A lot of people
find places like the nature, spa or Bali, to go to relax and get their lives
together. But to me, my spiritual Mecca is New York City. It’d come as a
surprise that actually the air in New York ain’t that bad. And to a depressed,
oppressed software geek like me that’s totally obsessed with art, what’s more
can a person ask for besides the cultural Epic center of America.
From the South to
the North, there’s countless museums, those concert halls, from Carnegie Hall to
Lincoln Center, the definition of fine art and music and the very popular
Broadway, where can you find more live drama and musical that very well
define an artist’s very craft as an actor? There’s no retake, all on the
spot, live.
If you are tired
and bored by the hustle and bustle of the city, just climb up a rock in Central
Park and you’ll find your oasis of silent.
Well, everyone now
would have to at least once go to the 911 Memorial Museum. For a person, coming
from a no-war country, we need to be a lot more sensitive about the situation
than others. Although I did become depressed due to the event even when I’m not
in New York at the time, it doesn’t make it right for me to claim it at
what I experienced. 911 changed the world, and it has redefined New York City.
It’s forever a scar to many New Yorker. While I could celebrate my victory over
my own depression, I still have many friends that have till this day unable to
go any further south than the 1st Street. We should remember
everyone of what has been lost that very fateful day. Pay our respect to those who
have fallen. It is not a tourist site. It is the monument that reminds us all to
never forget.
Well, when you are
in New York, there’re 2 museums that corner the 2 sides of Central Park like a
belt on its waist. One is the very definition of art itself, The Metropolitan
Museum of Art, and the other, with the world famous, fame of the movie Night At
The Museum, American Museum of Natural History.
There’s something
about these 2 museums that all people should know. If you don’t like art or
Sceince, then try not to go to these museums, cause these 2 of the largest
museums in New York, will take up to 8 hours to finish, by luck that is, so it will
be a really long yawn for the uninterested.
As for those that
really enjoy Art, there’s the Monet ever so mesmerizing Lily Pond, Rambrandt
haunting portrait, Renoir lively people, and of course the psychedelically
dreamy Starry Night from Van Gogh, all the dark medieval armor and lifelike
cheselicious roman statue you can look at and one of the largest Egyptian
artifacts collection in the United States. And a very fortunate me, due to the
Fashion Week Season, also get to see some of the most amazing costumes ever
created in our time scanned and recreated frame by frame in digital glory. Of
course if you are interested, there’s also a fairly LARGE collection of Asian
Buddha Statue and porcelain. Imagine these, a mile long and half a mile wide of
hall space, a whole floor, filled with paintings, then the same area, filled
with statue and artifacts, and then another filled with parts of buildings and pillars
and statues. And that is only half of what they have. So if you really need
time to closely admire the work of artists, it’s cost less to buy a membership
that allow you limitless access for the whole year.
There is however a side track moment
whenever you visit the Metropolitan, because they have a second museum at the
Cloister Castle where they house some of the medieval era artifacts and
Christian’s art. Overseeing the Hudson river atop the Fort Tryon
Park in the Washington Heights is a marvelous sight to behold of to another
side of the city too.
Right across the
Park, is the American Museum of Natural History, that is to say it mildly,
cause it is more than 2 mile long walk to cross Central Park. But if you are
also a Science Geek like me, AMNH is also a magnificent Monument of Science.
There you go the very definition of New York City, Art and Science, all Gather
in the same city. While many is coming into AMNH for Dumb Dumb or the
Tyrannosaurus Skeleton, the Skeleton at the Lobby is much more magnificent than
the one in the movies, and there are plenty of Dinosaurs Skeletons in the
Fossil area. There’s a lot of stuff animals, plenty of wax statue. The section
where we can learn about human evolution, plant, the Giant Whale hanging on the
roof of the sea life, the ultimate Solar system Model in the Planetarium
section, with 2 amazing theater to recreate the creation of Planet and Stars
and the Big Bang. If you really like walking through time, this is the place to
be.
Of course besides
these 2 museums there are plenty of museum that’s worth visiting, like the
Museum of Modern Art. There’s 2 reason to visit MoMA, that is because it houses
one of the largest collection Warhol, and the Second is the fact that it is the
museum that define what the modern transcending art form should feel like for
all the current trendsetter to understand where we are in art and where they
should walk to. It is a huge differentiation from the classics that is housed
in Metropolitan, it’s like those are the basics, and this is the advanced
future course. Of course to walk through 50’s to 90’s you can’t avoid from all
the display of sexual liberation and freedom of expression era that
surprisingly seem extreme to current time. Have we actually gone backwards? Or
the resistance to the obscenity of such display have actually won after so many
years?
