Author: Grubb

Returning to Europe I realize how much I miss the mansard roof. So much like a building with a hat pulled over its ears. They make me think of student lofts where impecunious poets are seized by nocturnal inspiration. Then there are the sixteenth century stepped gable roofs. The ultimate roof as a facade, stepped…

A lot of our trips involve a necessary pilgrimage on my part. In Japan, the Peace Memorial in Hiroshima; in Belgium, Jan van Eyck’s altarpiece in Ghent at St. Bavo’s Cathedral. Prior to coming to Belgium I considered Van der Weyden’s “The Lamentation” at the Prado in Madrid to be the altarpiece to end all…

Traveling to Ghent by train the pastoral landscape looked like something Bruegel would have painted six hundred years ago. Sheep grazed on grassy meadows with church spires poking above the tree line in the background. The only touch lacking that Bruegel might have brought to the scene were peasants toiling with farm tools on their…

Done with exploring the street art of Brussels, we went towards La Senne, the river near the Halle Gate (Porte de Hal). The Halle Gate is the former medieval city gate with the gigantic portcullis built in the 14th century. The exterior was being worked on but the interior was accessible. As gates go I’d…

In our street art ramble today we almost missed the Fleur de Papier Doré bar where Magritte and his surrealist friends used to hang out. I wouldn’t have noticed the bland facade with the tiny Fleur de Papier Doré sign hanging out front except that there was a large photograph in the window display next…

After inspecting the Horta House yesterday we took a bus to the WIELS Contemporary Art Center. On the second floor there was an exhibition of Lutz Bacher’s work. It was called “Burning the Days” which referred to her running around with a camera capturing the 60s and 70s. Black and white stills of a friend…

Around the corner from where we’re staying is the house where Victor Horta lived. Victor, along with Gaudi in Spain, was a  Fin de Siècle architect who defined art nouveau in buildings all over Europe. Museums, libraries, mansions, train stations, if it had the art nouveau stamp, the blueprints were probably drawn up by Horta. Some…

Outside of some religious art in the dark confines of centuries old cathedrals, Mechelen struck me as one big outdoor café. That’s where most everyone seemed to be, sitting at tables with sweaters tied around their necks drinking beer and wine. Duck in a church to glimpse a Rubens and you’d most likely be alone….

It was the dark look in Kafka’s eyes. A warning. “You might think that taking the train to Mechelen tomorrow will be an easy trip, brief, barely eventful,” they seemed to say staring out at me from the lampshade in the basement of the Parliamentarium, “but trust me, you’ll feel the frustration of sitting in…

Yesterday morning we tried to understand how the European Union worked.  Then we had a gourmet lunch that was low on everything that was supposed to be bad for our bodies. It was in a restaurant that was part of swank health club.  Just exiting the building I felt I was brimming with health.  That didn’t mean…

Or, if you’re more cultivated, go ahead and say, “E U”, either way we know you’re talking about the European Union. I’ve always imagined the EU to be some abbreviated code for a select group of European bankers who meet periodically behind barrels of distilled spirits in some dank rathskeller to determine the exchange rate…

Thanks to the many wars that have been fought on its turf, Belgium has been called the “European battlefield”.  If one wanted to take this to the economic level and make a killing in Brussels all they would need to do is land a hot air balloon hauling a load of chocolate treats smack in the…

As example of “zwanze” or bratty Belgian humor there’s Mannikin Pis, the little boy fountain that is located in the heart of Mont des Arts. It was easy to come across; we just funneled  down one of the narrow cobbled streets towards the crowd of tourists clogging the corner where the jokey statue is arcing his…

The goal of this morning’s trek was to get to the Magritte Musée by ten-thirty. That was the time on electronic the ticket I purchased in January that let us in to the Magritte museum and the Old Masters museum next door. Wait—did I say “ticket”?  When we arrived at the building with the large green…

Outside of inching across runways in Albuquerque and Chicago to experience lumbering jet choreography in the age of LAL (Living At Airports) where when the pilot announces to the stewards, “Prepare for landing,” it should be followed, once you land, with, “Please have patience while while we crawl. If you’re wondering whether you will make…