Giving a Thumbs Up to the Night

Try and keep someone like me away from an evening called "Conversations."

In this case, the conversation was about the VMFA's "Signs of Protest: Photographs from the Civil Rights Era" exhibit which I'd seen last week and was with UVA's John Edwin Mason and the museum's Sarah Eckhardt.

I was pleased that it actually was more of a conversation than a lecture or talk, with the two of them commenting on slides from the exhibit, sharing information with the audience and each other.

For me, it was particularly interesting to see the rest of the "Life" magazine spread on segregation Gordon Parks had done in 1956. Two pages are in the exhibit, but this was a look at the entire piece in color, when the original had been black and white. It was stunning.

Sarah also made the point that reading the text provided a look at the language we used to discuss racism then, so different than how we speak of it today.

Mason mentioned the letters to the editor that followed a few weeks later in "Life," many of them thanking the magazine for providing a glimpse into a black family's life, saying they had no idea good people in the south were treated this way.

They went through several other photographs, providing insight into them and the photographer who took them.

Mrs. Winston-Draper, the woman I'd heard speak at the Maggie Walker house (for MLK Day) and the sister of photographer Louis Draper, spoke a little about his work, but not nearly as much as she'd done Monday, making me glad I'd seen her when she was the sole focus.

When the conversation broke up, all too soon considering how fascinating it was, we went out to see the exhibit and there I chatted with Gordon, owner of Candela Gallery where the Louis Draper retrospective is now showing before going down to Best Cafe for music.

The Larri Branch Agenda was in full swing when I arrived, saw a familiar face and sat down at his table. LBA was performing their usual original compositions as well as a few standards and since I always enjoy seeing Brian Cruse on bass, I settled in for the duration.

Our conversation was far-reaching, covering foreign film and "Fight Club," movie soundtracks and improvisation, Chapman stick and looped cello.

I'm guessing the weather is still a factor for many people since the room was mostly full but not bursting at the seams like it so often is for the Thursday Jazz cafe.

But like Cinderella's big night, an evening at the VMFA has a strict time limit, so when they kicked us out at 9:00, I turned the car east, hoping to catch some dinner along the way home.

Magpie, with its windows fogged up and inviting, fit the bill perfectly although there was only one couple at the bar when I got there.

You hate to be that last customer, but the bartender assured me the kitchen was still open, so I took him at his word and looked for something warming to get me started.

Venison chili, loaded with onion and just enough heat, fit the bill perfectly and I all but licked the bowl.

If there's one thing you can count on at Magpie, it's game and '80s music and I was already enjoying both immensely by the time the couple cleared out, leaving just me.

When Van Morrison came on, though, I couldn't stop myself from asking the starting point and the bartender agreed with the poor selection.

"It's set to Elvis Costello...with alterations," he said."You have to treat Pandora like a pet, giving it thumbs up or thumbs down every time until it understands what you want. It's the only way to make it behave."

Brilliant. That's the best summary of how to whip your musical genome into shape I've ever heard and told him so. "You just have to catch it in time," he added. So true of pets and Pandora.

For my next course, I got bone marrow with pea shoot pistou and grilled bread, pleased when I heard that they were selling a ton of marrow the past few months as customer after customer learned the pleasure of bones.

For my main course, I went with one of the evening's medium plate specials, a riff on carbonara. Chive gnocchi, the sweetest rock shrimp, peas and watercress swam in a cream sauce made with bone marrow, an obscenely rich replacement for butter.

And the Cure and Bowie played on...

I'm not a pasta person but my Irish roots do incline me toward gnocchi and this was pillowy-soft and delicately flavored, absolutely irresistible to the O'Donnell in me.

I heard about the bartender's excitement about his upcoming trip to see the Pixies in Tennessee (he's seeing them at the National as well) as we discussed the pleasures of out-of-town trips that include music shows.

The chef told me about some of the recent charity dinners he'd participated in, marveling at the amount of money Richmond chefs have raised for worthy causes this year.

This is such a good time for the Richmond food scene.

By the time I got ready to go, Carver was pretty much in bed, the streets icy and abandoned, and I was oh-so full after a double shot of bone marrow.

And all the conversation I could have wished for.

A Gathering Storm

To an art geek, it's gratifying to see the VMFA so busy on a Saturday afternoon, especially one with a VCU game scheduled.

Arriving at the museum to see another part of the Race, Place and Identity shows, "Signs of Protest: Photographs from the Civil Rights Era,"  I was greeted with a massive line of people snaking through the atrium waiting their turn to be allowed downstairs to see the "Hollywood Costume" exhibit.

I've already seen it twice but that had been on weekdays and during the first two weeks after it opened, so it had been a most civilized affair.

Today looked more like Picasso had returned to Richmond, which shouldn't have surprised me since I'd heard tell that the numbers for "Hollywood" were rivaling those for "Picasso," but seeing it was a different story.

I also admit to being spoiled by being able to go to the museum mid-week and avoid the  twirling children, bored-looking teenagers and stoic parents waiting in lines that rival those at King's Dominion in July.

Luckily for me today, I was on my way upstairs to the photography gallery to see a slice of history, so I sailed past them.

I have to admit, the photography gallery was far busier than I'd ever seen it, a pleasure to witness.

The black and white photographs in the show were clearly picked with a great deal of care and an unerring eye for key moments big and small in the fight for civil rights.

I was particularly struck by the two Richmond images, both from 1960, one of the Woolworth's lunch counter protest and the other of a Thalhimer's picket line with protesters holding signs saying, "Turn in your charge-a-plate" and "Don't shop where you are arrested."

Since both were taken long before I came to Richmond, it was a look back on a time I'm glad I missed here.

A 1966 photograph by Gordon Parks of Stokely Carmichael in Watts showed him looking impossibly young, which he was- only 25.

The most dramatic image was James Karales' "Selma to Montgomery March, Alabama" from 1965, shot from below and showing a line of marchers along the crest of a hill with an enormous dark storm cloud overhead.

One of those images that encapsulates a seminal event and could never have been planned for.

I was surprised to see a Diane Arbus photograph in the exhibit, thinking of her as more of a photographer of odd people. I'd seen a stellar show of her work at the Hanes Art Gallery at Wake Forest back in 2005 and nothing I'd seen there gave me reason to think she'd be represented in this show.

Wrong. "Boy with a Straw Hat Waiting to March in a Pro-War Parade, New York City" showed what surely must have been odd to a lot of eyes, even in '67.

Not just that he was wearing a straw hat (although try finding a boy today who does), but a bowtie, an American flag bow on one lapel and a "Bomb Hanoi" button on the other.

I'm betting he grew up to be a good conservative.

The exhibit ended with two images from South Africa's apartheid protests, a fitting reminder that the fight for civil rights is ongoing.

After seeing all the photographs, including one of Martin Luther King walking arm in arm with Dr. Benjamin Spock, the baby expert, I did a second lap to look at them all again.

When I got back downstairs to the atrium, the lines were even longer and I almost collided with a man retrieving his family from the museum gift shop.

"Is this the line?" his wife asked incredulously.

"Uh, yea," he said testily. "That's why I've been trying to get you out of there!"

Hopefully, they'll both calm down once they see the splendors of the costume exhibit, even if it's sandwiched between dozens of other visitors.

I know this art geek benefited from an afternoon devoted to a slice of history in the form of a moving photography show.