The best days usually aren’t recognizable as such while they are happening, they just flow whether or not you’re paying attention. We often devote so much mental time and energy laying the groundwork for things to go right that we neglect to notice when they do. I had one of those days yesterday, but was thankfully prepared to enjoy it. It helps when you have interesting dinner plans to look forward to. Knowing a good meal and conversation is in the offing helps to frame how you structure the time leading up to it, especially during the precious few, short sunny days of mid-Autumn.
I was invited to dinner at Mission Chinese in San Francisco by my friend Joseph del Pesco and his old pal Al, to celebrate a generous award they’ve bestowed upon me. The duo founded A1 Travel Grants in 2010 to provide Bay Area artists with modest stipends to fund project-related travel. I’m very honored to have been awarded an A1 Travel Grant to study sculptures and paintings depicting sea monsters in Italy. The study will inform the Makkeweks sculpture I’m preparing to make for the City of Oakland this Spring. I’ll begin in Rome, make my way up to Milan, then take a train to Geneva to touch base with Reuge, the Swiss music box manufacturuer who are building the musical components for our Spinnradl project in Cincinnati.
Diagram drawn by Joseph del Pesco over dinner at Mission Chinese.Â