Project A.R.T.
Today I had lunch at Joel Robuchon with my friend, GC. We sat at the table on the right shown in this publicity shot for the restaurant:
The interior was mostly comprised of mahogany and rosewood with suffused warm lighting and contrasting orange-red accents in the shape of jars of pickled red chili and carrots. I noticed that on the walls next to us were raw spices, sealed in by glass panels to look like Modernist Art. This was pretty neat.
Food-wise, I had the langoustine fritters to start and then lamb cutlets with mash as my main. Both were perfectly cooked and delicious, and it struck me how the fritter casing was almost the same as a Chinese spring roll’s. [Btw, my mother is famous for her spring rolls which are packed full of giant tiger prawns, vermicelli, black ear fungus and herbs. She tends to make batches of 250(!) spring rolls at a time, which are eaten over 3 days during Chinese New Year].
Anyway, in the afternoon we did some music shopping before heading for his office where we scoped our online art project some more. We have some seed capital, some pieces of art, some finance + art sector friends and contacts with us on our adventure, and some end objectives. The details will be finalized over the coming weeks and months, but essentially I’m responsible for the technology and social network aspects of it.
Plus I’ll be calling upon senior people I know and/or have worked with at some of the investment banks to sponsor an art exhibition or two in a major city or two. Thankfully, my friend Marta will be here from Spain in a few weeks’ time so I can ask her for some advice. She previously worked in the sponsorships team of a big telco and her Uncle is CEO and Chairman of a telco giant which has developed some interesting online assets.
First on my list of bankers, I’ll be approaching a Deputy Global Head of Wealth Management and a Head of Corporate Strategy (Americas). I originally met them back in 2000 and it will be really interesting to speak with them about art instead of cost/income ratios.
Meanwhile, tomorrow I’ll be cooking a huge spaghetti bolognese. As much as the French food tasted wonderful the portions were so tiny that I’m now completely hungry!
UPDATE
Here’s that spaghetti bolognese I made first thing this morning in my wok after I did the laundry:
There’s enough to last this entire weekend — LOL. Oh and I marinated my sugar-sambal spare ribs too for grilling tomorrow night. It’s great to have haute cuisine treats but to stay firmly in favor of good old home cooking and comfort food too!
