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ikpopwriting · 3 years

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Seoulmates

BTS x Reader

Word Count: 1,780

Series Masterlist

Chapter Ten: Houston…

A/N: This is later than I planned and a lot shorter than I wanted, but it got deleted TWICE, so before it happens again, here we are

You knock on the door of your soulmates’ dorm urgently, glancing around you to make sure you’re alone. You hitch your computer bag higher on your shoulder, your foot tapping on the hallway floor. It opens a few moments later, and you meet Yoongi’s confused eyes. He says your name as he steps out of your way, allowing you into the now familiar space. Hoseok and Namjoon are sitting on the couch, Jimin and Taehyung are snuggled up on the loveseat, and Jin is sitting in one of the armchairs as he runs his hands through Jungkook’s hair where he sits on the floor in front of his eldest hyung. All eyes turn to you, varying degrees of confusion, concern, and happiness flashing across their faces.

“We have a problem.”

“What problem?” Namjoon asks, and you can practically see the wheels starting to turn in his head. You take the seat between him and Hoseok and pull your laptop out of your bag.

You pull up the picture Mason had showed you this morning, zoom in slightly, and sit back as you motion to the screen. “That. That’s our problem.”

All of them gather around to look at the screen, Jimin, Taehyung and Jin standing behind the couch while Jungkook scoots across the floor for a better viewpoint. Yoongi stands beside Hobi. The room seems to be fill with tension as they take in the picture; as what they’re seeing registers.

Jimin gasps. “That’s my soulmark,” he says in disbelief.

“Part of it, anyway,” Jungkook comments from the floor.

“How did we not notice this?” Namjoon asks.

“We’re so careful…” Hoseok trails off, staring at the photo.

On the screen is a picture from their most recent concert: Jimin smiling at Yoongi, his hand on his hyung’s shoulder while the elder talks to the crowd. There, on his wrist where his jacket sleeve has ridden up, is the triangle tip of his soulmark.

“Where did you find this?”

“Someone sent Mason a link to it on a fan site. It’s the only one, but rumor mill is already churning with theories,” you tell them. “He wants me to go back through all the pictures I’ve taken and see if I can find signs of a mark, hidden or otherwise.”

Jimin’s quiet for a moment, before he hits the back of the couch. “Fuck!” He runs his hand through his hair, beginning to pace. “All these years, and I ruin everything in one night.”

“Jimin, calm down.” Namjoon crosses his arms. “We’ll figure this out.”

“Can you make it go away?” Yoongi asks you, eyes hard. Not towards you, you know. Towards the situation. “Can you get him to leave it alone?”

You sigh. “Without him being suspicious, I tried. The magazine is hoping for something exclusive, though, so he’s like a dog with a bone here. He’s going to pursue it.” You meet Jimin’s eyes. “Be prepared for questions about it the next time he interviews you.”

He sighs, nodding. “Thanks for the warning.” He stops pacing and walks over to the door, sliding his socked feet into a pair of shoes. “I’m going to the gym.” He’s out the door before anyone can say anything.

“I’ll go after him,” Jungkook offers, getting to his feet. He looks at you. “He’ll calm down after he works out the frustration.”

“It’s not like this is the first scandal we’ve dealt with,” Jin says as Jungkook slips out the door, placing a hand on Namjoon’s shoulder. “So it’s a little closer than we’ve come to being outed—we can handle this, too.”

Namjoon smiles at him, placing a hand over his and squeezing. Yoongi sits on the arm of the couch beside Hoseok, who leans his head into his side. Taehyung looks lost in thought, but absently strokes your hair from his place behind the couch.

“If I come across anything in my photos, I’ll edit them. I don’t know how much more I can do, and if Mason compares the ones I’ve already sent him with any I edit—“

“Don’t jeopardize your career, doll,” Yoongi says.

“Can you send this to me?” Namjoon asks. “I need to let the company know.” You nod, and email the picture and the fan site link to him.

Then, a voice in the back of your mind starts speaking, and you bite your lip. “You know…I’ve been wondering what will happen when we’re through with the dates?”

