Preparing for First Hand Grenade Throwing, Southern Israel, 2005. Courtesy Rachel Papo and ClampArt

Good morning!

A great event to get to tonight is the free, public opening of the contemporary art installations presented by New York City Opera in its renovated house. The setting is the very, very special Promenade, with its Elie Nadelman sculptures. And since there's no performance tonight, it is your prerogative to dwell luxuriously here instead of worrying about getting back to your seat.

What you'll see: In addition to E.V. Day's manipulations of City Opera costumes, suspended in air, City Opera is presenting photography exhibitions along the perimeters of the red-carpeted balconies. Make sure you ascend to the first balcony, for the display of work by Rachel Papo, who is among The New York Sun's distinguished photographers (see some of those assignments here), and who last month won the Lucie Award for the International Photographer of the Year - Deeper Perspective Award.

Who you'll see: In addition to the artists -- both Papo and Day are strong, intelligent women who will invigorate you in a moment -- you'll likely hear from the guy in charge of making City Opera matter: George Steel. An elegant man, and one to pay attention to especially in the next few weeks. And then there's E.V. Day's husband, Ted Lee, author with his brother Matt of a new cookbook on Southern cuisine.

What does this have to do with opera? The photograph above is part of a series that has thematic resonance with the first opera of City Opera's season, "Esther." As City Opera's press department advised us, "Drawing from her experience as a teenager serving in the Israeli Air Force, Rachel Papo depicts the subject’s negotiation of the often contradictory roles of soldier and adolescent girl. The image echoes the struggle of Esther, who was also a teenager at the time she was called to risk her life to save her people from annihilation."

Dress: Make some effort! Color would work well here (remember, you'll be on a red carpet!)

Details: The preview takes place tonight from 5 pm to 8 pm at the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center, to the left of the fountain. "Esther," by the way, premieres on Sunday.

Photo by Getty Images.

“I hope only to stretch myself to some how reach the light.” —David J. Lista

“I chuff my way into another day/as ice glints on the razor wire.” —Jorge Antonio Renaud

“Today I ate BBQ chicken with a plastic spoon. Sound impossible? Well, eighteen hundred inmates did it. Usually we eat with a spork.” —John Yarbrough

At WNYC’s Greene Space this coming Monday night, the PEN America Center has organized a showcase of work written by participants in the PEN Prison Writing Program. The event, titled “Breakout: Voices from the Inside,” is a benefit with ticket prices starting at $50, to support a low-profile PEN project that certainly deserves a much higher profile.

For 28 years, working with bare-bone budgets, the PEN Prison Writing Program has guided thousands of people behind bars in the art of writing. This takes place through the distribution, to between 3,000 and 4,000 prisoners annually, of the “PEN Handbook for Writers in Prison,” with chapters on fiction, nonfiction, poetry, screenwriting, drama, and rewriting. The program also runs a writing contest, and the most promising applicants — about a hundred a year — are paired with professional writers for mentoring through snail mail correspondence. About 70% of the mentorships last through three letter exchanges, and some last much longer.

At various times, the program has narrowly escaped the chopping block. There have also been times when it has been able to do even more: A grant once made possible post-release programming, offering writing classes to people who had just gotten out of prison. “It’s a very troubled period of time, when they’re reintegrating back, so having a skill they’re practicing is a very important thing,” says the program’s director, Jackson Taylor, adding that education dramatically reduces recidivism.

The program’s key achievement isn’t helping prisoners get published or mentored, but rather, quite humbly, to help them make writing a regular part of their lives, which brings its own benefits. “Writing is a skill that generates other skills,” said Mr. Taylor. The theory behind the program is, of course, that all prisoners can learn to write. “We believe very strongly that writing is a skill that can be practiced, and writing well is useful in almost every avenue of employment. Part of what our job is to teach them what to practice and how to practice.”

We asked Mr. Taylor, who also runs the New School’s Graduate Writing Program, “Has a genre of prison fiction emerged from the program?” He answered that the fiction produced by prisoners covers a range of themes. Some express contrition; others proclaim their innocence; others “percolate with ideas about home life, family, and that’s when you sense that these 'prisoners' or 'inmates' are human beings who for some terrible reason have had something go wrong in their lives,” Mr. Taylor said.

At the event, excerpts from stories will be read (and streamed live on the wnyc.org Web site) by, among others, Lemon Andersen, fresh off the success of “County of Kings” at the Public Theater; John Turturro (most recently heard in the latest Transformers film), writer Mary Gaitskill, writer/actor Eric Bogosian, and Jamal Joseph, who wrote poetry and earned two college degrees while incarcerated for his participation in the Black Panther Party, and has since become a spoken-word artist on Def Jam Poetry, chairman of Columbia University’s Graduate film department, and artistic director of the New Heritage Theater in Harlem.

