The New Santa Fe Pens and Pen Show

Strange how these Missives go; I had two subjects all planned out and then I could not get the material so I am writing about my third activity this weekend which I actually wrote about two years ago ... The Santa Fe Pen Show.

This year the Pen Show moved.  One of the shopping malls within walking distance of the center of town has been bought by a charter school, Santa Fe School for the Arts so all the shops there had to move or go out of business.  Happily Santa Fe Pens, owned and run by Neal Frank, decided to move.  Not as convenient, being a hike from the center is a much larger mall called de Vargas, named after Don Diego de Vargas (1643 – 1704), a Spanish Governor of the New Spain territory of Santa Fe de Nuevo México,  the mall however, has become a bustling place thanks to a number of additional shops and activities.  To put on a show Neal must expand beyond his new intimate shop into the aisles of the mall.  In this case I can describe the location as unlike any place in in New York City.  It is opposite the gun shop!

Neal Frank far right

Fountain pens are anachronistic today but as said in my last Missive on this subject they have taken the place of my pipe, which was a warm “feel-y” in my life.  A friend, learning of my newest addiction, commented. “but don’t you get ink on your hands?”  Yes, you do and in fact I am typing with a purple middle finger right now (all the better to express myself with!) but it does eventually wash off.  The sensation of writing with a fountain pen is quite different from a ballpoint or roller gel.   It is like the difference between an automatic and manual transmission in your car. 

Santa Fe Pens sells all models, ballpoints, rollerballs, and fountain pens.  One can get  different nibs for the fountain pens in fine, medium and broad and sometimes with additional permutations like a nib for calligraphy: it’s fun to try different ones.  A broad nib is more for signatures and a finer nib more appropriate for taking notes.

At the Pen Show the tables are decked out with pens from many different makers.  Neal Frank, only invites distributors who work with him and many, such as, Parker, Waterman, Pelikan and Cross, don’t have representatives any more and work through on line companies.  Buying a pen that you have not held and cannot try first makes no sense to me.  Is it too thin? too thick? does it write smoothly?  All questions I want answered before I spend more that a few dollars on.

I had recently bought a rather expensive pen so I went having decided that I was just going to look.  It is fun and educational to speak with the distributors to find out about their pens and compare various models.  But then I spotted an all-wood pen, a material I loved in my pipes as well and I could not resist.  I bought a Delta, a brand that I am not sure I had heard of before and was sure it must be made in the American mid-west but no, it is made in Naples, Italy.

I find it interesting that in Santa Fe, with a population of some 70,000 (which can reach 2 million if we include tourists in peak season) Santa Fe Pens still exists after 20 years, while in New York, with a population of some 9 million (not including tourists) the number of pen shops where you can buy fountain pens has been reduced to one.   All the chain “stationery” stores such as Office Max, Office Depot and Staples say on line that they carry fountain pens but that is on line, not in the stores.   By the way I have also found that the pens I buy at Santa Fe Pens are usually similar or cheaper in price than on line and the experience is much more satisfying.

A Secret Society Laid Open

There is a large impressive building in Santa Fe called The Scottish Rite Masonic Temple.  While all buildings in the historic district of Santa Fe have since been mandated to be adobe brown, Masonic Temple which was built in 1912 in a style recalling the Alhambra in Seville, is painted pink so that it will glow at dawn and dusk.

I never knew much about the Masons other than that they are usually referred to as belonging to a secret society.   We learned that this is something that they vehemently deny.   In fact, when we went to the Temple on a Saturday it was after a well advertised and reported invitation to see the building and learn about Freemasonry.  We were rather curious knowing that many of the Founding Fathers such as, George Washington, James Monroe, Benjamin Franklin, John Hancock and Paul Revere were Freemasons.

We had actually been in the building a few times for theater productions in their beautiful auditorium that retains Moorish decor and original painted sets. We have even been at a birthday party and a graduation party in the in the large reception rooms,  still it was with some surprise when we learned that our friend Doug Ottersberg is a Freemason and he was one of the “educators” for the afternoon.  He explained that when he came to Santa Fe 22 years ago to start a business here, knowing no one, it was the best way to get connected.

It is not known where or when Freemasonry began.  The oldest known document, however, is the Regius Manuscript dated around 1390 and thought of as a Masonry Constitution.   I like, however, the explanation that it started with stone masons who were free to travel and work where needed and in order to identify themselves they used passwords to prove themselves legitimate.  Those passwords were the first secrets of the Masons.

