that swoops in and saves me from this thus far monstrous meal. We are off to a good start: The synthetic jalapeno flavoring creates a not unpleasant sensation. It’s as if thousands of microscopic drilling robots were heated to scorching temperatures and set loose to burrow into my tongue. However, as an infrequent chip eater, I forgot that kettle chips are as thick as CDs. They do not melt pleasantly into salty potato sludge upon being placed in one’s maw, as do regular chips. Instead, initial mastication of a kettle chip splinters it into still-substantial pieces that are equipped with jagged edges, which lacerate savagely the roof of one’s mouth. So, in addition to being flayed figuratively, now the interior of my mouth feels like the hacked offal left on the cutting board of some incompetent Top Chef contestant.

At least the spumante is still wine: Sweet, sweet wine. But, as noted earlier, it is wine with bubbles. Bubbles that are now entering and bursting inside of the open sores in my mouth, causing pain that is somehow miniscule and intense simultaneously. Here we have yet another reason that bubbles are indeed awful.

This has been a disaster; a fitting end to a hellish few months. As I close one chapter of what passes for my life, I must also take this opportunity to declare sadly that this feature will appear less regularly on Belly Blog. As I enter the ranks of the unemployed, I must tighten the purse strings, which includes cutting back on booze, unfortunately. Very sincere thanks are due to all who have read and given me feedback on these entries. But fear not, I will still post especially tasty - or terrible - pairings that I happen to consume in my foragings. And please check back as I experiment with more cost-effective options: Belly’s Glue & Cat Food Pairings comes to mind. However, I might eventually have to cut out the food altogether. It’ll still be fun, though. Perhaps.

(Published originally on December 8th, 2011.)

Belly's Best Music of 2011

2011 has been a horrid year: Not for music, but for myself. I can with a fair amount of confidence call it the worst of my life, surpassing even the school year of 1989-1990, when I was in first grade. My teacher that year was rubbish. She could not even spell dinosaur names properly. Also, she confiscated my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures, with which I was amusing myself after having finished my work much earlier than the other students, as I did usually. I’m positive she did this to spite me for correcting her spelling of triceratops in front of the class. However, I faked a temper tantrum until she gave them back. Needless to say, I had the last laugh.

But, I digress. My reason for declaring the wretchedness of 2011 in a post ostensibly about my favorite music released this year is, when reviewing my selections in sum, I am struck (slightly) by the overall melancholic mood. Additionally, there are very few unmodulated human voices to be found below, or even traditional instruments, as most of my choices come from the realm of abstract electronic music. For some reason, I have found great solace in sounds produced from artificial and synthetic sources. This could perhaps be due to the cirrhosis of my synapses to the neurotransmitters released as a result of human interaction. In a world in which social interfacing, whether in person or via computing devices, is becoming increasingly formulaic, even Pavlovian, why not surrender completely to automated emotional stimulation? Push button one for happiness. Hold button one for exaltation. And so on. (Please be sure to "like" this post on Facebook, by the way.)

I have again fallen victim to my narcissistic ruminations. I must declare unequivocally that the music below does not deserve to be characterized in such a way. In fact, the reason it has supplied such succor is quite the opposite and can be stated thusly: Through primarily electronic mediums, each of the proceeding artists has managed to evoke some sort of profound, unpredictable, and genuinely human moments of feeling and reflection from my desiccated soul. In doing so, I not only feel – a small miracle in itself – but I am provided with the hope that other mechanistic social phenomena do not result simply in the restriction of sensation and meditation, but may even spur it.

And so, like numerous websites that I disdain, I offer a list of my favorite music of the past year. However, I have tried to describe simply, concisely, and specifically how each album affects me, rather than citing myriad obscure references in order to explain why it is derivative of something else. Speaking of music websites, I am indebted to the blog Altered Zones, which turned me on to much of this music (and, as I link this, I'm just finding out will not be posting more new material, which is sad). But if you like what I have included here you should definitely browse AZ's archives. In any case, below you will find links to sites where the albums, or at least a selection or two, may be streamed, so you may judge for yourself, if you wish. Enjoy.

