Terry's Tiny Critique of Critics Criticizing Criticism - A Tanz FEED at the Lovable Warhorse Cafe

I'll get to Terry's Tiny Critique in a minute because I want to show you the Warhorse Cafe. Most of you have never seen it and some of you never heard of The Goat Farm Arts Center.

On Tuesday night Daniel Fuller - Atlanta Contemporary, Laura Relyea - ArtsATL, Karen Head - Atlanta Review, and Chuck Reese - Bitter Southerner talked art criticism, music criticism, literary criticism, food criticism, and criticism criticism thanks to Tanz Farm.

They are nice. They are feisty. They can be nice and feisty - the way they were Tuesday night bless their hearts. These folks put ideas into words. We are fortunate to have them.


The Warhorse Cafe is the Goat Farm's living room.


It's funky and flexible and multipurpose. It's got sofas and lamps, art and tchotchkes AND an indoor bathroom. Here's Jordan Stubbs who I joined in the outdoor SRO section.


I'm not so good at sitting quietly.


Daniel Fuller - Atlanta Contemporary is in the black shirt right hand to ear. Chuck Reese - Bitter Southerner is in the orange "T" giving the secret palms-down-crooked-finger-splay gesture.


Karen Head - Atlanta Review has right hand to chin and red boots (cool). Laura Relyea - ArtsATL has her Heineken in hand. Atlanta's artists and art fans fill the room.


Joe Dreher and AJ Robinson joined Jordan and me outside. Nice to meet you AJ.


The view from one of the dirtiest windows in town.

Finally, Terry's Tiny Critique:

I'd enjoy another kind of culture meeting. I want our art experts to talk mostly about art, to do it regularly, to be a bit ritualistic, a bit less open-ended. I want to get to know the art as we get to know the experts and the community.

Thanks so much. It's a pleasure to be here.

I Love the Back Side Most - Neel Reid 1915

I'm showing the backside of this Neel Reid because it felt great. More like this please.

All these houses are collaborations but in Atlanta they distill down to "It's a Neel Reid." And there is definitely a thing about them. I visit "Neel Reid's" when I can thanks to friends who tell me about estate sales and open houses.

This is the only chance I'll get, just an hour or so. Should I go back on the last day of the sale or stick with my first impressions? I returned.

Here's the street view.


Sold now. Overgrown. I bet Neel would do some trimming. We Atlantans do let our plantings go (except for butchering our Crepe Myrtles).

A little of the back, just a tease:


Where life happens.


With embracing shapes that hug the garden and hug the people.


The kitchen and back steps are in here.


This is the epitome of Neel Reid to me: Dotted "i" over a sturdy box in an open gable, the corner-boards read as columns under the returns. This is less but "less" is complicated.


Imagine 101 years of family at this door: All the groceries hauled in, all the dogs let out. Curvy corners in the lattice harmonize the curvy fan light.


Sleeping porch above. People attractor below. Chunky cornices with details galore. What do you call those asterisks? They animate everything.


When folks walked out here, they paused and sighed and many sat down. Me too and on both days. The doorway opens to the big formal living room.


Bill told me if it's in the architecture, you don't need to decorate..

(See Tara Dillard's: What Makes a Garden: Vanishing Threshold.)

I wish you could see it yourself.

One more tease before I go.


There's a house in the back of the back.