All eyes are on you again, but it’s Taehyung who speaks. “What do you want to happen, angel?”

You furrow your brows. “What do you mean?”

“He means it’s up to you, sunshine.” Hoseok smiles at you. “Whether you want to keep it a secret, or want to tell the world, it’s up to you.” He places his hand on your knee. “We’ve kept each other secret so long, we wouldn’t mind it either way, not now that we’ve found you.”

You meet the eyes of the others in the room, and see that they all feel the same. Your heart constricts; not in a painful way, but in an emotion you can’t place. It’s warm, and fuzzy, and feels like love—but it’s too soon for love, isn’t it? The hand on your knee gently squeezes your skin, and you look up.

“You don’t have to decide now,” Namjoon says. “Take your time. Finish the dates, and then…”

“Then?”

Jin smiles at you. “Then we’ll talk.”

You return his smile. “Okay.”

It’s late when you leave the dorm, and the two maknaes still haven’t returned. Everyone assures you that Jimin is fine, just upset at himself, and that if anyone can help him get out of the dark headspaces it’s Jungkook. You went through several photos with them, all of you searching for a flash of black on a wrist or writing on an arm, but find nothing. Hoseok was right; they’re careful. It makes you wonder how they messed up now, after so many years of hiding the truth from the world. It seems almost…suspicious. You shake the thoughts away. Even if it was someone trying to expose them, how would you prove it?

~*~

Your phone rings the next morning as you sit at the desk in your suite going through photos. Namjoon’s name shows on the caller ID. “Hello?”

“Bang wants to meet with you; sometime in the next two days, preferably.”

Ice courses through you. The head of the company himself, requesting your presence. That can’t be good.

“I can come today. What time?”

There’s talking on the other end, before he answers you. “Can you do lunch?”

You nod as you answer. “Lunch is good.”

“Great, we’ll see you then.”

You hang up and stare at your phone for several moments. What could Bang Sihyuk want with you, personally?

You’re distracted as you resume your inspection of the photos, the meeting in the back of your mind. You spend longer than necessary on several, simply because your mind is elsewhere.

Right before noon, as you’re finishing getting dressed—in all black, you realize—the front desk calls up that your car has arrived. You thank the woman, and grab your wallet and room key. You hurry to the elevator, accepting thanks from your neighbor for the bouquet once again. Once inside the steel contraption, you try to control your breathing. You’re so nervous, your hands are shaking.

Once in the lobby, you’re approached by Minjun, the assistant you met that first day with the boys, who escorts you out to the awaiting car. He sits up front with the driver, leaving you to sit in silence in the backseat. Silence that allows your fears and insecurities to fester on the ride down to BigHit. What if Bang Sihyuk forbids you from being around the boys any longer? Though there are laws against separating soulmates, the entertainment industry is a whole other world with its own set of rules. Someone like Bang Sihyuk could ruin your career before it’s even started, if you don’t agree to his terms. Even if the boys have done nothing but reassure you that your fears are the last thing that will happen, you can’t keep them away.

By the time the car parks in a spot and cuts off, you’re near crying. Minjun opens your door as you hastily compose yourself, and he gives you a reassuring smile.

“Right this way, Miss.”

Your trip up to Bang’s office is similar to the other times you’ve been to the company, only the elevator ride is significantly longer. You can’t help the thought that the building seems to have grown taller, for surely it doesn’t take this long to reach the executive floors? You’re tapping your foot slowly, measuredly, the whole time, and catch Minjun giving your foot a glance at least twice. He offers no words, though, and you’re unsure if you welcome or detest the silence. When at last the elevator doors open onto a new, unfamiliar floor, your breathing has quickened. Not enough to worry about, but noticeably so.

“It’ll be the door at the end of the hall,” Minjun informs you. “Just knock, and go in.”

You nod. “Thank you.”

The elevator doors close again before you move. Your feet are leaden as you slowly make your way down the hall, counting each step as you work on your breathing. The worst that can happen is your career is over, you remind yourself over and over. He wouldn’t jeopardize the success that is BTS.

