A Feast to Say the Least

Isaac Elyas (Dutch, active ca. 1620-1630), Celebrating Compagny, 1629. Oil on panel. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

The Thanksgiving holiday, and its associated goodies and foodstuffs with family gathered around the table, has caused my eyes to drift toward Dutch painting, especially the 17^th century variety. This gorgeous piece by Isaac Elyas, called Celebrating Compagny and painted in 1629, caught me a couple of weeks ago. There’s something about the glint of glass and the tableware, the sheen of satin and delicate lace ruffs that seemed particularly poetic.

Delicious things are being consumed, it is a time for comfort and relaxation in such an elegant manner. The details are captivating – the pewter pitcher and the charming disarray of the table, the folds in the tablecloth, as though it was fresh and folded, then brought out for this gathering. And for the cuteness factor, there is a fluffy little dog on the woman’s lap, perhaps calling to mind how, for many of us, little pets are an integral detail of life.

The Dutch artists of the 17^th century were especially good at these understated statements of elegance and abundance (well, never mind the fact that the Eighty Years’ War against Spanish Habsburg rule was raging outside; inside, things seem pretty pleasant). It had been a pretty good time for a rising merchant class, and people were filling their homes with art that spoke to a sense of pleasure and comfort.

Pieter Claesz (Dutch, 1597/98-1660), Still Life with a Crab, 1651. Oil on panel. Milwaukee Art Museum.

Still lifes were especially popular, like this 1651 painting by the renowned artist Pieter Claesz. This is of a sort known as a breakfast piece, and certainly on an empty stomach you’d be ready to dig into these edible delights. A bit of fresh crab, some luscious fruit, golden bread just waiting to be broken, and those lovely glass goblets, sparkling serenely under the light. And in the back, a pewter salt cellar — a mark of wealth and taste, as seasonings were treasured additions to the dining table.

Jacobus Victors and Jacob van Ruisdael (Dutch, ca. 1640-1705; Dutch, 1628/29-1682), Poultry Park, ca. 1670. Oil on canvas. Milwaukee Art Museum.

This painting, called Poultry Park, was done around 1670 by Jacobus Victors and Jacob van Ruisdael and now hangs at the Milwaukee Art Museum.  In the spirit of the Thanksgiving holiday, I couldn’t resist this painting, too. Obviously this picture, in its own day and time, is not associated with the creation of an American holiday that is the bane of any poultry’s existence. It’s like a beautiful barnyard showing off gorgeous birds — not just one, but plenty. Abundance for humans and birds alike.

Pieter Brueghel the Younger (Flemish, ca. 1564/65-1637/38), Peasant Brawl, ca. 1620. Oil on panel. Milwaukee Art Museum.

Here’s wishing you a pleasant and peaceful Thanksgiving, — but hopefully one that doesn’t bear any resemblance to the card-game-gone-wrong drama of Pieter Brueghel the Younger’s Peasant Brawl. Cheers!

Kat Murrell

November 23, 2011

At home in the virtual world

Anyone with a deep, abiding affection for paper of all sorts — books, notes, letter, medieval manuscripts, etc. — may get a prickly feeling when thinking about writing on the internet. In terms of permanence, it seems like inscribing your fond thoughts on a soap bubble. What are those mysterious, transient digital signals that lie beneath this webpage, these scraps of writing? Incomprehensible pulses that represent the mental energy of your head transmitted, via digital alchemy, to the great “out there”? It’s quite intangible, almost unreal.

Well, seemingly. Maybe it’s a process of settling in, now that the internet is an inescapable, and even cherished, part of daily living. With that coziness comes the realization that in this great “out there” of the internet, the lifespan of things can operate on a different scale than the tangible world. So here we are, back on the blog. After all, there are now services that will make a final status update to Facebook page after you’ve died, so why not pump some life back into an old site?

Funny enough, it’s hard not to conceive of this site as a physical space. In my own imagination, it’s like a summer house, or a place that you spent a lot of time at in the past, but closed up for a while. The windows are a little foggy with dust, filtering sunshine with a yellowish haze. The generous array of furniture is covered over with ghostly white sheets. The air smells stale with waiting. That’s what this site conjures in my mind; it’s been shut for a while, but at least the keys still work in the door (read: we still have the password).

