Lincoln assassins' gravesites in Washington and Baltimore

 

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the death of President Abraham Lincoln,  volunteers on Saturday led tours at Congressional Cemetery in Washington, D.C. to the graves of several who were associated with the president's assassination in Washington on April 14, 1865, and his death the next day. A volunteer guide at the cemetery, Steve Hammond, quoted some who claim that because Ulysses S. Grant did not go with President Lincoln to Ford's Theatre that night, it was "one of the reasons Lincoln was assassinated....Grant's wife couldn't stand Mary Todd Lincoln."/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Looking towards the entrance of Congressional Cemetery, Washington, D.C./Photo by Patricia Leslie

Volunteer guide Steve Hammond talks about conspirator David Herold, hanged on July 7, 1865 for his role in President Lincoln's assassination.  Hammond said Herold is buried beneath this grave of Elizabeth Jane Herold at Congressional Cemetery, Washington, D.C., but Wikipedia says Herold has a gravestone at the cemetery:

 

On February 15, 1869, David's mother and 5 of his sisters interred his remains in Congressional Cemetery ( Washington, D. C. ) in an unmarked grave, next to the grave of his father Adam.^[6][7] The gravestone memorializing David now present in Congressional Cemetery was placed there in July 1917, at the time of the burial of his sister Mary Alice ( Herold ) Nelson (October 16, 1837 – July 1, 1917) in the cemetery. Mary Alice was the wife of Frederick Massena Nelson (January 1827 - May 11, 1909) of Pomonkey, Charles County, Maryland/Photo by Patricia Leslie

This is the grave of Charles Forbes, who "was someone who should have been fired," based on his actions (or inactions) on the day of the Lincoln assassination, said Steve Hammond, a guide at Congressional Cemetery, on Saturday.  Supposedly before he shot Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth gave Forbes his business card when he "walked up to Forbes and said something," but Forbes carried the remark with him to the grave. The marker (above) reads:  

 

"Charles Forbes

Died October 11, 1895

Age 60

Margaret Forbes

Died October 26, 1881

Age 53

Charles Forbes Served As

Personal Attendant

to President Lincoln

1861-1865

He Accompanied The

Lincolns To Ford's

Theatre On The Night of

April 14, 1865 And Was

Seated Just Outside The

Box When The President Was Shot. 

 

The Lincoln Group

of Washington, 1983

/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Peter Taltavull (1825-1881) owned the Star Saloon, next door to Ford's Theatre where John Wilkes Booth stopped for a drink of  whiskey and water shortly before the assassination, according to Taltavull's testimony at the conspiracy trial. After Lincoln was shot, the medical team briefly considered taking the president to Taltavull's saloon before the president was taken across the street to Petersen's boarding house. Taltavull's grave is at Congressional Cemetery/Photo by Patricia Leslie

John Wilkes Booth who assassinated President Lincoln, and two others associated with the assassination, Samuel Arnold and Michael O'Laughlen (O'Laughlin), are buried in Baltimore at Green Mount Cemetery where a chapel sits atop the hill/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The Booth Family plot, Green Mount Cemetery, Baltimore, MD, where John Wilkes Booth was buried in 1869.  His small unmarked gravestone with Lincoln pennies on top is almost in the center of the photo/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The unmarked grave of John Wilkes Booth in the Booth Family plot at Green Mount Cemetery, Baltimore, MD, where visitors leave Lincoln pennies/Photo by Patricia Leslie

 

Congressional Cemetery, 1801 E Street, SE, Washington, D.C. 20003, ph. 202-543-0539 

  

Green Mount Cemetery, 1501 Greenmount Ave., Baltimore, MD 21202, ph. 410-539-0641

 

 

 

 

 

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Easter Sunday at St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York

St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York City/Photo by Patricia Leslie

St. Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue in New York City can accommodate 3,000 persons, but on Easter Sunday, it was standing room only at the 10:15 a.m. service.

 

Dollars placed in the collection bags on the crowded day will help the church pay a portion of a massive renovation project estimated to cost $175 million.  The building's exterior and stained-glass windows are being cleaned, and improvements to crumbling brick and marble damaged by acid rain are underway.  Completion of the project is scheduled for this December, and $100 million has been raised. 

