Jan 19 2013

Clevelands Wade Park

Brent

Cleveland wade Lagoon

Today’s Photo: Wade Park in Cleveland, Oh

From Wikipedia: “Wade Park is a park in the University Circle neighborhood of Cleveland, Ohio. An idyllic swath of land in one of Cleveland’s busiest neighborhoods, the park was built on land donated by Jeptha Wade with the intention of using part of the property building for an art museum. Its most prominent feature is the Cleveland Museum of Art and the adjacent Wade Park Lagoon. While not technically a historical landmark on its own, the park falls within the eponymous Wade Park historical district and essentially serves the landscape for most of the buildings included in the registry entry.

Established on the land donated to the city by Jeptha Wade in 1882, Wade Park today largely serves as a museum campus for the Cleveland Museum of Art, as well as several other Cleveland cultural institutions. One of the most prominent features of the park — and of University Circle — is the Wade Lagoon. The lagoon is situated on the south end of Wade Park, in front of the museum. Bounded by East Boulevard on the west, Martin Luther King Jr. Drive on the east and Euclid Avenue on the south, the lagoon provides a tranquil retreat as well as a home for fish, which are mainly ornamental koi.”

For more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wade_Park_(Cleveland_park)

Today’s Quote: “Light makes photography. Embrace it. Admire it. But above all, know light. Know it for all you are worth, and you will know photography.” – George Eastman


Jan 5 2013

Atrium at the Cleveland Museum of art

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Cleveland Museum of art atrium

Atrium at the Cleveland Museum of art

From Cleveland.com: “In a way that’s palpable but hard to measure, Cleveland just became a better place to live, thanks to the completion of the new central atrium at the Cleveland Museum of Art.

This grand interior space — nearly as big as a football field — was intended by New York architect Rafael Viñoly to be the centerpiece of the $350 million expansion and renovation he designed for the museum a decade ago.

Now it has the chance to do that job, and much more.

The atrium opened at 10 a.m. Tuesday without fanfare, seven years after construction began at the museum and four years after the new and renovated galleries started opening. Director David Franklin and several staff members waited quietly in the low and shadowy North Lobby as the first visitors trickled past them to enter the atrium.

They gazed up, open-mouthed, at the skylight high overhead and slowed down to take in the surrounding architecture, which includes the restored north facade of the museum’s white marble 1916 building, plus Viñoly’s glass, wood and metal gallery and office areas, which will wrap the other three sides of the space when they’re complete.”

For more on this article and Structure:

http://www.cleveland.com/arts/index.ssf/2012/09/cleveland_museum_of_art_atrium.html

http://www.clevelandart.org/

Today’s Quote: ”All architecture is shelter, all great architecture is the design of space that contains, cuddles, exalts, or stimulates the persons in that space”. – Philip Johnson


Dec 15 2012

Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art

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Moca Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art

Todays photo is of the Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA). This beautiful new building is within walking distance of both Little Italy and Wade Oval. Here is some information directly from MOCA’s website about the new building:

“MOCA’s new building is designed to serve as a catalyst for creativity and growth in a cosmopolitan Cleveland neighborhood, which is home to one of the country’s largest concentrations of cultural, educational and medical institutions.

The nearly 34,000-square-foot structure, which is 44 percent larger than MOCA’s former rented space, demonstrates that a museum expansion need not be large in scale to be ambitious in all respects. Devised for both environmental and fiscal sustainability, the design is at once technically inventive, visually stunning and highly practical.

The dynamic structure was designed by Iranian-born Farshid Moussavi of London, formerly with Foreign Office Architects (FOA) and now principal of Farshid Moussavi Architecture (FMA). This is her first U.S. commission and her first museum.

In addition to FMA, the design team includes executive architects Westlake Reed Leskosky, headquartered in Cleveland and designers of more than 50 cultural buildings throughout the United States.

Moussavi says that museums today are not just homes for art, but serve multiple functions and host a variety of activities. “Our design for MOCA Cleveland aims to provide an ideal environment for artists and visitors and to foster creativity and variety in exhibitions and programs.”

Because MOCA is a non-collecting institution – one of the relatively few such contemporary art museums in the country – its new building does not need to accommodate collection galleries, says MOCA Executive Director Jill Snyder. “This building’s design is a perfect expression of the museum’s philosophy and programs. Flexibility is key to a program like ours that embraces aesthetic, conceptual and cultural diversity, and displays works in a great variety of media and genres.”

The four-story building, which anchors the Uptown district, rises 60 feet from a hexagonal base to a square top, where the primary exhibition space is located. All four floors contain areas for either exhibitions or public programs.

Clad primarily in mirror-finish black Rimex stainless steel, the façade will reflect its urban surroundings, changing in appearance with differences in light and weather. Three of the building’s six facets, one of them clad in transparent glass, will flank a public plaza designed by James Corner Field Operations, a New York-based landscape architecture and urban design firm. The plaza will serve as a public gathering place and will link MOCA to Uptown attractions and amenities, including the expanded Cleveland Institute of Art, designed by Burt, Hill with MVRDV, and new commercial space and residential units, designed by Stanley Saitowitz/Natoma Architects Inc.