With a little cleaning of windows, whipping the sheets off the furniture, organizing some fresh flowers, voila – it’s a functioning space again.

That’s not so say that when returning to a place, you come back the same. You and everything else are always a bit different as new memories form an overlay for the old. So this opening up of STI is decidedly casual. There are ideas and intentions, and an impulse to have a space for art writing that may not be easily categorized — a little unruly, on-topic but with random bits thrown in, free-form and flowing.

So with that, welcome back.

~Kat Murrell

Painting is an arena

Like sand through the hourglass, summer is indeed slipping away. The almost imperceptible change in the air comes in an unconscious wave, slowly floating to the surface like a buoyant swimmer come up from the deep. The days of August tick off the calendar, coming closer and closer to the start of school, like a new New Year’s day.

I think this is why August can be such a time for reflection, for assessment. It’s got me thinking about painting.

There’s a particular cool stillness that comes when you can step into the shade of a gallery or museum on a hot summer afternoon. Shut out the sound of the sultry air and come into a temple of controlled conditions and raging imagination. Maybe that’s the contrast that, when done well, so effectively charges the air. The gallery or museum can be a world unto itself, different from outside the doors. Everyone is polite, quiet (unless you’re an enraged lunatic like the woman who again assaulted paintings at the National Gallery of Art in Washington. But I digress…). But isn’t there a difference in the energy, the reserved environment of the space, and the tumult of making that happens in the art? Maybe that’s why it’s so different to see work in museums and galleries, rather than in the general chaos and well-worn nature of homes.

On the subject of this tension among space and object and energy, Inova/Kenilworth is a great place to go. Inside, it’s austere and reserved, the raw industrial-tinged space a deferent host to the work on display. The current exhibition — rather, exhibitions — are engaging in their divergent flavors (for more on the show specifically, here’s my review in the Wisconsin Gazette). But this, and something a friend said, have got me thinking about painting.

Actually, the conversation and question was about the size and scale of paintings, but that’s another topic. What caught my attention was a moment of questioning — what is it that makes painting so appealing? Going back to the Inova/Kenilworth, in her three-dimensional installations, Martha Glowacki whips out some keen chops, like an artist-conductor shaping the rhythm and timbre of objects that become art. These works exist in your physical space — tangible, transformative. Yes, I certainly groove on installations and sculpture.

But there is also the work of Greg Klassen to see, monumental swashes of paint. They cover a lot territory, spatially. The absorbing nature draws me into a realization that must be acknowledged: I have a particular affection for painting. Yes, the thing with brushes or other implements on some surface, usually panel or canvas, often finished off by a frame. Yes, that same thing that’s literally been done for millennia. Love it. Past decades have stirred up headlines by asking the question of doom: is painting dead? I would certainly say not by a long shot, especially now with so many painters on the scene that notion is plain silly.

But to pull a riff on Shakespeare, how do I love thee? I love the concentration of paintings. Everything that needs to be said or implied originates within these boundaries. The edges of the support. I love that term — “support.” The physical foundation of the painting is like another actor whose job is to make sure the lead is able to plunge and soar to the edges of their role. It is a challenge, to make things happen in this given space, through layers of color and gesture and line. The myriad of decisions to be made — how much of a mark to leave, heavy or strong, or fine and nearly dematerialized. It’s all the subtly of language in nonverbal form.

There is a lovely Italian term — pentimento — which refers to a previous mark or part that has been changed, something intended but decided against in the painting process. This earlier direction is altered, changed over, but it still exists within the paintings layers. But sometimes age bring pentimenti out, and the earlier marks show thorough the later layers. That’s a lot like life, is it not? Our earlier experiences and selves may lie buried, only to resurface unexpectedly, but meaningfully later on.

A painting is not just a picture; it’s an arena. There is a lot that happens between it on the wall and one’s own self, as we stop to give the most valuable and irreplaceable thing we have — time. Paintings, and all art that moves you, that draws you in and encourages you to come back. It is generous, giving back moments more richly felt, sending you off more filled than before.