Would he?

“You know, if you walk any slower you would be going backwards.”

You jump, heart lurching into you throat, and spin around. Yoongi stands leaned against the frame of a doorway that you could have sworn was empty a moment ago, smirking at you with his arms crossed. He pushes off the doorway when you don’t say anything and stands in front of you.

“Doll, relax. Nothing bad is going to happen—to any of us.” He smiles reassuringly at you. “Relax,” he repeats, and your shoulders lose some of their tension, his voice soothing your worries. He holds his arm out to you, and you slip your hand into the crook of his elbow, hoodie warm against your chilled fingers. “You’re not alone, either. Namjoon and Jin are already inside. I was waiting for you.”

You swallow. “Okay. I can do this.” You shake your head, clearing away the unhelpful thoughts. “Let’s go.”

He leads you down the rest of the hallway and opens the door for you, motioning you inside.

“Ah, there she is,” Bang’s voice greets you. “Come in, come in. We have much to discuss.”

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route22ny · 3 years

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With Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations spiking around the country, dreams of a summer like those many us had in mind just a short time ago have faded.

The fully vaccinated have been told to resume wearing masks indoors. Companies and institutions are leveling vaccine mandates. And some municipalities are requiring people to show proof of vaccination to get into restaurants, bars, and gyms.

Confusion abounds about what is safe to do. (For the unvaccinated, there’s no confusion about what’s most important to do: Get immunized.)

To try to cut through the fog, STAT contacted three dozen epidemiologists, immunologists, and other infectious disease experts around the country to see how they are navigating the risk of Covid in these uncertain times. Twenty-eight responded.

STAT didn’t ask these experts to explain how they would advise others. Rather, we asked them to answer 10 questions — saying yes, no or only if masked — about their own willingness to engage in various activities, assuming they were vaccinated.

Their answers suggest that, with the highly transmissible Delta variant spreading, caution prevails. Those who know viruses best aren’t buying many movie tickets, and most aren’t eating indoors in restaurants.

But in other ways, responses diverged. And at least one expert suggested that geography really does matter when it comes to his own comfort level. Naor Bar-Zeev, a statistical epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, declined to respond to all but one of the questions, saying answers are highly dependent on the circumstances of a place.

“In a place where most people are unvaccinated, or otherwise at high risk, and where there is active transmission, I should act more conservatively and with greater caution, even though I am protected from disease,” he said. “In a place where most people are vaccinated, and there is low transmission, one can be more permissive.”

Let’s unpack their answers.

Of the questions, only one earned a unanimous response: “Would you send your unvaccinated child to school without a mask?”

“Lord, no,” Paul Offit, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, replied. “NO!!! As a parent and a pediatrician, that is a terrible idea,” wrote Andrew Pavia, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Utah.

None of 27 people who answered this question expressed a willingness to send an unvaccinated child to school without a mask. Carlos del Rio, a professor of epidemiology and global health at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, said he’d withdraw an unvaccinated child from a school if it didn’t have a mask mandate.

Children under the age of 12 cannot yet be vaccinated as none of the vaccines has been authorized for use in this age group.

The other school-related question — “Would you send your vaccinated teen to school without a mask?” — drew almost as fervent a response, with 24 of 26 saying no.

Ellen Foxman, an immunologist at Yale University, was one of the exceptions. “Yes, if the high school had a high vaccination rate/low Covid transmission rate and my family had no high-risk personal contacts,” she wrote. “If the school required all students and staff to be vaccinated, I would have no problem whatsoever with no masks.”

Pavia gave a nuanced answer for his support for masks for vaccinated teens. “If the vaccinated kids don’t mask, the unvaccinated are unlikely to mask and there is a risk of bullying. Masks for all is much more likely to work,” he wrote.

Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, said he not only wouldn’t allow a vaccinated teen to go to school without a mask, he’d demand the teen wear an N-95 respirator. Cloth face coverings aren’t enough to combat Delta, he insisted.

