Art is Hard: The Salvador Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, FL

The Dali Museum, a grandiose hull of glass nodules and steel adjacent to a marina in St. Petersburg Florida. Only a few years old, the powers found it necessary to destroy the former Dali Museum in order to erect a new one, not for efficacy reasons but for aesthetics alone. Our friend Danielle with whom we were staying told us this trend is increasing along the waterfront to the point where locals have begun protesting the destruction and recreation of a shoreline site called The Pier, simply because some find it outdated, at the behest of taxpayer dollars and the possible malnourishment of the pelican population. Why fix what isn’t broken? Because we can afford it, goddamn it!

In the lobby of the museum sits a remake of Dali’s Rainy Taxi, which by the insertion of a dollar bill into a slot causes simulated rainwater to pour through the interior of the automobile, soaking both the molding mannequin in the backseat and the shark-headed chauffeur. The original exhibition included chicory plants and live snails which crawled across the plastic woman. Its pay-per-play remake did not.

Snails not included.

As a tribute to the artist who was quoted once admitting a love for everything gilded and excessive, the institution exists solely to serve to the upwardly mobile their monthly helping of culture, celebrating the depraved opulence of the allotted few and not the collection of one of the greatest creative minds of the 20th century. It is, as with the yacht club or the golf club, a place to be seen and to socialize, a spot to nibble on cheese plates and sip $7 glasses of low-rung wine at the commissary and not to engage in a sensory experience with the present art. They are shopping, plugged in to their headsets, their faces saying “This one would look lovely in the pool house. Do you think they take checks?”

The appeal exists because Dali’s work is different enough to earn culture points but not outwardly shocking enough to spark real, introspective thought among these people, fighting their twanging discomfort in front of a wall-length portrait mocking the crucifixion of Christ or a topless portrait of his wife and muse Gala at the kitchen table. Anything more intense and they would barf into their Hermes handbags.

Their mentality is disturbingly appropriate as the collection itself began as one of the largest, private collections of the artists’ work in the United States, owned by a big-money couple from St. Petersburg who began collecting in 1943. The now amassed 1,500 works consist of still lifes of fruit bowls and landscapes of the artists’ hometown from his early art school days and the extravagant, absurd masterpieces he labored over in the final years of his life.

The art is exquisite and it is striking to see his works in person, many of them taking on varying shapes and meanings when viewed from different distances and angles. The motifs running throughout - the silhouette of the Venus de Milo, Gala,  melting clocks and globes - are traceable when viewed as a massive, live portfolio, witnessing his transition from student to artist, discovering his sense of Surrealism around the time he met idol Pablo Picasso.

Migrating through the mingling browsers - if you have the stomach for snobbery - there’s something hysterical about people fantasizing about art they’ll never own or even really understand. They’re more interested in what’s in the gift shop and who’s at the snack bar, anyway. We cannot help but wonder what Dali would have thought of such a clash - the very people he sought to satirize and shake out of complacency, quietly gazing at his works as though they were at the Sistine Chapel. Would he love it? Would he hate it? The answer is not one or the other, nor does it lie somewhere in between. It is in fact a trick question: he would probably pull the fire alarm and wait outside to spray patrons with a hose.

I Love The Dead: The New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum

I might as well come out and say it, as if we didn’t make it obvious enough to anyone and everyone we have talked to since our jaunt through the South, but Alexa and I both loved New Orleans. LOVED it. One of the things we admired the most about it was the amount of acceptance and assimilation that has taken place there. It still has its problems, and we saw a few sketchy characters – like the kid rolling a blunt in Armstrong Park who also huffed some blow off of the back of his hand, or the man with the bloodied face filling out a police report on the “other” side of Elysian Fields – but ultimately, it is one of the most welcoming places in the world.

What makes it so welcoming? It is just as easy to point to the colorful buildings – the marriage of diverse architectural styles and shockingly bright colors make New Orleans a psychedelic experience* – as it is to the broad culinary palate that existed in NOLA (word for the wise: no one down there calls it the Big Easy. Nobody.) long before the foodie explosion of the early Aughts. Let’s not forget the ever-present sounds of music, usually performed live on a street-corner, that also pulls you in. What I think makes New Orleans so enticing is not the architecture, the food, or the music – although those are all added values.