~ Kat Murrell

Looking at sustainability in the MIAD Senior Show

By Jeff Filipiak

As the term ‘sustainability’ becomes a popular buzzword, and our country hopes that green jobs will help revive the economy, it can be inspiring to see how students are exploring issues of sustainable design. I teach courses titled “Sustainability Studies” and “Food and Power: Why Am I Eating This,” at MIAD, so I’m particularly curious to see what students there develop. MIAD’s senior show provides a nice snapshot of what graduating seniors (most of whom I have not taught), in a variety of fields, are exploring in terms of sustainability and environmental awareness.

As someone long interested in studying the history of food and agriculture, the first two projects which hooked me involved students celebrating their ancestors’ recipes, beginning with relatives who lived outside the U.S.. Milwaukee is a more savory place for having these recipes added to its menu! Jose Hernandez sought to honor his ancestors by preserving their recipes, in a cookbook where recipes are arranged by relative. He visited a 91-year-old great aunt of his, and others, to learn about (and photograph) their recipes, which helped him appreciate the skills involved in cooking. Photographs, recipes and what might be called ‘cooking biographies’ combine to effectively communicate how a culture passes down tastes and talents.

Jessica Nieczyperowicz wrote of her cookbook that “I am preserving a part of my identity.” As a 2^nd-generation immigrant from Poland, she focused on the role her ethnic heritage has played in shaping her identity. Her illustrations color in memories, from herself as a charmed child enjoying soup, to demonstrations of how eating together (as well as cooking) built connections between generations of women in her family. The project mixed recipes, illustrations, and stories, demonstrating the power of stories as a means of helping us appreciate our food – and the care that goes into producing the most memorable meals.

A number of projects focused on how to interest people in exploring and connecting to the outdoors, a connection which can be the basis for joy – as well as a motivation to use resources and places more carefully. Josette Katcha’s design for a community garden sought to ease transitions between the built environment and park space, suggesting a spectrum of uses of land, rather than divisions between different zones. As the work of Jillian Duckwitz suggests, connecting people to nature isn’t just about re-presenting nature to them through ‘realistic’- looking images. Connection can involve clever designs, and artwork (like her prints) that highlights the key traits of species, for identification purposes. Her project proposes to use geocaching to combine exploring, learning, and observing. Molly Kate Opitz aims at a younger group with her tent design, as part of her work on learning-based toys. It charmed the students in my class… and I’m confident it would charm kids too. The dinosaur-based tent is bright and fun, inviting a child to think of their outdoors base camp as a playful basis for adventure.

I was impressed by the efforts of a number of designers to plan products which used resources more efficiently. But perhaps since I’m not a designer, I tended to be drawn to works on that focused more on how to persuade consumers to change their behavior. Laurel Komp’s communication design work used the power of trash to make her case. It is difficult today to make connections between what we acquire (and abandon), and the consequences of our choices on places distant from us. Komp used familiar objects to draw the viewer in, and then crisply presented a message about the impact of using such products.

Students in my sustainability class worried that sustainable products can sometimes come off as too simple, too bland, in their designs. So I appreciated Heidi Steiber’s effort to think about what image gardening products could project – as well as her attempts to ensure that the packaging itself would make use of sustainable design principles. She chose to focus on the area where Milwaukee is perhaps the nation’s leader in terms of thinking about sustainability – urban agriculture, where Growing Power, Sweet Water Organics, and the Victory Garden Initiative are just some of the groups exploring new possibilities. (I’m hoping enough students sign up for my “Food and Power” course this summer so I can explore these and related issues with students again soon!)

Perhaps the most interesting experiment, particularly in its effort to move outside the galleries, was Sarah Omen’s. How can an artist get her work to the public – and how can she get the public to make a commitment to act? Omen offered small paintings in exchange for those willing to “perform an act for the earth” within one month, and report back to her on it. Her work – and responses from those who received art – can be seen at http://www.omenart.org/ Yes, I volunteered, and my reflections will be posted on the site. Works are still available, so here’s your chance to earn some art!

