So on Friday I headed back up town, to visit the Guggenheim Museum. Another fun place to visit because it is fun to say.
Guggenheim, Guggenheim, Guggenheim.
Guggenheim, Minster.
Malkovich, Malkovich.
Unfortunately the exterior is still swathed in scaffolding as they are trying to restore the original surface, so I didn't get to appreciate Frank Lloyd Wright's work in all its splendour, but the inside is way cool. The main show that they have on the moment is Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso, which is an excellent topic for an exhibition, encompassing as it does El Greco, Velazquez, Dali, Miro, Gris, Goya, Picasso and so on. The works were arranged thematically rather than chronologically, as they were trying to bring out similarities in Spanish art from across the centuries, which worked well, highlighting particularly the Spanish artists' love of black and of the grotesque. The downside to this exhibition, taking up the spiral and the level six annexe, was that I didn't get to see much of the permanent collection. There was also a Fontana exhibition, and very cool, and part of the museum's collection of Kandinsky. But as a gallery I'm not a huge of fan of the spiral, although it would be excellent if you had both a sense of balance and those shoes with wheels, the constant slant downwards doesn't encourage lingering, or gaping-mouthed staring.
After that I had some cawfee, spent some time in Central Park (lovely! many undulating hills, and the last remnants of the autumn leaves are clinging on bravely) and then had a wander around a few of the commercial galleries - a v. good Jasper exhibition. Very intimidating galleries, around Madison avenue, lots of shiny surfaces. One was mostly made from marble, which my shoes, exhibiting the proletarian streak they sometimes share to protest such decadance, decided to squeak as though I had in fact strapped unhappy ducks to my feet. I didn't hang around too long there.
Evening was drawing in by then, which it does with startling haste in these parts, at this time of year, and at a loss for what to do, wandered. Shopping uptown makes you realise why people marry for money. I wandered until I was in Time Square again, and ended up with a ticket to High Fidelity, the musical. Which is weird, because I'm not a huge fan of the musical, to the extent that I can't remember the last one I saw in Australia (Phantom of the Opera maybe? About ten years ago? That would explain why I haven't been in so long possibly...) but now I've seen three in three months. Also weird, because, that's right, they've made a musical out of High Fidelity. Being a big fan of both the book and the film (it's the dvd I always hire when I'm lost in the shop amidst endless hollywood pap - I should probably have just bought it about three hires ago) it seemed only appropriate that I go see the musical. It has only just opened, a fact which I think shows, if it ever does come to Australia (ie if it survives this season) I hope it gets a damn good edit and a casting agent who has read the book, not just seen the film. The lead at the moment really isn't Rob, or even John Cusack, and the guy playing the Jack Black character that I can't remember the name of, seems to be playing Jack-Black-playing-the-character-I-can't-remember-the-name-of, but not as well. Laura also not quite right. Ian, Liz and Dick v. good. The entire first act seems to be dedicated to setting the scene, and goes on way too long with songs that need to be about 1/3 as long. Certainly no Rogers and Hammerstein. About halfway through the first act I realised what was bothering me about it - the incongruity about turning a story about characters who would heap scorn on broadway musicals into a broadway musical. Were they to be in NYC on a Friday night, it would seem unlikely that they would be sitting where I was, they would be in a club listening to a band that was little known but very cool. The central plot device of the novel and film - of looking up his exes and going a on a personal discovery tour, was covered in one song, a duet with a faux Bruce Springsteen. Nuff said really.
Barry! That's that character's name.
The weather until this time had been freakishly good, I'd just been wearing a hoody all week - with trousers and so forth, obviously - and had been perfectly toasty - but with the advent of December someone has flicked a large switch somewhere and we have arrived in Jacket weather overnight.
