Saturday, March 16, 2024

Glenstone and The Holdovers

Had a wonderful time today on my first visit to Glenstone, the art museum set in a sprawling grassy and woodsy large expansive setting out in Montgomery County, Maryland. There's a number of large outdoor pieces by Jeff Koons, Richard Serra, and quite a few others. The two buildings complement each other. The Pavilions are about a dozen large- and small-room galleries with a beautiful central pool that has grasses along the sides and a nice deck to sit out on. 

An Ellsworth Kelly retrospective was the featured exhibition covering his whole and varied career. Other rooms featured many different contemporary painters and sculptors. The Gallery was a more traditional design with an exhibit called Iconoclasts that had many well-known moderns--Calder, DeKooning, Pollock, Krasner, Yves Klein, Franz Kline, and many others. Two nice places for coffee and lunch--the Patio is outdoors and the Cafe indoors. Nice walks all around and between the installations and buildings.

Watched The Holdovers on streaming channel and thoroughly enjoyed it. Paul Giamatti is one of the most consistently superb actors who is on scene for the whole picture. His character is somehow likeable despite being deeply cynical and somewhat mean to his students at a classic New England prep school. He opens up when he's stuck staying at school over the Christmas holiday with a few students who also have no place to go home to. 

The settings are beautiful, of course--New England in the winter--and a trip to Boston allows some nice shots of familiar and other places there. Good performances by everyone but Giamatti holds the pic together in fine fashion. He was put up for the Best Actor Oscar but it was clear that that was the recognition he would get, not the Oscar; he's deserved one for many of his film performances.

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