New York Blitzkrieg Weekend
4 Museums; 2 Broadway shows; 2 dinners, 2 walks in Central Park; Times Square - Karen and I packed a lot into essentially 2 days. Here's some highlights:
ART
Martin Puryear at MOMA:
Over the last 30 years Puryear has created sculpture that defies categorization, examining identity, culture and history. Experiencing the sculpture first hand though you're immediately drawn to not only the materials Puryear uses (mostly wood), but the extent to which he explores interior and exterior space. The pieces take on a life, where secrets are both held closely and exposed in ways that make you want to sit with the pieces for much longer than you might usually do so for pieces of sculpture.
One of the revelations for me was the scale of the pieces and the incredible consistency of vision whether working large or small. The constant use of history and culture (Puryear worked for the Peace Corps in Sierra Leone when he was younger) can be seen in pieces like "C.F.A.O." from 2006-2007, which evokes primitive African masks, while using a common wheelbarrow that might be found on any American farm (or any farm anywhere really), and the incredibly beautiful "A Ladder for Booker T. Washington" (1996), where a curving, alive 36' high ladder starts off the ground slightly and climbs to the unkown heavens, narrowing as it goes as if climbing into the horizon, but not the horizontal horizon, a vertical horizon of unlimited possibilities.
This show was the highlight of the trip for both of us, and the reason we made the trip in the first place. Even though the show is coming to San Francisco MOMA in 2009, after seeing it at NY MOMA, both Karen and I are having a hard time how SF will stage the show, especially the large pieces that were in the spacious (and tall) atrium, a space that SF does not have. But, we'll definitely go see it when it comes here and anyone interested in contemporary sculpture should as well.
The Drawings of Georges Seurat at MOMA
Seurat, known more as a painter and neo-impressionist who used the idea of pointillism to bring almost a scientific aspect to impressionistic painting was also a master draughtsman and this exhibit of his drawings was a great one for showcasing those skills. From simple, quick pencil or pen sketches to more refined conte pencil or charcoal drawings, the use of the paper itself and the mastery of light and shadow showed Seurat to be truly a great artist.
Lucien Freud drawings at MOMA
Well, if you like your art raw and honest, and less than focused on beauty, then Freud is your guy. You can't dispute that he is an accomplished artist, whether painting or drawing, and that a certain honesty in subject matter is not the issue. The issue is whether that rawness of drawing or painting all the people close to you (he got lots of friends and family members to pose), in all their obesity, elderness, ugliness (blotchy skin as an example) is what we want to see as art. It might be, art being subjective, but it wasn't something I was willing to spend a lot of time with.
Uwe and Gert Tobias at MOMA
At the end of a grueling, long day at MOMA, after flying all night to get to New York, this small show was mostly forgettable. What made it most interesting was the collaborative nature of it. Two people, in this case twins, working on the same piece can have interesting results. Sometimes the pieces work, sometimes they don't.
Moveable Type - a media installation by Ben Rubin and Mark Hansen - Lobby, New York Times Building
This media piece is a dynamic way of portraying the daily New York Times. Using 700 small LED screens stretched over two walls, with 96' of the screend divided between the two walls, they've created a software program that they feed the Times into and then refract and parse all of that text into a flowing piece of art that asks questions and asks the viewer to not only think about how we consume news, but about the questions that the news raises, and how we interact with the news on a daily basis.
Housed inside the new Times building designed by renowned architect Renzo Piano, the piece is a great addition to a new and interesting building.
Paintings in the Age of Rembrandt - Metropolitan Museum of Art
This was an exhibit from the great and vast collection of European painting that the Met owns, specifically focused on paintings acquired from collectors that were early supporters of the Met and bought, and donated many paintings from the Dutch School at the time of Rembrandt.
After a day of modern art, it's always interesting to come back to the Old Masters and to a show focused solely on painting, and no complaints about this show. Rembrandt, Hals, Cuyp - portraits and landscapes - and, of course, the 5 Vermeers that the Met owns. Oh, those Vermeers. Worth the entire trip.
Gustav Klimt at Neue Gallery
Having just purchased one of the famous Adele Blauer-Bloch paintings, the two primary founders of the Neue Gallery took the opportunity to put up an exhibit of their relatively extensive holdings of Klimt paintings, drawings and memorabilia. I always like these kinds of exhibits that focus on one artist and combine different media with historical information, including photographs of the artist, his studio (there was even a re-creation of the greeting room from the studio he worked in the longest). I especially liked the drawings in this show, many of which were studies for some of his more famous paintings, and which showed how prolific Klimt really was. And the Adele is everything it's made out to be.
The Frick Collection
And, that's exactly what it is - an entire museum of one man's collection. Yes, there was one special exhibit of Saint-Aubin drawings and paintings that was more interesting than I thought it would be, but it's hard to believe that in all the years I've been going to New York, I had never taken the time to visit the Frick.
