this week in literature

FIRST SATURDAY — CONNECTING CULTURES: A WORLD IN BROOKLYN

Details of four works in the “Connecting Cultures” installation, from top: “Girl in a Japanese Costume,” circa 1890, William Merritt Chase; “Seated Shakyamuni Buddha,” late 19th–early 20th century; “Warrior Figure,” Huastec, 13th or 14th century; “Mask (Ges),” 19th century

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, November 7, free, 5:00 – 11:00
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org

The Brooklyn Museum is making its long-term installation, “Connecting Cultures: A World in Brooklyn,” the focus of its November free First Saturday program. There will be live performances by Ilusha Tsinadze, Lafawndah, and OSHUN, an artist talk and performance by calligraphy master Wang Dongling, a calligraphy workshop with Society of Scribes, a movement workshop with Afro Flow Yoga, a music workshop with Afrika Meets India, a book club discussion with Patricia Park about her novel Re Jane, Belladonna* poetry readings by R. Erica Doyle, Kyoo Lee, and Nathanaël Stephens, a curator talk with Kevin Stayton, an interactive reading by Selina Alko of B Is for Brooklyn for kids, pop-up gallery talks, an art workshop inspired by Syrian mosaics, and Brooklyn Film Festival screenings of Girls Gone J-1 (Mikhail Shraga & Alina Smirnova, 2014), Green Card (Pilar Rico & David Whitmer, 2014), and Born into This (Lea Scruggs & Sean Ryon, 2014). In addition, the galleries are open late so you can check out such other exhibitions as “Impressionism and the Caribbean: Francisco Oller and His Transatlantic World,” “Kara Walker: ‘African Boy Attendant Curio (Bananas),’” “KAWS: ALONG THE WAY,” “Ai Weiwei: LEGO Collection Point,” and “Zanele Muholi: Isibonelo/Evidence.”

TICKET ALERT: JOHN CLEESE AT THE SKIRBALL CENTER

Who: John Cleese
What: Reading and talk in conjunction with paperback release of So, Anyway . . . (Three Rivers Press, September 2015, $16)
Where: NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, 566 LaGuardia Pl., 212-992-8484
When: Saturday, November 14, $65.75 – $125, 6:30
Why: “I made my first public appearance on the stairs up to the school nurse’s room, at St. Peter’s Preparatory School, Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, England, on September 13, 1948. I was eight and five-sixths. My audience was a pack of nine-year-olds, who were jeering at me and baying, ‘Chee-eese! Chee-eese!’ I kept climbing the steps, despite the feelings of humiliation and fear. But above all, I was bewildered. How had I managed to attract so much attention? What had I done to provoke this aggression? And . . . how on earth did they know my family surname had once been Cheese?” So begins So, Anyway . . ., the memoir of one of the funniest men in the history of the world, Monty Python and Fawlty Towers legend John Cleese. On November 14, the star and writer of A Fish Called Wanda and cinematic portrayer of the Black Knight, Tim the Enchanter, Deadly Dirk, Nearly Headless Nick, King Harold, Q, and many other roles, will be climbing the steps of NYU’s Skirball Center on November 14, to talk about his wild and wacky life and career and all that attention and aggression. The four-time-married, self-described “writer, actor & tall person,” who is also a bit of a silly walker, is visiting Boston, Chicago, and New York celebrating the release of the paperback edition of the book. VIP tickets ($125) come with a signed copy of So, Anyway . . . and a photo opp with Mr. Cleese. Be sure to join in the chants of “Chee-eese! Chee-eese!”