 

James Renwick, Jr. (1818-1895), who designed Washington's Smithsonian "Castle" on the National Mall and the Smithsonian Renwick Gallery, is best know for St. Patrick's, which he created in the Gothic Revival or neo-Gothic style.  The church cornerstone was laid in 1858 but the Civil War caused construction to cease shortly thereafter.  It resumed in 1865, and the cathedral was completed in 1878/Photo by Patricia Leslie

 

While an usher collects donations, the Archbishop of New York, His Eminence, Timothy Michael Cardinal Dolan, prepares the incense at the 10:15 a.m. Easter Sunday service at St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The Archbishop of New York, His Eminence, Timothy Michael Cardinal Dolan, spreads the Gospel at the rear of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York during the 10:15 a.m. Easter Sunday service/Photo by Patricia Leslie

St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The clergy takes a left turn at the rear of the church at the conclusion of the 10:15 a.m. Easter Sunday service at St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York.  This perspective looks in the main entrance where police blocked latecomers who formed a line for the next service.  Standing on church steps, latecomers had an elevated view of the finery in the Easter Parade underway on the street below. Seen on the right is an unknown Chinese message, one of few handwritten signs observed in the area/Photo by Patricia Leslie

 

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The 2015 Easter Parade on Fifth Avenue, New York

In your Easter bonnet/Photo by Patricia Leslie

With all the frills upon it (Darling, height means everything in the Easter Parade!)/Photo by Patricia Leslie

You'll be the grandest fellow in the Easter parade/Photo by Patricia Leslie

I'll be all in clover/Photo by Patricia Leslie

And when they look you over/Photo by Patricia Leslie

I'll be the proudest fellow in the Easter parade (See the giant butterfly?)/Photo by Patricia Leslie

On the Avenue (There's a swan in here somewhere)/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Fifth Avenue/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The photographers will snap us/Photo by Patricia Leslie

And you'll find that you're in the rotagravure (?)/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Oh, I could write a sonnet/Photo by Patricia Leslie

About your Easter bonnet/Photo by Patricia Leslie

And of the girl I'm taking to the Easter parade/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York.  He forgot his bunny ears/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Fifth Avenue, New York/Photo by Patricia Leslie

A bonnet of recycled magazines/Photo by Patricia Leslie

 

With apologies to Irving Berlin.

Watercolors, photographs, rare books open at the National Gallery of Art

Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., curator, Northern Baroque paintings, National Gallery of Art, discusses Sir Peter Paul Ruben's Pan Reclining (possibly 1610) in the Print Study Room, East Building, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C./photo by Patricia Leslie

Guests are welcome to visit the Print Study Rooms at the National Gallery of Art to view and study rare books, prints, drawings, watercolors, photographs, images, and more.

All that are required are an advance appointment (some, two weeks ahead) and that a person be 18 years of age or older, or accompanied by an adult. 

Some 117,000 works from the 12th century through contemporary times by Europeans like Leonardo da Vinci, Albrecht Dürer,
Rembrandt van Rijn, and M.C. Escher are found in the East Building Print Study Room while the Americans, John James Audubon, James McNeill Whistler, Mary Cassatt, Winslow Homer, Romare Bearden, Jasper Johns, and many more, are found in the West Building Print Study Room.

Sir Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640), Lion, c. 1612-1613 on display in the Print Study Room, East Building, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

In the photography collection are some 15,000 works beginning in 1839 to the present by, among many, Paul Strand, Walker Evans, Robert Frank, Robert Adams, Alfred Stieglitz and his "Key Set" of 1,600 photographs from the 1880s through the 1930s, with 330 portraits of his wife, Georgia O'Keeffe.
.
The library has more than 400,000 volumes of Western art history, architecture, and criticism which begin with the Middle Ages.  Giorgio Vasari’s Lives of the Artists and serials by Dada artists are among the collection of 10,000 rare books, travel literature, annotated catalogues, price lists, and books about artists.

One of the rare books in the East Building's Print Study Room at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Lucius Annaeus Seneca (Roman author), Justus Lipsius (editor), Cornelis Galle I and Theodor Galle (engravers) after Sir Peter Paul Rubens (designer):  L. Annaei Senecae Philosophi Opera, quae extant omnia:  A lusto Lipsio Emendata et Scholiis Illustrata, Editio Secunda, atque ab ultima Lipsii manu, 1615/photo by Patricia Leslie

The library's images department has almost 14 million photographs, slides, negatives, digital copies, and more of primarily Western art and architecture from European and American art dealers, scholars, and international expositions.

