A friend of mine once told me that he had once sought out a lama in a remote region of Nepal. He’d almost reached the lama when he came across a man in a field (who, he later found out, had been in the midst of chöd practice). Upon seeing my friend, the man screamed in terror and ran off. My friend, puzzled, continued on and when he finally reached the lama he asked him about the man in the field.

The lama said, “Oh, he thought you were a demon. What he doesn’t yet realize is the gods and demons are all part of himself.”

From the New York Times:

Update | 1:30 p.m. Another reader in Iran shares her frustration:

None of the people I know have voted for Ahmadinejad. He wildly cheated and Khamenei, the leader of Iran, supports this scenario fully. They just wanted to show us that no matter what we do and what we think, they will do whatever they want to do. They just want people to know that their votes just don’t count. … I just feel terrible. I saw police force attack people brutally. I’m going to streets and I don’t know if I’m gonna come back home safely but I just can’t bear this anymore. — Anahita

There are some who oppose United States policy abroad who are oddly happy that Ahmadinejad was declared the winner — but though I often find myself in opposition to our policy abroad, that hardly means I cheer on when authoritarian regimes abroad rig elections and tighten their grip on power. I support liberal candidates and movements in all countries, including foreign nations we see as our “enemy” in some sense. If I were Iranian, who would I have voted for? This clear vote fraud is disheartening and it’s sad to see that Iranians have been driven to this point. To read this young woman’s plea brings tears to my eyes. I wish fervently for the aspirations of the Iranian people to be fulfilled.

Years ago, my martial arts teacher, Michael Thompson, and I were walking through San Francisco, and we came across a festival which was putting on a little informal sumo wrestling game. Anyone could participate, so I decided to enter the contest for the hell of it. There were some big guys in it, and I was a scrawny-looking Japanese guy; but I easily beat most of them, except for one athletic Chinese guy who must have had some martial arts training too. However, I had to do one last match to determine 2nd vs 3rd place, between me and this big guy. He was really shaking, he wanted to win so much, but I was calm. We got into it and he pushed me back with his size … but just as we were teetering on the edge of the ring, I relaxed and let him push and turned slightly and threw him out of the ring. I said to the people watching, “it’s because he wanted to win, and I didn’t.”

I certainly wouldn’t want to predict I’d actually win today if such a contest were repeated; I’m not nearly in as good shape as I was then, for one thing. But, I do think it’s worthwhile to point out that being cool under pressure is far more important than people realize, especially when it comes to matters of conflict or strife. The hot heads, statistically speaking, lose more often than they win, even if they may have some early success.

Just a brief note to mention that my uncle Arthur Yamada, my mother’s older brother and someone who I grew up close with, passed away this morning.  My event which was scheduled for Wednesday, June 3 has been cancelled, but the Saturday, June 6 event is still on.

My list of the five kinds of love (for me):

1) sexual attraction
2) romantic love
3) familial love (cuddling)
4) affection
5) friendship

To me, these types of love are relatively independent.  5) usually goes with 4) though I think they’re separate feelings, somehow.  I can feel each of these for multiple people at the same time, in varying amounts.  Some people can only feel 1) and 2) for one person at a time.  Once I love someone in any of these modes, my feelings can change a bit, up and down, over time, but I don’t ever really stop loving someone entirely, even if I feel love for someone else, later.

Andrew Sullivan circulates a misunderstanding of Buddhism:

From 2003, John Horgan explains why he gave up on Buddhism:

“…what troubles me most about Buddhism is its implication that detachment from ordinary life is the surest route to salvation. Buddha’s first step toward enlightenment was his abandonment of his wife and child, and Buddhism (like Catholicism) still exalts male monasticism as the epitome of spirituality. It seems legitimate to ask whether a path that turns away from aspects of life as essential as sexuality and parenthood is truly spiritual.”

From this perspective, the very concept of enlightenment begins to look anti-spiritual: It suggests that life is a problem that can be solved, a cul-de-sac that can be, and should be, escaped.

Of course, this is a fundamental misunderstanding of Buddhism. I agree, of course, that it may appear at first that the idea is to “transcend” ordinary life towards the notion of a nirvana which is far away, distant, and “detached” from life. But this is a misunderstanding: in fact the true emphasis is on the “Middle Way”, neither caught up and tossed around by life nor renouncing ordinary life, but rather participating fully in life while not becoming overly reactive to it (either in terms of clinging nor in terms of fear or aversion). In later schools this developed into the notion of “samsara is nirvana”, which is to say that there is no fundamental difference between the world of samsara and the world of nirvana — it’s a matter of how one relates to it. A fully enlightened perspective is one which can be in the world but not trapped by it; free, but not separate from the world. In fact, in Buddhism, the idea is that being overly attached to things, situations, or people actually prevents us from really appreciating them, because we become caught up more in our ideas than really present to what is right in front of us, our loved ones, our friends, and the circumstances of our lives.