PASOLINI 40 YEARS LATER: WITH ALFREDO JAAR AND NORMAN MacAFEE

Alfredo Jaar, THE ASHES OF PASOLINI, 2009. Video: 38:00 (Courtesy the artist, New York)

Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Ave. at Second St.
Sunday, November 1, free, 12:30 pm
646-336-5771
anthologyfilmarchives.org
www.alfredojaar.net

Chilean artist, architect, and filmmaker Alfredo Jaar honors the fortieth anniversary of the mysterious murder of Pier Paolo Pasolini with a special presentation at Anthology Film Archives on November 1. “Pasolini 40 Years Later: with Alfredo Jaar and Norman MacAfee” consists of a screening of Jaar’s 2009 documentary, The Ashes of Pasolini, the launch of a new artist book, Pier Paolo Pasolini: The Ashes of Gramsci, readings from the iconoclastic Italian writer and director’s poetry, and a discussion about Pasolini’s life and work. Jaar will be joined by writer, visual artist, literary translator, and freelance book editor Norman MacAfee for the event. Jaar has written that The Ashes of Pasolini — a eulogy for Pasolini inspired by Pasolini’s poem “The Ashes of Gramsci,” which was a eulogy for Italian theoretician Antonio Gramsci — “is a modest film about the death of an extraordinary intellectual. . . . As you know, it is still unclear who killed him. But for me, it has always been clear why: it was because of fear. Fear of his voice, fear of his life style, fear of his ideas, fear of his opinions, fear of his intellect. He was the totally complete intellectual: a filmmaker, a poet, a writer, a journalist, a critic, a polemist. He was totally involved in the cultural and political life of his time. As an artist he took risks, broke the rules, he created his own rules.” The tribute will be followed by a book signing and reception; the book will be available for purchase for $10.

LUNCH WITH MIMI SHERATON AND MICHAEL GROSS

Mimi Sheraton will be interviewed by Michael Gross at special lunch event at Rotisserie Georgette

Rotisserie Georgette
140 East 60th St. between Madison & Fifth Aves.
Saturday, October 31, $59 (plus tax, tip, and book purchase), 12 noon
212-390-8060
www.rotisserieg.com

Brooklyn-born restaurant critic Mimi Sheraton will be at Rotisserie Georgette on October 31 at 12 noon, interviewed by Manhattan-born author Michael Gross, focusing on Sheraton’s most recent book, 1,000 Foods to Eat Before You Die: A Food Lover’s Life List. As they discuss food and real estate — quite a healthy topic, as so many New York City eateries have closed or moved because of skyrocketing rents — guest will dine on Barigoule d’Artichauts and Brandade de Morue as an appetizer, Poulet Rôti “Farnèse” and Pomme Aligot for the main course, and Chocolate Pot de Crème for dessert, all taken from the book. Afterward, there will be a book signing with both Sheraton, who has also written such tomes as From My Mother’s Kitchen: Recipes and Reminiscences and The Bialy Eaters, and Gross, author of such nonfiction works as 740 Park and House of Outrageous Fortune.

FRIDA KAHLO: ART, GARDEN, LIFE

New York Botanical Garden re-creates Frida Kahlos Casa Azul studio and garden (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

New York Botanical Garden re-creates Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera’s Casa Azul studio and garden (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

The New York Botanical Garden
Enid A. Haupt Conservatory
2900 Southern Blvd., Bronx
Tuesday – Sunday through November 1, $8-$25
718-817-8700
www.nybg.org/frida
frida kahlo: art garden life slideshow

Don’t let the cold weather scare you away from seeing the New York Botanical Garden’s beautiful celebration of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo’s passionate relationship with the natural world. “Frida Kahlo: Art, Garden, Life,” on view at the Bronx institution through November 1, is a wide-ranging tribute to the artist, including paintings, photographs, a historical timeline, a re-creation of her garden and studio, known as La Casa Azul, and special programs. “When we began to research Frida Kahlo, we wanted to delve into the story of the woman who has been examined through her pain and suffering and paint her in a different light,” NYBG associate vice president of exhibitions and public engagement Karen Daubmann writes in her catalog essay, “Making Frida Kahlo’s Garden in New York: The Conservatory Exhibition.” She continues, “We wanted to learn more about the iconic face that is emblazoned on canvases, the strong and fierce-looking dark-haired, dark-eyed woman who used to be known as Diego Rivera’s wife and is now known simply as Frida. The more we researched, the more intrigued we became. . . . We were fascinated by the incredible detail of Kahlo’s curated life.” That curated life is lovingly explored in the exhibition, which features fourteen of the artist’s paintings in the LuEsther T. Mertz Library’s art gallery, including “Portrait of Luther Burbank,” in which Kahlo depicts the famed botanist emerging from the root of a tree; the vulvic “Sun and Life”; “Two Nudes in the Forest,” which was originally called “The Earth Itself”; and the sensational “Self-Portrait with Thorn Necklace and Hummingbird,” in which Kahlo, in between her first and second marriages to Rivera, paints herself surrounded by flowers, a dead hummingbird, a monkey, butterflies, and a black cat, a symbolic representation of life, death, and rebirth. The path to the next part of the show, in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, is lined with poems by Nobel Prize–winning Mexican poet Octavio Paz, including “The Religious Fig” and “Nightfall.” Paz was in fact not a big fan of Kahlo’s and Rivera’s; “Diego and Frida ought not to be subjects of beatification but objects of study — and of repentance . . . the weaknesses, taints, and defects that show up in the works of Diego and Frida are moral in origin,” Paz wrote in Essays on Mexican Art. “The two of them betrayed their great gifts, and this can be seen in their painting.”

