We made it through the holidays. Now the excitement of New Year’s Eve celebrations have faded and all of the city's outdoor Christmas decorations have been taken down and stored. The sidewalks are no longer packed with tourists and we have been enduring the bitter cold and dodging bits of ice, real and imagined. This requires some creativity and spontaneity that we didn’t have to face in the longer and warmer seasons in New York.
One Sunday there was a bit of a break in the weather and I found an exhibit that would be closing soon. It was in a small museum called
Neue Galerie located in the “Museum Mile” on the Upper East Side, about midway between the Metropolitan and the Guggenheim. It is in what once was a huge mansion but it is rather small to be called a museum. It has a Fifth Avenue address but I almost missed it as the entrance is actually on the cross street, 86th, with minimal signage. The place was packed but it turned out that most of the people were there for brunch. There are two cafes there on two floors taking up half of the public space in the old building. Both had long waiting lines so I wonder whether the main business is actually art or food. I was there to see a huge collection of
art postcards that were produced in Austria from 1907 to 1920. I like poster art from the 20s and 30s and these are simply miniature posters.
HERE are some examples. The other display was equally impressive and actually pretty bizarre and creepy. It was a
collection of busts created in the 1770s. Take a look at them to see what I mean. They certainly don’t look like other works from that period. I do believe they may have inspired an episode of
The Twilight Zone. If you are in New York and in the mood to see some different art remember that the smaller and lesser known places can be great experiences.
A week later Toni took a similar excursion and she takes over here:
I made it to my destination after trudging through the piles of slush and snow from the train station at 77th and Park to
The Whitney at 75th and Madison. Once I was warm inside I assessed the space. It was smaller than the MoMA, but larger and more accommodating then the Guggenheim. I decided to visit three floors: first the Edward Hopper exhibit, then the 12 large permanent installations titled “Singular Visions”, and end with Charles LeDray’s “Workworkworkworkwork”. All three shows gave me the lift I needed to shed my cabin fever. The
Hopper contained enlightening historical visuals of early 20th century New York City that I have never seen anywhere else. The arrangement of “
Singular Visions” isolated each of the pieces so communication between it and the viewer was maximized. Paul Chan’s “1st Light” and Edward Kienholz’s “The Wait” was well worth seeing in person and will be lasting memories for me. Both send strong messages to get out and enjoy life now, something we can never be reminded of too many times. Then I was amazed at the thousands of perfectly arranged ceramic pieces and miniature clothing vignettes of the
LeDray exhibit, again something I will not forget and witnessing it in person is the only way to feel their messages. Now with my imagination on fire it kept me warm as I walked down 5th Avenue along the East Side of Central Park until I reached the Plaza Hotel’s new food hall for a late afternoon lunch.
Back to Bill here on:
Then a couple of weeks ago we both went to the MoMA. There we saw a new exhibit called “
Abstract Expressionist New York” These works are all part of their permanent collection but we have not seen them displayed in this arrangement before.
Works were from artists like Pollack, Motherwell, Mark Rothko, Franz Kline, and more.
After that we toured the second floor featuring the permanent architecture displays. Then we grabbed a bite, an excellent lunch of homemade lentil soup and shared a grilled chicken Panini at the museum’s café. This was our fourth excursion to our little neighborhood museum and we were amazed to find new things to enjoy in it as much as we did the first time we were there in 2006.
Last Sunday was the first really good weather we had in a month so we hauled ourselves off to Harlem to meet one of New York’s hardest working artists, Franco the Great. His works are not located in galleries and they can’t be enjoyed during normal hours, in fact, just the opposite. His most famous works have been painted not on canvas but instead painted on
security gates. In order to accomplish that he had to paint them at night when the stores are closed and the gates are down. Of course when the stores are open they can’t be seen so you have to go late at night or early Sunday morning. Normally these gates are tempting targets for graffiti artists but these works have been left intact I suppose out of respect for Franco. You can also meet the artist as every Sunday he has a vendor table set up across the street from the Apollo.
His art is located on both sides of 125th Street and extends for a couple of blocks to the east and west of the
Apollo Theater. Since we were going that way Toni called ahead about taking a tour of the theater. We were excited to find out that Sunday was their annual open house and we would get to see the building and some amateur performances for free. What a great bonus.
So, we have managed to survive winter doldrums. Now the days are lengthening, the snow and ice are gone, and every week the temperatures get more and more agreeable. Soon the hordes of tourists and snowbirds will be returning and the cycle will start all over again. We can count on that.
