The Arts in New York City

Explore Chinatown while looking for works of art? Easy!! I’m in this neighborhood practically every week. I know my way around. This assignment should take no longer than an hour or two. It wasn’t until half an hour into our visit to Chinatown that I realized how wrong I was. There were so many significant places in this neighborhood that I had never encountered!

Rui Yan, Vishal, Rawan and I braved the freezing autumn winds and walked all around Chinatown last Sunday. We were looking for something that would be considered art. Luckily for us, a certain part of Chinatown, called Confucius Plaza, has two statues of famous Chinese philosophers. One of them was of course, Confucius. Confucius emphasized morality, justice and sincerity. This statue is considered as art because it represents the cultural values that the Chinese live by.

After we had found our “piece of art”, we decided to search for people we could interview. Fortunately, there was a small group of people from Brooklyn standing right by the statue of Confucius. They just so happened to be waiting for someone and had some free time on their hands. We interviewed them for a few minutes and they kindly gave us their insight on art in Chinatown. They weren’t too familiar with the neighborhood, but they did suggest Columbus Park, where senior citizens like to practice their tai chi, have chess tournaments and play music. We came across a very nice old man, who was willing to sit down with us for about ten minutes. He told us all about his life in China and introduced us to a few of the instruments that he and his buddies liked to play in the park. (He told us the names of the instruments in Chinese, so I have no idea what they’re called in English.) During the interview, I looked around and saw that there were many senior citizens hanging out in the park. Most of them seemed to be very close with each other, laughing and sharing stories. It really gave off a friendly vibe. Columbus Park definitely adds significance to Chinatown.

Rui Yan had introduced us to a certain theater that hosted shows such as operas. I can’t believe I’ve never even heard of this place! We had wanted to interview one of the performers, so we decided to sit in on one of the shows and wait for it to end so we could go backstage. Did I mention that the show was free?? The auditorium was practically filled. Although I did not enjoy the opera much, (It was rather boring for me. I didn’t understand a word they were singing, and the performers didn’t really seem to connect with the audience.) I was able to experience a taste of the music of my culture.

Chinatown is a very crowded and dirty place. But it also has a variety cultural entertainment. From little Chinese gift shops to delectable dim sum restaurants, Chinatown really is an exciting neighborhood to be in. I’m glad I got to learn so many new things about my culture from this assignment. I grew a new respect for Chinatown. I finally understand why tourists from all over the world are willing to spend their vacation in a crowded place like this. Although Chinatown isn’t the best neighborhood to enjoy art, one visit could teach people a great deal about the Chinese culture.

Oh how I love Greenwich Village.  It looks like Diagon Alley, it has the greatest mushroom ravioli ever, and most importantly for this blog, it’s known for its beautiful architecture.  As Eric and Kayde mentioned, we decided it would be fun to meet up on Friday night by Washington Square Park’s famous arch, which is the most prominent work of art in the entire Village.  The arch, a monument built to honor the 100^th anniversary of the inauguration of our first president, was clearly inspired by the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.  I’ve had the pleasure of seeing both in my life, and the one major difference is that Napoleon insisted that the names of all the places he conquered were carved into the sides of his arch, whereas G-Dubs was both a more humble man and quite dead by the time his arch was built.  Nevertheless, it’s an incredibly beautiful piece of architecture and it makes me really happy that New York has its own little slice of Paris right in the Village. (Ever since I went in April, I’m kind of obsessed with Paris. Does somebody want to be like Helen in Bridesmaids and take me back?)

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One of the things that struck me about Greenwich Village is that even though it has a reputation as an artsy neighborhood, there is actually very little traditional art there!  When we infiltrated NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, one of the students actually told us that when he thinks of art in the area, he thinks of Chelsea.  As he put it, most of the art galleries have moved out of the Village to Chelsea because the rent in the Village is 2 DAMN HIGH.  (Sorry, I couldn’t resist…is that guy even still relevant anymore?)  But even though it doesn’t really have any galleries, the Village still does earn its reputation as an artsy neighborhood because of the architecture of its beautiful buildings, many of which are owned by NYU.  I thought their student union was particularly pretty—you can see it in the background behind the fountain.

However, it’s not just the architecture that makes the Village artsy.  To get out of the cold for a few minutes we went into one of the local university cafés, and a young man we interviewed there mentioned that every morning on one of the nearby streets a man with curly hair just sits and paints all day (see Eric’s blog for the video).  When we came back into the park we ran into NYU’s theater group rehearsing in full early 20^th century attire for a play about the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.  Also, earlier in the evening when I was walking around the Village with my dad, we spotted two street performers playing a violin duet.  So you see, a lot of the art we found was not the type of art that usually comes to mind!  But maybe that was the reason why I enjoyed myself so much in Greenwich Village—rather than the art being contained in a gallery, the fact that it was literally built into the neighborhood via the architecture really makes the Village feel like a living, breathing piece of art.  (Although, like Kayde said—good luck finding anything there, unless you happen to be looking for a giant, white, illuminated arch)

            Our night started in Union Square Park and immediately we saw this statue of Ghandi. Not only did he have a necklace made of flowers, but in front of him was an entire garden. The beautiful plants in bright colors were a great start to my night and really got me in a nature mood.

            Although at times it was questionable which neighborhood we were actually in, we were all too distracted by the apartments to really care. There were gorgeous townhouses and walkups all decorated lavishly with beautiful wrought iron doors. I admit I proclaimed “I NEED TO LIVE HERE” a few too many times. When Zohar went to check her lottery ticket, I let her know that if she won, she was absolutely obligated to buy me a townhouse.

What was really interesting to me was the opportunity Halloween presented for the average person to be an artist. Almost every building had some form of Jack-O-Lanterns in front of it, and we found some pretty unique ones. I think that the pumpkins were an outlet of creativity that most people usually don’t get. For just a little while, every one of all ages and backgrounds get to unleash their wild spirit into a pumpkin face.

After finding many different Jack-O-Lanterns, we actually passed an apartment building that had a whole pumpkin on display in their courtyard. Walking down a main street with shops, we found a florist who had incorporated pumpkins into their windows. I think it’s safe to say that pumpkins are a pretty vital part of natural art this time of year.

Of course, this is not the type of art most people expect to hear about. Through walking, and in our interviews, we got to hear about various other types of art. We passed many cool galleries that were unfortunately closed. These ranged from regular art exhibits to “drawing workshops.” In an interview with a security guard, he even told us that the New School often exhibits student artwork. Two girls sitting in a Starbucks let us know about a Lower East Side walking tour, which we unfortunately could not take because it was night. (GAAAAHHH!)  In my favorite interview, someone who works at Blue Man Group told us about street art and street performers. I would have loved to see these! Graffiti is awesome because people can really do whatever they want. They have no pressure to make their art in a certain way or to please a certain group of people. Street performers are extremely cool because it’s pretty much live theater for free. They perform for everyone, so people on their way to work, people shopping, people just walking around all get a little art in their life. This can be in the form of music, a live statue, or even a “human robot.” I think as much as people don’t like being asked for money, street performers make everyone smile a little bit…

Proof that the entire ZENS group was together.