Shane Crotty, an immunologist at La Jolla Institute of Immunology, said he’d send teenagers to school with masks, but would be okay with them taking them off around friends outside of school or during an outdoor lunch break.

When the experts were asked whether they would eat indoors at a restaurant, responses were slightly more mixed. More than half of respondents said no, but six said they would, or would in off-peak hours, and three more said they would do it but would wear a mask when they weren’t eating.

Saad Omer, director of Yale’s Institute for Global Health, said he would eat indoors in a restaurant that required customers to show proof of vaccination. “I generally feel safe indoors in a restaurant as long as underlying community transmission is low and I’m eating with other vaccinated people,” wrote John Brownstein, an epidemiologist and chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital. “However, I always prioritize eating outside where possible.”

That approach no longer seems viable to Syra Madad, senior director for the special pathogens program in the NYC Health + Hospitals network. “More than 95% of Americans live in areas of high or substantial community transmission so it’s no longer a matter of ‘Yes, I’ll eat indoors if I’m in an area of low community transmission,’” she wrote.

It seems like we’re over DIY hair — or so the answers to the question of whether the experts would go to a hairdresser or a barber shop would suggest.

All but four respondents said they would go to a hair salon or barber at this point even if they didn’t know the vaccination status of other clients. And even one of the four more cautious respondents allowed that she might consider it. “No, but if we are all far apart and there are few people I might with a mask,” said Krutika Kuppalli, an infectious disease physician at the Medical University of South Carolina.

Most people who said yes did so with the caveat that they’d wear a mask. Jesse Goodman, a professor of medicine at Georgetown University, said he would go only if he and everyone else in the place was masked. Akiko Iwasaki, a Yale University immunologist, said she would try to reduce the frequency of visits. But Jeanne Marrazzo, director of the division of infectious diseases at the University of Alabama in Birmingham, was in favor of professional hair care in general.

“I know how careful my hairdresser has been,” Marrazzo wrote. “She also needs financial support; my hair also needs it.”

Would the experts go to the theater to see a film? Seventeen said no.

“Non-essential,” said Shweta Bansal, whose Georgetown University laboratory studies how social behavior affects infectious disease transmission.

Florian Krammer, an immunologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, in Manhattan, believes most people who are fully vaccinated are well protected at this point. He would go to see a movie wearing a mask.

Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease physician and a senior scholar at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, has a different view on Covid risks than some of the other people STAT polled. He (and others) believe Covid is going to become endemic — we’re going to have to learn to live with it. For fully vaccinated people, Adalja said, the risks even from contracting Covid are pretty low.

“That fact makes me comfortable as a fully vaccinated individual without underlying health problems to resume my pre-pandemic life because I am risk-tolerant and I know that if I am to get a breakthrough infection it is likely to be mild,” he said. Adalja said yes to all but two of STAT’s questions; he would not send an unvaccinated child to school without a mask and would not currently give a second dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

William Hanage, an epidemiologist in Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said he’d happily skip going to the movies, but his wife enjoys going. So he would go, wearing a mask.

There was almost an even split among the experts to the question of whether they would attend a large outdoor concert or sporting event, with a slight edge going to the “yes” side. Most of the 15 people said they’d do it if masked.

Robert Wachter, the chair of the University of California, San Francisco’s department of medicine, said he’d don a mask “if shouting people [were] at very close range.” Jason Salemi, an epidemiologist at the University of South Florida, said he “would not attend a large outdoor concert right now,” stressing the amount of Covid transmission in his state at the moment.

Move a mass gathering indoors and the answers shift. In response to the question of whether they would go to an indoor wedding or other religious service — one where they did not know the vaccination status of the other attendees — more of the experts said no.

Saskia Popescu, an infectious disease specialist and assistant professor in George Mason University’s biodefense program, for instance, would go to an outdoor concert or sporting event, masked. Even with a mask, she would not attend an indoor wedding or religious ceremony.