The motto for a Freemason is “Making a good man better”.  The goal of the organization, as it was told to us. is to help a good man become a better member of his family and his community. There are only two prerequisites to becoming a Mason: being a free-born man and believing  in a supreme being.   Religious denomination does not matter and I was told that there are many Jewish and Catholic Masons in New Mexico.  In other words, a slave could not be a Mason nor could a woman or child since they were also considered property in days of yore.   There are, however, Masonic organizations for women as well.

Their meetings take place in “Lodges,” of which there are two in the newer, detached building on the Temple grounds.  A mock meeting was held in one for the visitors that Saturday.   There were various ranking officials.  The lowest being a Junior Steward, then in order come Senior Steward, Junior Deacon, Senior Deacon, Junior Warden, Senior Warden...and the leader is the Worshipful Master.   These officials sit in designated positions in their Lodge, with the senior officials seated at the South and West sides and the Grand Master at the East, each on chairs, either one, two or three steps above the regular members who sit around the room.  An altar at the center of the large room has a holy book on it corresponding to the faith of the Worshipful Master In the case of the demonstration we were given it was the Senior Deacon who knelt before it to open it.

Not everything was explained to us.  Obviously, some things must be kept secret, but why no answer was given to a question as to what two globes above and to the right and left of the Deacon or Steward sitting in the West was beyond me.  One mystery was explained to me: the Logo of the Freemason is the compass and the square two instruments of architects with a ‘G’ in the center.  The ‘G’ as I understood it is for God and Geometry, though it is translated differently in different places.  Masons wear the symbol on a lapel pin.  Doug Ottersberg explained to us that his daughter could go up to anyone anywhere in the world wearing that pin and ask for help.

To sum up-- the program that was given out to the attendees that Saturday was headed, “Masonry is a beautiful or peculiar system of morality veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols.”

Inuit Art

It is amazing how short a time social media such as Facebook  has been with us and it has totally changed our lives.  More than once have I been introduced to people “virtually”.  The first time it happened I wasn’t even sure what it meant.  A dealer from New York met a collector from Santa Fe in Paris and knowing I lived there introduced us by email.  If I had gotten a phone call or letter that someone from Santa Fe had been at the fair I would not have wanted to get in touch for fear of imposing.  Yet, we have now become friends in Santa Fe.

It happened again last year when a wonderful Cherokee Basket weaver, Shan Goshorn sent an email saying in part, “Please may I introduce a friend of mine to you? Like you, he is an astute collector who also writes about native art and the art world. He is a retired teacher from NYC where he still resides and will attend Indian market next month, I believe for the first time.”  His name is Edd Guarino.   We did not meet that summer though we did correspond through email.  A couple of weeks ago, however, he came into the Ralph T. Coe Foundation, where I volunteer, brought by a friend of the Foundation President, Rachel Wixom.  He had come for the opening of an exhibition of works on paper from his collection of Inuit Art showing at the Museum of Contemporary Indian Art (MOCNA).

I became aware of Inuit Art when I visited my son, Danny, in Traverse City Michigan.  Needless to say, we went to the local museum, The Dennos, and their strongest collection is from the Baffin Island area of Nunavut, Canada.  It includes a 1,000 prints, sculptures, drawings tools and textiles.  Funnily enough I only remember prints and drawings in black and white.   There is probably much more but nothing else there particularly intrigued me.

I was most pleasantly surprised when Edd took me into his exhibition,  "Akunnittinni: A Kinngait Family Portrait".  There was color everywhere and fascinating subjects.  The exhibition offers a visual conversation between an Inuk grandmother, mother, and daughter – Pitseolak Ashoona (1904-1983), Napachie Pootoogook (1938-2002), and Annie Pootoogook (1969- ).   The matriarch bore her husband 17 children had to bring them up on her own after he died.  She settled in Cape Dorset where she was a pioneer draughtsman creating 9,000 drawings within 20 years!   “Family Camping in Tuniq Ruins”, 1976.  stonecut and  stencil, lent by Dorset Fine Arts, is typical of her intricate works of art.  I must say that I needed the title attached though I am sure that a Native would have understood the symbolism.

