Art is Where You Find It

Yes it’s your penultimate opportunity to… tell us what interested you in the NYTimes Arts section! Remember to save your comments on your own computer, in case of any future crash.

What else? I trust you are all working diligently on your reviews and podcast of said reviews. Don’t forget to post them to the blog by Wednesday, and also to bring a printed copy of the written review to class. While you are welcome of course to have fun with your podcasts, I am expecting that you are trying to do a Good Job in terms of effectively communicating your review as though you were the intelligent and creative human I know you to be… in other words, please not as many helium voices on this one…

And do be sure to bring your Flip cameras and laptops (with your working version of iMovie installed, the one we used in the demo with Lynn) with you on Wednesday too.

With fluorescent white walls outside, and contemporary art-deco furnishings inside, the Museum of Art and Design just exudes modern art. MAD is currently housing a two-floor exhibit entitled “Second Lives-Remixing the Ordinary”, a collection of works by over 50 international artists, who created pieces of art from normal everyday objects. My favorite piece in the exhibit was Paul Villiski’s “My Back Pages”, which consisted of butterfly-shapes cut out from vintage vinyl records, and which were then tacked to the wall—the piece was aesthetically beautiful, and the artist definitely accomplished his intent to make physical the beauty of music. Other notable pieces included Susie MacMurray’s “A Mixture of Frailties”, a dress composed entirely of latex washing gloves, and Teresa’s Agnew’s “Portrait of a Textile Worker”, a life-sized quilt depicting a worker at a sewing machine composed entirely of clothing labels. The pieces in the MAD collection were varied and awesome, and each had a message to tell the world. The two hours I put in at the collection was definitely less than the amount of time the exhibit deserves, so I will make sure to reserve an entire day for the next visit I make to the museum.

I’ve never had the chance to really observe and admire the Macy’s Herald Square window displays either because I was in a rush or just because I didn’t want to go out of my way. However, last Sunday, I happened to be near the area when they unveiled the new 2008 window displays. As part of a 146 year tradition, Macy’s revealed their new holiday displays which attract more than 7000 “consumers” per hour and possibly help bring in more business. We’ve all seen negatives the global economy has suffered this year yet its delightful to know that this holiday tradition lives as successful as it is unchanging. On November 23rd, Macy’s held off the entire storefront street to host the grand “unveiling” of the windows, an event that attracted a rather large crowd. Complete with a mini light show, Santa Claus(whats the holidays without Santa) and a replica of a Central Park features, the little pre-party outside of Macy’s was more than one could’ve expected. They even “invited” Kermit the Frog to sing a few Christmas songs to round out the holiday spirit. In the end, I was just glad that I happened to be in the right place at the right time to have been able to experience and witness this event at least once in my life.

There are two museums that people assume every native New Yorker has visited at some point in his or her life: the Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As a resident of New York for 18 years, Friday marked my first visit to the Met; and the experience was one that I would not soon forget.  It took the better part of my day, but the time I spent there was still not enough to explore even a fraction of what the Museum had to offer.  Yet ironically, after having explored as little as I did, it would still be impossible to fit a simple list of just the names of all the exhibits I saw into a mere paragraph.   The art came from many broad categories and featured art about different topics and countries from around the world.  There were pieces from such topics as religion, culture and landscape and such places as Africa, Asia, Babylon, Italy and America⎯to name a few.  The “New York, N.⎯Why?” exhibit really stood out amongst the rest.  The photographs in this exhibit felt warm and took me to the era that the pictures were taken in.  From my visit to the Met I can assure you of at least one thing; it has such a colossal amount of artwork in its collections that any visitor to the museum is sure to find at least one of the exhibits to be to his or her liking.

The newly renovated Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) blew my mind away. This is definitely by far my favorite museum in New York City. Its current exhibit, Second Lives–remixing the ordinary, is full of art pieces that are nowhere near ordinary. The exhibit occupies two of its upper floors and both floors amaze me with very creative and innovative designs. Some of the most notable pieces include “Spoons” by Jill Townsky and “My Back Pages” by Paul Vilinski. All of these artworks contain deep meanings that the artists intended to portray to the viewers through their creations. For example, “Spoons” are made of plastic spoons and rubber bands that are assembled together to create a massive pyramid. Although impressive, it flaws in its instability because the elasticity of the rubber bands diminishes over time, which will cause the whole structure to eventually collapse even if only one rubber band snap. The artist wanted to portray the message of “the actual ‘moment’ of the process can never exist retrospectively; it leaves only a ‘trace’ of its action” through this fascinating piece of art. My favorite piece in the museum is “My Back Pages” which is displayed over an entire wall.  It consists of vintage vinyl records, record player, wire, and recover covers. The vinyl records and record covers are cut into shapes of butterflies and are displayed as if they were flying out of the record player. This is not only a beautiful piece of artwork but it also “releases the meaning of album, collection, and songs into the world.”

The museum left me such a good impression not only because of its captivating art pieces but because of the brief description of each artwork. Although it undoubtedly limits our imagination by telling us the artworks’ intended meanings, nevertheless, it allows me to feel closer to the artwork and understand it in at deeper level. The museum successfully imprinted the objective of the exhibit in my mind and for this reason, I will most gladly visit it again for another pleasurable experience.