Growing up, I spent a lot of time in Central Park; for my most of my life I lived just west of the 81st Street entrance. The other day I heard about a woman, a legend of the park, who used to tell stories to children, families, and intrigued bystanders next to the Hans Christian Andersen and the Ugly Duckling statue (also near the Alice and Wonderland statue). During the summer months, for forty years, this woman, Diane Wolkstein, would share her favorite tales every Saturday from eleven to noon, rain or shine. I’m surprised to have just learned of such a legendary woman, and disappointed to never have had the chance to go listen to her storytelling for myself, as she passed away just earlier this year. I think Wolkstein’s devotion provides a great example of giving new meaning to a space or monument. Often times people simply stand and stare at statues and monuments, but some of my fondest memories in the park are from when my mom would let me climb these statues, along with Balto and the three bronze bears. The best part about climbing statues is that you can incorporate them into own adventure, giving them a more active kind of timelessness.
–Sophia Curran
On climbing statues: having a two year old son has taught me something I think I already knew. The best playthings were not designed as such. The best toys are cardboard boxes that occupy some kind of ambiguous reality, shape-shifting to fit whatever internal world one happens to be externalizing at any given moment. One minute they are passenger trains; the next minute they are caves that may or may not hold bears or venomous snakes.
Public statues have all of this magic – the magic of the public object meant to help you imagine. But they also have a different sort of magic, which is what an unreadable anthropologist named Taussig referred to as “the magic of the state”: the magic of intentional symbolism intended to bring people together and unit them behind a country or a cause. Graffiti or street art (e.g. Banksy) can be used to strategically subvert these political messages. But in some respects, climbing kids do more damage, domesticating the austere man on horseback and making him look silly. Treating him like a cardboard box.
Thanks for letting me know about Diane Wolkstein. Reading stories in a public space at the same time every week is basically turning yourself into a living monument – a fixture of the environment that (literally) tells a story.
Anyway, I could happily think about the way that the meanings of public space are appropriated and altered all day. In fact, some days I do. It’s an interesting topic. Great post.