Pitseolak was encouraged to concentrate her art on community rather than the individual “Migration Towards our Summer Camp”, 1984, lithograph lent by Dorset Fine Arts,  if you like me were brought up on the East Coast think of an Indian camp not summer camp in Maine.  This is one of her last works and reminds me of the African-American Migration Series by Jacob Lawrence.

As in so many Native Families it is not just one member who is an artist but it becomes a tradition and even a dynasty of artists.  No exception here.  Many of Pitsolak’s progeny became artists and one of her daughters Napachie Pootoogook is represented here.  I love this lithograph of 1989 titled, “Nascopie Reef”  from Edd’s collection who supplied the following 3 images.  We don’t need any more information to realize how dangerous that reef is and of all the boats that have broken up on it.  The remaining images are courtesy of Edward J. Guarino.

I wrote the last paragraph before receiving the backstory, which Edd sent me: “Nascopie Reef documents an historic episode in the life of Cape Dorset residents.  The people of Cape Dorset depended on the supply ship Nascopie to bring them goods to get them through the winter.  In July, 1947 the R. M. S. Nascopie hit a reef off Cape Dorset.  The citizens of the town rushed out to the ship to try to get as much off of it before it sank, knowing that it carried the only supplies they would see all year.  Without them they could not make it through the winter.  This event was so traumatic that it is still vivid in the minds of the people of Cape Dorset so much so that a number of artists have created works that reference this incident.” I thought this an excellent example of how if the work of art is successful the history is not necessary though it helps to expand our knowledge.

Napachie’s daughter Annie is more involved in family than community.  The drawing of her grandmother, Pitseolak, is a woman we all know instinctively.  It is a sympathetic portrait of an older person.  Do note the child peeking in on the right side in this image of everyday family life “Drinking Tea”.

My last image by Annie, “Couple Sleeping” 2002-2003, a drawing with pencil, crayon and ink, shows a major progression in style using color as much as draughtsmanship  to depict the scene.  Gustav Klimt at the beginning of the last century used color similarly to form his subject.

I am asked why I continue to do these Missives week after week numbering well over 300 by now and there are two simple answers.  One is that if I stop even for a week I feel I may never start again and the other is that every week I am able to learn something new or at least get a fresh insight into another world.

Lloyd Kiva New

Lloyd Kiva New (1916-2002) is not a name I was familiar with on the East Coast.  Yet, when he died in 2002 the New York Times devoted substantial space to his obituary.

In honor of the 100th anniversary of New’s birth there are currently 2 exhibitions in Santa Fe about his work with a third coming later this year.  They are at the Museum of Contemporary Native Art (MOCNA), ““Lloyd Kiva New: Art, Design, and Influence” and at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture (MIAC), “A New Century: The Life and Legacy of Cherokee Artist and Educator Lloyd “Kiva” New”.

Lloyd New was a Cherokee born in Oklahoma.  He was an artist, a designer and a teacher and graduated from the prestigious Chicago Art Institute in 1938, taught at the Phoenix Indian school for a while, then in 1941 enlisted in the Navy.  In 1946 he opened his own design studio and named it Kiva Studio.  He also included it in his name.  He built up a wealthy clientele and became known for his handbags, clothing and printed textiles throughout the 1950’s.  Here is an image of New with an IAIA student ca. 1965 from the IAIA archives.

Lloyd Kiva New in the textile printing studio with IAIA student
c. 1965, IAIA archives

It was as a teacher, however, that he had the greatest influence having started with Dr. George Boyce the Institute of American Indian Arts  (IAIA) in Santa Fe.  IAIA was founded in 1962 under the Kennedy administration first as a high school under the Bureau of Indian Affairs.  It became a Congressionally chartered two-year college in 1986 offering associate degrees in Studio Arts, Creative Writing and Museum Studies.  Today, it is full fledged college where you can get a BA & MA.  Some of the most important Native American artists and writers have gone there.  To name just a few, Dan Namingha, Fritz Scholder, David Bradley, Doug Hyde, Allan Houser, Charles Loloma,  and T.C. Cannon.

New was first Director of the Institute then President from 1965 to 1978 when he retired, only to go back in 1988 to guide the school through its separation from the Bureau of Indian Affairs.  In 1989 when he was honored as a Santa Fe Living Treasure, he said about the school, “It should add to its vision--its goals, its objectives—an obligation to help every student who goes there to make a good living.”

