Margaret Explosion’s first performance with Phil Marshall came off without a hitch. I was confident that it would. Phil sounds great. Ken Colombo streamed our first two songs live on Facebook so Bob Martin in Chicago could hear how it went without him.
Everybody knows the Mushroom House. It is so over the top. But I had forgotten that the same local architect also designed the Liberty Pole (nowhere near as elegant as the Civil War Monument in Rochester’s Washington Square Park, pictured above in a watercolor by Leo Dodd). I’m not crazy about the house or the pole but James Johnson also designed many of this area’s most unique sacred places, churches and temples, and this is where is his organic sense of form really shines. Temple Sinai in Brighton, the dramatic light silo in St. John the Evangelist Church in Greece and the AME Zion Church on Clarissa Street in Rochester – Frederick Douglas’s old congregation – are all magnificent. Chris Brandt, architectural designer at Bero Architecture, gave a presentation about Johnson’s achievements today at the Memorial Art Gallery and it was really inspiring. I especially loved how he cast giant Gaudi-like organic forms in sand and then lifted them into place in structures like St. Januarius Church in Naples.
We hadn’t been to Atlas Eats all summer. “Witness” has been all consuming. We would have eaten out on the sidewalk but they were taking down a tree across the street. We started with a cup of coffee and both Peggi and I ordered the usual: Spinach Artichoke Grilled Cheese with Braised Onions in Peggi’s case and Kimchee with Tofu in mine. The homemade Dragon Sauce is secret weapon there.
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