Three Disappointments in One Week (one cent)

A bit much, I'd say.

1. There is a major exhibit of Mexican paintings at the Ripley Center. It is the third Latin American exhibit that I have seen in the last year or so. The first was at the National Geographic and consisted of Peruvian works; the second also at the Ripley concentrated on 20th century Latin artists. Both were wonderful, and I assumed I would enjoy the all-Mexican exhibit to the same extent. There are about 100 works on display; they include works be the well known Diego Rivera, Tomayo, Sequieros and others. It is said that most have not been seen outside of Mexico. I didn't like any of them. It did not appear to me (but what do I know?) that any of the pieces, even those by first rate artists, were first rate pieces.

2. Then there was Saturday night supper at Nirvana, the Indian restaurant at 19th and K. It is a very busy place at lunch time, but at 6:30 on a Saturday night was virtually empty. It is a vegetarian restaurant, so I knew the menu would be no problem. Except that there was no menu, because it was Diwali, and there was a special all you can eat thali menu, with about 7 or 8 different dishes, served in those little tin dishes that is used for thalis. Diwali is a sweet holiday, and the dishes seemed all to be party starch and partly sugar. Big disappointment, especially at $20 a head.

3. Finally, as part of the Washington Performing Arts Society "edge" series, Israeli born cellis Maya Beiser performed last night at the Kennedy Center. Her show had been written up pre-performance both in the Post and the Jewish week. I knew it was a "performance artist" show, that there would be mixed media, and that the pieces were all very, very contemporary.

There is no question but that Beiser can play the cello. No question. but, with few exceptions, the pieces left me completely cold. The best (and my wife agreed) was a Cambodian piece called Khse Buon, written by Chinary Ung, who is not only a composer, but a scribe who has preserved much of Cambodian folk tradition. And a shorter piece called Feige/Antiphonal Song by Tan Dun matched the cello with a young Chinese woman singing a folk song of her particular ethnic tradition on a screen. We enjoyed that as well. But the highlight of the show, so they said, was a 40 minute song by Armenian composer (I guess, composer) Eve Beglarian, where there were seven tv screens of various sizes (all showing the same black and white video), the cello, and Beiser's speaking voice. It is called "I am writing to you from a far off country". It should have been called: "Sonata for solo cello, television and platitudes". Absolutely worthless, I thought, as must have some of the people that left in the middle.

But again, there is no question but that Beiser can play that cello.