The exhibition at MOCNA was curated by 3 different people for various aspects of the show they are Rose Marie Cutropia, Tatiana Lomahaftewa-Singer and Ryan S. Flahive. The MOCNA installation is dense with materials and immerses one in the artists work.  The extremely impressive main gallery has over 30 textiles designed by New’s students in the 1960’s and 1970’s.  There is also a computer device where one can design one’s own textile on a large screen.

Another section of the show is a mock-up of the Kiva Studio with small chests of drawers, which one can open and see images, clipping and some of the hardware that went on the shirts or handbags which surround you in the room.

The third part of the show is devoted to the watercolors.  His images of World War II are poignant indeed.  Unfortunately, I do not have any to illustrate but if you are in Santa Fe before July 31st you can go see them for yourselves.

The MIAC exhibition which is curated by Tony Chavarria, Curator of Ethnology, is sparser and simpler allowing one to focus more closely on the artist’s work.  Rather than bunching a group of handbags together they just show one or two in a case.  It is less razzle-dazzle and more contemplative.  This is a case of handbags photo taken by Jason Ordaz from the MOCNA exhibition while MIAC might show a single handbag with a scarf. Here is one photographed by Blair Clark.

My favorite piece in either show is at MIAC it is a shirt with horses that has buttons designed by Charles Loloma who is among the most widely known of Native American artists.  When my wife was curator of 20th century decorative arts at the Metropolitan museum in the early 1980’s we were invited to view a trunk show that Loloma was holding in a New York Fifth Avenue apartment.

Photo credit: Blair Clark

Photo credit: Blair Clark

These exhibitions are eye openers to Native Fashion a hot subject at the moment with a much acclaimed show at the Peabody Essex Museum called, “Native Fashion Now”.  The artists  themselves, however, do not want to be known as Native, but as designers, as well they should be.

The Portraiture of Anthony van Dyck

The Frick Collection in New York has been doing more and more elaborate paintings exhibitions and this may be the most ambitious yet.  About 100 works by Sir Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641) in a show called, “Van Dyck: The Anatomy of Portraiture,” is opening on March 2.  It will be the first major show in this country devoted to his work in two decades and the Frick will be its only venue.  To achieve this they will use their small drawings & sculpture galleries downstairs, the Rotunda and adjacent gallery on the main floor.

It is not that surprising that the Frick undertook this project since van Dyck was a favorite of Henry Clay Frick and the museum boasts 3 engravings and 8 paintings by one of the world’s greatest portraitists.  Van Dyck often recorded the well-known artists of his time and here is one from the Frick Collection of around 1620 of Frans Snyders (1579-1657) best known for his hunting and market scenes and as a master of still life.

Photo by Michael Bodycomb

The curators for the exhibition are Stijn Alsteens, Curator, Department of Drawings and Prints, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Adam Eaker, Assistant Curator of Northern Baroque Paintings in the Department of European Paintings, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and formerly Guest Curator at The Frick Collection.

In Stijn Alsteens’ article titled “Portraitist’s Progress” he quotes the art critic Roger de Piles in 1708, “The greatest perfection of a portrait is extreme likeness.”  Compare that to what the American painter Gilbert Stuart had to say of portraiture, “What a business this of a portrait painter - you bring him a potato, and expect he will paint you a peach."  Clearly the portraitist must achieve both so that the sitter and viewer are satisfied.

Anthony van Dyck showed his talent from his youngest days.  At about the age of fourteen was probably a student of the already famous Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640).  At the age of nineteen he became the master’s chief assistant in the artist’s large workshop.   Van Dyck went on to great success in Italy and then was called on to become painter to the court of Charles I (1600-1649) in Great Britain.  He arrived there in 1632 and was there till his death in 1641.  In that time he managed to paint 260 portraits many of which were full length.  He too must have had a very well organized studio. 

I would think that one of the most difficult achievements for an artist is to paint a self-portrait.  It brings to mind Shakespeare’s line, “to thine own self be true.” and here is his uncharacteristically small self-portrait done at the age of fourteen or fifteen from the Gemaeldegalerie in Vienna and an almost full length self-portrait done five or six years later from the Metropolitan Museum of a young man but there is no mistaking that it is the same but more mature person.