Pyramid is centerpiece of Casa Azul re-creation (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

The centerpiece of the exhibition is La Casa Azul, a reconstruction of Kahlo’s studio and garden at her family home in Mexico City, which is now a museum. The conservatory is filled with folk art objects, religious ex-voto paintings, Mexican plants described in both English and Spanish (and inspired by archival photographs), and re-creations of the Frog Fountain with its mosaic floor, Kahlo’s desk and easel, and the strikingly colorful Casa Azul pyramid, holding dozens of Mexican cacti and succulents. The conservatory exhibition was designed by Scott Pask, the three-time Tony-winning designer of The Book of Mormon, The Coast of Utopia, and The Pillowman. Outside the conservatory, by the lily pond, is a fence of organ pipe cacti, like the one Kahlo had at her San Ángel house. “Frida Kahlo: Art, Garden, Life” immerses you in the world of this fascinating artist, who passed away in 1954 at the age of forty-seven. In conjunction with the exhibition, the NYBG is hosting special programming through closing day. On Saturdays and Sundays at 1:00, there is live music and dance in Ross Hall and throughout the garden, with performances by such groups as Mexico Beyond Mariachi, the Villalobos Brothers, Flor de Toloache, and Calpulli Danza Mexicana. “Cooking with Frida” takes place in the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden on Wednesdays, Saturday, and Sundays at 2:00 & 4:00. The daily “Frida’s Fall Harvest” consists of family-friendly activities in the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, including a puppet show and playhouse kitchen; the children’s garden will be open till 9:30 on October 23 for “Frida for Families: A Spooky Nighttime Adventure.” Also daily (but not for kids), “Spotlight on Agave: A Tequila Story” presents the history and tradition of the Mexican spirit. October 22 is “Frida al Fresco Evening” LGBT Night, with live music, stilt dancers, and Mexican food and drink. On October 24-25 and October 31 – November 1, things get scary with Día De Los Muertos Weekends, featuring skeletal processions, stilt dancers, skull face painting, and more. The “¡Cámara, Acción!” film series continues on Sundays at 3:00 in Ross Hall with Alonso Ruiz Palacios’s Güeros on October 25 and Francisco Franco’s Last Call on November 1. Also on November 1, there will be a live performance by two male models interacting with Humberto Spíndola’s “Two Fridas” sculptural installation, based on Kahlo’s 1939 double portrait in which two versions of her sit next to each other, holding hands.

