The tail end of the Fringe

Matt and I arrived in Edinburgh during its busiest and most festive month, August. This city hosts a month long festival for the arts, music, poetry, comedy, books, and more. Unfortunately, we came when there were only 4 festival days remaining, but we made the most of them. We saw several amazing bands, some of which were playing on street corners. At the Guildford Arms, we heard "Yard of Ale" and "F.C. Ukulele"-- both amazing! We also laughed our arses off watching the University of Edinburgh's Graduate Student Comedy Club perform stand up at a pub in Grassmarket. We saw fireworks and even caught a glimpse of the famous Edinburgh Military Tattoo as they marched by us as midnight.

Here are a few highlights. Can't wait for next year when we get a full month of this!

The Orpheum Theatre, Los Angeles

The Orpheum Theatre is Los Angeles at its finest! We had a wonderful night celebrating our anniversary here. We wandered around the place, oooohing and aaaaahing at all the ornamentation. Everything, even functional things like "exit" signs, were designed to be beautiful. These photos don't do it justice! It is so... GRAND!

The silent movie we saw, Douglas Fairbanks as Robin Hood, was a lot of fun. Before the show began, we were treated to a short cartoon called Koko's Earth Control (which you can see here). And then Leonard Maltin took the stage and told us about the theater, the movie and the era in which they were both made.

But classic movies and famous critics were not the star of the evening's performance... the Wurlitzer organ masterfully played by Robert Israel was pure magic. I was impressed that he played throughout the 5 minute cartoon... I was floored that he played throughout the entire length of the feature film. And then, when I thought I could not be any more dazzled... I realized that Mr. Israel actually composed the whole score, ensuring that the music matched the action perfectly. It was truly an amazing thing to see and hear!

Afterwards, Matthew and I got to check out the organ and talk to the musician and the technician. We also climbed up to the projection room and had a snoop around. We really took in the whole place.

Going to a modern day movie is great fun, but it is nothing compared to this movie-going experience. This felt special... Special in a way that is uniquely LA.

Cottage in the Woods

Source

A little Burrow-esque!

Evening in the Suburbs by Justin Miller

Den Lille Havfrue (The Little Mermaid)

Since we're in the middle of a giveaway from the Filigree... a Mermaid Extravaganza, actually, I thought it is only appropriate that I post a few pictures from my recent visit to the Little Mermaid sculpture in Copenhagen.

As my guide said before we approached her, "she's just a little thing'. I guess many American tourists expect her to be on par with the Statue of Liberty, size wise, and that she is not. Her smaller stature makes her seem more life-like, more vulnerable, more little- which is a better fit with the original story.

The title character from Hans Christian Andersen's beloved tale has seen many representations since she swam into the world in 1837, the most popular in recent years being Disney's Ariel. Ah, Ariel. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of this version, and I love that everyone is happy in the end, but of course, that's not what Andersen intended. If you don't know the real story, or if you need a refresher, the original in it's entirety can be found here.

One of my favorite things as a child was my set of Superscope Story Teller books and cassettes. This version of The Little Mermaid was abridged, but it still stuck to Andersen's plot line- the Grandmother, the sister's hair, the knife in the heart, the sea foam, the sorrowful end.... I can still hear the sister's voices encouraging the Little Mermaid to come back to them under the sea. 

The statue in Copenhagen captures the old story wonderfully. She is a little sad, sitting there on that rock. She is beautiful and exposed and without defenses. She enchants visitors, some of whom just pose next to her to snap a quick photo, and others who sit for a while and gaze at the rocks as she does. She thrills the little ones, especially the girls, who know some version of her tale... and I know of at least one visitor who saw her and pitied her for wanting to be something she was not, but admired her anyway, for trying.

The Filigree- Interview and Giveaway!

As if I needed another reason to love Etsy... A few months ago, while shopping for some fantastical prints to decorate my new apartment, I found The Filigree. I fell in love with the beauty and style of just about everything in this shop. I ended up with these two beauties-

These are the kinds of images I get lost in-- looking at them is like reading a great story! (You can order yours too, by going here and here). In my ordering process, I exchanged a few emails with Celena, half of the creative team behind The Filigree. We got talking and she and her husband Martin agreed to an online interview- a first for Dreams & Happy Things! 

Martin Øbakke, a native of Denmark (home of the Little Mermaid), met Celena Cavala, ballerina and Nashville native in Florence, Italy- last century. They started making Fairy Tales and haven't stopped since. In their work, you'll find elements of old world Europe to Southern Gothic charm. Martin does the illustrating and sculptures while Celena sews and writes the world they live in, in their Nonsense News, the Filigree. They currently live on a small town square outside Nashville in an old Victorian loft, where all of their works are created and sent off to admirers from around the world. 

They're inspired by the Invisible world and Imagination and the points in between that they refer to as 'the Filigree'; thin gossamer strands that connect everything...                   

-The Filigree, about

D&HT:  Thanks for being the first interview on this blog! I am such a fan of what you both create--your work is amazing and interesting! How do you come up with the things you write about, paint, sculpt...?
C&M: By working together throughout a day-- we'll chit chat and these ideas will form. It's enormously satisfying to chase an inspiration and see it materialize.


D&HT: If you were not creating the world of Filigree,  what do you see yourself doing?