Andy Stott, We Stay Together (Modern Love)

A wonderfully gritty, menacing take on electronic dance music. This EP lurches and rumbles along powerfully, enveloping the listener in a dark, pulsing, rough sonic space. It's like locking yourself in a basement and taking a power sander to your skull, in a good way.

Clams Casino, Rainforest EP (Tri Angle)

The cover art is an apt representation of what one finds upon listening. It is at once smeared and hazy, but interspersed throughout are vividly colored passages that are surprisingly evocative of the natural spaces after which the EP and the individual songs are named.

Ford & Lopatin, Channel Pressure (Mexican Summer)

An encapsulation of contemporary sensory bombardment by high-definition stimulation so complete and impeccably produced that it becomes almost ominous. Everything is so poppy, punchy, clear, and slickly packaged that you want to dance and cry simultaneously.

How to Dress Well, Just Once EP (Love Letters Ink)

The only album here that is constituted simply by the human voice and traditional instruments, specifically a chamber orchestra. HTDW's work is so unabashedly open, beautiful, and intense that it draws a powerful response from even someone as emotionally bankrupt as myself. 

Julia Holter, Tragedy (Leaving Records)

Though it is hard to name a favorite, this may very well be it due simply to how starkly it stands apart from anything I've ever heard. This album is one of those wonderful works of art that seems perfectly natural in its utter uniqueness. Holter's record, based loosely on Euripides' Hippolytus, captures beautifully the simultaneous strangeness and familiarity of Attic tragedy, in addition to simulating effectively the course of the play, with its moments of ruthlessness, tenderness, and despair. I intend to write a longer meditation on this album in conjunction with Euripides' text at some point in the future, since I believe it deserves such attention, in addition to the simple fact that I would love to spend as much time with it as possible. 

Kuedo, Severant (Planet Mu)

This album makes you feel as if you are on another planet, or in a futuristic past, and something dramatic is happening. A desirable sensation, in my opinion.

Laurel Halo, Hour Logic EP (Hippos in Tanks)

This record is pleasurably propulsive. When listening, you feel as if you are moving constantly forward, though at variable speeds over unpredictably fluctuating terrain, sometimes launching into the air or plunging through water. 

Moa Pillar, The Moon and Thunder Dance EP (G5 Music)

This EP marked my introduction into Russian electronic music. It is at once punishing and melodic, a contradiction represented in the album art's inspired combination of sinuous, flowing lines with sharp, rigid edges.  

Sleep ∞ Over, Forever (Hippos in Tanks)

Delicate, subtle, nocturnal, and wistful. Simultaneously deliberate and amorphous. 

Steve Hauschildt, Tragedy & Geometry (Kranky)

I feel as if I could listen to this record perpetually because I have been doing just that, only I didn't realize it. Hauschildt brings to light a glittering, crystalline sonic structure hidden beneath the grating noise of the everyday world, a revelation both unnerving and comforting. 

Tim Hecker, Ravedeath, 1972 and Dropped Pianos (Kranky)

Two sides of the same coin. Ravedeath evokes vast, empty spaces with droning, reverberating organ tones, which give the impression they were produced by powerful, deliberate pressure from Hecker on the instrument's keys and pedals. On the other hand, Dropped Pianos is more intimate and less assertive, while paradoxically providing increased room to breathe. Both are hauntingly beautiful in their own ways.

An addendum (added 12/5/11):

Roly Porter, Aftertime (Subtext)

This album was recently brought to my attention by FACT's year-end top albums list, which has some other good selections on it as well. Spare, cold, and savagely beautiful; this record provides what I imagine would be a perfect soundtrack to the nature of existence after the hypothetical Big Crunch, in which all the dimensions of spacetime (whether there be 4, 9, or 11) are compressed in a reversal of the Big Bang.

(Published originally on November 30th, 2011.)

