We say San, you say Fran

Saturday morning I made my way from Berkeley on the Bart train headed for the spectacular San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. I lucked out, and there were some great temporary exhibits: one about organic architecture, a small exhibit on poster design, and a very large and bizarre show by avant-garde artist/filmmaker Matthew Barney. He had taken an entire floor of the MoMA and covered it with photos, sounds, video exhibits, sculptural pieces and more, all revolving around the theme of Japanese whaling tradition. Some of it was even accompanied by music from Bjork, his girlfriend (wife?). In a different area, he also had a few video pieces of himself making artwork under restraint, in an attempt to combine art with athletics. The rest of the MoMA was great -- I especially enjoyed the Robert Rauchenberg pieces, and a hilarious golden statue of Michael Jackson sprawled out like a reclining Buddha, with Bubbles the chimp on his lap.

That night we celebrated my Aunt Dofie's 92nd birthday party at Kris and Wilbur's house. When asked if she felt different, she said that she felt luckier than ever before. Still being able to go to yoga class, ride on public transit, and live without assistance at 92 years old sounds pretty lucky to me.

After dinner I made my way into the city to go to the Tilly & the Wall, Now it's Overhead, and Jason Anderson show. Jason played super-fun, inspirational rock (like a motivational speaker) which I thought was great. Tilly & The Wall were just as adorable as they were the first time I saw them in Denver, and played a ridiculously fun set full of keyboards, guitar, singing and tap-dancing. Seriously. I talked to a few of them afterward, and they were really nice people too. Here are two short clips I shot of some of the foot-stompin', singalong action:






The next day, after a long late-night bus across the bay, I woke up in the afternoon and didn't accomplish much except to make my way back into the city to visit the San Francisco Museum of Craft & Design which had an exhibit on Raymond Loewy. He's a guy who designed buses, stereos, train engines, cars, interiors, a plethora of famous logos (Lucky Strike, Hoover, Greyhound, etc.) and more. He is most famous for the book Never Leave Well Enough Alone which is a concept that matches his design career perfectly. Seeing all of his work in one place was inspiring to say the least.

Today, Gretchen (my dad's cousin) and I got in the car and drove over to Mt. Tamalpais, which is the highest mountain in the Bay Area at just over a mammoth 2500 feet. That would be a lot more impressive if I wasn't from Colorado. The views were great and the drive was fun as Gretchen tried to keep her cool driving alongside the occasional sheer cliff. We also stopped by the Muir Woods, one of the two big redwood areas of California, which was incredible to say the least. After dinner at Gretchen's favorite macrobiotic restaurant, we went to frugal design nerd mecca: Ikea. Since we don't yet have any Ikea stores in Colorado, I was completely obsessed with the place. I was also somewhat surprised at how massive it is: it was almost the size of two Target stores stacked on top of one another, but full of even cooler stuff. I took pictures, which probably embarassed Gretchen.

I'm leaving San Francisco tomorrow on a long flight to Shanghai with layovers in Toronto and Vancouver (yes, I'm going backward... it was cheaper this way). After I get to China, I won't be back in the states for more than a year. It's a weird feeling having only completed .015% of my trip.

Ryan!