New York

Thanks to everyone who made our NY trip possible! We had an extraordinary visit with Mark Dion's tour of the Natural History Museum, then a trip up to Columbia and to the MFA studios, where they treated us to pizza and beer and a good time. They were remarkably unlike Portlanders: Fashionable hair, foreign accents, tight jeans, no beards.

Next day, some of us went to our Smack mellon meeting, then off to meet the others at Artists Space where we were warmly welcomed, then to the Drawing Center for another nice presentation, and Deitch for paintings in a formerly unseen color scheme. The Whitney Biennial was next- mediocre at best, but a few works really stepped out, like Alex Hubbard's video.

Many of us went to see the fabulous Miwon Kwon speak about her new curatorial project about Earth works. Claire Bishop was in the audience and we felt a little extra shiver of excitement. Miwon Kwon was warm, smart, honest and extremely likable.

Saturday, a tour of Flux Factory with Chen Tamir in Queens, PS1's performance show (comprehensive but squished and poorly "hung"), and Chelsea, where miraculously we saw a number of good shows in 1 block. Lucky day: Catherine Opie, Janet Cardiff, Barbara Kruger and more (all my cards are in the library so I can't name them all).

A visit with Dexter Sinister followed, then dumplings in Chinatown.

Sunday was a free day so I visited the lovely Dan Walsh and checked out his new book projects before eating Korean brunch. Our many-hour late flight allowed for funny and irritating interactions at the airport with a backdrop of teen a cappella.