It’s the people.

As a town driven in no small part by year-round tourism, its biggest draw is no doubt the party atmosphere. Second only to Vegas, NOLA serves as a venue for typically demure businessmen attending a sales convention, virginal bachelorettes, and good timer frat boys to get completely and utterly shit-faced. We are talking just totally ruined, as in puking into the nearest catch basin at four in the afternoon, after debasing and embarrassing themselves along every inch of their downward spiral to this point.

This is where the locals come in.

Conscious as to why so many people flock to New Orleans – and after all, where else can you publicly double-fist tumblers filled with daiquiris? – the locals are understandably wary of out-of-towners. Some, as we witnessed, are downright mean to the stumbling drunks on Bourbon Street, and to our delight, especially since New York City’s tourism industry is regarded as a sacred institution. For the out-of-towner seeking more than the gratification of their id, expect – after some initial curtness – to meet the nicest people in the world.

Such was our experience with John T., the resident psychic and clerk at the New Orleans Voodoo Museum. Sitting behind the counter in a cloud of incense smoke and with the piercing eyes of a mystic, John presented an intimidating presence. With its location in the heart of the French Quarter, on Dumaine Street between Bourbon and Royal, John no doubt sees his share of tourists who treat the Voodoo Museum (or at least its front room, since there is no admission fee for that) as though they were on safari. When we came in and asked questions about the cost of tickets, the test began.

“Tell me,” he asked, in a Southern accent that was both charming and slightly discomforting, “what are your signs?”

“Capricorn and Cancer.”

John’s eyes widened.

“Capricorn and Cancer?” He sat back and folded his arms, shaking his head slightly. “Oh, that is a match made in Hell.”**

He went on to ask us about our interest in Voodoo, picking our brains to make sure we weren’t just there to treat something he takes so seriously like a joke. I told him we were interested in studying religions and belief systems, and that we were particularly fond of rituals, images, and objects held sacred by them. With a glint in his eye that was somewhere between an avuncular twinkle and a spark of Hellfire, he told us that what the museum featured was good and well, but that what he had in his third-floor apartment upstairs was something different altogether.

Raising his eye-spark with one of my own and a half-smirk, I asked what we would find upstairs?

“Oh, I have things up there that would send you running into the street.” He returned the smile, no longer trying to scare us but instead playfully teasing. “You wouldn’t last five minutes!”

With that, we passed the test. It is only left for us to speculate how other people would carry on during this psychic game of poker, but I would imagine the visitors being much more stand-offish. John smiled and told us about the museum: it was founded in 1972, that he himself is the resident psychic as well as a practitioner. He also added a fair warning for us before we entered the museum.

“Anything you see involving body parts or animals is not there for the fear factor. It is there because these are things used in Voodoo ceremonies and rituals. They are used because Voodoo believes God is present in all living things.”

And it is on that note that we present our own photos of the Voodoo Museum:

Baron Samedi, left, and the Rougarou, a Cajun variant of the werewolf, on the right.
The New Orleans Rougaroux has a much better ring to it than the Pelicans, don't you think?
It would certainly make for more interesting merchandise.

Voodoo has its origins in the folk religions of West Africa.

Historically, to allow Voodoo practitioners to hide in plain sight, Catholic saints were used in place of Voodoo spirits.

There is a unique reverence for the dead based more in celebration and ancestor worship, rather than fear.

Part of a display case depicting Voodoo symbols (the rainbow snake on the back tapestry represents God) and offerings.

Voodoo offerings made in Saint Louis Cemetery No. 1.
Different offerings mean different things: makeup signifies romance, jewelry signifies the desire to seduce, lottery tickets signify wealth and prosperity.