Mr. Taylor notes just how important it is to have the stories of prisoners out in the open. “The system doesn’t want you to see. I tried to see a prisoner last year, Charles Patrick Norman, down in Florida. He’s entered our contest, I just love the guy. And even with PEN’s backing and going through all the proper channels, I wasn’t allowed to see him. I think that’s wrong, people need to have access. They’re already isolated enough,” Mr. Taylor said. The PEN Prison Writing Program is one way prisoners can gain access — and we can gain access to prisoners. “I’ve read pages and pages of human despair…all I can do is connect in this small tiny way,” Mr. Taylor said.

Here is the excerpt that will be read, written by prisoner Charles Patrick Norman:

Dear Diary, I grow flowers. I’ve been doing this all my life, off and on. Some of my earliest memories are of holding onto my grandmother’s skirt as she tended her flower and vegetable garden in the country near Redwater, Texas. At Railford, in late 1980, I finally got permission to order flower seeds, germinate them under lights and grow them around our housing area. Everyone loved the colorful blooms, with a few exceptions, and I got approval to extend the flower program. Over the years, transfers came to many different prisons across Florida, and I continued growing flowers. Years after I left Railford, an old man arrived on the transfer to Polk, where I’d been a couple of years. He told the admitting guards, “Charlie Norman must be here.” They told him yes, he was right. How did he know? He gestured to the flower beds in the visiting park, the lines of flowers along the sidewalks, and told them the instant he saw all those flowers, he knew I was here. No one else in the prison system did that.

And so for one night, an audience in the studio and on the web will be invited into the world behind bars.

“Breakout: Voices from the Inside” takes place on November 9, 7 p.m., WNYC’s Greene Space, at the intersection of Varick and Charleton, tickets start at $50. On the web: http://bit.ly/cLeFD. Phone: 212.334.1660 ext 120.

The head of New York Landmarks Conservancy, Peg Breen, with honorees George Kaufman, Robert Morgenthau, Baroness Mariuccia Zerilli Marimo, Tommy Tune, A.E. Hotchner, and past landmark and host Liz Smith.

The New York Landmarks Conservancy has a way of making the business of galas -- gathering people to eat smoked salmon and filet and cheer for some "honorees" -- fun. In fact, after sixteen years, the organization has it down to an art and science, as it proved tonight in the 16th edition of the "Living Landmarks" gala, held at Cipriani 42nd Street.

The method relies on the queen of entertainment writing, Liz Smith, who knows a thing or two about entertaining. She is a gracious, intelligent, witty, warm, and multi-talented host. She makes the evening into an event.

There are some celebrities involved -- Bill Cosby was on the premises to introduce honoree George Kaufman, who brought back Astoria Studios, and with it, a lot of film and television business, not to mention tourists.

Part of the fun is that the honorees are asked to talk about why they love New York, and what New Yorker doesn't love that. Broadway star Tommy Tune said, "The creativity is so thick, you wake up in the morning and your brain starts going. It's fertile ground." Baroness Mariuccia Zerilli Marimò, in a charming Italian accent, said, "New York is so wonderful because it's not a city. It's many cities."

Humor is always welcome at such affairs. Tonight it came from New York County's celebrated District Attorney, Robert Morgenthau, who is famously headed into retirement. He recalled having lunch with Sam Waterston, who plays a character on "Law and Order" based on Mr. Morgenthau. "I understood he was getting $25,000 an episode, so I said to him, 'When you're getting to retire, let me know, because I want your job.'" Watch out Mr. Waterston.

Even the band leader -- that would be past honoree Peter Duchin -- brought levity to the most mundane proceedings. "Please find your seat and sit on them," he said before the lights went down and the hands started passing around the bread baskets.

As for the photographer -- well, this year, that guy wound up as an honoree: Bill Cunningham of The New York Times became a "Living Landmark," described as "the Edith Wharton of photography."

But he wasn't the only one snapping: Here are some photos we took.

Jessica Tisch and Emma Bloomberg

When we saw Mayor Bloomberg's eldest daughter, Emma Bloomberg, last night at the New York Public Library's gala, we naturally asked her when and for whom she planned to vote today, Election Day. Ms. Bloomberg told the Sun she'd be up early to vote for her dad, the mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, who is running for his third term. "I'm voting early because then I'm working subway stops to make sure everyone else does," Ms. Bloomberg said, specifying her territory as between Tribeca and Houston Street. In order to do so, she's taking half a day off as a vacation day; in the afternoon, she'll be back at work, the Robin Hood Foundation.

