Today took my students to Jackson Heights, where we ate paan and they did a scavenger hunt involving tasks like finding out the names of spices and deities,

then we went to PS 1 and saw many wonderful works, including Jon Kessler’s “the palace at 4 a.m”. — video machinery tour de force, like a wildly updated Nam June Paik in bed with Survival Research Laboratories and Jean Tinguely — cameras everywhere, sometimes the viewer in the images, sometimes cameras trained outside the building on, for example, a giant video screen billboard showing ads –huge images of war and fashion and kabuki actors and hideous luxury and spattering blood — dazzling.

Also Johannes VanDerBeeks amazing 3-D model city in ruins made entirely of newspaper, delicate shapes cut out with an exacto knife and different depending on viewing angle, detailed and horrifying in its news imagery. Brilliant.

Then went with Alan Davies to see another Naruse film: Echo (Yama no Oto) — poignant as first raindrops or whatever — beautiful. Alan said, I could watch that again. And I said — three times!

So much good input today. Thrilled to be here.