Yesterday was very cold, but beautifully blue and clear which was nice, although with a wind that could slap you around. I drank a bucket of coffee over the Village Voice to start my day. On coffee: the supply was so erratic in the UK that I'd actually cut way back, could start my day without the coffee-absence-salsa in my frontal lobes until like, 2 in the afternoon, very strange - but as soon as I arrived in the US of A the coffee supply lines have been resumed and I'm back in my usual morning focus on Get-me-to-the-coffee-and-then-we'll-figure-out-what-my-name-is-where-I-am-and-what-I'm-supposed-to-be-doing-today thing. I haven't had espresso though, which is very bizarre, because the filter coffee is actually good here, and excellently, served in buckets, so you can read a whole newspaper or the entire internet in the time it takes to get through the coffee. Which is also why this blog is now up to date. And how I've figured out the origins of Irish dance. [i.e. if you sit for an hour or so over bucket of coffee and then stand up, you have about 2 minutes to find a 'restroom' to have a 'rest', if you also have to shut down a mac in this time, you will have a new experience of how time can actually physically slow down, and find yourself needing to dance from foot to foot while trying not to move.... ]
In other matters pertaining to food: all that super size me stuff convinces you that food in America is perpetually awful, which, for Washington and New York at least, is definitely not true. New York especially, because you can get pretty much anything at pretty much any time of day or night (and that's just in the East Village...). I can see why you could end up the size of a small semi-detached though: they do junk food incredibly well. Not as in trashy crap food, but taking good ingredients and transforming them into something wildly unhealthy, and then giving you a lot of it, for a fairly respectable price. Except for root beer. Which is the only soft drink I've every consumed and thought "I wonder if there was a meeting about this product when they had to decide if they were going to sell it as a beverage or a bathroom cleaner." And frankly, they made the wrong choice. But, my goodness, the bagels: surely they prove that the Jewish people do indeed have a special relationship with the Lord. Mightly refreshing to be in a country that if you order a bagel you get a properly boiled bagel, not just any old leavened item with a whole in the centre. In Canberra recently I went to a cafe called 'Bagels' and got a bread roll with a whole in it: I find that unacceptable in a milk bar in say, Dubbo, but in a cafe CALLED 'Bagels'?! Also, they have little containers of cream cheese, in an array of varieties. V. good.
Then I wondered downtown [when you're feeling low, downtown!], and found that shopping downtown creates that feeling you get when all you've consumed all day is starburst and black coffee {which if you haven't done you should, you won't really enjoy it but everything will be very entertaining and requiring your attention simultaneously]: far too many places to look and interesting things to touch. This is one reason why it would be very dangerous for me to live in NYC: going for a simple walk can involve several shoe shops. On an aside, I seem to be thwarted when it comes to boots this week: not the boots made from ponies, nor the rainboots with the kitten heel, nor even the gold faux-snakeskin, which have all been on sale, have they had in my size. Which some of you will no doubt think is a mighty good thing. But others will know the pain of being shoe-thwarted and will join me now in a sigh: *sigh*. Thanks. Then I found myself in a large department store of brand discounts! happiness! Unfortunately a happiness I had to share with most of New York and a good percentage of the mid-west. On your receipt it tells you how much you spent, but also how much you saved: so sure I spent 50, but I saved 110, so that means I made money! Clever huh?
This was, incongruously, across the road from Ground Zero, which was a deeply surreal place to visit. Having now spent a little time in New York, doing my usual things of gibbering at art and drinking coffee and pawing footwear, and developing a hope that I'll spend a lot more time in the future doing those things here, it seems even less comprehensible that something so reprehensibly horrendous as 9/11 could have happened in what for me is a happy place. Also, that morning the main story in the Village Voice was about the growing number of unusual cancers (for healthy working age men) that have been developing in the workers that cleared the site in the months after 9/11. Thousands already have serious respiratory illnesses, but several hundred now also have cancer. There is already a mass lawsuit about his, because, unbelievably, a week after 9/11 the EPA said that it was categorically okay to drink the water and breathe the air in downtown Manhattan. Despite that the testing hadn't been completed. Later, it came out that the White House had a lot to do with this, taking the red pen to more cautious statements and inserting more positive remarks about the air quality - which subsequent tests showed to be ridiculously high in things that will kill you. Because they were concerned about getting Wall Street up and running. The article drew on several stories of individuals effected by this, one of whom recounted how he was working both at Ground Zero and out at the site where they sifted through all the rubble - mostly the contents and structure of the buildings that had been powdered - with all the protection of a face mask. One day when they were taking a break, in came in the FBI, in full hazchem suits, with any possible opening taped up. There were something like 40000 people involved in the operation, let alone all the people in downtown New York on that day and in the subsequent months.