Next, naturally, we asked her what she was reading. "I just finished 'In the President's Secret Service,' which you should read," Ms. Bloomberg said, addressing the recommendation to a friend, Jessica Tisch, who has worked in the counterterrorism unit of the New York City Police Department. Next? "Today I downloaded Joyce Purnick's new book," Ms. Bloomberg said. That would be: "Mike Bloomberg: Money, Power, Politics." Guess it's always good to be informed about the candidate you're campaigning for.

At Jennifer Rubell's "Creation" project for Performa '09, held at the X Initiative in Chelsea: Maria Catalano Rand, Jennifer Rubell, Mira Rubell, a chocolate bunny by Jacques Torres, Archie Rand, and Donald Rubell

Jennifer Rubell pulled off her grand, biblical gastronomic art event on Friday night, galvanizing more than 500 guests to shell their own peanuts, choose their own glasses, mix their own drinks, and put together their own plates of ribs complete with honey dripping from a contraption hanging from the ceiling. For dessert, they got to pick apples (from felled trees) and take a hammer to seven chocolate bunnies constructed by Jacques Torres in the form of Jeff Koons's 'Rabbit' sculpture. Good thing he wasn't around to see guests a smashin'. Ms. Rubell said that Mr. Torres told her, "Never call me again," because the bunnies were so difficult to make.

Well, Mr. Torres wasn't the only one who'd been put out to make this event happen. But wasn't it worth it, just to see Thelma Golden chowing down on ribs?

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RELATED: A photo album from Performa 09's 'Creation' as well as an album from which to order prints

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"Eating is an act of art," said celebrated chef Mario Batali as he dug deep into the peanut heap. "I love eating installations," said the editor in chief of Food and Wine, Dana Cowin. "The most thrilling, transgressive part of this is when you throw your peanut shells on the ground," Sarah Steel said. Don Mullins was intrigued with the choose-your-own-drink adventure: He made himself a rum and ginger ale, in a flute he selected because "it seemed like the weirdest glass with the least volume, so I'll stay sober."

Cocktail hour was, according to the program notes, a reference to the creation of the Garden of Eden; the ribs served for dinner were meant to evoke the creation of woman. Dessert was about the expulsion and fall -- a point tied to the location, which, the program stated, "was chosen mainly for the use it no longer has, as the Dia Center for the Arts. This seemed appropriate for what is fundamentally a story of exile by choice."

Dia-philes may have seemed a bit nostalgic for their space, but then again, it was easy to get caught up in the moment. "I'm hoping there's going to be a food fight by the end of the night," Seth Unger, who runs the New York City Food Film Festival, said, sitting at a banquet table accomodating 100 guests. "The sheer scale is unbelievable. The brilliance is that it forces everyone to immediately drop their guard and interact with one another," Mr. Unger said.

The director of Performa, RoseLee Goldberg, was pleased with the event. "I think in New York, we’re all so sophisticated, and the beauty here is to say we can go even beyond that, to use creativity to be able to seduce people with ideas, with intellect, with food," she said. "In New York, we see so much; there’s nothing we don’t see. You’re trying to trigger creative thinking in a whole new way, and that’s what’s thrilling, to see people responding to this. I’ve seen everybody walking around with big grins on their face. I hope that’s how performers measure their work. I always say, what I care about is that you feel something and that you never forget it. Someone said tonight, 'People are going to remember this for the next 10 years.'"

Ms. Rubell didn't eat at the event, instead circulating among guests, carrying a bottle of water and Ricola cough drops. Finally, with the bunnies demolished and apple cores starting to dot the floor, someone brought her Champagne in a beer glass. The evening had been judged a triumph, and she was able to relax, for a moment or two. At least, until she gets her next catering-art-performance assignment.

"You will never eat at Performa without Jennifer," Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn, Performa's new chairman, promised during brief remarks. Next time, Ms. Rubell, please eat!

Alan Gussow's "Surf/Monhegan" (1986) shows how the painter, born and raised in New York City, found a sense of the city's frenetic energy in the violent surf of the Atlantic Ocean, off the Maine coast.

Gussow spent time on Monhegan, an artist's retreat where there are no cars and barely even roads. Instead, painters plant their feet and their canvases and get to work. It all seems perfectly natural. Perhaps it is only when these canvases, capturing nature, are imported into a midtown gallery that they start to seem strange and powerful.

