A Short Jaunt to Buffalo

This was our fourth visit to the city of Buffalo, NY.  However, our last visit was in 1983.  Yes, you read that correctly.  We only live about five hours away, but we have not visited the city in over 30 years!  Back then we were drawn to Buffalo by the Albright Knox Gallery, one of the nation's distinguished art museums.  This time it was art again that took us back, but to a newer gallery across the street from the main one.

Our visit was a short one, consisting of Friday evening and Saturday up to just beyond the noon hour. There wasn't much time for anything except a brewpub and the art exhibit we came to see.  We crossed the river from Fort Erie on the Peace Bridge, and not only was it toll-free, but we got right up to a customs booth.  The custom inspector was very friendly and we were soon downtown and at our hotel.  We stayed at one of those big, anonymous hotels that are usually too expensive.  Adams Mark Hotel is right downtown, and we snagged a good internet rate. Our room was lovely, very comfortable, had great views eastward from our sixth floor room, and it turned out to be very quiet, too.  Full marks for this place!

Five minutes walk from the front door is Pearl Street Grill and Brewery.  Located in a beautifully restored old canal-era building, this place was hopping on a Friday night at 6:30 pm.  However, we got in and were seated immediately.  There were good veg selections on the menu, and the beer list was very appetizing.  I ended up having three 10 oz glasses of their beer.  I began with this one:

Scotch Ale  6.5% ABV                      

20 SRM  10 IBU's  FG 1.024

A staff favorite, this big, sweet, chewy scotch ale goes perfect with turkey dinners and the first snow fall.  It's not a strong beer, it's just a Wee Heavy...

It was rich and tasty, just what I wanted!  My second glass contained this one:

Street Brawler 
Our Oatmeal Stout, Street Brawler is dark and roasted with flavors of chocolate and black coffee. It is hopped with traditional English hops that together with the oats serve to round out the edges and give this beer a smooth finish.

Again, it was full-bodied and filled with flavour.  It is worth brawling for.  After dinner (I had a ten-pound bean burger; Deb had a huge salad) I enjoyed this minty treat:

Chocolate Stout  Street Brawler's smooth, dark, richness is accented by the sweet fullness of chocolate.

I took a wander around the place.  There were a lot of private parties going on.  The building is old and full of magic, and there isn't a bad seat in the house.  There are four floors of mayhem (at least on a busy night).  Highly recommended for hungry and thirsty visitors!

Beer board at Pearl Street Grill, Buffalo

Next morning, after a breakfast of oatmeal and bagels and tea at a downtown Starbucks, we made our way to the gallery.  We drove up Elmwood, a very fun street filled with shops, parks, good houses, people and cars.  We stopped at a pet store before continuing on to our destination.

2014 Buffalo Skyline shot, from Wikipedia.  Our Adams Mark Hotel can be seen in the right corner, a long, low gray building just above the brown one in the very corner.

The Burchfield Penney Art Center is a place we have been wanting to visit for a long time. Home to the largest collection of paintings by Charles Burchfield, they had a special exhibit on of his landscapes, many of them borrowed from other museums for this show.  He is one of the greatest American painters of the 20th C., though he was nearly drowned out by the likes of Jackson Pollock and other modern artists.  This museum and their exhibits go a long way in restoring his position as one of the foremost artists of his time.  We had recently seen over a dozen of his works exhibited in Detroit (DIA, permanent collection), and were ready for more. It was a great show, small in scale ( 3 rooms, though containing 88 works) and we were the only people there on Saturday morning!  Talk about a private showing.

Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo.  It is right

across the street from the Albright Knox Gallery.

Entrance to the art center, showing the poster for 

the exhibit we would see today.

The exhibit held many breathtaking works, some of them quite large.  I have included a few of my own (flashless) photographs of some of the works that appealed to me, but by no means all of them.  The really interesting thing about Burchfield is that his journals are as interesting as his paintings.  The two, in fact, should be taken together.  We purchased the catalogue, as well as another picture book of some of his greatest works.  I am amazed that the Detroit works are virtually unknown; they are of extreme high quality.  Likely due to their fragile nature (watercolours) and the fact that they were just recently on display explains their absence in this show.

Late Winter Dawn, Burchfield

Spiro Collection, NY

East Wind and Winter Sun, Burchfield

Baltimore Museum of Art

Deserted Miner's Home, Burchfield

Burchfield Penney Art Center

The Glory of Spring, Burchfield

Burchfield Penney Art Center

Night Hawks at Twilight, Burchfield

Flint Institute of Arts, MI

Early Spring, Burchfield

Burchfield Penney Art Center

In spring 2015 there will be another exhibit of Burchfield's works here at the Art Center, and we hope to attend.  That exhibit will focus on his attempts to put sound into his pictures, and the techniques he used to accomplish this effect.

We left the gallery just before noon (it opened at 10 am) and headed to the University Heights district for lunch.  Deb had found out about Amy's Place diner on-line before our departure. Though it serves meat, it is a very vegan-friendly place, the best one in Buffalo.  We had a great lunch, and there was so much to choose from.  It's best described as a little hole-in-the-wall; it's an old-fashioned place, but it was bustling and very popular with locals.

Amy's Place, Buffalo.  We enjoyed a great lunch!

Right after lunch it was time to head back home.  The next day was to be our all-day Winter Solstice event at home, and we wanted to be in early tonight to make final preparations.  It was a sunny and mild day, and the drive was uneventful except for a major sneezing and sinus attack that came upon me halfway home, one that continued until bedtime.  Go figure.

Mapman