Author: Lauren Silverman

I didn’t go on the original class trip to Avenue Q so I bought a ticket on my own and went today. I love the city, so I’m glad I got to go, and since it wasn’t for a school trip I enjoyed just hanging out around the city without having to worry about meeting up with anyone. I really like hanging out by myself, and I think it’s beneficial for everyone to do cool stuff on their own every so often.

The theater was so cool. I noticed that A Clockwork Orange just closed yesterday, which was in the stage down the hall. I would have liked to see that.

The show was so amazing! The mezzanine where I was had like 5 people in it so they let us move to the front row. The theater was small and intimate and the show was just hysterical. I love dark, raunchy comedy and I found this show to be perfect for me. The songs were hilarious and ridiculously catchy! I thought the cast did a wonderful job. In a world where people get offended by EVERYTHING these days, I found this show to be refreshing. I’m so glad I ended up going and, aside from the horrific Times Square sidewalk traffic, I had an amazing time! I didn’t think I would enjoy the show this much.

To be honest, I wasn’t excited that I had to go into the city on a Tuesday night. The only thing that kept me motivated was that it was something I have interest in, which is performing arts. The ride in was pretty easy, thankfully.

I thought the play was wonderful. I liked the supernatural element to it- in art, I find myself drawn to eerie/macabre elements so I thought it was a fun little addition, even though it wasn’t the central point. A lot of my own writing has a death theme to it as well, so I found the play familiar and relatable. I liked the bartender character at the beginning, but once the characters got to California I thought Leonora was a more interesting character and the bartender seemed much more annoying after that (sorry, girl). I would have liked a little more background for the two of them and how their relationship began.

My favorite characters were the two old men. They provided occasional comic relief, but I think they slowly came from the background into the foreground and ended up embodying the main themes of the play. I thought their character progressions were impressive.

Overall, I think I would have enjoyed it more if I weren’t so tired and hungry (that usually kills my mood), but I have never been to a play reading before and I thought it was a learning experience. It also inspired me with some ideas!

I had a wonderful time at the Garth Fagan dance over the weekend. One of my favorite art mediums is performance because of how versatile it is- it doesn’t just mean dance, it could be anything (Even an artist sitting in a chair doing apparently nothing… think Maria Abramovic’s “The Artist Is Present”)! It is one of my favorites because artists push the boundaries to the extreme with this type of art. There are so many ways to interpret a performance, especially if there are multiple showings of it. Another thing I really like about performance art is that it is one of the most temporary mediums. A painting will last, a film can be saved, and photographs displayed, but aside from whatever videos or photos are taken of the performance (which are usually not allowed anyway), once the performance is over… Well, it’s OVER! You only have your memory and emotions left over once you leave the viewing area. That in itself is a fair representation of the art.

I hadn’t seen many dances before- only as a part of another show (I did see one ballet, though), or in my own dancing school when I was a small child. This was a mostly new experience for me. One of my favorite things about the performance was the music and how it changed with every dance. The styles differed, from a more traditional sound in the first dance to a cover of a Coldplay song toward the end. I actually texted my drum teacher during the intermission because the first song had a percussion pattern known as a 3/2 clave, which I’ve been working on with him. I think that Latin-ish style is one of my favorites in terms of playing, but also to watch dancers to!

The dancers themselves were clearly passionate about their work. They might have been performing Garth Fagan’s dance, which is scripted and choreographed, but it takes a true artist/performer to connect with it and make it their own. No two dancers will dance to that music exactly the same way. That relates to my love for performance art because it proves that there is always a raw, natural element to it. It is never static. I loved the various styles of the dances, and I think my favorite was “Estrogen/Genius.” It was definitely a “girl power” dance.

I had a really nice experience when Rich Stremme came to speak to the class. I found it amusing and refreshing to have a punk musician as a guest speaker, especially because my high school was rigid and would never have allowed for someone too artistic or creative (we had a lot of alumnae come to speak, but they always bored me).

