Some art, less food writing...no, reverse that...

Every so often I get to a point in a restaurant review where I really want to tear my hear out [editor's note: tear my "hear" out?!? Que? I am letting this stand just as a monument to bad typing. It should read "hair" by the way], or at least quit. I come upon a dish and realize that I have to describe it. I can't just say, "yummy" or even leave it at "well-made." Normally this is no problem. I just describe it (and many others ever single week) and that is that.

But then there are these days when I feel like I am writing a parody of food writing, that I have really used up all my food vocabulary and have devolved to nothing but cliche.

Subtle hints of red plum delicately lifted by a hint of shallot. Yawn.

Melanie's co-workers seem to have fun when I get in a rut. "Provides a perfect foil for the..." that one kept them giggling for awhile. The problem is that Melanie works for the newspaper, so all of her coworkers read me. Now we even get the newspaper delivered to our house, so even I read me. I can't help it. I am a compulsive newspaper reader, which is why I quit completely for awhile. Now the thing is on the doorstep every morning and it is safe to say that I have fallen off the wagon.

So not only do I have to face my writing on my own computer, but I get it in print.

Anyway, I really do like food writing, but there are those times when it just seems like I am spinning my wheels:

"You thought the hat was empty, but look at this lovely cliche!"

Then I think about my poor colleagues in the Sports section.

"Oh, you have some nerve, eating delicious duck rillette sandwiches and describing the texture of the friggin' ciabatta! Try making the thousandth double play sound unique."

Everyone knows that the best writing in any newspaper is found in the sports pages. You have to be good to write sports or you get out.

The best way to renew the springs of inspiration is to read non-food writing (and lots of it) and to read classics in food writing. Then, buy a good set of electrodes and program your word processor to send a painful pulse through them whenever you write "soft, yet able to stand up to..."

In college I had a brilliant idea for using electrodes and MIDI to produce better keyboardists. All you need to do is wire a sequencing program to a MIDI keyboard and a set of electrodes. Then you set the limits: dynamics to X%, rhythmic allowances for Y% (allowing for rubato only in the right hand, and carefully controlled ritardandi at the ends of sections, etc.). Then you play. If you hit a wrong note, or with dynamics outside the allowances, or the rhythm gets funny, a powerful charge of electricity rebukes you.

Like I said, brilliant idea, but for some reason I could never get a volunteer to try it out. You build a better mouse trap and the mice just complain bitterly.

Anyway, art is always fun to write about, unless it is crap like Jeff Koons, but that is not really art, so I feel safe ignoring it.

We went back to SFMOMA on Saturday. Amalia was asleep in her stroller, so Melanie and I got to go through the galleries at a much more leisurely pace.

I noticed something that I missed the other day: a beautiful Agnes Martin canvas. I suppose she was fresh in my mind, seeing as how she passed away last week at the age of 92, but I am still shocked that I missed this painting the other day. I have always liked her work. Anyway, having a few minutes (not enough, because Melanie has normal patience for taking long gazes at almost-minimalism) to look and think about this painting was fantastic.

Furthermore, it got me in the right mood to study a gorgeous Ad Reinhardt canvas in the next room, which all adds up to making my pique at the lack of Robert Ryman works all the more acute. And since for every reaction there is an equal and opposite anti-reaction, where are the Arnesons?!?

I want, no, I demand the extremes. Give me somber reflection of Ryman and Martin, and give me the goofball joy of Arneson. But get rid of the smug "irony" of Warhol or the goofball seriousness of Newman (for some reason the goofball seriousness of Still and Rothko never bothers me, probably because both men produced a few fantastic works).

We had a great visit (still a little shorter than ideal, but few people enjoy museum visits as long as my ideal), and Amalia woke up in the gift shop just as we were buying her Christmas present (oops).

Anyway, back to "sweet without being cloying." To quote Ian Shoales, "I gotta go."

Posted by erik at December 21, 2004 12:55 AM | TrackBack