The Galef Oceanside Asylum

2009

Welcome to our webspot. Our continuing mission is to explore our universe and even if we don't boldly end up where no one has gone before, we hope to make some new friends on the way. We are Janis and Frank Galef, and we live in Oceanside, California. Our son, Jeff, finished his Master's degree in Environmental Resource Engineering at Humboldt State University and is working for the Department of Water Resources in Sacramento. Sharing our home for now is a big striped Cichlid, and a pond full of goldfish and koi.

Mister Cichlid

For the past year our home had been a bit lonely. Macho, our amazing chihuahua, had to be put to sleep and we just didn't feel ready to begin again with a new dog. Nonetheless, early this summer, Jeff got a pair of chihuahuas to keep his beast, Mr. Big, company. It turned out that they were two too much for a small apartment, to we agreed to adopt them. They are a high energy couple who go everywhere together and do everything the same way. It is often spooky seeing them in exactly the same pose, at tleast when they hold still long enough to be seen. Here are Coco and Shiloh, and while they will get their very own webpage soon, this shot will introduce them.

ABOUT US (not our day jobs)

Janis has a long-standing interest in vocal music.. She has been a fan of Connie Francis since childhood. If a friend hadn't shown Janis that there was a Connie Francis Webpage on the Internet it is unlikely that she would have permitted Frank to get a computer just to pursue paleontology and other alliterative activities. Janis has always enjoyed singing along with her favorite songs and has taken vocal performance classes at our local community colleges. While her interest in Pop led her into her studies, she is now interested in Blues, Jazz, and Opera as well.

Frank has a longstanding interest in the past, the distant past. He has been fascinated by dinosaurs since he was a child and now enjoys learning and teaching about the ever-changing pageant of life on Earth. He has been collecting fossils and building models of dinosaurs for years. Some of his collection can be seen at his office and through our links. With the rest of his free time he enjoys discovering exotic cuisines, gardening and playing badminton (not for wimps). Plus, once a year, he carves a pumpkin for Halloween.

HALLOWEEN PUMPKIN 2009

In May we visited the Prado in Madrid. It is definitely one of the great art museums. There is room after room of incredible art and while I didn't go through it with carving a pumpkin in mind, as Halloween approached, I got to thinking about some of the images I had seen there. While the work of artists from all over Europe are on display, there is a definite emphasis on Spanish artists. I considered Zubaran's Lamb as a pumpkin, bound and calmly waiting to be carved. I thought of Las Meninas, by Velasquez, redone as a rather orange royal family being captured by one artist while being carved by another. I also considered some of the paintings of the Emperor, Carlos V, such as his mounted portrait at Muhlberg. With his Habsburg jaw, he's already almost a pumpkin. But then I realized that there was already someone whose art already reflected a far more twisted view of humanity than the darkest Halloween night. While Goya began his career painting fluffy "cartoons" for translation into tapestries and then switched to carefully veiled satires in his portraits of the royal court, his painful dealings with the dark side of the Spanish soul and the events of the Napoleonic invasion of Spain in the early 1800's resulted in what are called his "black paintings". Some say that a typical sight in a Spanish art museum is a white wall hung with dark squares, but Goya probably took this motif farther than anyone other than Rothko in his final days. While all of the paintings from this late period in his life are dark and despairing, probably none is darker and more despairing than Saturn Devouring His Children. Well, I had to go Goya one better. Not only do I depict the frustrated deity's infanticidal culinary choice, I show him after having first baked them in pies. Shades of Titus Andronicus! Goya worked in oils, and the palette he chose resulted in black paitings. Had Goya worked instead in squash, he would have been famed instead for his period of black and orange.

Here, then is my 2009 Pumpkin, PUMPKIN EATS HIS CHILDREN

HALLOWEEN PUMPKIN 2008

We spent a week in Bavaria last month, and along with the onion-domed churches that are so characteristic of German architecture, we were very impressed with Ludwig II's fantastic castle, Neuschwanstein. The walls inside are covered with murals inspired by scenes from Wagner's operas. I figured that if tales from Wagner were good enough for the King of Bavaria, they were good enough to appear on my pumpkin. Here, in a scene from Wagner's final opera, Parsifal, a naive and wild young man who is unaware of his noble birth and fantastic desitny, has stumbled into a magic realm. In a hunting mood, not unlike a certain vice-presidential candidate, he has shot the first thing he sees. Sadly, his victim is a gentle and peaceful symbol of this mystical kngdom and he is immediately taken to task by a noble knight whose job it is to ensure the safety of all creatures near the holy castle. While Parsifal gestures in protest that he is innocent, his action will have far reacing consequences... but that is another story. Well, in the original story, it was a swan that Parsifal shot, but this is Halloween!

Here then is my 2008 Pumpkin, "PARSIFAL UND DER RITTER VON DER HELLIG KURBIS"
(or PARSIFAL AND THE KNIGHT OF THE HOLY PUMPKIN)

HALLOWEEN PUMPKIN 2007

For those of you not up to date on your Cordon Bleu technique, the writing on the steps reads,

"La Méthode Française de tailler le citrouille".

Bon appetite!

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Here are some links to some of my other pumpkins from the past:

2006: Aztec Calabeza Carver. After spending several days in Mexico City where the Aztecs once spent a lot of time making ritual sacrifices, this depiction of the source of pepitas seemed to make a lot of sense. Chac mol is keeping the priest company and awaits his share of the filling.

2005: Samurai Pumpkin Carver. This is also called the Zen of Kabocha Seppuku.

2004: BAD Halloween. Birds Are Dinosaurs. This was my spin on the classic Knight rendering of dueling Laelaps, an early name for Allosaurs.

2003: Hellvis. Condemned to play the accordion for eternity.

2002: Death Takes a Holiday. Hey, this IS Oceanside, remember?

1992: Tilting at Windmills. Just because you are tilting at windmills doesn't mean there aren't any dragons!

1991: Rubbed the wrong way! Be careful how you wish for what you want.

1990: Dueling Dinosaurs. A somewhat modified version of a John Gurche painting. I substituted a Triceratops for the Styracasaurus.

Also, if you want to see another take on Pumpkin Carving, check out my brother Barry's website, Jack O'Lanterns by Barry Galef! Barry goes for a more high concept type of approach. He seems to be in the Opera Seria genre, while I tend more to stay in the Buffa style.

During the years that Jeff was at Humboldt State University, we made a lot of trips up and down this 750 mile long state. An important part of our history is the Mission system that was Spain's attempt to colonize California while stopping the Russians from encroaching from the north. There is a lot of controversy about the Missions and the people who were here first, but the old buildings and the museums associated with them are among the most fascinating places you can visit. Between the 1770's and 1820's, twenty one Missions were founded between San Diego in the south and Sonoma in the north. We were able to visit all of them, and some of our impressions are here, at Style Elements of the Missions.

The Galef Oceanside Asylum

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