Photography students at MIAD reminded me, in a variety of ways, to look more carefully at things that I might forget to appreciate. Kelly Alexander explores an often-overlooked landscape in her prairie prints, emphasizing strands and waves of light. (http://timenatureidentity.blogspot.com/) Maggie Salvini takes viewers out into the quiet winter landscapes of Milwaukee parks, in photos that suggest her wrestling with tensions over the human place in nature. Her photos don’t include any humans, focusing instead on trees and snow – but she does include impressive arced park architecture, as well as highlighting her role as creator by producing composite photos, built from many smaller images. (http://www.maggiesalviniphotography.blogspot.com/)

Ok, a confession: as someone who gave a talk in praise of snow at the Portrait Society Gallery (http://portraitsocietygallery.wordpress.com/) last winter, I rarely need to be reminded to appreciate snow… but I’m not going to pass up a chance to remind others to observe and enjoy it!)

Ashley Petchel’s photographs of water demonstrate how sometimes the medium (in her case, water; for me, its more often snow…) can be provide as much aesthetic interest as what’s behind it (the underwater surface); indeed, the medium is the main focus of her photos. Textures bubble; blues rarely seen on land jump out at the viewer; and she finds more shades of yellow and green in water than one would expect. Colors below, and sunlight behind, the camera are refracted, repeated, pulsing; the water is often jelly-like, the light often strung in kaledioscopic effects. Her work pays tribute to the elegant aesthetics to be found in small places, to the array of shade and wave that exists only in a moment. It inspired me to go out and look carefully at, and through, the water!

I enjoy examples of art that remind us what we can find in nature, and can reframe how we look at it. Photographers inspire me through the images they create, using careful observation and composition to display scenes in more visually striking ways than I might observe them. In fact, one could probably never ‘see’ what Petchel’s photographs capture; the photos capture a moment which we can’t ever quite isolate from our flow of lived experience. Instead, we enjoy different pleasures; her photos can lead us to celebrate the pleasures of being in motion in our own outdoor moments, where we can savor our immersion. (http://www.ashleypetchelphotography.blogspot.com/)
The most direct way we bring the outdoors, and its life, into our homes and bodies is through by pleasures of eating. There’s a lot to savor in our food, particularly if we choose something healthy and sustainable. Anna Maund’s photos of cabbage reminded me of this. Food that reminds us of its origins, the living creatures it came from, connects us to farmers and to the soil. It can be a lot more visually interesting (and diverse) than more industrialized food, which processes food into simplified, standardized forms. And, of course, there’s the taste…

Maund’s photos remind me of the connection between what we see (shape) and what we feel (while eating). The surprisingly sharp edges in her photos call up the crispness one experiences while eating cabbage. She finds a surprising diversity in texture, from crisp edges to paperlike folds to a gentle bagginess. She uses cabbage to remind us how sensuous a vegetable can be. (http://www.annamaund.blogspot.com/)

Nature repeats forms on different scales, so we don’t need to look at a mountain range to see its forms – we can find objects closer to home with them. At times she presents cabbage as a landscape, abstracted into black and white to highlight contrast and texture. Ridges rise up, and there’s an elegance in the rhythm and pattern of the natural forms. Looking carefully (it helps if you eat slowly) can provide joys that don’t cost anything. Rarely has cabbage taken my breath away like this… and I do eat my share of sauerkraut and kimchi…

Here’s to happy eating and looking, at MIAD and elsewhere! Perhaps you won’t feel compelled, like I did, to buy a head of cabbage the next day, and to slowly observe the head as you eat some of it… but whatever you do choose to look slowly at, I hope you enjoy it!

MIAD Senior Exhibition 2010

April 16-May 15

Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design

273 E. Erie St.

Milwaukee, WI 53202

(414) 847-3200

The Shrinking Local Scene

Lapham’s Quarterly (I highly recommended it), the new edition, has been sitting on my desk for a few weeks now and I’ve yet to get to reading it. The subject is Crimes and Punishments; quite apropos, given the scandalous amount of advantage taken in business lately. It seems criminal, is it? Or is it the natural result from the exploitation of loopholes and a system set up by those who run it so that they and theirs can reap (or rape) the full advantage. Crazy amounts of money. I’m sure they’re thinking that the good ol’ days are over.

But I am thinking that, here in our humble Milwaukee, losses are mounting. Not just the jobs in the labor force or homes foreclosed from untenable loans and deals, but in the loss of yet another independent, smart outlet for creative forces and things that enliven daily living. Paper Boat announced earlier this year that if things didn’t improve financially, they were going to have to close up shop. It was a sad and surprising statement, especially since an imminent closing would have come on the heels of the very successful premier of Faythe Levine’s clever documentary film, Handmade Nation. But things seemed like they were surviving, until now. Over the weekend the email went out that they will have to close, apparently it’s not economically viable to hang in there. So sad, so ironic that after this film, where Milwaukee is a part of this movement, it’s not able to sustain it.