Emergency physician Uché Blackstock, founder and CEO of the consulting firm Advancing Health Equity, said she’d forgo indoor and outdoor large gatherings at this point.

We asked two questions about travel: “Would you travel to a part of the United States experiencing a surge in Covid cases?” and “Would you go on a non-essential international trip?” Surprisingly, there was slightly more willingness in the group to travel internationally than to domestic Covid hot spots.

In response to the former, Peter Hotez was succinct. “I’m living it,” said the Hotez, co-director of the Texas Children’s Center for Vaccine Development, based in Houston-swamped Covid-19.

Del Rio, who lives in Atlanta, goes frequently to Miami to visit his son and his son’s family. “I am very careful when I travel,” he said. Since the pandemic began he has twice visited his mother in Mexico, “but at this point I am not going. May go later in the year,” he wrote.

Carl Bergstrom, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Washington, said he wouldn’t travel abroad now. Not because of Covid directly, but because he might get stuck somewhere if travel restrictions were instituted. Hanage and his family vacationed on Cape Cod this year instead of taking a planned trip to Iceland, for the same reason.

Nahid Bhadelia, director of Boston University’s Center for Emerging Infectious Diseases Policy & Research, said she would not travel to an American Covid hot zone if she could avoid it, but would travel internationally, if her destination had a high vaccination rate and a low transmission rate.

Angela Rasmussen, a coronavirus virologist at the University of Saskatchewan’s Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization, said she would travel to a location in the U.S. having an upswing in Covid transmission, but would do it using precautions. As for international travel, “depends where, but masked,” she said.

Our final question was for the physicians in the group was this: “Would you recommend that patients who received the one-dose J&J vaccine get another dose of vaccine?”

Crotty, the immunologist at La Jolla Institute of Immunology, said yes; he tweeted recently about his support for giving J&J recipients an extra dose of vaccine to cope with the Delta variant. “I have had physicians emailing me thanks about my [Twitter] threads on this,” he said.

Megan Ranney, an emergency physician at Lifespan Health System in Providence, R.I., said she’s waiting for guidance from the Food and Drug Administration. “But in the meantime, I certainly wouldn’t judge anyone who does get another dose.”

And Helen Keipp Talbot, a vaccine researcher at Vanderbilt University, pleaded the Fifth. Talbot is a member of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, which advises the CDC on vaccination policy. “No comment,” was her reply.

***

About the Author: Helen Branswell

Senior Writer, Infectious Disease

Helen covers issues broadly related to infectious diseases, including outbreaks, preparedness, research, and vaccine development.

@HelenBranswell

***

source: https://www.statnews.com/2021/08/17/whats-safe-to-do-during-summers-covid-surge-stat-asked-public-health-experts-about-their-own-plans/

#life during covid #infectious diseases #vax up #coronavirus pandemic #covid-19

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path-of-my-childhood · 4 years

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Taylor Swift, An Icon Forever And Always

By: Sabriya Imami for The Michigan Daily Date: October 5th 2020

I was seven years old when “You Belong With Me” came out, and it still gives me an indescribable rush of sheer happiness. It’s the song I play in the car with the windows down, letting everyone else on the road share my joy. It’s the song that I dance around to in my pajamas, feeling like I’m at a concert. Every time I hear it, I have to stop what I’m doing to give it the devotion it deserves.

That’s how I feel with every Taylor Swift song. That’s how so many people feel with every Taylor Swift song.

Barbara Walters once said “Taylor Swift is the music industry.” She said this in 2014, after Taylor’s record-breaking album 1989 was released. Six years later, Taylor Swift is still the music industry. She’s released eight albums since the beginning of her career, and they’ve nearly all broken records. From her self-titled debut album to her most recent, surprise release folklore, she has never let the world down.

It’s a shame, though, because the world has let her down on more than one occasion. From accusing her of writing only about her ex-boyfriends to the #TaylorSwiftIsOverParty to losing her master license over her recordings to having beauty standards forced on her that led to an eating disorder, the world has let her down because the world wants to hate Taylor Swift.