I found the reading we did in class to be interesting because it showed how hardcore punk became a type of “anti-art” art movement, which I mentioned in class reminded me of the post-WWI Dada movement, where artists who were disillusioned with the current state of affairs said “screw this” and made art that the general public as well as critics considered outrageous. The readings made me wish that the type of creative spontaneity was still possible in NYC, but with the advancements in technology recently, it is harder and harder for small artists to promote their work and make a profit without building some sort of network first. This is extremely frustrating to me because, while I am the first person to roll my eyes at adults who complain about technology, I think social media has distorted what it means to be an artist. It has given everyone the chance to become an artist, whatever that means to them.

Rich Stremme’s talk made me think about what art is, what being an artist means, and how different movements have impacted history. It gave me hope that, with hard enough determination, I can make art a part of my future without living in a 5X5 studio apartment… Maybe.

While I was initially excited to go to the opera, as it got closer I began to dread it because it was later in the evening and the thought of going into the city at that time seemed like a nightmare. Luckily, Olivia came to the rescue and her mom was able to drive us!

I didn’t think I would like the opera, but I found myself invested in the characters’ thoughts and actions. I wanted them to have happy endings, even though I had read in the playbill before the show that Mimi dies. I knew it would end in tragedy, but I hoped for some sort of positive ending. My favorite character was Marcel (aka Marcello) until he buckled and rekindled his romance with Musetta. I couldn’t believe he did that, even after she broke his heart. I thought less of his character after that.

I thought the music was delightful as well, and I always appreciate when the orchestra gets applause. It’s easy to forget that they are down there, under the stage, playing the music.

I think I would go back to the opera. I saw the Exterminating Angel ad and it seems like something I would want to go see. I also recently saw online that that particular opera has the highest note ever sung at the Met, which seems pretty interesting. I had a great experience!

I found Alexa’s presentation on Keith Haring to be of particular interest. I think the comical intro was what drew me in initially because it stood out from the others. Also, it seemed to fit the theme of the presentation and the type of art that Haring made, which had a childlike, comical nature most of the time. But what I liked that Alexa presented was that his art actually focused on some serious topics, such as the AIDS epidemic that impacted him and many other artists greatly.

Even as an art person, I never knew too much about Keith Haring- he was the artist whose work I could point out, because there’s no mistaking him for anyone else, but I never knew much about what he stood for or what kind of message he intended to spread by creating his art. I had known that he was related to the AIDS epidemic only because of the logo for the AIDS walk, but I actually assumed it was some type of copycat logo drawn by someone else meant to be in Haring’s likeness. I thought it was interesting that he had actually drawn the logo.

Alexa did a great job of presenting the important info, and she clearly researched it well. I liked all the picture she showed of his work to give us ideas of how diverse his art was, from drawings to sculpture. I like that even his sculptures had that curvy, pop-art ish feel to them even though they were not drawings. I admired his skill of being able to translate his personal style across mediums.

Alexa’s style of presenting was engaging and entertaining. I enjoyed it while learning a lot. Great job, Alexa!

 

I had been planning to go to the Whitney Museum for a long time, and I’m glad I finally had the opportunity to go. I reached out to a friend from high school (we also went to middle school together!), as we had planned to meet at museums and hang out after graduation. I wasn’t sure what to expect from the Whitney; I knew it had modern American art, but I made a point of not reading about the exhibits online so I could be surprised.

The museum is 8 floors! The exhibits start on floor 4 I believe. The first level was one of my favorites. It had an interactive portion where we had to take off our shoes in order to walk around in a simulated beach area. The area had little tents with floors of varying textures, such as cold (VERY COLD) water, small rocks, hay, and even books. There was a jungle-gym type part where we could walk through the cold water and little pebbles one at a time.