How long has it been? Was it one year ago, two years ago that there was so much going on? I remember driving down Water Street in warm sunshine, passing under the freeway and into the Third Ward and thinking about how lucky we were, as a city, to have so many amazing places; I suppose that is now referred to as “back in the day.” There was Hotcakes, Broad Vocabulary, White Whale Collective, Brooks Barrow Gallery, shows happening at the Hide House (actually, ArtBeat is having an event there on Fri., Apr. 3; see message on MARN list]), Schwarz’s seemed an eternal presence on Downer Avenue, and I know there are others I’ve missed. (o4/03/09: *blush!  Luckystar’s gallery is another unfortunate absence – I knew I made a huge oversight [and there's probably more...])

Like so many other cities, our publications are feeling the pinch – Vital Source is now solely online as Third Coast Digest. Of course, I think the online format is fabulous, but there is still something to be said about printed materials. They have a definite presence, you see them in the newsstand as you’re wandering into Alterra or other favorite businesses, and it brings them back to mind. A new cover is a reminder to pick one up, or check online for new articles. The same with the Shepherd Express, strolling past the newsstands offers a half-second perusal of the stories and headlines, and a mental note to read up soon.

The shame is that these places and things are disappearing not because of a lack of quality, but a lack of money; another dimension to that “root of all evil.” Who knows where it ends or how things ultimately shake out; all I can think is to support the local scene, before there isn’t one left.

~ KM Murrell

Love and Money

Another tumultuous relationship: Venus, Goddess of Love, and Mars, God of War

Peter Paul Rubens (Flemish, 1577-1640), Mars Disarmed by Venus, ca. 1610-1612

Say you’re in a relationship, it’s lovely, passionate, spicy…really, Valentine’s was only two weeks ago, surely memories last longer than chocolates?

Everything is wonderful, until the bottom drops out, something happens, and for the sake of an example, we’ll say it’s money. Financial problems erupt, it’s bad. What is the net effect on said relationship? Does the “kicking to the curb” ensue immediately? Do you lose all that you had because of these external storms? Or do you tough it out, and even find strength in lovely passionate spiciness?

What if that metaphor was about the Arts? Arts with a capital A – art, music, dance, literature and poetry, the fruits of creative souls produced by professionals whose mission in life is to make things that make you, dear reader/viewer, experience something out-of-the-ordinary. In that light, it makes us rather lucky, that these individuals largely sacrifice so much (job security, earning potential, health insurance) because they’re driven by a force to create things and ideas, and expose this labor for the public’s enjoyment, or for the public’s derision. That’s also gutsy.

But this relationship with the Arts, if we love it so much, and get so much from it, why is our emotional barometer so linked to money? The market drops, economy crashes, jobs are lost. Why are we not seeking solace and refuge in these places of art, performance, music and theatre? Granted, tickets can be terribly expensive for the best performance seats, but there are ways of getting discounts, through special deals or subscriptions (also read: commitment). Art museums and galleries offer us plenty for free, just plan your trip accordingly, and make the most of your time. Relax, absorb, think, unwind. It can be even better than a spa.

Maybe I’m far too idealistic about this, but the arts and humanities can be likened to a Greek chorus in our own unending drama; sometimes they take the center stage, sometimes they offer whispered asides, or give sharp perspective as tragedy or comedy unfolds. As long as we pay attention, and in the full spirit of a fruitful relationship, are engaged. Like love, there’s plenty of pleasure to be had, in the traces of the deftly-handled paintbrush that creates a face to last hundreds of years, and the singular fragile moment of music sustained in the air, the result of years of practice and refinement. There is solace and there is meaning.

Love and money are strange bedfellows, and always have been. Art is the unruly progeny of this union, and we need all three. They say don’t go to bed angry, and don’t kick love out of bed when money has issues.

~ KM Murrell

No More Sipping and Seeing?

