Just a week ’til Xmas and 80 degrees—I know, not a big deal for those in the know, but I’m not in the know…

I decided yesterday that both of the sets of paintings are done and I started packing the foot-square ones into “If it fits it ships” USPS boxes that just happen to be exactly a foot square.BTW, the post office is a five minute walk from here, and,  just like at home in Portland,  the Starbucks is about the equivalent of three blocks away. In the three weeks we’ve been here I think I’ve stepped outside the Rauschenberg Residency property about a half dozen times (always with a purpose like get the Sunday Times at SBux). This island of tranquility within the island is well sheltered from the “island life” flavor. The “resort” and strip mall next door just don’t have appeal. 

Every day I see this Rauschenberg piece between the studio steps and the pool.

The more I see it the more I like it. It is a bronze version of his Ancient Incident (Kabal American Zephyr) 1981. Doesn’t at all look like bronze.

First of all I enjoy the absurdity of the meeting of the chairs at the top where is would be impossible to sit face-to-face with no knee room. Then of course you have the “rickety” steps leading to the (mundane) chairs, but to the backs of the chairs, so you couldn’t comfortably take a seat event if there was knee room. It’s an elevated meeting place for the exalted, where it is impossible to meet, built as if Buster Keaton could have done it.