From Abstracts to Tintypes: Passing the Brush to Margaret Muza
On March 24, Pamela Anderson revealed her collection of art produced during her residency at The Pfister. The Pop-Up Gallery was alive with color and conversation before the pièce de résistance, the unveiling of her Legacy piece, which will soon grace the hallway next to the legacies of the former AIRs: Reginald Baylor, Katie Musolff, Shelby […]
FOOD AS ART: Pamela Anderson’s Legacy Dinner
When I first wrote about the Pfister Hotel Artist-in-Residence Pamela Anderson a little over a year ago, I contrived a letter from her to me, written from a plane: Dear Dominic, I’m writing this from 28,000 feet. Soon, I will touch down on the hotel’s carpeted runway and disembark in my new studio-for-a-year. I haven’t met […]
A Room With a View: Afternoon Tea at Blu (Finally!)
(Suggestion: Play while reading.) It is no wonder that Blu has been named the Best Hotel Bar in Milwaukee by OnMilwaukee.com. But it’s not only their thirst-quenching selection of premium cocktails that earned them this billing–or their stunning views of downtown and Lake Michigan, or their bookings of some of the hottest jazz and other […]
That’s a Big Clock: Robin and the Polish Moon
Robin Campbell, The Pfister Hotel’s house carpenter for eight years, retired two years ago. But he came back for Gallery Night last Friday to see the work of his friend Stephanie Barenz, the Hotel’s fifth Artist-in-Residence (AiR), as well as the work of the other AiRs past and present. When she arrived, she described him in […]
Getting HAPPY at The Pfister: A Story of Loss and Recovery
Suggestion: Turn up the volume on your device, click play, and prepare to get happy! One of the many privileges of being human is that we experience emotions. While some might argue that other creatures express emotions, too, or that it’s not much of a privilege that we have to experience the painful ones, no […]
Gallery Night: Interpreting the Textures in Our Lives
It is what it is. Perception. It is what it is not. Metaphor. My mother used to like to recount how one day in preschool, a classmate approached me and asked me, “What are you?” Yes, “what” not “who.” As my mother and teacher eavesdropped, I’m told that I (and this is all my mother, […]