By Debra Brehmer

Director, Portrait Society Gallery

Did anyone notice the lack of free wine on the last gallery night (January 16)? As a gallery owner, I was told by fellow gallerists as well as the Historic Third Ward Association that it is now verboten to serve wine to our visitors. What apparently happened is that more and more retail stores began hosting “drink and shop” nights. Someone in Waukesha complained to authorities that a store there was violating legal code in providing alcoholic beverages to shoppers. The state stepped in and asserted that an existing statute prohibits this and anyone who violates it will be fined and publicly flogged.

Yes, it’s high time someone cracked down on the wine-sipping that goes on at art galleries. This social atrocity has been going on for a few hundred years so thank God that the good state of Wisconsin had the clear vision (finally) to mop up this morally corruptive practice. We’ve all seen the art lovers stumbling around the Third Ward after they’ve fed at the bountiful trough of free wine, looking all disheveled from their night of raucous visual art encounters; an ugly sight indeed.

To clarify the matter, what follows is some of the information surrounding this long-awaited civic improvement:

Dear Gallery Night Participant:

We have been advised by Georgeann King, Special Agent for the Wisconsin Department of Revenue that it is unlawful to give away or sell alcoholic beverages in your place of business unless you have a valid license. Her letter follows below, along with an article that was printed in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel regarding the same.

Since Gallery Night and Day is this Friday and Saturday, we wanted to make you are aware that this law is now being enforced.  The Historic Third Ward and East Town associations encourage your business to abide by the law.

Sincerely,

Gallery Night and Day Staff

**************************************************************************************************************

Good afternoon Nancy, this is a follow up to our phone call this morning regarding the Gallery Night/Day event that is being held on Friday January 16 and Saturday January 17, 2009. There has been ample media attention regarding events such as this, as well as individual businesses providing free alcohol to their customers on a regular basis or during a special event. I would like to clarify some important laws regarding this issue.

*Boutiques, art galleries, hair salons, bookstores and the like (this list is not all inclusive) are not allowed to give away or sell alcohol beverages to customers. Under definition, these businesses are considered “public places” (please see 125.09(1)). In addition to that, 125.67 states that a business can not give away alcohol beverages to evade the law. During the special event, an option for a business could be that they would provide a “coupon” (or something similar) to customers, allowing them to have a “free” drink at one of the local, licensed establishments.

Of course, any of the licensed businesses involved in the Gallery Night/Day event are allowed to sell and serve alcohol beverages accordingly. My goal is to clarify the laws surrounding these events to ensure consistent and fair enforcement of the Wisconsin alcohol beverage laws. It would be greatly appreciated if you would disseminate this information to your members involved in this event.

If you, or any of your members have questions or need further assistance, please contact me. In addition to that, if there are any other associations that I need to contact regarding similar events, please let me know.

Thank you for your assistance in this matter.

Georgeann King, Special Agent
WI-Department of Revenue
Criminal Investigation Section
Alcohol & Tobacco Enforcement
819 N. 6th Street, Room 408
Milwaukee WI 53203
(414) 227-4260
georgeann.king@revenue.wi.gov

Bubbly may get boot as shops face penalties for serving alcohol

By Kathy Flanigan of the Journal Sentinel

Posted: Dec. 1, 2008

Enid Garcia looked in the mirror as she tried on a belted plaid jacket at Fred, a boutique on N. Water St. Everything in the store was 40% off, and Garcia’s morning plan included shopping, then sipping.

“I’m going to get the deals first, then relax,” Garcia said. Her sentence was interrupted by the sound of a cork popping from a bottle of champagne – part of Fred’s free Black Friday brunch of mini-muffins, doughnut holes and mimosas.

But the party could be coming to an end.  Two weeks ago, after a citizen complaint about a Wauwatosa shop offering free cocktails, the state Department of Revenue put an end to booze at all boutiques in the Tosa Village – and, possibly, other similar shops in the state.

In the last few years, boutiques from Brookfield to the Third Ward have been offering free cocktails and hors d’oeuvres to get customers in the door. In tough economic times, every little incentive helps. However, recent crackdowns may force boutique owners to forgo the adult beverages or face fines of up to $10,000.