A Gussow show including 25 oil paintings is now on view at Babcock Galleries (724 Fifth Ave., Monday-Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.) in conjunction with the publication of the first monograph on his work, "Alan Gussow: A Painter's Nature." Those willing to travel to Old Lyme, Conn., can explore Monhegan further in an exhibition at the Florence Griswold Museum devoted to artist colonies of the New England coast, including those at Cos Cob and Old Lyme. It's striking how the colonies, all offering an escape from the city and access to inspiring light and scenery, have produced such different bodies of work. Old Lyme comes off as a picturesque place, whereas Ogunquit and Monhegan have produced a much wider range of responses -- pictures with working men (who were paid to pose with beer), abstractions, bolder colors. (See www.flogris.org for more information).

Closing night at New York Film Festival. Penelope Cruz; Pedro Almodovar; Mara Manus, Andrea Illy, and Richard Pena; Donald Newhouse, Si Newhouse, and Susan Newhouse // Photos by Amanda Gordon

"Good evening, fellow elitists," Richard Pena, program director of the New York Film Festival, said tonight in Alice Tully Hall, addressing some of the criticism of this year's festival with good humor. The audience approved, and it was on to the highlight of the festival: Pedro Almodovar's "Broken Embraces." Mr. Pena recalled that 22 years ago, the festival opened with the Spanish director's "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown." "That was the film that brought him to a much larger audience, and made a household name of him, if your household was an art house," Mr. Pena said. Since then, Mr. Almodovar has returned to the festival several times. But after tonight, his next big New York night will likely be on Broadway: "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown" is being turned into a musical, directed by Bartlett Sher, and is scheduled for a spring opening.

This Saturday night, at 3rd Ward in East Williamsburg, we attended "a one-night physical manifestation of the Nonsense NYC email list, celebrating 10 years of weird art and culture coverage in New York City."

Nonsense is a weekly e-mail round-up of novel events, so novel, in fact, that it makes for entertaining reading in and of itself, and so novel, in fact, you find yourself compelled to go out. "Weird art and culture" is may be how the newsletter defines itself, but the key word is fun. We first heard about it when we met its founder, Jeff Stark, at a carnival where the rides, such as a carousel, ferris wheel, and see-saw, were all made from old bicycles.

"The New York that comes to us every week is vibrant and alive," wrote Mr. Stark in an e-mail announcing the party to his subscribers. "It's a place where people do stuff because doing stuff is fun. Because that's how you meet your people. How you exist in the world.

"You might be making art, but we think what you're doing is far more important. We think you're creating culture. We are creating culture. All of us."

And so: we arrived at 3rd Ward. First we put on bunny ears to have our picture taken with a man in a bunny suit. Then we checked out a group show of event posters by artists, venues, and event organizers, promoting events that they think shouldl happen in the next 10 years. We got hooked quickly here, not only because the posters are such wonderful examples of hand-crafted work, but because they convey our anxieties, fears, and dreams. We liked the idea of Abe Lincoln and Frederick Douglass performing live dance music together, through the advances of time travel. Another poster told us, "The end is not at hand." Phew.

Check out the gallery here.

At 9 p.m., stilt walkers and others started coralling groups to go upstairs for performing acts. We participated in a clothing swap with a fashion show at the end to "strut our stuff". We listened to a story teller in a room lit red and outside in an alley, found the Raya Brass Band playing their hearts out. We attended a 15-minute dinner party, during which the servers scooped up our plates and threw them all against the wall. And we witnessed a pillow fight.

With that, we're going to find our own pillows and bid you good night.

Last night the American Museum of Natural History held a ribbon cutting and dinner to celebrate the restoration, dramatic new night lighting, and new landscaping of its 77th Street facade and grounds.

Those holding the ribbon during the cutting included Liz Krueger, Alfred Ross, George J.Gillespie III, Adrian Ross, Janet Ross, the museum’s chairman, Lewis Bernard, the museum's president, Ellen Futter, Kate Levin, Christine C. Quinn, Scott Stringer, Linda Rosenthal, Robert Tierney, Helen Rosenthal, and Dr. David Milton Steiner.

We're not huge fans of posed ribbon-cutting photographs and even if we were, we weren't invited to attend the ceremony. But we're happy to bring you this small portion of it, featuring the queens of the castle in royal blue, Janet Ross, left, and Ms. Futter, right, along with Mr. Bernard:

And we're pleased to bring you a photograph of the celebratory cake in the shape of the museum, which is still a de rigueur capital project menu item even in times of layoffs and belt-tightening.