Wow, what a collection. There was one point in the audio guide where they talked about how Frick used to come down at night, when everyone was asleep and the house was dark and turn on the lights in a room and just sit with his paintings, and after seeing the collection one can see why. In one room alone there is a wall with an El Greco sitting high above a fireplace and flanked on either side, lower down and next to the mantle, two Holbein's - the famous paintings of Sir Thomas More on one side and Cromwell on the other.
If you haven't been to The Frick Collection, then I highly recommend it. One man's vision and collection and paintings by many of the great painters of history - almost all European (Whistler and Glibert Stuart being the only exceptions) makes for a great art history lesson.
THEATRE
"The Homecoming" - Harold Pinter
Probably Pinter's best known and celebrated play, this production brought out not only the incredible language of Pinter - focused on the barbaric dysfunctionality of the family portrayed in the play, but the humor that a lot of directors don't necessarily allow to come out in Pinter.
My friend, Tom Bestor, http://www.rationalfeast.blogspot.com/, commented on this production on his blog and from his recent trip to New York, and I'm not sure I have much different to add. The cast, as Tom points out, is excellent and if you like Ian McShane you will love him here (though there was something about his handling, or maybe mishandling, of the cane he uses that bothered me and felt like the one false note), but Eve Best is amazing in her understated portrayal of the wife of the prodigal son who becomes the dominant personality in the play and becomes the matriarch in the end.
As Tom says, if you like Pinter, a show well worth seeing.
"August: Osage County" - Tracy Letts
Again, Tom wrote an excellent review of this show as well and you can find it at the same link as above. I don't have a lot to add.
It's long, but riveting. The acting and directing is excellent, with new twists, and new secrets revealed in every act. Interestingly, The New Yorker, found this to be a device that made the play somewhat corny, but I'm not sure I agree. It kept my interest for over three hours.
If you're up for dysfunctional families, then these two shows fit the bill - but the fact that they both had a level of humor and even compassion for that dysfunctionality made these eminently watchable and engaging.
We also had two good dinners, Bar Americain, a Bobby Flay restaurant on Friday night. Good, solid American food, nothing pretentious, but decent fare at decent prices. On Saturday we went to Aquavit, where the experience would have been really great but for a falldown in service at the end that caught us off guard and made us late for the theater, and where we missed out on our dessert and petit-fours from our 7 course tasting menu. Ah well, even great restaurants have off nights in the kitchen, I suppose. But it was a bit of a disappointment as we had made it clear that we had a show to get to.
All in all, a really worthwhile trip, even though it was so short. We missed the big storm in the Bay Area, but had really decent weather in New York, not all that cold, minimal rain and we were able to walk almost everywhere. When New York is like that, I could spend a lot of time there.
ART
Martin Puryear at MOMA:
Over the last 30 years Puryear has created sculpture that defies categorization, examining identity, culture and history. Experiencing the sculpture first hand though you're immediately drawn to not only the materials Puryear uses (mostly wood), but the extent to which he explores interior and exterior space. The pieces take on a life, where secrets are both held closely and exposed in ways that make you want to sit with the pieces for much longer than you might usually do so for pieces of sculpture.
One of the revelations for me was the scale of the pieces and the incredible consistency of vision whether working large or small. The constant use of history and culture (Puryear worked for the Peace Corps in Sierra Leone when he was younger) can be seen in pieces like "C.F.A.O." from 2006-2007, which evokes primitive African masks, while using a common wheelbarrow that might be found on any American farm (or any farm anywhere really), and the incredibly beautiful "A Ladder for Booker T. Washington" (1996), where a curving, alive 36' high ladder starts off the ground slightly and climbs to the unkown heavens, narrowing as it goes as if climbing into the horizon, but not the horizontal horizon, a vertical horizon of unlimited possibilities.
This show was the highlight of the trip for both of us, and the reason we made the trip in the first place. Even though the show is coming to San Francisco MOMA in 2009, after seeing it at NY MOMA, both Karen and I are having a hard time how SF will stage the show, especially the large pieces that were in the spacious (and tall) atrium, a space that SF does not have. But, we'll definitely go see it when it comes here and anyone interested in contemporary sculpture should as well.
The Drawings of Georges Seurat at MOMA
Seurat, known more as a painter and neo-impressionist who used the idea of pointillism to bring almost a scientific aspect to impressionistic painting was also a master draughtsman and this exhibit of his drawings was a great one for showcasing those skills. From simple, quick pencil or pen sketches to more refined conte pencil or charcoal drawings, the use of the paper itself and the mastery of light and shadow showed Seurat to be truly a great artist.
Lucien Freud drawings at MOMA
Well, if you like your art raw and honest, and less than focused on beauty, then Freud is your guy. You can't dispute that he is an accomplished artist, whether painting or drawing, and that a certain honesty in subject matter is not the issue. The issue is whether that rawness of drawing or painting all the people close to you (he got lots of friends and family members to pose), in all their obesity, elderness, ugliness (blotchy skin as an example) is what we want to see as art. It might be, art being subjective, but it wasn't something I was willing to spend a lot of time with.
