BTW newsletter
This celebration of summer introduces the June 29 By the Way newsletter, a free weekly update with events and stories. You can find recent newsletters in the newsletter archive, and you can sign up here.
The Chingon Taco Truck serves Carnitas in the courtyard at Mass MoCA, with green salsa.
High point in the last week? We’ve had so many as summer hits the Berkshires, even in these chaotic days. Scarlet, my first summer intern, has been getting me out to explore.
We went to Jacob’s Pillow together on their opening day, and I sat transfixed by the beauty of movement that has lived a thousand years and more, and all the pain and joy and past and future these artists embody — Jasmine Hearn danced with light and shadow. Dormeshia shook the room with the music of Nina Simone.
The Warwick Gombey troup took me back to the exaltation of walking through town behind the timpany drums in the college marching band, the sheer energy of being that present.
And Scarlet has brought me along to places and people I’ve wanted to know. She introduced me to the Chingon Taco Truck, and I got my first taste of their carnitas, sitting in the sun in the Mass MoCA courtyard.
Friday afternoon we were walking slowly through the gardens at the Mount, from the sea serpent to the dolphin fountain. She met me here to wander through the house and talk about Age of Innocence on the lawn …
Edith Wharton has a way of suggesting passion and pleasure in the world if we have the nous to look, even when her storytellers turn away. In AoI, Ellen Olenska grew up dancing flamenco, as we saw Nelida Tirado and her company perform.
And she would have walked around the corner from her apartment in Paris to see Rodin’s work at the Louvre, as we saw his bronzes a week ago at the Clark. But he would have been alive then, shaping psyche and eros out of clay in his studio. Loie Fuller would have been talking with him over coffee and inventing modern dance in Paris as Ted Shawn and Ruth St. Denis traveled the world.
This weekend …
We discover a whimsical sea serpent, sculpture and June flowers in the gardens at the Mount, above, and Rose B. Simpson’s ceramic sculptures and Chingon tacos at Mass MoCA, and an evening of Internationally acclaimed American dancers at Jacob’s Pillow, from Jake George and the Traditional Iroquois dancers (above) to tap legend Dormeshia, poet and artist Jasmine Hearn and ballet powerhouse Sara Mearns …
Rose B. Simpson's clay figures lean together wearing clay beads in the ceramics show at Mass MoCA.
Rose B. Simpson's clay figures lean together wearing clay beads in the ceramics show at Mass MoCA.
Cecelia, a sea serpent made of vintage scrap metal, glides on the lawn in Edith Wharton's gardens in the annual outdoor sculpture show.
Flowers brighten Edith Wharton's gardens at the Mount in late June.
Jasmine Hearn, acclaimed dancer and poet, musician and performance artist, dances with light at Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. Press photo courtesy of the Pillow
Tap and jazz legend Dormeshia performs in America(a) to Me at Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. Press photo courtesy of the Pillow
Sarah Mearns, principal in New York city Ballet, performs to Gershwin on live piano at Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. Press photo courtesy of the Pillow
Events coming up …
Find more art and performance, outdoors and food in the BTW events calendar.