With this all in my mind it made the experience of visiting the site hard to process - it looks like any other huge construction site that hasn't gotten much past the hole-in-the-ground stage, but with a fenced-off viewing area, and a huge photo display of what the finished buildings are projected to look like, what the WTC looked like, and lots of images taken on 9/11 and subsequently. Including a really poignant one of part of a squashed Calder sculpture - I've seen so many of them recently and they hang with that grace that Calder infused into metal, for me that photo sums up so much of what was lost on that day to see something that was just about beauty squashed and wrecked. There are a lot of people there looking around, and a lot of people visibly moved by the experience of being there. I was glad that I had gone on a weekend, when most of the workers in the Wall Street area are not likely to be there, I can't quite imagine how you would deal with seeing all those people checking it out everyday. And I really don't understand the people who take photos of each other standing in front of the site?
I continued my path south, although actually I veered west, because I had turned a corner and forgotten, and walked on down to the Hudson, thinking to myself, "I wonder where the Statue of Liberty actually i-" as I rounded a corner "... ah, there". So took many photos of the distant statue in the sunset, and kept walking along, and came to the Staten Island ferry and caught it and then caught it back and now I have lots of photos of blurry statue of liberty in the sunset and blurry NYC at night. Taking photos at night from a moving ferry is strangely challenging.
Monday, December 04, 2006
Saturday, December 02, 2006
New York, New York, issa wonderful town.
Hey look, the counter is past the 1000 mark! [thanks Mum...]
The Museum of Modern Art: eeeh hee hee hee! Eee! Hee! Hee! Eeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Just to give you an insight into my internal murmurings of excitement as I approached MoMA. Resisting the urge to dance with excitement, as MoMA is home to one of the best collections of Modern art ever – if you put all of the works in Australia by those artists into the one space I think you’d end up with a collection about five percent as good as the fourth floor – lots of works that I would see out of the corner of my eye and turn around and almost say hello! Because I feel like we’re old friends. The constant presence of many security guards fortuitously served as a reminder that I shouldn’t hug any of them. The works I mean, not the guards.
Mondrian, Matisse, Miro, Picasso, Cezanne, Pollock, Rothko.... These are a few of my favourite things. The new building is beautiful [not that I ever saw the old one], the design is a great frame for the works and has a great sense of space, you constantly get glimpses of where you’re about to go or where you’ve just been. Although the central atrium up the centre is a little scary, now that I have my new fear of heights. [Other people get tattoos and shoes when they travel; I get phobias. Excellent.] There’s also a lot of natural light, and views out over the surrounding streets and the sculpture garden. And a really expensive café that serves excellent cookies.
By about halfway through the day I was ready to sit down on the floor, go foetal, and gibber, such was the state of hyper-stimulation of my brain. The only downside to the fabulousness of seeing all this is seeing it in such a short space of time, knowing that I’ll be heading back home and not seeing anything in the same vein for quite some time, and not having much time to mull and muse over things to fully absorb and appreciate them.
Les Demoiselles D’avignon!
My first Saturday night in New York: and I spend it doing my laundry. And running around surrounding streets because I kept needing more quarters. Gorgeously attired in an ensemb from my remaining clean clothes: bright red embroidered skirt, pink and turquoise striped top, lime green flip flops. Excellent. Fortunately it would take more than that for the East Villagers to take a second glance.
Clean socks!
Sunday and it was off to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Having slept in and generally dithered about it took me quite awhile to get there, and once I did get in the general vicinity I had to then find coffee immediately, as several caffeine receptors in my frontal lobe had taken to dancing a samba on my nerves. So by the time I got in there and got looking it was in the afternoon, so I’m definitely going to have go back. But I went through their modern collection (Georgia O’Keefes, a Pollock that will have you drooling down the front of your shirt and leaving a hazardous puddle in front of it) and saw a temporary exhibition – Vollard and the art that went through his hands as a dealer – Cezanne, Picasso, Van Gogh, Vuillard, Bonnard, Renoir, and so on. The guy had an eye, and some very good connections. Deeply strange experience of sitting on a bench, gazing in a state approaching a coma, at a wall of Cezannes (3 still lives and 4 late landscapes) and sharing the bench with 5 or so New Yawkers who were debating the merits of the various CSIs. Insanely loudly. Such a weird experience to be in front of such works and for them to be having the most incredibly mundane conversation. So that half the gallery could hear them. I’m never a stranger to a deep and passionate analysis of the trivial, but in front of Cezanne? And it’s never a debate is it? Everyone just takes turns in saying that the Vegas one is better than all the others, what were they thinking with that guy in the Miami one and then the conversation moves on to how many Law and Orders there are. Apparently Monday night is a particularly bad one for TV in NYC, just so you know. But then, they just had this conversation and then moved on, I’m the one putting it on the web.