To save time, search the online collection before calling for an appointment. The National Gallery staff will be happy to help.

What:  View, research, and study photographs, watercolors, images, rare books, and many other media.

Where:  National Gallery of Art between Third and Seventh streets at Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. On the Mall. 

When:  Print and Photograph Study Rooms:  10 a.m. - 12 p.m., and 2 - 4 p.m., Monday through Friday

Library and Images: 12 - 4:30 p.m., Monday, and 10 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., Tuesday through Friday

For an appointment at the Print Study Rooms, call
(202) 842-6380 (European works), or (202) 842-6605 (American works), or email printstudyrooms@nga.gov.

To make an appointment at the Photography Study Room, call (202) 842-6144 or fill out the online form.

To make an appointment at the Library, call (202) 842-6511.

To make an appointment at Images, call (202) 842-6026 or fill out the online form.

No charge to visit, view, research, read.

Metro stations: Smithsonian, Federal Triangle, Navy Memorial-Archives, or L'Enfant Plaza

For more information: 202-737-4215

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Dumbarton Concerts presents another world premiere

 

The Historic Dumbarton Church in Georgetown/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Last Saturday morning while I bustled with cleaning chores getting ready for a weekend visitor, I looked at the photograph of my mother posted on the refrigerator door and sighed:  "I wish I could talk to you."

She's been long in the grave (almost 18 years) and I wondered if this same thought occurs to me every day.

That night at the Dumbarton Concerts the Tiffany Consort sang Angelo Cicolani's poem, "My Mother's Shadow (after Bach)":

My daily world goes on and on,
Yet special moments bring her close,
When joy or trouble make me wish
That we could talk.

It was the world premiere of the piece Mr. Cicolani commissioned Nicholas White, Tiffany's founder and director, to write, the third White composition directed by Mr. Cicolani. 

The "Mother" selection came at the end of the evening's concert of an otherwise solemn presentation of mostly a cappella medieval and Renaissance music, most dedicated to the upcoming Holy Week.  If anyone forgot it was Lent, the first part of the program was a stark reminder.   

(For the concert, the darkened and historic (1850) Dumbarton United Methodist Church always makes a beautiful setting with window sills decked with lighted candles.)

Nicholas White

The program led with another White compositions,  "Kyrie (after Albinoni)":  "A Lament for those who left this life too young," a tribute to Cicolani's  college roommate which included "In the midst of life we are in death....deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death." 

Eloquently accompanying the vocalists on "Kyrie" was cellist Benjamin Wensel. (Saturday's consort was composed of Steven Combs, sopranos Emily Noel and Laura Choi Stuart, tenor Matthew Hill, countertenor Roger Isaacs, and Mr. White. Was a singer or two missing?)

Music for Maundy Thursday included  the somber "Lamentations of Jeremiah" (Part One) by Thomas Tallis (1505-1652) with these words:

[The city] weeps bitterly in the night, tears on her cheeks, among all her lovers she has none to comfort her; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her.

In case those words were too uplifting, ending the first half of the program was "Miserere mei" by Gregorio Allegri (1582-1652), originally intended for Renaissance monastic matins (after midnight) at the Sistine Chapel for Holy Week and included:

...cleanse me from my sin.  For I acknowledge my faults;  and my sin is ever before me....Turn Thy face from my sins:  and put out all my misdeeds.  Make me a clean heart, O God: and renew a right spirit within me.

After intermission came the hymn, "Jesu, meine Freude" BWV 227 by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), a motet which may have been written for a funeral.  I counted seven movements over its 20 minutes (and understand I missed four), but the appreciative audience seemed to like it best of all. 

Wensel followed with a much welcomed detour from verbal beatings with Bach's short solo "Sarabande" (Suite IV in E flat BWM 1010).

The best was saved for last.  Cicolani described his motivation for the commissioning of "My Mother's Shadow" in the program: " ... to express a wistful lament for the loss of our mothers....we often wish to summon her shadow to seek her thoughts, or to share something special in our lives....This commission is dedicated to all those mothers who have left too soon, and I hope will speak to the people they leave behind."

In the program notes Composer White wrote he could not escape the knowledge that the day of the concert was the 330th anniversary of Bach's birthday (O.S. March 21, 1685) which laid the foundation for the music.

More from the poem:

She left so long ago,
Mourning's done, our lives apart,
Waiting near my wistful heart,
To share our thoughts.