It also ought to be pointed out that there are many sects and approaches to Buddhism, which include the full gamut from monastic celibacy to traditions in which monks can and do marry, and lay traditions which have a wide variety of approaches, including practicing right in the midst of ordinary life. To the extent one does meditate in a monastic or retreat situation, from a Buddhist standpoint this isn’t seen as an end in itself, but merely “skillful means” — the idea is not to retreat forever from life, but to make it a little easier to understand life in a simpler context. In many traditions the idea, furthermore, is that one ought not to stay in such a situation indefinitely, but rather, once one has had some level of insight, be it after a day or years, return out into the world to live your life and help others.

Heather Anne and I had an interesting conversation today about ways of speaking and writing, and she brought up this Emerson quote from her post:

I have been writing with some pains essays on various matters as a sort of apology to my country for my apparent idleness. But the poor work has looked poorer daily as I strove to end it. My genius seemed to quit me in such a mechanical work, a seeming wise—a cold exhibition of dead thoughts. When I write a letter to anyone whom I love, I have no lack of words or thoughts. I am wiser than myself and read my paper with the pleasure of one who receives a letter, but what I write to fill up the gaps of a chapter is hard and cold, is grammar and logic; there is no magic in it. I do not wish to see it again.

She was saying that she wants to be able to write to “anyone whom I love.” This is something I really have to remind myself to do … it’s so easy to get pulled into a certain way of thinking, speaking, and writing that is natural for a lot of people but not so much for what I’m interested in doing. It reminds me of my two really important criteria for a good conversation: one is that it’s open to both the sublime and profane, the everyday and the intellectual, the deep and the frivolous … all accepted as part of a single fabric, not just juxtaposed but seen as one and the same thing, part of the play of conversation in life. The second is that it be an open-ended, creative endeavor, a kind of mutual collaboration towards the unknown or the unknowable, where both people are open to the possibility that it may go where neither initially imagined. It’s not just about one side convincing the other, but about both sides challenging each other yet being willing to build on what the other has said, towards an unbounded undetermined destination. Writing, I think, can be a participation in this kind of conversation, but it’s delicate … it’s so easy to get pulled into binary oppositions, into attempts to explain too much. Heather Anne’s idea of taking a cue from Emerson and writing to anyone whom you love is lovely, a way of protecting your voice and that infinite space of vibrant creative interchange which writing and conversation can be part of.

I’m excited that my Roku now can stream HD rentals from Amazon (in addition to the SD rentals it could do before, and the SD and HD rentals from part of Netflix’s catalog). The Amazon HD rentals are quite good, they look better than the Netflix HD rentals which are a little grainy. Watching Chinatown in HD right now… beautiful.

A trackback reminds me to remind you to check out Magdalena O’s thoughts.

I’ve always resisted having a theme for my shows.  It’s not that I’m opposed to all art shows with a theme, as that would mean being opposed to nearly every art show, since they almost all have themes. But I find that quite a few shows suffer from the “contrived theme syndrome” — the curation doesn’t really have an organic coherence, but rather the works just seem to be selected because they share a certain curatorial ingredient on a superficial level.  For this and other reasons I personally eschew having an explicit theme for my shows (not that I will never have a theme in the future — it’s just that, so far, I haven’t felt moved to do so) — yet, despite this, my shows do tend to hang together organically, often surprisingly so, perhaps driven by a combination of synchronicity and my own curatorial instincts.

For example, one of my pet peeves are the (to my mind) awful theme shows often on display at the Whitney.  They might have one really great show devoted to a single artist, then on floors 2 and 3 a couple of generic “theme” shows (such as the shows they have up now).  The theme only serves as an artificial contrived overlay, in my view, grouping together work in a rather haphazard manner.  The work itself is usually quite good, taken individually, but as a collection it makes me think of “Iron Chef Art”!  Everything has to have the same ingredient!

Curation for me is a form of art, a show is an artwork in its own right.  My objection to having a conscious theme is the same as my objection to programmatic music or fiction with a “point”.  One of my favorite essays on a related idea is Flannery O’Connor’s “The Nature and Aim of Fiction” … as she puts it, most bad stories she comes across are “essays with a plot”.  Naturally, this doesn’t mean stories never ought to have a title, or that titles are always contrived — it’s just that I see this too much in shows and I want to avoid that in my shows.

I’ve seen themes that work quite well, of course.  In fact Laura’s show, Stranger Than Fiction, that’s up now in my space (open through the 23rd, email me if you’d like to see it), works very well, as do a lot of other shows — one of my favorites was a show I saw years ago, in Portland, called “The Map Show” … the theme was maps.  It was very low key and DIY, but the work was excellent, one of the best art shows I’ve seen anywhere, in fact. A wide variety of different work on the theme of maps, accompanied by experimental film. But, in that case, the artists actually created work FOR the show, for the most part.