Belly's Wednesday Wine & Food Pairings

The site of last week’s reunion offered “a little taste of Tuscany in Horsham.” Unfortunately, I cannot say whether that claim is true, for a couple of reasons: One, I’ve never been to Tuscany; and two, I did not partake in the food. In any event, one authentically Italian aspect of the restaurant that I did experience was the exceedingly rude wait staff. However, their heavily accented, garlic-scented surliness gave me a hankering for an authentic Italian pizza. So, enjoy selections from Sun Araw's Ancient Romans as this week’s pairing is unveiled:

What rustic authenticity! A Freschetta Brick Oven Pizza, of the 5-Italian Cheese Medley variety, and Italo Cescon Pinot Grigio ($10.99, from Veneto, Italy). First, the pizza: It is square; a legendary shape for which the brick ovens of Italy are famous, or so Freschetta and its owners, the Minnesota-based Schwan Food Company, tell us. And, since it’s square, it will undoubtedly taste as if it’s been baked slowly in a wood-fired brick oven, rather than in the modern, gas-powered, stainless steel monstrosity that heats my meals so soullessly.

Next, the wine: Tied to the bottle is an actual twig from the vines that yielded this authentically rustic vintage!

The label includes an explanation that merits quoting in full:

The idea of the "tralcetto" was born on a winter’s day of rest and meditation for the men working in the vineyard. While collecting the vines that had been pruned, grandmother Anna saved a small piece of vine and placed it in her apron pocket. When she returned home, she was assisted by her son Italo, who was a wine grower, to tie the piece of vine (tralcetto) with a string at the neck of a wine bottle. Doing this symbolized that the wine had been grown from that vine, and that it had been produced through the hard work of grandmother Anna’s hands. From that moment on, in 1957, the story of the “tralcetto” began and still identifies today Italo Cescon’s classic production of genuineness, representing the wine and the simple way to preserve it.

A thousand thanks to grandmother Anna and her son (who is named Italo, no less!) for providing irrefutable proof of the genuineness, the rusticity, and the authenticity of this wine! So immersed am I in the aura of the Italian countryside that, as I sit down to my autentica festa italiana, I fully expect to look up and see this rustic fellow, who may or may not be Italo, in the adjacent seat.

 

(Jusepe de Ribera, The Sense of Taste, c. 1614-1616; oil on canvas; Hartford, CT, Wadsworth Atheneum. Is that you, Italo?)

And now, finally, to the tasting: Ugh. If this were my only experience of “authentic Italian pizza,” it would lead me to believe that the traditional ingredients included Wonderbread, ketchup, and Kraft singles. The wine’s website boasts of a “deep-yellow, straw-like color,” before proceeding, unnecessarily, to the flavor notes. I say unnecessarily because “deep-yellow” and “straw-like” suffice to describe the taste of this rancid vintage. In fact, I suspect Italo may have micturated in the casks for a laugh. Together, the flavors combine to produce the impression of what it must feel like to be a squalid child consuming a sandwich, made of the aforementioned ingredients, after relieving himself sloppily and not washing his hands. Other than the possible urine content of the wine, the only authentically Italian aspect of this pairing that I can identify is the awkwardly written, essentially nonsensical description of the tralcetto (re-read the final sentence, in particular), characteristics which suggest that it was composed by a native Italian speaker, or is perhaps the result of a Google translation.

This is sorely disappointing, as well as embarrassing. I have been suckered by slick presentation and quaint rhetoric. Sadly, I cannot recommend this pairing; unless, that is, you happen to want to pay $5 extra to have a sprig of vegetation bound to your bottle of wine.

(Published originally on November 30th, 2011.)

Belly's Wednesday Wine & Food Pairings

This evening I will be attending my ten-year high school reunion. Consequently, I have nothing to report as of yet. I consulted the website of the restaurant at which the reunion will be held for a wine list, so I could at least provide a preview of the night’s libations, but to no avail. Thus, this week’s post will serve as a site for miscellaneous ruminations on the occasion. I feel that How to Dress Well’s “Change Yourself (Winter is Coming Mix)” is an appropriate music choice. It is alternately brooding and buoyant, ecstatic and contemplative, and combines some throwback tunes with contemporary ones; perfect for an occasion such as this.

