Seagull/Talking Heads, Villu Jaanisoo, 2006 It was certainly an eye opener for me to see the permanent collection of the KUMU. As if that wasn’t enough, I was also treated to the Latin American Art temporary exhibition with works by Diego Rivera and Fernando Botero. On this post, I’ll show images from the permanent collection only as there was quite a lot of Latin art on display that merits a separate post. Come back to read all about it. Villu Jaanisoo is a sculpture graduate of the Estonian Academy of Arts where he also served as the head of the Department of Sculpture in the 2000s. He uses non traditional materials for his sculptural pieces like rubber, plywood, sound and others. In the Seagull installation, he took 86 busts of children, heroes, Stalin from the Museum collection to create a roomful of “heads” backed by an archive of interviews conducted with these subjects playing on repeat and creating a cacophony of sounds in the exhibition room, hence the moniker Talking Heads. ...
Dinner is served I heard a lot about Din Tai Fung through friends who had the chance to eat at one of their restaurants worldwide. Then when I was in Taiwan, I found out that Din Tai Fung has its roots in Taipei. First there was a cooking oil business which later expanded in 1972 to include a small shop with four tables serving noodles and dumpling soup. The birth of Xiao Long Bao drew many more diners to their shop. One evening while in Vegas, I finally had the chance to try some of Din Tai Fung’s menu offerings, thanks to my sister who invited me to dine there. We ordered cucumber salad, shrimp fried rice, chicken wonton soup, string beans with garlic and red bean xiao long bao for dessert. This spread fed three people. It was plenty. Everything was delish but the best tasting dish of the lot was the garlic string beans. This is the entrance to Din Tai Fung Vegas where you can observe the dumpling makers at work. The art of making Xiao Long Bao is like this: it is handcraf...