Uwe and Gert Tobias at MOMA
At the end of a grueling, long day at MOMA, after flying all night to get to New York, this small show was mostly forgettable. What made it most interesting was the collaborative nature of it. Two people, in this case twins, working on the same piece can have interesting results. Sometimes the pieces work, sometimes they don't.
Moveable Type - a media installation by Ben Rubin and Mark Hansen - Lobby, New York Times Building
This media piece is a dynamic way of portraying the daily New York Times. Using 700 small LED screens stretched over two walls, with 96' of the screend divided between the two walls, they've created a software program that they feed the Times into and then refract and parse all of that text into a flowing piece of art that asks questions and asks the viewer to not only think about how we consume news, but about the questions that the news raises, and how we interact with the news on a daily basis.
Housed inside the new Times building designed by renowned architect Renzo Piano, the piece is a great addition to a new and interesting building.
Paintings in the Age of Rembrandt - Metropolitan Museum of Art
This was an exhibit from the great and vast collection of European painting that the Met owns, specifically focused on paintings acquired from collectors that were early supporters of the Met and bought, and donated many paintings from the Dutch School at the time of Rembrandt.
After a day of modern art, it's always interesting to come back to the Old Masters and to a show focused solely on painting, and no complaints about this show. Rembrandt, Hals, Cuyp - portraits and landscapes - and, of course, the 5 Vermeers that the Met owns. Oh, those Vermeers. Worth the entire trip.
Gustav Klimt at Neue Gallery
Having just purchased one of the famous Adele Blauer-Bloch paintings, the two primary founders of the Neue Gallery took the opportunity to put up an exhibit of their relatively extensive holdings of Klimt paintings, drawings and memorabilia. I always like these kinds of exhibits that focus on one artist and combine different media with historical information, including photographs of the artist, his studio (there was even a re-creation of the greeting room from the studio he worked in the longest). I especially liked the drawings in this show, many of which were studies for some of his more famous paintings, and which showed how prolific Klimt really was. And the Adele is everything it's made out to be.
The Frick Collection
And, that's exactly what it is - an entire museum of one man's collection. Yes, there was one special exhibit of Saint-Aubin drawings and paintings that was more interesting than I thought it would be, but it's hard to believe that in all the years I've been going to New York, I had never taken the time to visit the Frick.
Wow, what a collection. There was one point in the audio guide where they talked about how Frick used to come down at night, when everyone was asleep and the house was dark and turn on the lights in a room and just sit with his paintings, and after seeing the collection one can see why. In one room alone there is a wall with an El Greco sitting high above a fireplace and flanked on either side, lower down and next to the mantle, two Holbein's - the famous paintings of Sir Thomas More on one side and Cromwell on the other.
If you haven't been to The Frick Collection, then I highly recommend it. One man's vision and collection and paintings by many of the great painters of history - almost all European (Whistler and Glibert Stuart being the only exceptions) makes for a great art history lesson.
THEATRE
"The Homecoming" - Harold Pinter
Probably Pinter's best known and celebrated play, this production brought out not only the incredible language of Pinter - focused on the barbaric dysfunctionality of the family portrayed in the play, but the humor that a lot of directors don't necessarily allow to come out in Pinter.
My friend, Tom Bestor, http://www.rationalfeast.blogspot.com/, commented on this production on his blog and from his recent trip to New York, and I'm not sure I have much different to add. The cast, as Tom points out, is excellent and if you like Ian McShane you will love him here (though there was something about his handling, or maybe mishandling, of the cane he uses that bothered me and felt like the one false note), but Eve Best is amazing in her understated portrayal of the wife of the prodigal son who becomes the dominant personality in the play and becomes the matriarch in the end.
As Tom says, if you like Pinter, a show well worth seeing.
"August: Osage County" - Tracy Letts
Again, Tom wrote an excellent review of this show as well and you can find it at the same link as above. I don't have a lot to add.
It's long, but riveting. The acting and directing is excellent, with new twists, and new secrets revealed in every act. Interestingly, The New Yorker, found this to be a device that made the play somewhat corny, but I'm not sure I agree. It kept my interest for over three hours.
If you're up for dysfunctional families, then these two shows fit the bill - but the fact that they both had a level of humor and even compassion for that dysfunctionality made these eminently watchable and engaging.
We also had two good dinners, Bar Americain, a Bobby Flay restaurant on Friday night. Good, solid American food, nothing pretentious, but decent fare at decent prices. On Saturday we went to Aquavit, where the experience would have been really great but for a falldown in service at the end that caught us off guard and made us late for the theater, and where we missed out on our dessert and petit-fours from our 7 course tasting menu. Ah well, even great restaurants have off nights in the kitchen, I suppose. But it was a bit of a disappointment as we had made it clear that we had a show to get to.
All in all, a really worthwhile trip, even though it was so short. We missed the big storm in the Bay Area, but had really decent weather in New York, not all that cold, minimal rain and we were able to walk almost everywhere. When New York is like that, I could spend a lot of time there.
posted by Paul Salinger at 8:30 PM
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