Though I have characterized these musings as miscellany, I still have the occasion to begin with wine. I had not considered it previously, but my relatively newfound lust for sweet vin blanc might be the extent of my personal growth and evolution in the last decade. Otherwise, I feel remarkably (terribly?) similar, and not simply by virtue of the fact that, as I write this, I am sitting in the same twin bed I’ve slept in since the age of four (form an orderly queue, ladies). However, as usual, I’m being hyperbolic. There have been other changes. For one, I have more muscle mass than I did in high school; though, at the moment, not so much as I would like. Also, I worry occasionally that I am less adventurous, less hopeful, and less open. Furthermore, I am beginning to doubt strongly that there exists for me a place in society, as it is constituted presently, and I hope morbidly for the thoroughgoing obliteration of currently hegemonic institutions and ideologies. In any case, my predilection for sweet white wine and dissatisfaction with my currently measly muscularity are clearly the more significant issues.

Taking stock of myself has caused me to wonder what changes others have undergone that I might be confronted with this eve. Undoubtedly, some will have experienced similar metamorphoses in body mass, volume, and density. Some may have had inanimate objects inserted into them, whether for cosmetic, orthopedic, or other reasons. A number have entered into legally, and in some cases religiously, binding contracts to cohabitate exclusively with a person of the opposite sex for the remainder of their lives, and for this they receive tax breaks. I know for certain that a few have spawned, incubated, and expelled from their bodies entirely new human beings. Some have only spawned them, as incubation and expulsion are not part of their biological job description. Additionally, the vision of certain individuals may have deteriorated to the point that they now require glasses. On the other hand, perhaps some who sported glasses previously have switched to contact lenses. Or, some may have resorted directly to contacts for vision correction, bypassing entirely the option of wearing glasses, in which case I will have no way of determining if their vision is as effective as it was ten years ago. I may or may not be unnerved by some, all, or none of these things. Only time and the volume of wine I imbibe will tell.

One also cannot help but speculate what manner of fête lies ahead. Will it be one of concord and felicity? Of easy laughter, affectionate embraces, and smiles as dazzling as the flickering light cast by the chandeliers of Renoir’s Moulin de la Galette?

(Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Le Moulin de la Galette, 1876; oil on canvas; Paris, Musée d’Orsay.)

Or will it take on a bizarre, sinister character, as in Ribera’s imagining of Silenus and his grotesque guild?

(Jusepe de Ribera, Drunken Silenus, 1626; oil on canvas; Napoli, Museo Nazionale di Capodimonte.)

More likely, it will be somewhere between the two poles, an area in which many find comfort, but that I dread. Oh well, perhaps I’ll be able to procure some mushrooms, by which I mean portobellos and creminis, of course. The reunion is being held at an Italian restaurant, after all. 

(Published originally on November 23rd, 2011.)

Duck, Duck, Goosed

(After Michelangelo, Leda and the Swan, after 1530; oil on canvas; London, National Gallery.)


Well, to be accurate, swanned. But that doesn’t have quite the same ring to it. In any case, in mentally perusing paintings that depict the zoological passions of pagan myth, I arrived inevitably at the above work, which I am fortunate enough to have seen in London. The myth of Leda and the swan, in which Zeus disguises himself as a white waterfowl in order to seduce the mortal Leda without attracting the attention of Hera, has been depicted fairly frequently in European art from antiquity to the nineteenth century (by Paul Cézanne and Gustave Moreau, among others). This particular painting is by an unknown sixteenth century artist after a lost work by Michelangelo. The original was apparently rejected by its initial patron, Alfonso I d’Este, the duke of Ferrara, around 1530. The painting then found its way into the hands of the French royal family, where records that indicate it was destroyed in the late seventeenth century.

The uncharacteristic ill treatment of a work by il divino Michelangelo seems to be due to the painting’s overt lasciviousness, which distinguishes it sharply from prior and posterior depictions of the myth. The downturned tail of the swan indicates clearly that the foul fowl is shown in mid-thrust, making the viewer a witness to the moment at which Leda is penetrated by her avian amante. This is perhaps more plainly visible in the superb print after the painting by Cornelis Bos.

(Cornelis Bos, after Michelangelo, Leda and the Swan, 1544-1566; engraving; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Bos' version includes an egg and two infants. As a result of Leda's liaison with the swan she laid two eggs, out of which hatched two pairs of twins: Castor and Pollux, of the Gemini constellation; Clytemnestra, the eventual wife and murderer of Agamemnon; and Helen, of Trojan War fame. I urge you to visit the Met's site, which has recently upgraded its viewing technology, allowing works to be examined in extraordinary detail.) 