What makes her amazing, though, what makes her a true icon, is that she rises above it all. She forgives, but never forgets. She proves the world wrong. When the world said that she relies on the talent of others to write her own songs, she released self-written Speak Now (my absolute favorite album of all time). When the world said she was “just” a country artist, she released 1989, for which she became the first female artist to win the Grammy’s Album of the Year award twice. When the world turned on her and called her a snake, she embraced it and released reputation. When the world said that she could only ever be a cookie-cutter pop star, she released the indie folk album folklore, which has led her to surpass Whitney Houston’s record for most weeks at number one on the Billboard 200 charts. Taylor Swift sits among the most revered stars.

She refuses to let herself be torn down by haters or the media. As she herself said during the 1989 World Tour before her performance of her song “Clean,” “you are not the opinion of somebody who doesn’t know you or care about you.” And she’s not. The number of haters Taylor Swift has is the same number of people who refuse to give her a chance. They see a talented, young female star and refuse to give her any of the credit she is due.

The people that do love her — her fans, her Swifties — have never just sat by and let the world tear her down. And in return, she loves them. Taylor Swift invites her fans to her house and plays them songs before an album’s release. She bakes them cookies, sends them Christmas gifts, shares inside jokes on Tumblr. How many artists do that? How many artists let their fans into their homes, into their hearts, the way she does?

At the core of her being, Taylor Swift is an artist. Her songs, her words are, for lack of a better word, iconic. So many people have proposed to their significant others while “Love Story” was playing. So many people’s 2014 and 2015 Instagram bios read “darling I’m a nightmare dressed like a daydream.” Everyone knows that when you turn 22, it’s your “Taylor Swift Birthday.” So many people declared 2020 saved when folklore came out.

She has proven time and time again that she doesn’t need the flashy concerts, gorgeous music videos or vast number of awards to be successful. She needs her voice, her songs and her fans. Taylor Swift appeared at the (socially distant) 2020 Academy of Country Music Awards to perform the song “betty.” That award show had more viewers than the 2020 VMAs despite the fact that country music isn’t a widely-listened-to genre. The other performers played a part for sure, but it hardly seems a coincidence that the first time she showed up at the ACMs in seven years was the time that millions of people tuned in. She sat on a stage with her guitar, accompanied by a harmonica player in the background, and just sang. There was no audience, no light-up bracelets, no showmanship. It was just her, happily returning to her country roots. And she still managed to capture everyone’s attention.

That’s the power of Taylor Swift.

#love writers that are T-Swift fans <3 #The Michigan Daily #article #about taylor #taylor swift #through the years #folklore era

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rengiyuus · 7 years

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im rlly talkative today but the fact i went to miami to see kard again lksdjfsdf is just nuts like Firstable. how did i even get my parents permission to do so

#i cant even go to the store by myself bc they dont trust me to + im extremely anxious but ljksdfsdf #i went to miami ?????#i didn't explore much bc i was dead tired n where we stayed was Not Pretty n just reminded me of my old home #in los angeles #but Wow ???#n LKJSDFSD the fact pattie also saw kard again but in ny is so funny bc we both talkd about seeing them again #n were just like Yeah. Lets see them again #but SDFSDF tbh</3 ill always prefer the houston concert bc it felt a lil more free #n kard seemed to be able to do more in their first tour #but AAAAA #idk i lov kard n im glad they're the first group i've been able to see and meet twice!#jp #non bap #also i noticed today i haven't been like....having thoughts about oding ?????? since the concert bc ive just been so happy #n usually thts just a constant thought in my mind so im glad they help me feel idk a lil more sane #oding ment /

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1-800-iluvhockey · 2 years

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hey hey!! for your talk to abbster day (which I love so much) my question to you is.... what is the best/favorite concert that you have been to? (love ya bestie)

OHMYGOSH

okay okay I’ve been to a fair few concerts in my short life time:

one direction - where we are tour (w/ZAYN & 5SOS)

taylor swift - fearless & rep tours

bon jovi

etc etc

but my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE

was …….

