spiritual reflections on art

Asuca Hayashi 林明日香 — Song of the Earth, Tokyo (May 5, 2024)

On a sunny 5th of May — Children’s Day in Japan — I made my way to what seemed like an unlikely venue, Mifa Football Cafe, for a matinee child/family-friendly concert and luncheon called “Song of the Earth,” organized by the J-Pop singer Asuca Hayashi 林明日香. Mifa is located in Toyosu, one of a series of artificial islands in Tokyo Bay just southeast of the former Tsukuji Fish Market in Tokyo, a strange but fitting location. Both Asuca and the people of Tokyo were charting a new course in pursuit of more healthy, sustainable lives.

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Alix Bailey Reminds Us That Painting Is Light and So Are WePhoto © by Alix Bailey 2022, “Alex and Pink” 42” x 60”

Alix Bailey Reminds Us That Painting Is Light and So Are We

On November 25, 2023 I had the pleasure of attending the closing reception for "Alix Bailey: Recent Paintings" at The Painting Center in Chelsea. The show, her fourth at The Painting Center, consisted mostly of large paintings of one particular model whom Bailey...

M³ Festival Demonstrates the Power of InclusivityPhoto © by Christopher Pelham

M³ Festival Demonstrates the Power of Inclusivity

From Sept 21 – 23, Mutual Mentorship for Musicians (M³) held its 2nd annual M³ Festival at Roulette Intermedium in Brooklyn, NY. The event brought together musicians from around the world from M³'s 3rd and 4th cohorts, many of them meeting and performing together in...

When My Exile Sees MePhoto © by Christopher Pelham

When My Exile Sees Me

Having presented violinist/composer Sita Chay as part of Shoko Nagai’s trio Tokala with percussionist Satoshi Takeishi in the White Room at CRS and having seen them perform several times at Barbès, I was very interested to see Chay’s program, featuring the same...