LIVE FROM THE NYPL: TA-NEHISI COATES / KHALIL GIBRAN MUHAMMAD

Ta-Nehisi Coates will discuss his incendiary new book at the New York Public Library on October 13 (photo by Nina Subin)

Who: Ta-Nehisi Coates and Khalil Gibran Muhammad
What: Live from the NYPL
Where: New York Public Library, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, Celeste Bartos Forum, Fifth Ave. at 42nd St., 917-275-6975
When: Tuesday, October 13, $25-$40, 7:00
Why: With Between the World and Me (Spiegel & Grau, July 2015, $24), Atlantic national correspondent Ta-Nehisi Coates has written one of the most important books ever about the history of institutionalized racism in the United States, an intimate, angry, and eye-opening treatise in the form of a cautionary tale being told to his adolescent son. Coates, who also wrote the 2008 memoir The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood, holds nothing back in the new book, telling his son about the danger the black body is in every day in America. He writes about his childhood, the lessons he learned from his father, his experiences attending Howard University (which he calls the Mecca), and the tragedies involving Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, Renisha McBride, John Crawford, and other African Americans killed by white police officers. Although the book is a mere 156 pages, it is a dense read; you’ll want to pore over passages again and again to get the full effect of what Coates is saying. And nearly every page is filled with quotes you’ll want to remember and share with others, stinging indictments of the current state of the nation. “Race is the child of racism, not the father. And the process of naming ‘the people’ has never been a matter of genealogy and physiognomy so much as one of hierarchy,” he explains early on. “Difference in hue and hair is old. But the belief in the preeminence of hue and hair, the notion that these factors can correctly organize a society and that they signify deeper attributes, which are indelible — this is the new idea at the heart of these new people who have been brought up hopelessly, tragically, deceitfully, to believe that they are white.” Between the World and Me is a book that should be required reading in every high school in America. Coates will be at the New York Public Library on October 13 to discuss the state of racism and more with Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture director Khalil Gibran Muhammad.

WILLIAM KENTRIDGE IN NEW YORK

William Kentridge invades New York this fall with an opera at the Met, a performance at BAM, and a number of discussions and lectures (photo courtesy the Metropolitan Opera)

William Kentridge invades New York this fall with an opera at the Met, a multimedia performance at BAM, and a number of discussions and lectures (photo courtesy the Metropolitan Opera)

When William Kentridge comes to town, he really comes to town. Back in 2010, the South African multidisciplinary artist was all over New York City, with the smashing “Five Themes” retrospective at MoMA, his production of Shostakovich’s The Nose at the Metropolitan Opera, a unique artist book at Dieu Donné, a screening of some of his animated films accompanied by live music at the World Financial Center, and a performance of his one-man show “I am not me, the horse is not mine” at MoMA. He’s back in the city this fall, with a host of wide-ranging events, exhibits, and performances all over town. On October 12 (free, 7:00), he’ll be giving a lecture, “The Sentimental Machine,” at the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting & Sculpture. On October 13 ($30, 6:30), he’ll be at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in conversation with printer Andrew Hoyem in the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium discussing the limited-edition letterpress book The Lulu Plays, delving into the nature of human imagination and time. On October 14 (free, 5:00), Kentridge will deliver the Belknap Lecture at Princeton, “O Sentimental Machine,” about his Trotsky-inspired multimedia installation.

From October 22 to 25 ($30-$100), Kentridge teams up with longtime collaborator Philip Miller for the audiovisual chamber opera Refuse the Hour at the BAM Harvey, a wildly inventive lecture-performance with dance, music, projections, and more, a companion piece to his wildly inventive “The Refusal of Time” 2013 installation at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In conjunction with Refuse the Hour, Kentridge will be at BAM Rose Cinemas on October 24 ($15, 5:00) for a discussion with physicist and Refuse the Hour collaborator Peter Galison, moderated by Dennis Overbye. From November 2 to December 31 (free), the Marian Goodman Gallery will be showing works by Kentridge in the third-floor project room. From November 4 to 8 ($10-$40), The Lulu Plays will be on view at the IFPDA Print Fair at the Park Avenue Armory. And from November 5 through December 3 ($27-$335), there will be eight performances of Kentridge’s four-hour-plus version of Alban Berg’s Lulu at the Met, featuring Marlis Petersen in the title role, Susan Graham as Geschwitz, Paul Groves as the painter and the African prince, and Johan Reuter as Dr. Schön and Jack the Ripper, conducted by Lothar Koenigs. We’re exhausted just reading about all the sixty-year-old Kentridge has planned; we can’t even begin to imagine doing it all, but we’re going to see as many of these events as we can, and we urge you to do the same.