One of my biggest issues with the Village the few times that I’ve ventured to the area was that it is impossible to maneuver. The streets all seem to converge and unless you’ve committed the street names to memory, even the best sense of direction will need assistance. Even when we went to see Asuncion, we shared adventures of getting lost and/or followed, and if I recall, Professor Healey mentioned that even the people who live in the Village don’t know their way around.
Despite my quarrels with the layout of the village, I was excited to be assigned this neighborhood, because quite frankly, I’m never there. That being said, my group decided that our meeting place would be Washington Square Park, an area often depicted as an artistic experience in and of itself. However, as I arrived to the park, I couldn’t help but feel off put by the construction that was going on and the grass all being fenced off. How would one attend an artistic performance in a park that is partially a construction site. Nonetheless, individuals flocked to the park on that chilly Friday night. The main attraction? The beautiful illuminated arch in the middle of the park.
I think it need not be explained why my group unanimously decided that the arch would be the focus (and meet up destination) of our conquest to find art in the Village. Heck, if architects didn’t know it would be such a huge attraction, they wouldn’t have invested God knows how much money to have the structure illuminated for the late night dwellers who happen to wander into the park. Which is another thing that I found interesting, unlike other parks, the sign for this park said it closes at 12am in comparison to 9pm. I guess that worked out well for the NYU theater students that we happened to come across rehearsing their play on worker’s rights in the middle of the park. Dressed for the part, they marched around in the 20th century attire and demanded less hours and more pay.
Not only does the park attract theater performers, but we also came across many photographers trying to capture the beauty of the arch. In fact, one of the photographers informed us that he even though he wasn’t from the area, he was in the park to photograph an event that was happening for Nike. This demonstrated not only the diverse forms of art and expression that occur in this iconic part of the Village, but the appeal of the park to non-locals.
As my group ventured out of the park and into the rest of the city, the presence of NYU seemed to be a very influential aspect of the neighborhood. The architecture of the dorms and many of the buildings had a very quaint appeal to them, and felt like they should belong in a vintage movie about a struggling artist. Continuing our quest to find art, we were, much to our surprise, permitted to enter the Tisch School of the Arts, where a lecture seemed to be held in a room just out of our reach. We did however, get to interview one student who had a very interesting take on art in the Village. When we asked him how he felt about the area, he declared that there isn’t much art left to be found outside of the school’s gallery.
He supported his claim by explaining how much of the local artists had been pushed out of the area by it’s increasing cost of living there, and all that remains is wealthy, privileged NYU students. To an extent, I agree with this student, although I find it ironic that he insult the “rich NYU kid” being that he most likely is one of them. While my group walked around the Village, it seemed more filled with pretentious college students, bustling about, and quite possibly looking for a party (hey, it was a Friday night after all). Although we did encounter various art forms in the park, and were informed of a local “curly haired” artist, I did not see much evidence of art outside of the school of art and Washington Square Park. I think the area does show remnants of a once predominantly artistic community, especially with it’s beautiful brownstones. However, other than that, I did not see any sculptures, murals, not even any graffiti. Maybe the lack of activity was due to the chilly weather, but I must agree with the student from the gallery and say that majority of art has been removed from the Village, and in its place are pretentious individuals longing to appear artistic (who must have AMAZING GPS systems on their phones).
