Day 13

September 13

Oh what a night....or morning....woke up at 5am and we officially have no wifi in the apartment. I must have dreamed something because I was so desperately crazy....finally went back to sleep. 
Woke up at 8 and walked over to the site of my installation. Love the entrance.

  I can say it is a good space but Russia has obviously never watched one episode of Curb Appeal. Perhaps there is not a weed eater in the country...or at least I have not seen or heard one. So I will spend one day just "sprucing" the place up. That is part of the charm of working in another country. Did run into Loli's friskier Russian brother.

At this time the wifi in the apartment is still not working due to a power outage at the internet service providers location.

After returning from the installation site, the assistant director told me she had seen so many images of my Nizhniy show on the Russian version of Facebook. Sadly we can not access that site. 

We took a car to their version of Home Depot to pick up some supplies. It is very interesting seeing the various products that they offer that we do not have especially in the bathroom and kitchen fixtures. Much more contemporary than in the US. They also have large plastic roles of printed tiles for back splashes complete with texture. Just glue and you're done. 

We then returned to the apartment via the market. Great seaweed salad with olives for lunch.

I then hit the streets. It was my first time to really just get out and roam around...I am about 3 days past due for that. I walked down Nevsky Prospekt all the way to the Alexander Column at the Winter Palace and the Hermitage. It is an amazing plaza. 

Coming back stopped at the Alexandr Pushkin statue at the Russian Museum and loved howl the birds resting on him changed the whole silhouette.

Did some shopping. When I buy souvenirs I head immediately to the taxidermy department.

Then back to the apartment.

Ed is doing a presentation at Proarte in the Peter and Paul Fortress. What an amazing place.I ran into Olga there. She was researching a project in Nizhniy and came to my artist talk last week..

When visiting the Peter and Paul Fortress, one gets the most impressive vistas across the mighty Neva to the Palace Embankment and to the very gold Peter and Paul Cathedral.

I walked down the steps to the waters edge and along the beach and was stopped in my tracks by a most amazing site. All around the Peter and Paul Fortress is a low large chain barrier...purely for decoration. Attached to this chain link were hundreds of locks with names engraved or painted on one side...some blank. Some were red, pink, metal, even heart shaped. I am assuming this is a location to be shared with a loved one marking whatever occasion with a lock to signify a permanent love to be revisited at some point in the future.

 I was really moved by happening up on this as so much of my work as an artist for the last two decades has dealt with love and loss..What an amazing surprise. 

Ed's talk ended and we left the fortress and headed back over the Trinity Bridge 

Got back to the apartment and the wifi was working.