I suppose it may be that I’m not so much opposed to theme shows as I’m opposed to bad shows, and most shows are bad in my opinion; and many are bad because of the contribution of the “theme” towards a contrived and arid experience. Perhaps, if I ever decide to title or “theme” one of my shows in future, I’ll choose to do so after the show has come together, like an author who titles her story after writing it. That’s far more likely than me titling a show in advance.

For those of you who don’t know or can’t remember the ancient days of the Internet, way back in the years 1999 - 2001: There was once a lovely, intriguing, and fascinating blog called LemonYellow, written by a lovely, intriguing, fascinating woman named Heather Anne Halpert. Many of my friends read her site regularly, and it was in my mind one of the best blogs at the time and to this day. She and I became friends and we still work together even now, but for many years she did not keep a public journal. Those years have, thankfully, come to an end, with the opening of her new site: www.blurryyellow.com … she’s written several weeks of posts already, but the site is only now being opened to the public. Please check it out!

I recently decided I wanted to get better speakers. My grandfather used to be into high fidelity, and then my dad; I have fond memories as a child watching my dad happily bring home a new amplifier, or going with him to the stereo store to buy a new set of speakers, where we carefully listened and chose a pair that sounded best.  For some reason these memories really stand out for me.  We’d bring them home and listen to music — a lovely experience.  And speakers last — they were a constant reminder, year in and year out, of a certain commitment my family has to aesthetics, something I was proud of.

When I was in my 20’s I owned a fairly good set of speakers, DCM TimeFrames, and a decent amp, but that system didn’t have a lot of punch, and when they were stolen I never really replaced them with anything exceptional, although what I had was far better than what most of my friends own. It seems the era of high tech has made people less interested in high fidelity. People listen to compressed mp3s on cheap earbuds, or, even worse, on laptop speakers, which sound even worse than the boom boxes of the 80’s.  I’ve been to many parties where the main entertainment was a laptop playing YouTube videos through tinny speakers.

I’d been making do with inexpensive subwoofer + satellite computer speaker systems. Recently, however, I had some savings and decided the time had finally come for an upgrade. I spent quite a while researching online, and I listened to a bunch of systems in the store, and even took some home (thank God for return policies), but the first two systems I bought just didn’t quite have the “wow” factor I was hoping for. With each excursion the price crept up … but I finally decided if I’m going to get some really good speakers and a good amp, I should make the investment, go for something truly beautiful. Speakers can last years, even decades, so in fact the cost, when you think of it, is relatively small, less than the price of a few lattes a month. Even if that weren’t the case, however, I think certain things — beauty, visual or aural, are worth it.

So … I finally settled on an interesting setup. A pair of Polk LSi9 speakers with a relatively inexpensive subwoofer (a PSW110). These are difficult-to-drive speakers that take a lot of power; the audiophile forums all suggested I get an external amplifier, but for now I found a high current receiver, an Onkyo TX-SR806, which can handle these speakers. The reviews for the Polk LSi line of speakers are amazing … for both the LSi9 and the LSi15 (which by all accounts are similar, despite the fact that the LSi9’s are bookshelf speakers and the LSi15 is a much more imposing tower speaker — the LSi15 is very close to being an LSi9 with a subwoofer built into one cabinet).

Of the LSi9, Soundstage said:

I really liked the combination of having a punchy and lively presentation, but also having the refinement and smoothness that I expect in a top-notch speaker. This speaker jumps to life like a Spring Break party, but retains the sophistication of a black-tie dinner. This combination is something you rarely find in small speakers at any price. The LSi9 also images with precision and provides a level of robustness that is thoroughly captivating.

On the LSi15, Onhifi.com gushed:

Quite simply, the Polk Audio LSi15s sent showers of neural sparks coursing through my brain, stimulated my corpus callosum, and produced endorphins by the bucketful — or, to put it in lay terms, they made music.

Most reviews consider the LSi line “audiophile” quality — sounding as good as speakers twice their price or more.  When I got them home I hooked them up — after some adjustments … I was floored. As Katharine said when she heard them … “Is there something wrong if it sounds even better than live?” With a system like this it becomes excruciatingly clear that mp3 files are significantly different from CDs … playing music from my iPod sounded good, but when I hooked up my CD player digitally directly to the Onkyo … you could hear details in the music that I didn’t think possible: the sounds of fingers brushing strings as the musicians played, tiny nuances in vocal performances, and certain recordings just jump out at you, not in a harsh or fatiguing way, but sounding natural, smooth, rich, and full.  I’m going to have to reencode a lot of my CDs as lossless or high-bitrate files, something I never thought I’d need to do.

The overall effect of listening to this is dramatic, striking. It’s far beyond my expectations. This is by far the most impressive soundsystem I’ve ever owned, and the price turned out to be higher than many would pay but well below the upper ranges of what some audiophiles spend. It’s worth it, I believe.