I visited the Picasso and Yoko Ono exhibits again this weekend, with my language exchange partner, and was slightly more interested in the Picasso this time, but again nowhere near as excited as I was about Yoko Ono's show. (I believe it has already finished its American run, unfortunately, for those who didn't get to see it.)

A slew of factors are responsible for my enjoying Ono's show more -- Picasso's prints (and prints in general) are just not as flashy as his paintings; the show focused on his art and loves, which meant we got a lot of self-imagery (Picasso, young and virile, as Zeus! Picasso, old and impotent, as voyeur!); his background and experience are fairly alien to me, etc.

Ono's works, though, as conceptual art will do, engage the viewer and force you to reevaluate your ideas about art. Against that (plus the recent and powerful personal history interwoven into her art), Picasso's prints, pornographic as they were, had no chance.

Had shabu-shabu on Saturday night with Maiko and her Korean friend Gyung-dok and Gyung-dok's mom, who was in town visiting. Gyung-dok and his mom were very affectionate, not just with each other but with me as well -- his mom took my hand in hers when we met, and walked to the restaurant together like that. Gyung-dok asked us if his mother's skin wasn't wonderful, and patted her face affectionately.

Later in the meal, Gyung-dok's older brother joined us. He was sweating from the heat of the sulty summer night, and his mother dabbed at his face with a napkin as he talked with us.

After dinner, Maiko, who is Japanese, stood outside with me after they'd gone and looked shocked. "I've never seen that kind of relationship between mother and son," she said of Gyung-dok. "In Japan, we'd say he had a mother complex. And his brother! With the sweat and the dabbing!"

She shook her head. "I don't think I could ever marry a Korean man," she said.