Thoughts of mother etched in my soul,
Yet sadness comes not anymore.
I miss her presence every day,
Her shadow lives by me evermore.

Based on the audience's warm response to each piece and the standing ovation at the finish, the Georgetown crowd, with a few music critics, thoroughly enjoyed the evening.

A happy surprise at Dumbarton Concerts is the "Concert Cafe" (in the wine cellar) with spirits and desserts to savor before the concert and during intermission, highlighted last week by an art show of color photographs of the region, some so splendidly reproduced they looked like oils on canvas. The artist, Rob Rudick, was on hand to talk and answer questions.

 With the lamentations behind us, it was time to walk the Georgetown streets and find joy among the people who, at that time of night, were celebratory and it is presumed, unmindful of self bashing.   

"Sizzle" is the name of the last concert at Dumbarton this season,
which suggests an entirely different kind of music, more in tune with spring's colorful array to contrast with the dark and sad, long-lasting winter.

Who:  Salome Chamber Orchestra

What:  "Sizzle" at Dumbarton Concerts


When:  8 p.m., Saturday, April 11, 2015

Where:  Historic Dumbarton Church, 3133 Dumbarton Street, NW, Washington, D.C. 20007

Admission:  $35 and $30, seniors

Free limited parking:  At Hyde Elementary School, 3219 O Street, NW a half block off Wisconsin Avenue where an attendant will direct you on the short walk to the concert hall.

For more information:  202-965-2000

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National Portrait Gallery celebrates Elaine de Kooning

 

Elaine de Kooning (1918-1989), John F. Kennedy #21, 1963, Michael and Susan Luyckx

 

I've been twice in five days.

 

If you lived in a generation with the halcyon JFK administration and recall the verve, the energy, spontaneity, glamour, and intelligence the Kennedys brought to the White House, you will not want to miss the nine portraits and drawings which Elaine de Kooning

(1918-1989) drew of President Kennedy in 1963, some larger than life and now on display at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery.

 

They are part of the major retrospective of Ms. de Kooning's portraits which went up last week, coinciding with Women's History Month and the artist's birthday on March 12.

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy sat for "Elaine" (the name the Portrait Gallery says she likely would have favored) at the "Winter White House" in Palm Beach, Florida in late 1962 and early 1963. 

At the National Portrait Gallery,  Senior Curator Brandon Brame Fortune discusses Elaine de Kooning's John F. Kennedy, 1963.  This work usually hangs at one of the National Gallery's entrances and is part of the museum's permanent collection, "America's Presidents."/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Ms. de Kooning called President Kennedy "bigger than life....I was determined to...communicate his warmth, sharp wit, appraising glance, and something of the outdoor figure I saw." In the year after his death in 1963, the artist barely lifted a paint brush, and throughout her life, she kept the JFK portrait #21 (at the top of this page) which still belongs to her family. 

 

How she came to be selected to paint the president's portrait makes fascinating reading in the de Kooning catalogue ($49.95), but, in a few words: If it were not for the Harry S. Truman Library, there might not be a JFK series by Elaine de Kooning. According to the library's executive director at the time,  David D. Lloyd, she "obviously belongs in the new frontier of art," and she got the commission.  (Later, Ms. de Kooning said it would take a while for President Truman to grow accustomed to her style since he was not a big fan of modern art.) 

 

Pretty amazing stuff when one realizes she was competing against male artists in 1962.  Not only was she a woman, but her style was unconventional and one might say extreme for a presidential library located in the Midwest.

 

Once it got wind of the library's interest in a Kennedy portrait, the White House went to work right away to accommodate Ms. de Kooning, and off to Palm Beach she went.

 

Of the portraits and drawings in the show, the Truman JFK is my least favorite.  And why is that?

 

The whole thing is stilted and artificial.  The background of bright yellows and oranges overshadows the subject who sits in the center with a puzzled expression as if to say: "Why am I here?" He appears uncomfortable, thinner, more timid than the person we have come to know, lacking his customary confidence and sex appeal but with a fire (the assassination?) about to engulf and shroud him, his expression and bearing make more sense.

 

Yellow is not a strong color.  It's a weak color, especially compared to the vibrant and energetic greens and blues Ms. de Kooning used for the National Gallery's official JFK portrait that is part of the Gallery's series of presidential portraits.  (She is one of two female artists represented in the series, the other, Greta Kempton, who, coincidentally, painted President Harry S. Truman!)