The unexpectedly literal visual interpretation of the age-old myth provoked me to ponder a question of great philosophical import: Would copulation between a male bird and a human female be possible? A survey of the internets revealed that the answer to my question was yes: Swans are one of the few species of birds whose males possess external sexual organs of comparable physiology to male humans. More commonly, birds mate by direct contact of orifices called cloacae, through which they also defecate (cloaca is Latin for sewer). Basically, instead of mammalian-style intercourse, the majority of birds just touch their butts together.

As it would for any ambitious philosopher, this discovery prompted further questions: Did Michelangelo know definitively that swans are one of the few birds that would be anatomically able to fornicate with a human female? And, if so, was this knowledge the raison d’être for such a graphic depiction of bird-on-bird action? We know that Michelangelo, like numerous other artists of his time, dissected humans in order to gain a better understanding of anatomy and physiology. Did he dissect birds as well? Perhaps the Casa Buonarotti would allow me access to their archives in order to investigate further.

(Published originally on November 22nd, 2011.)

Pasiphaë's Profligacy

Guard: Your Majesty, Daedalus, the unparalleled craftsman, requests an audience.

Pasiphaë: Admit him. Perhaps his agile mind has deduced some strategy to assuage my tortured psyche.

(Daedalus enters, along with a life-size sculpture of a white cow.)

(Daedalus Presenting the Wooden Cow to Pasiphaë, first century CE; fresco; Pompeii, from triclinium p of the House of the Vettii; Regio VI, Insula 15, number 1.)

Daedalus: Your Majesty, I cannot help but hear that you have been troubled as of late.

Pasiphaë: Ay! Yes, I am overtaken constantly by the most lecherous impulses! I have seen a beautiful white bull in the fields outside the palace. And though it is a beast, when I look upon it I cannot help but feel in my loins a stirring, nay, a pandemonium! Have you a way to rid me of these depraved desires?

Daedalus: Um. Perhaps. You see, your desires are the reason I have toiled in recent weeks to fashion this wooden cow.

Pasiphaë: I do not understand, craftsman. Do you mean to provide me with some sort of diversion for my bestial affections?

Daedalus: Not exactly, your majesty.

Pasiphaë: Well, what then? Out with it! My loins are a scorching conflagration! Such blazing loins may befit me as a daughter of Helios, who shepherds daily the orb of the sun across the sky; but still, the agony! Alas, my loins!

Daedalus: Okey dokey. Well, that is why I have crafted this beautiful beast, your majesty. It is hollow, so you can situate yourself inside and line up your, ahem, loins, right where this enticing cow’s would be. Then, you could have your servants wheel my contraption into the field. I assure you that you would catch the eye of your beloved bull, and probably more. In fact, I can guarantee that the bull would do to you something very similar to what my young apprentice there in the corner is doing…

Pasiphaë: What are suggesting, you deviant? Though I am undoubtedly afflicted by the brutal whims of some malicious Olympian, I will resist such profligacy to the bitter end! Get out of my sight! You are fortunate you are so skilled and useful or I would force you to occupy your vulgar contrivance yourself!

Daedalus: My deepest apologies, your majesty. Clearly, I misjudged the situation. I will depart. And, as for my perverted apparatus…

Pasiphaë: Leave the cow.

(Settecami Painter, Pasiphaë and the Infant Minotaur, 340-320 BCE; tondo from the interior of an Attic red-figure kylix; Paris, Cabinet des Medailles.) 

(Published originally on November 16th, 2011.)

Belly's Wednesday Wine & Food Pairings

Allow me to offer my apologies for not posting last week. My descent from the heights to which I soared on the wings of wine and Wendy’s was Icarus-like. To be dumped unceremoniously into the demented, distorted milieu that I occupy presently nearly broke what is left of my already flimsy resolve. I required an additional week to recover. 

