Events | Daydream Tourist

Jul 16

Happy 1st Birthday Daydream Tourist!

Happy blog-iversary Daydream Tourist! One year ago, I was itching to use my passport, enjoyed planning hypothetical trips and thought I could share that with a wider audience (hence the blog title Daydream Tourist). Luckily I wasn’t too strict and let the posts and scope of the blog evolve. Part hobby, part creative outlet, I’ve enjoyed writing, researching and sharing and am proud of what I’ve done this past year.

The greatest revelation of this experience has been how much I love art and history. Like I said, I originally meant to write a travel planning blog but when my fourth post was about my favorite Hapsburg rulers, it was pretty clear my interests were broad! This sounds laughably nerdy, but I’ve really enjoyed the primary research and detective work of The Friedrich Wahle Project and hope to make more progress this coming year. It was also fun to find my niche among travel bloggers. I’m not really one for adventures and crazy, breath-taking experiences. I’m someone who likes to linger and absorb the details of a place whether that’s through people-watching or spending 4hours at a small archaeological site. I’d like to think I share interesting observation and pictures from my travel with a mix of history and context to these places.

I’ve also learned that writing is hard. Don’t get me wrong, I write quite a bit professionally, but its a technical style that doesn’t lend itself easily to art history and travel subject matter, nor to the tone of a blog. The Daydream Tourist has been good practice for me and I hope that with time my writing will improve and I can get a little faster at making these posts. I would also be helpful if I stopped perpetually editing my draft posts and published them. Right now, I have 10 semi-completed stories, so if in the next week there is a wave of slightly awkward posts to go up, you know I just got fed up and let them loose.

I particularly liked the image I made for my MLK Memorial post which showed the relative size of some DC memorial statues relative to a 6′ tall person.

My Favorite Posts: It should come as no surprise, that I’ve enjoyed writing pieces that require some investigation and analysis. I really liked my post on the Iconography of John the Baptist. It was an interesting story to tell and was genuinely inspired by something small I noticed and didn’t understand. I also liked putting together and doing some critical analysis of the outdoor context of several Arnaldo Pomodoro sculptures and showing the connection between art history and the 2011 Nobel Prize for Chemistry. I definitely like the gratuitous use of John Singer Sargent paintings and the amusing hypothetical question posed in the My Perfect Portrait post. It’s really hard to choose a favorite travel experience but I must say I loved the ancient Marathon re-enactors, the mosaics at Ravenna and my photos of the Istanbul Spice Market.

People love this Alaska vintage travel poster! (Flickr, Boston Public Library)

Most Popular Posts: My most popular post describes how historical, artistic and scientific analysis was used to determine what George Washington looked like. I discussed a beautiful piece of research from Mount Vernon in collaboration with the University of Pittsburgh and Arizona State University. I half suspect these page views were all from middle school students trying to write a report on George Washington. Hopefully they learned a little bit about America’s first President and something about forensic anthropology! My second most popular post was on the virtual reconstruction of Duccio’s Maesta altarpiece. The huge painting is a 14th century masterpiece and raises some interesting questions about restoration. I’m happy with how that article turned out; it was actually pretty fun tracking down the panels outside of Siena and making the Maesta images! It’s also interesting to see what posts get views based on internet searches. A post about vintage travel posters and my very first post which included a UNESCO World Heritage map still get very consistent traffic.

Special Thanks! I want to thank my readers and 61 followers. It’s very encouraging to see that others actually like what I post! Thanks also to top commenter and art news conduit Elliott in Gotham!

Next Steps: I’m still so satisfied from my Turkey trip, I’m not really sure where I am traveling next. Maybe Peru to soak up some Inca history? Maybe Vietnam to soak up a new culture? Maybe an art pilgrimage to Ghent? Maybe a real pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago? I’ll guess we’ll just have to see. 🙂

Jul 1

Boston Harborfest: Tall Ships and Fifes and Drums

The USS Constitution “Old Ironsides” will be celebrating the bicentennial of several famous naval victories this year

Boston really does know how to do the 4th of July. The week long Harborfest brings together lots of American history, colonial revolutionaries and roving bands of Redcoats, tall ships, good food, great music and a firework spectacular. I met some folks from Florida last night during the festivities who were there checking Harborfest off their Bucket List. I’ve been in DC for several Independence Day celebrations and I have to admit that Boston is more fun.

The Life of a Sculpture: “The Sphere” in Lower Manhattan

I came across and interesting article this week. “The Sphere”, a 25 foot tall bronze and steel sculpture by Fritz Koenig, was once part of the fountain in the plaza between the World Trade Center buildings in New York City. The work was meant to symbolize the advancement of peace through international trade. The sculpture miraculously survived the 9/11 attacks and was moved to Battery Park ten yeas ago as a memorial. Due to some upcoming improvements to the park, “The Sphere” will be removed and it is unclear where and when it will ultimately be placed.

Italian Good Friday Procession Art

It is traditional in Spain, Italy and other Catholic countries to stage elaborate religious procession on Good Friday and Easter. While in Erice, a village on the Western tip of Sicily, I found a Museum of church objects that had a series of statue used to commemorate the Passion story of Jesus on Good Friday.

Statue Conservation in Action at the MFA Boston

Juno in her former home, a suburban Boston estate garden (Photo: MFA)

The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston is hosting an interesting conservation project. An impressive Trajanic or Hadrianic Period (early second century A.D.) statue of Juno was moved into the George D. and Margo Behrakis Gallery of ancient art this week. Given its massive size of 13ft and 13,000 lbs, conservator will be examining, cleaning and repairing the work in situ. Recently donated to the Museum of Fine Arts, the statue has spent the last 100 years in an estate garden just outside of Boston. The resulting wind, snow, freeze-thaw, biological and vandal damage has taken a toll on the piece. The Museum is raising money to support the conservation. You can learn more about this on-going project at the MFA’s website.

I’m particularly interested in the analysis of the head. It is clear that it was reattached at one or more times in the piece’s history; however, it also seems that the head and body are not the same marble and may have been united at a later time. Given that little historical information exists about the piece prior to the 17th century, curators and conservators will have to rely on scientific analysis to understand the past of this statue.