The lack of surviving detailed studies on paper for his painted portraits suggests that van Dyck mastered the technique of being able to begin by sketching his sitters’ features directly on the canvas of the finished work.  Where there are related chalk sketches the focus is pose and drapery , with the faces barely defined.  There is, however, one drawing in the show that I found particularly appealing from the Frits Lugt Collection which Lugt left to his Fondation Custodia, Paris.  It is an informal depiction of François Langlois playing a Musette  believed to have been done in 1641, the last year of van Dyck’s life.  Langlois was an engraver, publisher and art dealer as well as an accomplished amateur musician.  Van Dyck and Langlois probably met in Italy when they both lived there some twenty years earlier.

There is a lovely little picture, an oil sketch from the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh of “The Princesses Elizabeth and Ann. Daughters of Charles I” from 1637.  Anne died of Tuberculosis in 1640 and Elizabeth died in 1650.  Their mother was convinced that the latter died of a broken heart after the execution of her father.

If I may end on a personal note and thank the author Adam Eaker for his statement from the catalog in the chapter “A Taste for van Dyck”.   He acknowledges the role of the market in art collecting and art history.  In the last paragraph he writes about a self-portrait by van Dyck bought by a Los Angeles collector that was not given an export license from England and was finally bought by the National Portrait Gallery in London thanks to a public appeal.  Eaker writes, “The attempt to preserve national patrimony necessarily clashes with a global art market in which paintings by van Dyck continue to command high prices, yet both demonstrate the artist’s enduring appeal”.

Out of Africa

We went recently to a film, titled simply “SEMBENE”, that I would not have bothered seeing if we were not friends with Jason Silverman, the co-writer, co-director, and co-producer.  He was also credited as being one of the cameramen on the film.  He is well known in Santa Fe as director of Cinematheque, a division of the Center for Contemporary Arts which also includes a Kunsthalle and a public arts program.  His made-in Santa Fe documentary has been on numerous “best of 2015” lists, among them New York Magazine , RogerEbert.com, and it is a top contender for the Cannes Camera d’Or best first feature .

The film is about Ousmane Sembène  (1923-2007), author, filmmaker and activist from Senegal.   Jason met Samba Gadjigo, Sembène’s biographer, when, as editor of a film magazine, he commissioned an article on Sembène.  In Jason’s words, “Sambène used his camera as a weapon better than anyone I can think of ... I then invited him (Gadijigo) to co-curate a festival of African cinema I was producing and curating in Santa Fe. He brought a series of Sembène films to Santa Fe and we had the opportunity to talk about Sembène’s life and work. I found Sembène’s life to be incredibly dramatic and worthy of documenting.”  Here we have a picture of Samba and Jason together.

Sembène was the son of a fisherman who never made it past 5th grade.  Senegal was a French colony and he served in the French free forces led by Charles de Gaulle during World War II. Later he went to Marseilles where he was a dockworker for a decade.  In 1960 when Senegal became independent he went home.  While he was in Marseilles he wrote several books but when he went back he wanted to make films.  He wanted to reach the mostly illiterate population of his country.  He received a scholarship to the Gorky Film Institute in Moscow.  When he left there he had only two problems, no equipment and no funds, but it doesn’t seem to have stopped him.  He became Africa’s first filmmaker and director.

He finally did acquire a 16 mm camera and made 3 short films one of which was “Niaye” (1964) denouncing the hypocrisy of traditional African Chiefs.   Sembène used his artistic talents to attack injustice wherever he saw it and his first full-length feature was “La Noire de …” translated “Black Girl”, 1966.  It was about a Nigerian woman hired by a white French family as a domestic, all alone in a strange world she was taken advantage of by being continually hounded to do more and more house work and given little in return.  Here is an excerpt from Black Girl:

Each of his films exposed one kind of injustice or another.  One went up against the African bureaucracy, another the French military, and another the corrupt African business community.  In the words of Jason Silverman, “when he attacks the Islamic leadership and by extension, the President of Senegal which is beholden to them…he has bitten every hand that fed him.”  Therefore there was a long hiatus in his movie making.  During his lifetime Sembène made only nine films.

The documentary “SEMBENE” does not depict a man you want to sit down and have a beer with but someone driven by his sense of right and what should be.  He never seems to have lost the idealism we all have when we are young, before cynicism sets in!

