Breaking Away

Sunday November 15 2009

Did you see "Breaking Away," which won the Academy Award in 1979?  If yes, do you remember that it was filmed in Bloomington?  Which is where I am right now, and finding out how beautiful this college town is.  Being on campus made me feel as if I were on a movie set, so I wasn't surprised to learn that it's been hailed as one of the five most beautiful college campuses in America.

The Indiana University Art Museum, located on the IU campus, was designed by I.M. Pei.  My favorite gallery was where they displayed modern and contemporary craft work they own.  There were weavings, ceramics, jewelry, and glass, each piece elegantly mounted.  I did kind of a double take when I read the label for a brooch and saw it was designed by George Rickey.  He taught art at IU in the early 1950's and this brooch was done in 1951.  It preceded his kinetic sculptures, which are found in almost every sculpture park and garden in America, but who knew he made 6 7/8" pieces, too? 

The IU Art Museum also had a rich show of African art, several rooms with colorful weavings on the walls and platforms filled with large and elegant ceramics in the center.  All very muscular and almost intimidating in their strength.

From there to the Mathers Museum of World Cultures, where I wandered several rooms of "Images of Native Americans," drawn from their extensive Wanamaker Collection, "the largest and one of the most imortant collections of photographic enterprise in the United States."  There seemed to be an apologetic undertone to the pictorial documentation, which must stem from criticism of the stereotypes and staged nature of many of the photographs.  Stereotypical or not, they were beautiful.  And sad.

I'm staying at a lovely inn close to IU, and within easy walking distance of the charming downtown, built around a square on which sits the county courthouse.  Everything seems to be in walking distance here, including a one-block restaurant paradise with nine (!) restaurants, including Basil Leaf (Thai), Casablanca, Mandalay, International Market, Bombay House, La Dolce Vita, Siam House, Anyetsing's (Tibetan), and Anatolia (Turkish).  Just across the road on the next block are Snow House (Tibetan again) and India House.  And this is Bloomington!  I felt as if I were on St. Marks Place in the East Village.