Upon entering the building, visitors find themselves in an atrium where they can see the dynamic shape and structure of the building as it rises. This space leads to MOCA’s lobby, café and shop, and to a double-height multi-purpose room for public programs and events. From there, visitors may take MOCA’s monumental staircase, a dominant architectural feature of the building, to the upper floors. On the top floor the 6,000-square-foot gallery space has no fixed dividing walls, allowing for a variety of configurations. This floor also contains a gallery designed for new media work and the Dick and Doreen Cahoon Lounge, which overlooks the plaza and Uptown.”

For more information about this great museum click here:

http://www.mocacleveland.org/

Today’s Quote: “Not everybody trusts paintings but people believe photographs”. – Ansel Adams

 


Apr 24 2012

Cleveland Museum of Art

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cleveland museum of art

Today’s Photo comes from the Cleveland Museum of Art. This statue is only about 1 1/2 feet tall but the wide camera angle makes it look much larger. The Cleveland Museum of Art was founded in 1913 “for the benefit of all the people forever.” The original neoclassic building of white Georgian marble was designed by the Cleveland firm of Hubbell & Benes and was constructed at a cost of $1.25 million.

The Cleveland Museum of Art is free and open for all to enjoy, take advantage of it!

http://www.clevelandart.org/

Today’s Quote: “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new”. – Albert Einstein


Mar 8 2012

Head of Pierre de Wissant at the Cleveland Museum of art

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Auguste Rodin

Heroic Head of Pierre de Wissant, One of the Burghers of Calais, by Auguste Rodin at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Museum is one of the world’s most distinguished art museums and it’s free!

Here is some history on the museum from its website: “The museum opened on June 6, 1916 after many years of planning. Its creation was made possible by Cleveland industrialists Hinman B. Hurlbut, John Huntington, and Horace Kelley, all of whom bequeathed money specifically for an art museum, as well as by Jeptha H. Wade II, whose Wade Park property was donated for the site. The endowments established by these founders continue to support the museum. The original neoclassic building of white Georgian marble was designed by the Cleveland firm of Hubbell & Benes and was constructed at a cost of $1.25 million. Located north of the Wade Lagoon, it forms the focus of the city’s Fine Arts Garden.”

Visit: http://www.clevelandart.org/

Today’s Quote: “We say we waste time, but that is impossible. We waste ourselves.” – Alice Bloch


Jan 5 2012

The Emperor’s Gun

Brent

Flintlock Sporting Gun of Napoleon I Bonaparte

Today’s Photo: The Emperor’s Gun

This double barreled flintlock sporting gun was made by Jean Le Page for Napoleon Bonaparte, who in turn gave it to the Polish count, Vincent Corvin Graf von Krasine-Krasinski as a gift. Le Page was also the royal gun maker for the French king, Louis XVI. This amazing gun and many others can be viewed in the armored court section of the Cleveland Museum of Art.

For more info:

http://www.davidrumsey.com/amica/amico6100263-36064.html

http://www.clevelandart.org/

Today’s Quote: A picture is worth a thousand words.- Napoleon Bonaparte


Dec 15 2011

The Haserot Angel

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Haserot angel famousToday’s Photo: The Haserot Angel

One of Lake View Cemetery’s most famous piece of graveside sculpture has to be the Haserot Angel. The Angel sits over Francis Haserot and his family. The angel is holding a snuffed out torch upside down and because of weathering it appears to be crying. For more information on the Haserot Angel and The Haserot family click here:

http://www.forgottenoh.com/LakeView/haserot.html

Today’s Quote:

“If we do not help a man in trouble, it is as if we caused the trouble.”   Nachman of Bratslav


Dec 2 2011

Winter on Lake Erie

Brent

frozen lake erie

Today’s Photo: Winter on Lake Erie

This photo was taken on Whiskey Island in Cleveland last winter. It was so cold that I couldn’t stand outside for more than few minutes at a time. In the background you can see a ship making its way towards the mouth of the Cuyahoga.

Today’s
Quote: Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude – Thomas Jefferson


Nov 23 2011

Crossing the Cuyahoga

Brent

cuyahoga rail bridge

Today’s Photo: Crossing the Cuyahoga

This photo was taken looking down the Cuyahoga River towards Lake Erie. One of Cleveland’s many rail lift bridges can be seen on the left.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Today’s Quote:  “The United States as we know it today is largely the result of mechanical inventions, and in particular of agricultural machinery and the railroad” – John Moody


Nov 22 2011

Tugging on the River

Brent

tugboat on the cuyahoga river

Today’s Photo: Tugboat

Tugboats have been used to help guide larger ships up and down the narrow, crooked Cuyahoga River for over a century now. This is a photo of a modern day tugboat pushing a barge down the Cuyahoga towards Lake Erie.

Today’s Quote:

“History is a gallery of pictures in which there are few originals and many copies” – Alexis de Tocqueville