So moving along.
Monday: Getting Fricked. I went to the library of the Frick Art Gallery and Reference Library: which is excellent, if only for the fact that it is an old school nineteenth century style library – dark wooden bookcases and desks, lamps, old stone building – very conducive to work. Even over my internal conga line of “I am in New York, yeah! I am in New York!” [repeat, ad infinitum]. They had some cool stuff, lots of catalogues from exhibitions from the ‘50s and ‘60s in New York and surrounds. Happy times.
Tuesday: Out to Queens to visit the MoMA research library – eee hee hee – art nerd joy! - catalogues, artist files and so on – eeeeheeeeheeeeheeee.
Tuesday night: the train back from Queens went to Time Square so I figured it was time to fulfil Tourist Tick Box #1 and look at all the pretty lights. And my, there really is a lot of them. And then I found a cheap ticket to Spamalot: The Monty Python Musical. So I bought it. It was a standing room ticket, so J & T were thrilled – Thrilled! - by my decision. But looking at how much room you got to sit down in, I think I made the right decision. And much better access to the toilets at interval as you get quite the head start when you are at the back of the room. Strange how I’ve never been invited to write theatre reviews isn’t it? The musical is great, I wasn’t sure how it would translate, or if it would just be for the serioius trekkie-level python fans that can ruin an entire evening once they start quoting at you, and heaven forbid you go on a road trip, but it has been really well written, nice mix of the lines they have to include (ni! And so forth) and new material. So go see it if you get the chance.
Wednesday: Whitney Museum – Picasso and American Artists, exploring, wait for it, the influence of Picasso on American artists, surprise! Great excuse to get a whole bunch of Picassos, Lichtensteins, Pollocks, de Koonigs together for a little party. The Pollock room was particularly great, as it had a nice span of his development as a painter.
After that I wandered about, looking at shiny things and trying not to impulse buy. So many pretty frocks!
Thursday: MoMA research library, Manhattan – more great books and catalogues, and in the pleasing surrounds of the new MoMA library which just opened this week. It is in the building on the other side of the sculpture garden from the main museum, so you get a great view over to the other building, the sculptures and 54th street. More internal conga. Thence, to Soho and Chinatown and a wander about, looking at some seriously cool shops and pondering just how much it would cost to send a shipping container home.
The Museum of Modern Art: eeeh hee hee hee! Eee! Hee! Hee! Eeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Just to give you an insight into my internal murmurings of excitement as I approached MoMA. Resisting the urge to dance with excitement, as MoMA is home to one of the best collections of Modern art ever – if you put all of the works in Australia by those artists into the one space I think you’d end up with a collection about five percent as good as the fourth floor – lots of works that I would see out of the corner of my eye and turn around and almost say hello! Because I feel like we’re old friends. The constant presence of many security guards fortuitously served as a reminder that I shouldn’t hug any of them. The works I mean, not the guards.
Mondrian, Matisse, Miro, Picasso, Cezanne, Pollock, Rothko.... These are a few of my favourite things. The new building is beautiful [not that I ever saw the old one], the design is a great frame for the works and has a great sense of space, you constantly get glimpses of where you’re about to go or where you’ve just been. Although the central atrium up the centre is a little scary, now that I have my new fear of heights. [Other people get tattoos and shoes when they travel; I get phobias. Excellent.] There’s also a lot of natural light, and views out over the surrounding streets and the sculpture garden. And a really expensive café that serves excellent cookies.
By about halfway through the day I was ready to sit down on the floor, go foetal, and gibber, such was the state of hyper-stimulation of my brain. The only downside to the fabulousness of seeing all this is seeing it in such a short space of time, knowing that I’ll be heading back home and not seeing anything in the same vein for quite some time, and not having much time to mull and muse over things to fully absorb and appreciate them.
