The Arts in NYC Fall 2012

This past Friday afternoon I went to the Highline to participate in Kenneth Pietrobono’s art project. It was my first time at the Highline and it was absolutely beautiful. The Highline is an old railroad that overlooks the bustling city. It is now surrounded by fields of grass, tall trees and blossoming flowers. When I arrived, I met up with some other friends from class and we found Kenneth who gave us all his T-shirts to wear. These T-shirts had economic terms that reflect what Kenneth sees as current important problems facing America. Some terms were “Games We Can’t All Win,” “Human Capitol,” “Protect me From Disappointment,” “Opportunity Cost,” and “Terms and Conditions.” My shirt read “Games We Can’t All Win.” This means that in life there are winners and losers. We can’t all end up on the top and we can’t all be the rich 1%. One of my other favorites was “Opportunity Cost.” I feel like this slogan uncovers such important truth. Today many opportunities cost money-they are not free. Let’s say a student has the opportunity to attend Boston College. That opportunity comes with a $60,000 annual cost. “Opportunity Cost” also relates to Kenneth, because he was awarded the prestigious opportunity to attend NYU Grad School, but that came with a very high financial cost. These slogans really made me think about the economic injustices currently going on in our world. Once all of our T-shirts were on we walked down the Highline in a group. As we passed by, many people stared at us. Some people came up to us asking what our shirts meant and what project we were a part of. One woman was so fascinated that she pulled out her camera and took a picture of all of us. When we were approached we all took turns telling what our T-shirts meant and we handed out Kenneth’s business cards encouraging them to visit the website so they could learn more about the project. On the walk back, we separated into groups of three because we wanted to see if more people would approach us if we were in a smaller crowd. Turns out people stared and approached us either way. It was fun seeing the fascination on people’s faces, and it was cool knowing that we helped people think about current economic problems in an interesting way. Kenneth organized a very creative art project because it was visual, catchy, interactive and very different from your typical art exhibition. I learned that art doesn’t have to be a painting or a sculpture; art can be something as simple as phrases on a T-shirt that end up leaving a footprint in the minds of people.