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Glad I didn’t miss this! I’d been looking forward the National Gallery of Art exhibit on Arcimboldo since last fall (when I wrote about it here). This huge, brand new sculpture, Winter (After Arcimboldo) by Philip Hass, is a dramatic, contemporary example of the ongoing influence of this 16th-century artist. Here is the Arcimboldo painting that inspired it: Winter is one of his four seasons paintings.

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One of my favorite things is having friends over to cook and eat. On a recent Saturday night, our friends Kathy and Chris, and their daughter Rachel came over to cook and eat with us. Rachel was even kind enough to take all of these photos, so I could concentrate on enjoying my company. Marty started off the evening by making special martinis with preserved lemons.

For a first course we made a fresh mushroom pasta where emulsified ’shrooms infuse the liquid used to make the pasta dough. It was based on a recipe from Charlie Trotter’s cookbook, “Mushroom Noodles with Vermouth and Braised Lettuce Sauce.”

Kathy cranked out pans and pans of lovely pasta ribbons. To top the pasta, Marty made a celery root puree and veal with roasted root vegetables.

He also braved the cold and grilled veal loin chops on the Big Green Egg.

The happy cooks, Marty and Kathy…

Rachel swings a mean baguette (and takes a mean photo!)…

Thanks, Rachel, for letting me relax and enjoy my own party, knowing we would still have nice photos to share!

I know this post is a total Mom thing… but Dov  just had his senior prom. Of course we had to do pictures! It’s all about the tie and the shoes. My friend Alvin made the brilliant blue tie, and about the shoes…

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Stamps can be tiny works of art. Art Director Ethel Kessler, of Kessler Design Group has perfected the art of stamp design, having created many of these tiny works for the United States Postal Service (USPS). We’ve collaborated on several stamps specifically designed to be used for wedding invitations. The 2011 wedding stamp, which will be released on April 21, is a “Forever” stamp (which isn’t a comment on the bonds of matrimony, but denotes the monetary value of the postage: “Forever,” it will correspond to the frequent increases in the USPS first-class postage rate).

Here are some previous wedding stamps that Ethel and I worked on together…

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