Attending the Metropolitan Opera House to see Tosca was an experience that I never had before. It was a very rewarding experience, because I had the chance to relate material that I learned in my music class to my understanding and analysis of the opera. There were many aspects of the opera and opera house that I enjoyed. For example, The Metropolitan Opera House was very grandiose and elegant, with six floors of audiences watching the opera. The audience was elegant themselves, because everyone had on business attire, so I didn’t see anyone wearing jeans that night. The way everyone was talking during the intermissions was like nothing I’ve seen before, because usually, especially at movie theaters are excited, talking loudly, and all over the place. The calm mannerisms and soft tones of politeness was a first-timer for me, and I believe that is partly due to the “proper” attire everyone had on that night. During the intermissions, I discovered that food prices downstairs were extremely expensive. I saw people having dinner on the upper levels of the opera house, and noticed how finely dressed they were. The food didn’t even look like it was worth a few hundred dollars, but then I found out the people eating dinner weren’t watching the opera; they came just for the dining experience. I was amazed at the sight of the people that were there that night, and couldn’t even believe that they were spending so much money.

The stage was the biggest stage I have ever seen, and the costumes, lighting, and orchestra was grand. My seat was in the eighth row right in front of the stage, so I got to see everything, from the expressions on the character’s faces to the details on the costumes.  The conductor for the orchestra was standing right front of the audience facing the stage, watching the characters and lip-singing the libretto as well. The orchestra was on a lower level than the audience and conductor, blocked off with glass windows so the audience couldn’t see them and the stage at the same time. I was really curious to know what kind of instruments I was hearing, because during the first half of the show, it was difficult to know if I was hearing a harp or a piano, a French horn or a clarinet, a violin or other string instrument. So during the second intermission, I went to the where the conductor stood, and looked down to see what kind of instruments were being played. To my surprise, I saw a big harp, a small drum set (most likely a tympani), clarinets, trumpets, the flute, the oboe, a French horn, and several violins and violas.

I hope to see more operas in the future!

Last Thursday, I just wanted to take myself out, and walking up from our school, I hit tenth avenue, and discovered this art gallery called the Taglialatella Galleries. No, forget the complicated name of the place. The artwork was amazing! Take a look at the piece shown below. Its Mickey Mouse! 

This piece was done by someone called Mr. Brainwash, and is a stencil and mixed media piece on paper. There are old sections of newspaper behind MickeyMouse, and he’s standing smack in the middle of history. I thought this was really a piece of art. Mr.Brainwash is trying to tell us, the viewers, that times are changing, from an era of black and white to one with color. Not only that. Mr. Brainwash is also telling us that modern times and icons like Mickey Mouse are allowing us to forget the times of the past. Because Mickey Mouse is standing in the middle of the newspaper articles, it’s not that visible and our attention is just on Mickey. Maybe if he would get out the way, we would be able to catch up on some of that history. 

Mr. Brainwash also had this piece below exhibited at the gallery:

Mr. Brainwash calls this piece Einstein, but its stencil and mixed media on canvas. His vivid use of colors and overlapping segments in his artwork shown here suggests a message: people are constantly changing with times, and are acquiring more rights and freedoms.  Science, technology, and innovation are causes and byproducts of these constant changes and human evolution. Whether positive or negative, change has to happen, and we have to learn how to accept it and adapt to it. That is what makes the piece so cool to look at: its creative, original, and unique.

Now, as far as I understand, an artist has a meaning behind the art, because the artist starts off with an idea. I’m not sure why Mr. Brainwash is calling himself Mr. Brainwash. One reason could be that the center of his artwork ( like Mickey Mouse) or objects in his art in general (like in Einstein) are brainwashing the public. Of course, that’ll remain a mystery, like the man behind Mr. Brainwash himself.

Today, I walked out of school unsure of what to do, or where to go. I was headed towards the High Line Park, until I bumped into a few art galleries. One of them was called Galerie Richard, and the works of William Bradley were exhibited there. Bradley’s work is exceptional. It looks simple at first, but if you take the time to stare at the paintings a bit longer, a lot can be discovered.

For example, this image up top is one of his works, and the reason why its so interesting is because no one knows what’s going on. Of course there has to be a meaning associated with the colors, and different shades of red and blue. When it comes to color, I always associate it with emotions. Considering the amount of red in the painting, one could say that the artist is angry, or is upset about something. Or maybe he thought these were the best three colors to use to grad the viewer’s attention. So that’s that for the colors. How about the fact that there’s so much overlapping going on in the artwork? How come things weren’t more spread out? I don’t like seeing all of that congestion in the center, so I think the artist should have used all the space in the painting. Now there’s too much red in the painting. But there is in fact one thing that I like: the different hues of color is something that makes this painting stand out. The light blue and darker shades of blue, and bright red and crimson, make the panting look bold. What I mean is, I believe this painting isn’t just an example of paint splattered on a paper. There’s more to it, but to find out, we’d have to go through Bradley’s imagination. This painting is called “Fun and Games.” It does look like some of the drawings I made when I was younger, so I guess Bradley really did use his imagination.

I didn’t know what to think of this one when I saw it, but all I knew was that it was real cute. Many thoughts came to my head upon seeing this image. First, I thought of Pacman, then I thought of a fetus, and lastly I thought of a person’d head, too consumed with the problems in the world. I tried to make sense of what I saw, and I came up with that last conclusion, because I saw blue and green on the sides of the giant circle. Those colors and dripping from the person’s mouth, so it could portray greed too. Its a weird drawing, and I feel even more weird trying come up with explanations for the weird painting. I wish Bradley could explain what he was drawing and why.