Dallas Museum of Art Boasts of 2008 Record Attendance

Apparently, 2008 was a record year for the Dallas Museum of Art. I have recently read several articles over the internet discussing this and the museum’s press release can be found here.

Plenty of the increased attendance is due to the King Tut exhibition still on display until May. Also, Olafur Eliasson (a Danish artist) has an exhibit to experience in the barrel vault of the museum and the four adjacent galleries. Another part (the best part) of the exhibit is located in another section of the museum (The Marguerite and Robert Hoffman Galleries). Filled with light, color, mirrors, metals, stone, water, and fabrics, you can walk around, through, and into some of these vast sculptures. This exhibit is entitled Take Your Time and I encourage you to do so. Previously the exhibit was at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

From the Dallas Museum of Art website

When I go to the DMA to see a new exhibit, I always take a whirl through my favorite two sections of the museum: the European art of the 20th century with works by Picasso, Braque, Gris, Mondrian etc., and then the Reves Collection consisting of several recreated rooms of Emery and Wendy Reves' Mediterranean villa. The following is a self-portrait of Camille Pissarro that can be found in one of the rooms.

Camille Pissarro, Self-Portrait, 1897-1898; Oil on canvas;

20 7/8 x 12 in. (53 x 31 cm); Dallas Museum of Art,
The Wendy and Emery Reves Collection, 1985.R.44

For me, however, 2008 at the Dallas Museum of Art will always be the year of Making it New: The Art and Style of Sara and Gerald Murphy.

Dallas Arts District is one of the New York Times top 2009 Destinations!

An article entitled “Where to Go; 2009" by Seth Sherwood and Gisela Williams was published in the January 11, 2009 edition of the paper in the Travel section:

17.

15. Everything is bigger in Texas, and the Dallas art district is no exception. Billed as ''the largest urban arts district in the United States,'' the 19-block area gets bigger when the Dallas Center for the Performing Arts (http://www.dallasperformingarts.org/) opens Oct. 12. The gleaming center includes the Dee and Charles Wyly Theater, a floating cubelike structure designed by Rem Koolhaas that will be home to the Dallas Black Dance Theater and others. Next door is the 2,200-seat Margot and Bill Winspear Opera House. Designed by Norman Foster, the glass box features a red, tubelike core where the Dallas Opera will perform. Orchestrating the move is George Steel, a Leonard Bernstein protégé who will serve as the opera's new executive director.

The number typo was their mistake . . .

More on the Dallas Arts District later.

Called Out of Darkness

Anne Rice’s book entitled Called Out of Darkness: a spiritual confession is an account of her life as it relates to religion and how she has refocused her writing towards Jesus Christ. Ms. Rice is the author of 20 books of gothic, vampire-themed novels, a few other writings (adult-themed and erotica) under pseudonyms, and 2 books about the life of Christ. I was curious to read what made her change the focus of her writing from vampires to religious themes and to find out about her life before and after this transition.

Ms. Rice’s first book and later the popular movie was Interview with the Vampire. I personally never read this book and never did see the movie for some unknown reason (perhaps I was burnt out on Tom Cruise at the time). The only books of hers that I have read are the last two she wrote before writing Called Out of Darkness. I read both of them in the bookstore and they are very easy, quick reads. The first, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, is about the life of “Yeshua” when he is a child returning to Palestine from the flight to Egypt with his mother, father, and extended family. The second, Christ the Lord, The Road to Cana, is about Jesus’ decision to leave his family and friends and begin traveling around the Holy Land. I love reading historical fiction, so I enjoyed how Ms. Rice fictionalized the life of Jesus to make the characters seem real by showing their weaknesses, feelings, and hardships. I especially enjoyed the second book because Ms. Rice creatively shows the two sides of Jesus. Also, she had to do extensive research for both of these works, which I always appreciate.

Ms. Rice's own story in Called Out of Darkness is focused on her spiritual life and not on her writing or personal life. She does tell her life story, but does not delve into great detail, nor does she get intensely personal about her feelings, only about her spirituality. She focuses on her Catholic upbringing (pre-Vatican II) in New Orleans, surrounded by her Irish Catholic family, in their Catholic neighborhood. As a child she only knew Catholic people and lived in a completely Catholic world. Apparently, her mother was a raging alcoholic and died when Ms. Rice was a teenager. I was surprised to learn that Ms. Rice moved to Texas because her father remarried a Southern Baptist lady from Richardson, Texas (a suburb of Dallas). Ms. Rice then went to Texas Woman’s University in Denton, Texas (also home to my alma mater of the University of North Texas). She met her husband Stan Rice in Denton and from there they moved to California.

After so many changes and being away from the Catholic world, Ms. Rice became the popular writer she has been for so long. She and her husband had a little girl that died of leukemia when she was 6 years old. Later she had a son, Christopher, who also writes. In the late 1990’s, she was found to be a Type I diabetic and almost died when she lapsed into a diabetic coma. She got better and later the Rices moved back to New Orleans. She got back in touch with all her Catholic relatives and was surprised to find she wasn’t some sort of outcast from them and their religion. She enjoyed seeing her old churches and neighborhoods and her submerged Catholic faith was reawakened in her. She does spend a long time writing about some signs and coincidences that gave her pause to reflect on her spirituality and lost and found faith. Stan Rice died in 2002 and Ms. Rice moved to California and now lives in Rancho Mirage. She moved back to California just before Hurricane Katrina. She has decided to only write about Jesus.

I just now have viewed AnneRice.com, Ms. Rice’s official website. This author’s site is very extensive compared to many I have seen. I intend to peruse it thoroughly in the near future.