The project cost $37 million and began in 2006. Major funding was provided by the City of New York through the Department of Cultural Affairs, with support from the New York City Council. The facade, designed by Cady, Berg & See and built between 1891 and 1897, spans 700 feet and includes 637 windows and a 42-foot-wide monumental arch. It is now illuminated by 52 energy-efficient ceramic metal halide lamps. In a separate but related project, the late Arthur Ross, a trustee, funded the re-design and restoration of the 77th Street entry plaza. It now has ornate wood and cast iron benches with circular armrests.

Here are some of the remarks made in a press release:

Ms. Futter: “As improbable as it might seem to have a castle in New York City, this magnificently revitalized building reflects our commitment to honoring and preserving our past while advancing the most cutting-edge research, pioneering education, and highly topical exhibitions, all while providing the people of New York and an increasingly global and digital audience with unending wonder and discovery. We are so grateful to the City of New York and to the other supporters who have made this spectacular restoration a reality."

Ms. Quinn: “During these difficult times, New Yorkers, now more than ever, want to see restoration and renovation projects move forward. The completion of the American Museum of Natural History’s renowned castle façade sends the powerful message that even during the toughest of times, our City is still growing and working together.”

All photos courtesy the American Museum of Natural History

Joan and Sandy Weill at the New-York Historical Society's History Makers Gala on Wednesday. Photo by Amanda Gordon

Well, there's no surprise winner like President Obama, who has just won the Nobel Prize for Peace, but New Yorkers can be proud that two of the four recipients of this year's Andrew Carnegie Medlas of Philanthropy are New Yorkers Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Sanford and Joan Weill. Gordon and Betty Moore and the Koç family of Turkey have also been named winners.. The awards -- consisting of a bust of Andrew Carnegie and a bronze medal -- will be given on October 15 as part of a Medals of Philanthropy Conference in New York, featuring, among others, Patricia Stonesifer, former head of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Established in 2001 by the 21 Carnegie institutions founded by Andrew Carnegie's philanthropy, the awards are given every two years, to "one or more individuals who, like Andrew Carnegie have dedicated their private wealth to public good and who have a sustained an impressive career as a philanthropist." Among past recipients are Walter and Leonore Annenberg; Brooke Astor; Irene Diamond; Agnes Gund; George Soros; Ted Turner; and the Gates, Heinz, Hewlett, Packard, Mellon, and Rockefeller families.

Mr. Bloomberg's philanthropy recently received star attention at a U2 concert. With Mr. Bloomberg in the audience, Bono, on stage, said he is "a fellow combatant in the fight against extreme poverty and disease. Using his enormous wallet to research new treatments for malaria and stuff. " Mr. Bloomberg's gifts in 2008 alone totalled $235 million, making him the leading giver in the United States according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy. He has long been known as a generous -- although officially anonymous -- donor to the Carnegie Corporation of New York, one of the sponsors of the award. As mayor he has taken several steps to strengthen the nonprofit sector including launching NYCService, which helps nonprofits attract and use volunteers effectively. He made his fortune with the financial information company Bloomberg LP.

Although Mr. Weill fell off this year's Forbes 400 list, his and his wife's philanthropy have had over several decades a major impact at institutions including Carnegie Hall, Cornell, and Alvin Aileiy American Dance Theater. Mr. Weill is known for inspiring and coaxing others to give; in honor of his 70th birthday, he helped Carnegie Hall raise $60 million for its music education program by making a matching gift of $30 million. He is former chair and chief executive of Citigroup.

Through their foundation, which they started in 2000 with a gift worth about $5 billion, Gordon and Betty Moore fund programs in environmental conservation and science. The foundation made a $600 million gift to the California Institute of Technology and has also funded the Thirty-Meter Telescope and the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. Mr. Moore is co-founder of Intel.

The Koç family established the first private foundation in Turkey, the Vehbi Koc Foundation, named after the family patriarch who initiated its philanthropy more than 80 years ago .The family has focused on improving the quality of Turkey's healthcare and education systems and supporting its cultural resources. Its support established Koç University in Instanbul. Koç Holdings is a conglomerate with business interests in consumer durables, automobiles, finance, and energy.

The selection committee's chairman was the president of the Carneige Corporation of New York, Vartan Gregorian. The great grandson of Andrew Carnegie, William Thomson, served as honorary chairman. The Carnegie institutions represented on the 2009 committee were Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland, Carnegie Institution for Science, Carnegie Dunfermline Trust, Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.