Art Matters

It has been a whirlwind here in New York. Last week I saw three shows and did a tour of the Chelsea galleries. Then over the weekend Paul and I did as much as possible of the big art shows around town. It was tough to coordinate because we only had Sunday and Monday to do everything. I realized that the gallery world is just like the theatre, in that when you have a job you can never actually see any other work, because of the schedule. But we did our best. So Sunday we went to the Whitney to see the Eggleston show.

These are some of the images from the show. I was very surprised that I found so many of them online. Eggleston was a real highlight of the art this weekend. After Eggleston, Paul and I raced through the Calder show. This particular show is from his Paris years, and are not my favorite Calders. From there Paul and I hurried over to MOMA. The Pipilotti Rist installation, was so major. I could not describe it if you payed me but it was riveting. Both Paul and I thought it was very successful, and will probably be a monumental moment in her career. We went through the contemporary show and just as we were leaving realized that we had missed the Joan Miro exhibit, so we went back up stairs and did a quick walk through. I am not the biggest Miro fan, but you can not deny his influence and aesthetic achievements.


We didn't see the Van Gogh exhibit because it was sold out for the day, which both Paul and I thought was a good thing. I had no particular interest in seeing that show anyway. Although if there had been tickets we probably would have gone through. And then we would not have had time to get down to the New Museum. As it was we left MOMA and rushed down to the Lower East Side/East Village. We didn't have a lot of time, so we concentrated our efforts on the Mary Heilmann show. Heilmann is an interesting case, because she has always been called a painter's painter and only recently began to get the credit she deserves. Her show at the New Museum is phenomenal, and was another highlight of my art cram session. After that we needed to take a break for eating, which has been another constant occurrence on this trip. It was still pretty early so we decided to make an event of it, and went for oysters in Tribeca. We were really close to La Pettie Abielle, which was featured in "The City" and happens to be Ben's bar. I gave Ben a call and made him meet us for a drink. We were in a rush so we didn't stay long. Paul and I decided that we wanted to take it easy so we went to see Quantum of Solace. There is not much to say about that, other than the tall boys were key and Paul fell asleep. We got home relatively early, although we were both exhausted.
Monday Paul took me on a tour of Forest Hills Gardens, which is a pretty desirable neighborhood, with lots of nice property. Then we took the train into the city and went straight to the Guggenheim. They have a group show up, which is all about being in the art, in fact one of the pieces is a hotel room in the museum, which people were actually able to rent out for the night. And like all good New York shows is sold out. The Guggs also has a show of Catherine Opie's photography. I loved the Icehouses and the Surfers. Bellow are some of the images from her show, including one of the surfers. They were really striking, particularly when you see the whole series.






Overall though I thought the show at the Guggenheim was ... um, oh. Yea.


Next Paul and I decided that we had to have dim sum in Chinatown. We went to the Ping Seafood Restaurant, which Paul assured me is the best in the City. It was pretty darn good, but I reserve the right to say that it is not the best. From there, Paul and I got on the train to PS1. The PS1 show was another one that was um, ok. Although the Robert Boyd piece, a video instillation with conspiracy theory clips set to the Kylie Minogue song I Believe in You was pretty incredible. The video I linked above is not the actual piece although some of the clips in it are featured in Tomorrow People. Paul later did some research about Boyd and it turns out that he is a bit of a crazy. Apparently he was a one time the spokesperson for the Green Party in Britain, but was asked to resign because he was a loon. Just to give you a taste, Boyd thinks that George Bush is a reptile. Anyhoo, there was also a another Pipilotti piece at PS1, which we almost missed because it was installed in a crack in the floor, pretty cool eh.

Whoo, even writing all this down is tiring, so I don't think I will add much from my day yesterday except to say that I took the bus up to the Cloisters, which is the Met's medieval extension uptown. I had never been and it was something Blackie and I talked about before she passed, so I really wanted to get up there. After the 2 hour bus ride, which would have been shorter on the train, but less scenic, I arrived. The Cloisters is a really beautiful building, in a even more beautiful park, atop a hill that over looks the Hudson. The stuff inside ain't to shabby either. The Met is one of those museums that is so rich that they just bring entire buildings from the 12th century and put them inside the Cloisters. It is something else. After I got back downtown I met Shawnte, we had planned to go see Richard Prince at Gogosian but we had a long meal instead. I might try to stop by Gogosian on Saturday.

Today I head out to Connecticut for Thanksgiving. I'll update you when I get there.