tame impala - the slow rush tour

it was PHENOMENAL AND OVERALL A 100/10 experience….. it made me feel like I was in another dimension 😫 I have loved his music for so so long so when I saw him it was amazing.

a runner up is my HSLOT Houston concert!! it got cancelled twice so that’s the only reason why it’s not first!! (and he didn’t play tbsl, medicine or anna LOL)

#abbster answers #thank you anon <33 #talk to abbster day !!!#concerts r the best and one of my faves ever

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gagosiangallery · 3 years

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Frank Gehry at Gagosian Beverly Hills

May 27, 2021

FRANK GEHRY Spinning Tales

June 24–August 6, 2021 456 North Camden Drive, Beverly Hills __________ When I built the first model of the fish, I saw in it the movement that I was looking for. It was startling that a static object could express motion in such a dynamic way. —Frank Gehry Gagosian is pleased to present Spinning Tales, an exhibition of new work by renowned architect Frank Gehry. It pairs large-scale elaborations on the Fish Lamps series with a new installation, Wishful Thinking (2021), and is Gehry’s eighth exhibition with the gallery since 1999. Celebrated for his groundbreaking architectural designs, Gehry has also produced significant bodies of sculpture and furniture, from Easy Edges (1969–73) and Experimental Edges (1979–82)—chairs and tables made from layers of corrugated cardboard—to bentwood furniture items designed for Knoll (1989–92). The Fish Lamps evolved from a 1983 commission by the Formica Corporation to utilize ColorCore, a type of plastic laminate. After accidentally breaking off a shard of the material, Gehry was inspired by its scale-like appearance; molding wire armatures into piscine forms, he affixed ColorCore fragments to them. In the main gallery, three outsize, internally illuminated Fish Lamps sculptures are suspended from the ceiling in dynamic, twisting poses, as if swimming through water. In these works, Gehry has used polyvinyl and copper for the first time. These central forms are surrounded by lively, colorful sculptures that are more baroque in their ornamentation. While these sculptures are autonomous works, the “perfect form” of the creature that they emulate reappears throughout Gehry’s architectural oeuvre, lending itself to the undulating profiles of buildings including the Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain (1997), and the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles (2003).

Filling the upstairs gallery is the immersive installation Wishful Thinking, based on a scene from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Gehry renders the Mad Hatter’s tea party as a group of ten surreal figures, twice life-size. Fashioned from brilliantly painted metal, Gehry’s abstracted interpretations of Carroll’s original characters surround an internally lit table, the glowing heart of the scene. Three overlapping woven steel “tapestries” of trees evoke the episode’s forest setting, while a mirror on the opposite wall implicates the viewer. The crumpled surfaces of Wishful Thinking’s figures establish a new visual connection with some of Gehry’s best-known designs. Frank Gehry was born in 1929 in Toronto, and lives and works in Los Angeles. Collections include the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain; and Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Ultimo, Australia. Solo exhibitions include Frank Gehry, Architect, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2001); Centre Pompidou, Paris (2014); and Los Angeles County Museum of Art (2015). Awards include the Pritzker Architecture Prize (1989), National Medal of Arts (1998), and Lifetime Achievement Award from Americans for the Arts (2000). Gehry’s buildings include the Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, Germany (1989); Guggenheim Bilbao, Spain (1997); Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles (2003); Dr Chau Chak Wing Building, University of Technology Sydney (2014); Facebook headquarters, Menlo Park, CA (2015); Luma / Parc des Ateliers, Arles, France (2021); Philadelphia Museum of Art, PA (2021); Children’s Institute Inc. Center, Watts Campus, Los Angeles; and Judith and Thomas L. Beckmen YOLA (Youth Orchestra Los Angeles) Center, Inglewood, CA (forthcoming, 2021). _____ Frank Gehry, Fish on Fire, 2021, copper and steel wire, 43 × 24 × 24 inches (109.2 × 61 × 61 cm) © Frank O. Gehry. Photo: Joshua White

#Frank Gehry #Gagosian

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