 

The year attached to the Truman painting is 1963. The catalogue has a photograph of President Truman with Ms. de Kooning  at the presentation ceremony in 1965. 

 

The color catalogue features the works in the show, naturally, and an entire section is devoted to JFK, and Ms. de Kooning's experience trying to paint a figure constantly in motion: "He was--well, he was just a great-looking man." And "incandescent, golden." (The yellows in the Truman JFK?)

  

Ms. de Kooning was an abstract expressionist, known for her stark, angular, and bright renditions  of contemporary figures, usually men, who dominate the show.

 

"Men always painted the opposite sex, and I wanted to paint men as sex objects," the catalogue quotes her. (Rock on, Elaine!) She drew several men (Fairfield Porter, Johnny Snow) sitting with their legs spread, and when JFK drooped his leg over a beach chair and asked her "Is this pose all right?" Yes, it was! (Rock on, Elaine!)

 

 

The exhibition is not entirely about JFK, but that's who (or what) engulfs me. Three free films run continuously in a loop.

National Portrait Gallery Senior Curator Brandon Brame Fortune with Elaine de Kooning's The Burghers of Amsterdam Avenue, 1963, private collection.  Loosely modeled after two Dutch paintings, both titled The Governors of the Kloveniersdoelen, one executed by Govert Flinck (1615-1660) in 1642 and the other by Bartholomeus van der Helst(1613-1670) in 1655, both on loan from the Netherlands to the National Gallery of Art where they may be seen at the Seventh Street, NW entrance to the ground level through March 11, 2017/Photo by Patricia Leslie

 

Govert Flinck, Dutch (1615 – 1660)
The Governors of the Kloveniersdoelen, 1642, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, on loan from the City of Amsterdam to the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Bartholomeus van der Helst, Dutch (1613 – 1670) The Governors of the Kloveniersdoelen, 1655, Amsterdam Museum on loan to the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

In the Kogod Courtyard at the National Portrait Gallery, there was "a party going on" to celebrate Elaine de Kooning's birthday March 12 and the opening of a major retrospective of her portraits/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Kim Sajet, director of the National Portrait Gallery, welcomed guests to the reception for "Elaine de Kooning: Portraits." In a statement Ms. Sajet said the artist "ensured that a person's likeness was linked to their innate vitality and spirit."  The Gallery holds the largest museum collection of Ms. de Kooning's portraits, and the new exhibition includes rarely seen works on loan from the artist's estate and from family members/Photo by Patricia Leslie

At Elaine de Kooning's birthday party March 12, 2015 at the National Portrait Gallery/Photo by Patricia Leslie

At Elaine de Kooning's birthday party March 12, 2015 at the National Portrait Gallery/Photo by Patricia Leslie

A man in black (subject for the artist?) at Elaine de Kooning's birthday party March 12, 2015 at the National Portrait Gallery/Photo by Patricia Leslie

At Elaine de Kooning's birthday party March 12, 2015 at the National Portrait Gallery/Photo by Patricia Leslie

The Dolls, and Sean Lane and the Bay Jazz Project made music at the Elaine de Kooning party at the National Portrait Gallery, and this energetic gal with a bobbing head slashed her fiddle with a force to stun and silence the crowd/Photo by Patricia Leslie

William Wordsworth would have been proud of these golden daffodils at Elaine de Kooning's birthday party March 12, 2015 at the National Portrait Gallery. The colors match the yellows in Ms. de Kooning's JFK portrait on loan from the Harry S. Truman Library in Independence, Missouri/Photo by Patricia Leslie

What: Elaine de Kooning:  Portraits

When: Now through January 10, 2016.  The National Portrait Gallery is open from daily from 11:30 a.m. - 7 p.m.

Saturday, March 21, 2015, 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.:  Women's History Month Family Day, Kogod Courtyard

Friday, April 17, 2015, 12 p.m.: "In Her Own Light:  Liz Rideal on Elaine de Kooning."  Ms. Rideal from the National Portrait Gallery, London, is the author of How to Read Art (2015), and she will lead a tour of the de Kooning show.

Where: Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, 8th and F streets, N. W., Washington, D.C. 20004

How much: No charge

For more information: 202-633-1000 or visit the web site

Metro station: Gallery Place-Chinatown or walk 10 minutes from Metro Center

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