Celena: I was a classically trained ballet dancer so I would probably be teaching and perhaps choreographing.
Martin: I would probably be involved in some furniture design/construction.


D&HT: Describe your "dream" day... what, for you, is the perfect day?

C&M: We love our lives so basically everyday is exactly what we want to do~  love interacting with customers online, finish projects, create more art and pack things to be shipped out all over the world and ideally, do some yoga and always eat well.


D&HT: Ok... At a beautiful garden luncheon, who are the other 4 sitting at your table?

C&M: Hmm, difficult question! Joyce Carol Oates, (an enthralling and very prolific american author) & Oscar Wilde,  Edgar Allen Poe, & Sherlock Holmes.


D&HT: Where is your Happy place?
C&M: Not a particular material place as rather a quiet room in our mind where we Imagine.

The Giveaway!!!

Not only is this Dreams & Happy Things first interview, but the lovely duo at The Filigree has agreed to a giveaway! One lucky reader will win a trio of prizes- Mermaid cards, a Mermaid paper doll, and an issue of The Filigree Newspaper featuring articles about all sorts of goings on in the invisible world, including a headline about our favorite underwater hybrids- It's truly a Mermaid Extravaganza!!!   

I am already jealous of the winner...!

How to enter:

First, make sure you are a follower of Dreams & Happy Things, so that you can comment on this post. Think of every comment to this post as a raffle ticket. At the end of the week, I will put each comment into a 'hat' and pull out a winner at random. You can have lots of chances to win- its as easy as 1,2,3 (4,5)! 

1. Go to The Filigree and browse around. Come back here and tell us about one thing that caught your eye. (anything from the Gallery, Shops, Studio Journal, etc...)

2. Like The Filigree on Facebook (come back here and leave a comment saying you did so)

3. Like Dreams & Happy Things on Facebook (come back here and leave a comment saying you did so)

4. Follow The Filigree on Twitter (come back here and leave a comment saying you did so... see a theme?)

5. Follow Dreams & Happy Things on Twitter (come back here and leave a comment saying you did so)

*Already following/liking? Leave comments saying so and you get counted too!

**Want even more entries?? Retweet or share this post on your Twitter, Tumblr or Facebook accounts and write two more comments! That means you could have 8 chances of getting chosen! Those are darn good odds!

Remember to leave your email address or some way of contacting you if you are the lucky winner! (Or else, check back on Saturday,  Jan. 28th to see the winner announced)

Good Luck!

Aspire to travel

artist

"Whereas the tourist generally hurries back home at the end of a few weeks or months, the traveler, belonging no more to one place than to the next, moves slowly, over periods of years, from one part of the Earth to another."

 -Paul Bowles

Getty Day

I must start by saying... It took us two hours to get the the Getty Museum. And it's 12 miles from our house. After some simple mathematic figuring, I am sure you can conclude that we were all a little cramped and grumpy when we finally arrived. But our moods were lifted quickly, as the Getty is such a special place. Nestled in the foothills of the Santa Monica mountains and overlooking the city of angels, the location itself plays a part in the museum's heavenly feeling. Its so 'removed-from-it-all'. You can't help but pity the poor schmucks far below you, wasting their day jammed on the 405 freeway. (Wait.... was that us just moments ago?) It's wonderful that there is no car access to the museum, so once you *finally* arrive, there are no sounds of scuttling or idling engines. Visitors ditch their driving contraptions at the bottom of the hill and glide to the top via computer-operated tram.

 The Getty has a very unique look. It's architecture is modern without being stark, interesting without taking away from the art, gardens or view, and impressive without feeling heavy. There is a mixture of blocky travertine structures and curving buildings made of tiles and airy rooftops. The design plays into the varying surroundings- the rugged hills, the grid of the city, with its freeways and high rises, and the not-too-distant Pacific ocean. Read more about architect Richard Meier and his inspiration and choice of materials in building the Getty Museum, here.

Just as important as the buildings and the art work they house are the Getty gardens. They are expansive, beautiful and a little bit strange. This garden is home to grasses, succulents, bushes and bougainvillea. Robert Irwin designed the space and has said that the Central Garden "is a sculpture in the form of a garden, which aims to be art".  In the middle is a large pool with a maze-like design made of azalea plants. Me and Matt, along with his sister Julie and her beau Brian wandered through the grounds and took it all in, stopping to rest or strike a pose...

After our photo shoot around the gardens, we went to see how the experts do it by visiting the photography exhibits inside. We saw In Focus that showcased photos around Los Angeles from 1945 to 1980, the works of Lyonel Feininger, and a collection titled Narrative Interventions in Photography- which I enjoyed the most. I fell in love with the works of Eileen Cowin and with Simryn Gill's project, Forest. 

Eileen Cowin

Simryn Gill's Forest mixes texts in various languages into live vegetation

And while the works inside the museum were wonderful to view, they simply couldn't compare with the works outside...

The evening sky was ridiculous! Blood reds, swirling oranges, and fuchsia clouds against the darkening blue vault of the heavens... I think even for the best photographer, it would be impossible to capture the beauty of last night's sunset, and I certainly don't do it justice with my snap shots- but it was one that will stay in my memory. ahhhh. pretty.