After the museum, we had a nice conversation with John, during which a group of tourists came in, doing exactly what we thought they would do: they took pictures, asked how much the museum cost, lied that they “might be back,” and then promptly left. There is a lot more for us to share: our conversation with John, where he told us just what he had upstairs, the walking tour itself (led by Jerry Gandolfo, historian and brother of the Voodoo Museum’s founder), and an encounter with a Voodoo priestess in her temple (where she quoted Bobby “Blue” Bland and told me I was a seeker with an old soul – so yes, we got along swimmingly), but you’ll have to wait for the book for all of that.

* It is worth noting that neither of us have been to San Francisco – but we’ll get there.

** We look forward to one day telling our kids about the best compliment we ever received, and it will be the time a psychic in New Orleans said we were "a match made in Hell." (It sure beats the time a drunk in the East Village asked me if Alexa was my sister.)

Trompe le Monde: Two New Orleans Icons: Napoleon House & Café du Monde

In keeping with the sometimes-we-do, sometimes-we-don’t tradition of dedicating a post to somebody, I would like to dedicate this entry to my dad, Eric DiBlasi Sr., with whom I first explored New Orleans in 2009.

This marked Alexa’s first time to New Orleans and my second, which allowed me to both revisit many of the same restaurants, shops, and other sites of interest from my first visit, while also doubling as a guide through my favorite place in the world. The afternoon we arrived, we dropped our bags off at the hotel and drove into New Orleans proper. I took us right to Napoleon House, at the gorgeous intersection of St. Charles and Chartres Streets, and one of many places where my father and I ate during my first trip to New Orleans four years earlier.

Napoleon House is a building with history literally etched into its walls, with the bricks visible beneath the cracked plaster. For a town that is already distinctly different from the rest of the United States (Voodoo historian Jerry Gandolfo called it “the north coast of the Caribbean,”) walking into Napoleon House is like stepping into a European bistro, albeit with a tropical climate.

Both times I ate there, I kept it simple and classic: red beans, rice, and sausage. No frills, no bullshit, nothing fancy. A staple of New Orleans cuisine, it is the perfect blend of flavors and textures. Words are barely enough to describe it. When done right, red beans and rice is a food experience that borders on the divine.

On my recommendation, Alexa ordered the muffuletta sandwich. An often-overlooked fact about New Orleans is that it boasts the largest Italian-American population in the United States. The muffuletta is an invention of Sicilian immigrants, featuring layers of meat (mortadella, salami, and ham) and cheese (provolone and mozzarella) on muffuletta bread, topped with a slightly spicy olive tapenade. The bread is somewhat like focaccia, thin and soft, and topped with sesame seeds. To soften the cheese – and also to make it into a melty bite of Heaven – the sandwich is usually served warm. Most restaurants will offer the sandwich in quarter, half, and full-sized portions. Measuring ten inches across, the full-sized portion is a lot of sandwich.

If the food is among the best things I ever ate (apologies to Alton Brown), then the atmosphere is even better. Featuring both indoor and outdoor seating, it is an ideal spot to enjoy a good meal, coffee and dessert, or to just sit back with a local favorite (Pimm’s Royal is highly recommended) and people-watch while listening to the classical music played over the house speakers.

We didn’t order it this time around, but when I visited New Orleans with my dad, I enjoyed the cassata (spumoni ice cream served with jelly and cake – a true delicacy) while my old man indulged in one of his favorite things on the planet, after Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, 1950’s sci-fi B-movies, and his Fender Mustang: the cannoli. Regardless of what you do there, no trip to New Orleans is complete without stopping by Napoleon House and just soaking in the atmosphere – but be sure to order something among all the soaking.

Just a short walk away from the Napoleon House is Café du Monde, one of the better known dining spots in the French Quarter, famous for their beignets and traditional New Orleans style coffee. The beignets, deep fried pastry fritters topped with powdered sugar, arrive steaming hot to the table under a large green and white striped canopy in pure French flair. The café au lait is another local must. The coffee beans are roasted with chicory, giving a peppery flair to your morning coffee. While Café du Monde is one of the more touristy spots, it is worth the visit. The beignets and café au lait make the perfect mid-afternoon snack or ending to a day in one of America's coolest cities.