Nonetheless, I press on. Well, that is not entirely accurate, as this week’s pairing has been constructed yet again with escapist intentions. The present is horrid and the future bleak, so I look to the past, which is slightly less so. Specifically, I attempt to recapture at least a small portion of my experiences of a year ago, when I spent the month of November in Paris. The electronic artist Little Loud provides a brilliant remix of Memory Tapes’ “Bicycle.” The original song is from the album Seek Magic, an ideal soundtrack for cruising down the grand boulevards on a Vélib'. For refreshment and repast, I have decided upon Mouton Cadet Blanc ($9.99; a 2010 vintage from Bordeaux; a blend of 65% Sauvignon Blanc, 30% Semillon, and 5% Muscadelle), accompanied by a baguette, nuts, and dried fruit (as well as wilted flowers).

This made up the bulk of my daily fare as a traipsed around les bibliothèques et les musées last year. It is a monastically spare, almost coarsely straightforward meal, chosen not only for its economy (eat for 3 euro a day!), but also because, in my opinion, it contrasts amusingly with the sophistication and complexity of the objects and texts I love to examine.

It would, however, be a great injustice to label the Mouton Cadet as spare or coarse. This white, like most French blancs, is a respite from the saccharine vintages I customarily imbibe, which are so delightfully sweet that they may as well be packaged in juice boxes. The Mouton has a steely, firm introduction akin to the powerful first impression made by Michelangelo’s Rebellious Slave, located in a gallery named for the Renaissance master on the ground floor of the Louvre’s Denon wing. The wine’s confident preamble gives way to a subtly calibrated refinement of pear and nectarine notes that somehow rumble quietly, like far-off river rapids, and echo the remarkable illusion of pulsing, rippling undulations in the figure’s marble musculature.

(Michelangelo, Rebellious Slave, 1513-1515; marble; Paris, Musée du Louvre.)

My choice of sustenance also has an evocative purpose. I like to imagine that Michelangelo, famously irascible and neglectful of nearly everything other than his work, may have himself employed such modest morsels to fuel maniacal sessions with the marble.

The opposite end of la Galerie Michel-Ange is occupied by Canova’s masterpiece, Psyche et l’Amour.

 

(Antonio Canova, Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss, 1787-1793; marble; Paris, Musée du Louvre.)

This work is also the polar opposite of Michelangelo’s in regard to a sculpture’s possible impact on its viewer, which was demonstrated to me vividly as I tried to illustrate my written impressions with drawings. When I attempted to sketch the Slave my pen skittered and jumped across the page, but dug in solidly when making contact, depositing quick, energetic, yet assertive lines in its wake. However, when in front of Psyche et l’Amour, despite the most delicate pen strokes I could muster, no line was fine or soft enough; any pressure applied was too heavy. I was compelled eventually to abandon my endeavor, as the work seems to resist tangible apprehension. Canova does not so much enliven dead stone, as Michelangelo does, but performs some sort of mystical alchemy that results in an object that has volume, but no mass; form, but no definitive contours; that is solidly before the viewer at one moment, but dissipates into the ether when caressed by the sun’s rays.

 

If it is natural to imagine Michelangelo sustaining himself on scraps in his herculean battles with the marble, it is equally easy to envision Canova – a consummate gentleman who was quite at home with the nobility and royalty of Europe – sipping daintily on ambrosia as he effortlessly fashioned this painfully beautiful pair. I remember entering the museum, seeking refuge from the biting November nights, and thawing myself in the presence of Canova’s work, as if it were a smoldering fireplace instead of glacial stone. Similarly, the frigid, flinty wine sluices down my gullet, but results paradoxically in a pleasant warmth that meanders lazily from my core to my extremities. This sensation is a favorite of mine, on par with the simple satisfaction of taking the first bite out of a warm, fresh loaf of bread.

Unfortunately, I do not believe this baguette to be fresh, despite the claims of my local Giant Supermarket. Its warmth is not that of the hearth, but comes from the microwave; a result of my desperate attempt to simulate the sensation mentioned above. Once again, the affliction referred to commonly as reality impinges upon my reveries. However, I must admit that it was nice while it lasted, and what more can one ask than that? Hence, I heartily recommend this pairing and I appreciate your indulgence of my reminiscences. 

(Published originally on November 16th, 2011.)