PAM

We went to the Phoenix Art Museum[^] today.

I enjoyed it. Well, I've always enjoyed museums. I have golden memories of visiting the Melbourne Museum in 1970 and alternating my gaze between the mini-skirted young ladies and displays of wax fruit with hand annotated labels dating from 1887. I enjoyed both sights! To this day the sight of a well done wax apple that looks like the real thing reminds me of... umm I better stop before you conclude I'm confused! :-)

We dragged Andrew along. For some time he's been afflicted with the idea that he's 'artistic'. This is going to sound like a harsh judgement; if so then so be it. He has talent. I can't deny it (and wouldn't if I could). I wish I could put lines on paper the way that he can. But, on the other hand, I've never seen him put a single line on paper that he hasn't copied from somewhere else. As a copy artist he'd succeed. But he has greater ambitions. I've tried, unsuccessfully, to get him to put down an original idea. Any idea. He won't do it. I'm sure he's afraid of failure. Nothing I can say seems to get him over that fear... (and sometimes it's best to stop pushing overtly).

So I thought, given that his only influences seem to be TV why not try something else? Hence the art museum. He spent the entire afternoon being truculently bored. Hmmm I can remember being just the same at close to the same age. So I have no idea what to do.

All is not lost. After the museum we went to Biltmore Fashion Park. The name is grander than the reality; it's just an upmarket overpriced shopping centre at the corner of Camelback and 24th street. We were in search of cold drinks which we found. Sitting outside the coffee shop we discussed the afternoon. Andrew felt sufficiently comfortable that he could unbend and admit that he'd enjoyed much of the afternoon; we talked about some post modernist paintings we'd seen and got into quite the adult argument over whether the composition was off or not...

Thus we progress!

I notice that they're going to be running La Belle et la Bete[^] soon. I doubt they'll run the version with the Philip Glass soundtrack but I can live in hope (and after all, I have it on DVD). If I'm in Phoenix that night I'm there!