Samba Gadjigo is a professor of French at Mount Holyoke College and according to Mount Holyoke’s website his research focuses on French-speaking Africa, African Cinema and particularly the work of filmmaker Ousmane Sembène.  Gadjigo sought out his hero and they became good friends.  Gadjigo even accompanied him on a world tour to meet many celebrities and other famous people in the movie industry.  After Sembène’s death  Gadjigo launched a project to  restore and re-master his films and keep alive his memory.

This all brought back memories of the early 60’s when I was a young idealist and wanted to learn about Africa.  I looked in my library and found a couple of college text books from that time and my history of Africa course.  Remember this was just in the middle of the civil rights marches and sit-ins.    By 1965 most of the countries had been liberated and changed their names.  A bit like, the New Mexico pueblos that have gone back to their original native names.

I asked Jason how and why he got involved with this project and he replied, “I have always been interested in how our stories - our culture - impacts the way we lead our lives, and in this age of commodity-driven storyteller, am concerned about how we are being taught to be consumers rather than citizens or community members.  Any storyteller who uses their art as a means of resistance is to me a hero.

The Souper Bowl

A while ago I was asked by a friend whether I was going to the Souper Bowl and replied that I was not because I had no particular interest in football.  She then explained that it was not the Super Bowl but the Souper Bowl.  Sounds the same but is spelled differently.

There is a charity in town called the Food Depot which is a Food Bank.  In other words they accept food donations, financial donations and manpower in order to bring people in need surplus food from all possible sources:  food that is near it’s expiration date, food that is not selling as expected. Think of the restaurant that thought they would sell 200 chicken dinners in a week and only sells 150.  Today there are 250 Food Banks across the country that have literally given billions of pounds of food to those who might otherwise go hungry.  The Food Depot in Santa Fe collects the surplus food and distributes it to 145 partner agencies that feed people in need.

Like every not for profit they look for all possible ways to raise funds and out of that in Santa Fe came the Souper Bowl.  Chefs  from all the restaurants in town are invited to apply and the first 30 who do are asked to prepare their favorite soup.  Then from 12 to 2:30 pm on a Saturday afternoon the week before the Super Bowl (no conflict) they all turn up in the convention center and serve samples so the public can vote on their favorites.  People pay admission of $30 for adults, $10 for children  (children under 5 are free) so it amounts to an expensive lunch but you do get fed, have helped the hungry and have fun.  It has become a true community event.  I have never seen so many people in the convention center at once with about 1400 participants and a 100 volunteers.  Compare that with a food benefit in New York, at least the ones that reach the social pages where people pay from $500 to $2,500 dress to the nines and sit down for a gourmet meal.  Which seems more appropriate in reaching out to those who are hungry? 

Inside the convention hall it was a mob scene but you could quickly see which were the more popular restaurants because of the lines in front of their tables.  We knew a number of them but by no means all and we could think of some that did not participate.  When you walk in you are given a bag with a pen from a local bank, a napkin a very small spoon and a card from which you tear off tickets to put in the box of the chef who had your favorite soup over all and one in 4 categories, Seafood, Cream, Savory and Vegetarian.

Going from table to table I slowly came to the conclusion that there can be too much of a good thing and began to pace myself and not go to every single restaurant.  Some people, however, take it all very seriously and sit down at the many tables and chairs supplied and rate every single soup and then vote on what they considered the best soups.  For me, if I could remember it after an hour of sipping and slurping it must have been very bad or very good.  I find in so many things people disagree with me even though I know I am right .  So it was with soups.  I spoke to another friend afterwards who said she hated the soups that I thought were the best.

There was one interesting phenomenon in my mind.  There is a new Indian Restaurant in town called Paper Dosa.  It is one of the few Asian cuisines that I am not a big fan of and so I did not stop at that stand.  They were also at the end and I was quite full and the tortilla soup I had tried last was the worst I had ever had.  My wife, however, was raving about it so I said, this will be my last soup and gave it a try.  To my amazement, I really liked the Curry Leaf Corn Soup they had prepared and everyone I spoke to afterwards had voted for it as I did.  That was the only soup that I voted for that won in its category.

 Next year I think I will come up with a more methodical plan for tackling the Souper Bowl.

The chefs are asked to supply their recipes for the soups they present and my friend had the job of gathering them for a cookbook that is a loose leaf containing the recipes for the soups made over the last few years.  When I asked my wife if we should buy it she said, “I don’t make soups” which, upon reflection, is true.  We open a can!  Seriously, however, what a fabulous resource if you do consider yourself a cook, if not a chef.