Regular Thursday evening happy hours, as well as complimentary Black Friday Bloody Marys and mimosas, have been a tradition at Jilly & George, a boutique at 7605 Harwood Ave., Wauwatosa. Not any more. “It’s illegal, if you’re not a licensed premise, to serve alcohol,” said Jessica Iverson, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Revenue, which monitors for proper licenses and permits.

“A proprietor may hold a private party (invited guests, specific date/time, after business hours) at a business and serve alcohol; once business is conducted, the party is no longer private in nature, and the business is functioning as a public place,” Iverson wrote in an e-mail, citing a state statute.

That statute is difficult to enforce, and many boutique owners said they weren’t aware of it. While an agent visited most of the boutiques in the Tosa Village, owners in other parts of town weren’t contacted. Other boutique owners have interpreted the statute their own way, some based on the advice of attorneys or other professionals.

Ronn Krinn, who owns Fred, 524 N. Water St., used to offer wine in the store. “It was part of our concept that we started from the beginning,” he said. He put a stop to that after a discussion with his attorney.

Fun, but no business

Even in compliance, the statute can seem ambiguous. Krinn said he locked the doors during private parties as required, but was ordered by the fire marshal to keep them unlocked while customers were inside.

Fred continues to have shopping parties once a month and invitation-only events that include martinis or wine, sometimes served by a licensed bartender. But, in the statute’s strictest terms, private parties would be considered illegal if business is being transacted, Iverson said.

The state agent who stopped at the Wauwatosa shops advised owners of the statute and offered options that included private parties in which drink coupons are offered for licensed premises, or parties in which the doors are locked and the guest list is by invitation-only. “Again, they should not be conducting business,” Iverson said.

Shopping as a party

For now, Department of Revenue agents are educating shopkeepers, although they haven’t made their way to every part of town. In the Historic Third Ward, home to several boutiques and the popular Gallery Night, shopping and sipping is the norm.

At Lela, a boutique at 321 N. Broadway, “We never hesitate to pop open a bottle of wine or champagne any time a customer has had a rough day or needs a boost or has a reason to celebrate,” employee Tracey Golden wrote in an e-mail.

Gallery Night has had a long history in which galleries offer wine in their stores during quarterly events.  “We had a discussion about alcohol with relation to Gallery Night with police,” said Ruth Lawson, spokeswoman for the Historic Third Ward Association. “They said, ‘We know what’s going on, and we’re going to “overlook it until there’s a problem.’  The City of Milwaukee has its own criteria for what galleries and other non-hospitality businesses can and can’t do when it comes to serving alcohol.

“Giving it away is the same as selling it. That’s a proposition of law that’s pretty clear,” assistant city attorney Bruce Schrimpf said. “If you are a bona fide art gallery, you can obtain a Class B or Class C wine license, and we cover that by saying we’ll view that as a form of recreational premises. If you are a bona fide party, it’s my understanding that the Milwaukee Police Department has a list of criteria for determining what is a private party.”

‘They make it fun’

Over on Brady St., they aren’t taking chances. Detour, 1300 E. Brady St., planned to host a live music event for customers once a month with DJs and refreshments including wine. Manager Jason Meyer said attorneys advised making the event invitation-only. Now he’s considering a switch from wine to non-alcoholic drinks.

Other shopkeepers say they could live without the drinks.  Next Door, 18915 W. Capitol Drive in Brookfield, hosts Thursday happy hour with champagne and chocolate, but Renotta Thompson, who owns the store with her daughter, thinks camaraderie and sales, not alcohol, bring in customers.

Customers say they would miss perks such as free cocktails.  “I like that it’s a boutique, and I love how they have the girls’ night,” said Fred shopper Garcia. “They (Fred) make it fun.”  Tammie Figlinski, 35, of Milwaukee passed up the mimosas at Fred’s – “with one drink I’m too tipsy to shop” – but likes the parties because they encourage time with her girlfriends.

Girlfriend-bonding events – girls’ night out, birthday celebrations, bachelorette parties with appetizers and adult refreshments – help customers find the off-Brady St. boutique Vieux et Nouveau, 1688 N. Franklin Place, said owner Heidi Calaway. The parties also ease some of the impact the economy is having on her business.  “In October, I had shopping parties – that helps tremendously,” Calaway said.

http://www.jsonline.com/business/35350294.html

Of Poetry and Power

By Judith Harway

(Judith Harway is a professor of writing at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design and a poet).