Les Demoiselles D’avignon!
My first Saturday night in New York: and I spend it doing my laundry. And running around surrounding streets because I kept needing more quarters. Gorgeously attired in an ensemb from my remaining clean clothes: bright red embroidered skirt, pink and turquoise striped top, lime green flip flops. Excellent. Fortunately it would take more than that for the East Villagers to take a second glance.
Clean socks!
Sunday and it was off to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Having slept in and generally dithered about it took me quite awhile to get there, and once I did get in the general vicinity I had to then find coffee immediately, as several caffeine receptors in my frontal lobe had taken to dancing a samba on my nerves. So by the time I got in there and got looking it was in the afternoon, so I’m definitely going to have go back. But I went through their modern collection (Georgia O’Keefes, a Pollock that will have you drooling down the front of your shirt and leaving a hazardous puddle in front of it) and saw a temporary exhibition – Vollard and the art that went through his hands as a dealer – Cezanne, Picasso, Van Gogh, Vuillard, Bonnard, Renoir, and so on. The guy had an eye, and some very good connections. Deeply strange experience of sitting on a bench, gazing in a state approaching a coma, at a wall of Cezannes (3 still lives and 4 late landscapes) and sharing the bench with 5 or so New Yawkers who were debating the merits of the various CSIs. Insanely loudly. Such a weird experience to be in front of such works and for them to be having the most incredibly mundane conversation. So that half the gallery could hear them. I’m never a stranger to a deep and passionate analysis of the trivial, but in front of Cezanne? And it’s never a debate is it? Everyone just takes turns in saying that the Vegas one is better than all the others, what were they thinking with that guy in the Miami one and then the conversation moves on to how many Law and Orders there are. Apparently Monday night is a particularly bad one for TV in NYC, just so you know. But then, they just had this conversation and then moved on, I’m the one putting it on the web.
So moving along.
Monday: Getting Fricked. I went to the library of the Frick Art Gallery and Reference Library: which is excellent, if only for the fact that it is an old school nineteenth century style library – dark wooden bookcases and desks, lamps, old stone building – very conducive to work. Even over my internal conga line of “I am in New York, yeah! I am in New York!” [repeat, ad infinitum]. They had some cool stuff, lots of catalogues from exhibitions from the ‘50s and ‘60s in New York and surrounds. Happy times.
Tuesday: Out to Queens to visit the MoMA research library – eee hee hee – art nerd joy! - catalogues, artist files and so on – eeeeheeeeheeeeheeee.
Tuesday night: the train back from Queens went to Time Square so I figured it was time to fulfil Tourist Tick Box #1 and look at all the pretty lights. And my, there really is a lot of them. And then I found a cheap ticket to Spamalot: The Monty Python Musical. So I bought it. It was a standing room ticket, so J & T were thrilled – Thrilled! - by my decision. But looking at how much room you got to sit down in, I think I made the right decision. And much better access to the toilets at interval as you get quite the head start when you are at the back of the room. Strange how I’ve never been invited to write theatre reviews isn’t it? The musical is great, I wasn’t sure how it would translate, or if it would just be for the serioius trekkie-level python fans that can ruin an entire evening once they start quoting at you, and heaven forbid you go on a road trip, but it has been really well written, nice mix of the lines they have to include (ni! And so forth) and new material. So go see it if you get the chance.
Wednesday: Whitney Museum – Picasso and American Artists, exploring, wait for it, the influence of Picasso on American artists, surprise! Great excuse to get a whole bunch of Picassos, Lichtensteins, Pollocks, de Koonigs together for a little party. The Pollock room was particularly great, as it had a nice span of his development as a painter.
After that I wandered about, looking at shiny things and trying not to impulse buy. So many pretty frocks!
Thursday: MoMA research library, Manhattan – more great books and catalogues, and in the pleasing surrounds of the new MoMA library which just opened this week. It is in the building on the other side of the sculpture garden from the main museum, so you get a great view over to the other building, the sculptures and 54th street. More internal conga. Thence, to Soho and Chinatown and a wander about, looking at some seriously cool shops and pondering just how much it would cost to send a shipping container home.
Friday, December 01, 2006
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