One of my favorite rooms was a small, dark one with Jimi Hendrix playing quite loudly. There were hammocks suspended from both sides of the room. My friend and I sat next to each other and listened to the music for a long time. It was an unfamiliar, enjoyable experience!

The other floors were also really cool. I found myself fascinated by the floor dedicated to protest art, especially the wall on Vietnam-based protests (pictured below). Also, outside there was a sculpture piece that consisted of red glass cubes that go from dark to light. It was interesting to see up close and from four floors above! The outside of the museum has a spectacular view of the High Line as well as the city skyline.

Even outside the museum, there was a group of performance artists partaking in some type of strange ritual dance/skit. My friend and I couldn’t figure out if the skit group was the same as the dance group or not.

After the museum I went to AmpleHills Creamery, which I had never had before, which was spectacular. Though, apparently they are discontinuing Cookie Au Lait, which is the flavor I got. Bummer.

The Whitney had a vibrant mix of sculpture, installation, and fine art, which I found greatly appealing. I had a wonderful time and would definitely go again!

 

I had a great time at the Night at the Museum event yesterday! The fact that we took an Academy bus was one of the first great things because I was expecting a regular yellow school bus.

I had never been to the Brooklyn Museum before, but I’d heard great things about it from regular visitors such as my mom and some friends. I was especially excited to see the installation “The Dinner Party” on thefourth floor but, much to my dismay, the exhibit was closed and the floor was off-limits. That put a temporary damper on my night, as I was really looking forward to seeing it, but I knew that there were lots of other interesting exhibits that I could see as well.

My group started at the fifth floor and worked our way down. We did our appreciative recording on the installation with Russian movies slowed down to 1% of the speed. It was so unusual that I thought there was some type of technical malfunction at first before I read the blurb and realized that it was intentional. I was most amazed at the fact that different viewers may get completely different meanings out of the piece depending on what time of day they see it at and for how long. To sit and watch one of the movies would take 100x as long as usual!

I also liked the Egyptian art. I have always appreciated history and artifacts, so I found them mysterious and beautiful. Honestly, I am much more interested in modern/contemporary art, so after a while a lot of the art pieces started to losetheir uniqueness to me, like the classical portraits. They are great displays of technical skill, but after a while I usually lose interest in these.

I enjoyed my experience overall and took some great pictures as well. I’m glad I got to experience the Brooklyn Museum, even though the Dinner Party attraction was closed!

I was pleasantly surprised by my trip to the NAWA Gallery. I enjoy every opportunity I get to travel into the city, and I was excited that I was able to go somewhere I hadn’t been before. I was grateful to find NAWA on the first try! Thankfully, the gallery was labeled on the elevator buttons and I had a trusted adult with me (thanks for paying for my Metrocard, Dad!).

I found the gallery itself to be a fascinating little hole in the wall. I generally love the atmosphere of art galleries; some of them are so quiet and reverent that they seem to have a church-like atmosphere, where everything echoes and people rarely speak above whispers. NAWA was like this- not echoey, but being the only person in the gallery (besides my dad. Thanks, Dad!) made it a very personal experience.

My favorite type of art is strange, whimsical modern art that may take some time to understand, and NAWA had a great deal of that, much to my excitement. While I appreciate the technical skill that goes into highly detailed paintings such as classical art or even landscape paintings, I find them somewhat repetitive and nothing more than pleasing to the eye. I like modern art because it challenges the audience, and something that may seem random or too weird was often put there for a reason. I also love modern art because, to me, it allows me to communicate with the artist more than other types of art.

Some of my favorite pieces in this exhibit were more abstract; one of them reminded me of Cy Twombly, whose work I had first seen and fallen in love with at the Philly Museum of Art last year. I also loved the sculptures because they were daring and completely nontraditional, like the deer with a doll head or the giant bull with google eyes covering its face. That one made me a little itchy.

Overall, I found the gallery to be beautiful, striking, and thought-provoking. I am glad that I made the trip!

 

-Lauren Silverman