Near the end of an exhilarating inauguration day, I found myself reading Elizabeth Alexander’s “Praise Song for the Day” with one of my classes at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. After listening, the students peppered me with questions: Is Elizabeth Alexander America’s poet laureate? What is a poet laureate anyway? Why does the United States have a poet laureate, and not an artist or composer or choreographer laureate? Why does a presidential inauguration need a poem?

And, perhaps most intriguingly, How can anyone expect to write a great poem on demand?

Although I can’t address every star in this constellation of questions, my curiosity was definitely piqued. The long and lofty tradition of commissioning works of art or pieces of music for public occasions thrives into the present day, but somehow the relationship between poetry and power has dwindled since the days when every king maintained a versificator Regis in his retinue. Yes, the United States names a poet laureate, as do forty individual states and a surprising number of cities (Milwaukee’s current poet laureate, Susan Firer, whose work is intimately braided into the human and physical landscapes of the city, is a great example of how such a role can continue to have relevance); nevertheless, ours is an era and a culture in which it’s far more common to find individuals who say they write poems (a statement generally qualified by the phrase to express my feelings) than to find serious readers of contemporary poetry. Just ask my students.

The term “poet laureate” hearkens back to the ancient Greeks, who believed that Apollo reserved his laurel crowns for poets and heroes. The association of poets and heroes may seem quaint nowadays, but at the inauguration of this country’s first African-American president (not a poet, but he’s undeniably a terrific writer) it’s tempting to get swept away with effusive notions like Robert Frost composed for John F. Kennedy’s inauguration, hailing A golden age of poetry and power / Of which this noonday’s the beginning hour.

Curiously, Frost is the only poet laureate in American history to address the nation as a new president was sworn in (two year’s after Frost’s tenure in the post had ended, but who’s counting). And, to my ear, the poem he composed for Kennedy’s 1961 inaugural is a real clunker. It begins:

Summoning artists to participate

In the august occasions of the state

Seems something artists ought to celebrate.

Differing accounts of the day suggest variously that the sun and wind made it difficult for Frost to read his own words (he was 87 at the time, after all), or that Kennedy had requested a different poem in the first place. At any rate, what he recited for the inauguration was The Gift Outright, an earlier and far better work. In the years since, poetry has been invited to the table only three more times on inauguration day, each time to welcome an incoming Democratic president – Frost read for Kennedy; Maya Angelou for Bill Clinton’s first term (her inaugural poem, published as a chapbook, sold an unprecedented million copies) and Miller Williams for his second; and now Elizabeth Alexander ushers Obama into office. Call it party profiling, but this is little surprise to me as a reader or a voter.

Just to set the record straight for my students, Elizabeth Alexander is not the current poet laureate of the United States. Kay Ryan is. Ryan’s work is a poetry of ideas, at once elegant and open to nimble rhythmic play. While I am an appreciative reader, I also see the wisdom of Obama’s choice of Alexander as the voice of this momentous inauguration (We now have a president who reads!! And thinks!! How cool is that?). Alexander ‘s work is at once accessible and complex, steeped in American history and in the lived particulars of human life. When I hear these lines from her inaugural poem –

Say it plain: that many have died for this day.

Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,

who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,

picked the cotton and the lettuce, built

brick by brick the glittering edifices

they would then keep clean and work inside of

– I am rooted in the knowledge that the Capitol building rising behind President Obama as he recited the oath of office was built by slaves; the White House in which President Obama will dwell and conduct the country’s business was built by slaves. This is the dimension that a great poem can add to a great inaugural address.

Of course poetry, like Obama himself, can ‘t change the fact that these are scary and uncertain times. One hired pen proclaiming the potential of a new administration is not mightier than the hired guns doing much of the dirty work in this country’s privatized wars. As Americans, however, our inheritance includes not only the beautiful, mongrel English language, but also a beautiful and ever richer stew of cultures that add to it by the day. This is very worthy of celebration, in poetry and in the ordinary gestures of our daily lives, as we stand, in Elizabeth Alexander’s words, on the brink, on the brim, on the cusp….

P.S. Just for the record, I still can’t quite explain how anyone manages to compose a great poem on demand, but apparently it can be done.