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601 actual miles; left at 6:10 AM, home at 8:20 PM.
I have discovered this in-between-area in the world of art - the space between Public Museums and Private Collections. They are the commercial fine arts galleries/Private Art Dealers (MME Fine Art in NYC) and auction houses (Sotheby's and Christie's in New York, Skinner in Boston), and they offer art-on-view for very limited times:
ArtFix Daily's announcement for MME FINE ART:
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and Sotheby's website:
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I left the house just after 6 AM, hit traffic on 128 South, but had clear sailing after that - I hit the NYC parking garage just after 11 AM. A nice sunny 2-block walk (it would hit 75º later in the afternoon) over to Sotheby's on York Avenue, between 72nd and 71st Streets:
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Since clothes-make-the-man, I was wearing a nice suit and tie, and it was GREAT seeing Martin Johnson Heade's The Great Florida Sunset, 1887, in their 10th floor viewing space:
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(Note from the future [2 days later] - The leading lot at Sotheby's Taubman collection sale on Wednesday reportedly is headed to a Minnesota museum. The founders of the Minnesota Marine Art Museum are the buyers of the 8-foot-by-4-foot The Great Florida Sunset for an artist record $5.9 million, reports the Star-Tribune. It is said to be a companion piece to Heade's View from Fern-Tree Walk, Jamaica, already on view at the museum.)
Other excellent pieces at Sotheby's included:
William Bradford - Sunset Glow on Sea and Land
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detail:
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Thomas Moran - Sunset, Amagansett, 1905
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and two wonderful pieces by Andrew Wyeth, from the Collection of Charlton and Lydia Heston:
Flood Plain, 1986
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detail:
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Ice Pool, 1969
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WOW - Heade, Bradford, Wyeth, Moran, Winslow Homer, George Inness, Francis Augustus Silva, plus a pair of Tiffany lamps down on the 9th floor - this is better than many museums I have visited over the past few years!
I walked past our old apartment at 108 East 81st Street:
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looking a bit upscale - no air conditioners hanging out the windows.
I had a wonderful visit with Elizabeth M. Stallman and Mindy Ellen Moak, Principals at MME Fine Art, LLC, 74 East 79th Street
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and they let me hold William Trost Richards - Sunrise on the New Jersey Shore, 1881
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And then I got out-of-town. I was up in Connecticut before I realized that I could fit-in the Berkshire Museum in Pittsfield, Mass., and I got up there at quarter-to-5. Excellent pieces include:
Thomas Hill - Yosemite Valley, 1889
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Frederick Edwin Church - Valley of the Santa Ysabel, 1875
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Thomas Moran - The Last Arrow, 1868
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Charles Herbert Woodbury - Mid-Ocean, 1894
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Attributed to J.M.W. Turner - Beach Scene with Nets
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Edward Moran - City and Harbor of New York, 1889
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also at the Berkshire Museum was a lovely Photography exhibit, including:
Ansel Adams - "Clearing Winter Storm," Yosemite Valley, 1937
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3 and 1/2 hours to get home - Thank You God for a Great Day! - It Worked Out Perfectly!
Music:
from the iPod, of course I had to start with
Day Trip by the Pat Metheny Trio, 2008
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then albums from the purple nano:
"Panic in Detroit" from Aladdin Sane by David Bowie, 1973
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Aja by Steely Dan, 1977
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All That You Can't Leave Behind by U2, 2000
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America by America, 1971
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Hard Promises by Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, 1981
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Blows Against The Empire by Jefferson Starship, 1970
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Bookends by Simon & Garfunkel, 1968
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The Best of by Quicksilver Messenger Service, 1990
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Hard Nose The Highway by Van Morrison, 1973
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The Pursuit by Jamie Cullum, 2009
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Houses Of The Holy by Led Zeppelin, 1973
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Hot Tuna - 1st album by Hot Tuna, 1970
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High Tide and Green Grass by The Rolling Stones, 1966 (their 1st Greatest Hits album)
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Harvest by Neil Young, 1972
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L.A. Woman by The Doors, 1971
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The Title Track is an EXCELLENT driving song!
Shameless Plug: if you enjoy this blog, you may like my other one about Hiking the 4,000 footers in New Hampshire (I have done 41-of-48 thru October 2015)
hyperlink: dixonheadingnorth
http://dixonheadingnorth.blogspot.com/
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