Well, it is advised that parents should be prepared to explain what and
why are those pictures or paintings called art to their young child. And a lot
of time it seems like you are in the twilight zone, because modern art means a
lot of photography, projected image, basic forms, and walking through things
that’s from a recent past or future not far from now, glued together to become
statue or those funny time when everyone is staring right into the abyss of a
all white only or all black only painting and contemplate why it cost 300
thousand haha!
Another great
museum that the building itself is an art piece is the Guggenheim Museum, which
is a right a cross the same street the Metropolitan is on, cross the 5th
Avenue and go a few block north (actually 5th Ave is the definition
of Museum’s avenue), you’ll come to surprisingly round and huge Guggenheim. The
museum is the easiest to navigate inside, there’s a round ramp that just goes
around and up the building, each level maintain an exhibition hall, and the
most recent main exhibition is in the center mostly hanging and on the ramp
itself. And the Hall on the highest level is for performance art. It is without
a doubt that Guggenheim houses the largest collection of cubism like Picasso, Braque
and Chagall, the lesser-known Van Gogh painting and the illogically rambling of
a Pollock, The Guggenheim collection is smaller and much more concentrated,
it’s like a private collection version of Metropolitan and MoMA combined.
I always love to
walk the museum row on the Upper East Side, there’s plenty of museum about and
some of the best and luxury café in those museums. One of them is Café Sabarsky
in the Neue Gallery. Yes, 35 dollars for a few pieces of cake and a pop of
latte is a bit too much. But they make the best macchiato ever. And seriously
the dessert is heavenly. The café retain it’s grand wooden wall and the high
ceiling that the is typical of an Upper East Side building with spiral stair
cases. While usually I was there for the coffee, there’s the occasional
collection exhibition that I really love about the place. As usual, I walk the
Central Park East length of the 5 Avenue to Neue Galerie to grab an after lunch nibble, and Café, and
do my “light” reading. And they have a private collection of Gustav Klimt. The centrepiece
of the Austrian’s painter collections of course is the famous The Woman In
Gold, a breathtaking 1907 gold leaf painting. There’s a great
story behind the painting, Maria Altmann family was Austrian Jews, during the
World War, the painting were confiscated by the Nazi and returned to their
owner or government after the war ended, Austrian Government never return the
painting to the Altmann and Maria started fighting for the ownership when she
is 82. Maria won the case against the Austrian Government, the painting were
brought to the United States in 2006 after 8 years. It was then sold to Ronald
S. Lauder, the heir to Estée Lauder with condition that it will be put on
permanent display in his Neue Galerie. So everyone who came to the galerie will
forever be reminded to do what’s right. The Woman in Gold really is a
masterpiece on it’s own, and probably worth the 100 million dollar because of
the way that the gold leaf is laid to lift the three dimensional effect, and
further amplifying the paleness of the lady under the shimmering umbrella. It
is magnificent to behold in real life indeed. And it is one in a billion
unique.
Surely when you are in America, you got
to see some American Art, one thing that is all over the city is Jeff Koons
sculpture, this year they erected a whole Jeff Koons Cow in Rockefeller Center
and they also decided to have a whole Jeff Koons Collection in the Whitney
Museum of American Art. Whitney is not a huge building, but every piece of it
is designed to display art. And to see Warhol and Jeff Koons work in it’s
original forms is amazing. Again to all parent, it is modern art after all so
walk with caution. There’s a lot to explain why something without cloth and wee
wee dangling out is supposed to be art. But if you really want to get a feel of
the real world of modern art this is the very definition of it. We go from all
the balloon sculpture, from giant to the tiny and the earlier work of expression
in modern erotic photography to the later heavy cooper and metal work. You
might get a big pile of colorful manure and you would think this is art.
There’s no doubt that this is genius and bold. And I often think with every
significant artists cornering ever few segment of art original dimension,
what’s left to be created can be called original these days. And how far deep
do we need to dig to get there.
One more amazing thing about the East
of Central Park is that both the Zoo entrance and the Jackie Onassis Reservoir
are just a cross the avenue. Central Park, means more to everyone in the City
than anything. It is the very place where you can get fresh air, the one place
where you can get away from all the people and tourist, have a walk or sit on a
bench and not be bothered. You’ll never get tired in it, it is the reminder to
get fit. And the reservoir is also the single largest empty spaces to let you
eyes have a bit of a wider horizon. It is the very place that makes it makes
sense, how people, rich or poor, can live in the over-crowded city, and find
balance. Of course all the love movie scene shot here that brings back all the
nostalgic memory doesn’t hurt. It is a strange feeling though, before I come to
NYC, what’s in the movie is so far away, then when you are here, all of the
movie’s seem to be in New York City one way or another. And sometimes when you
walk out you are on the very place where story in the movie just were. It does
make it feels like you are in a movie wonderland of sort. The most beautiful
time of the year for Central Park was in the Autumn sunset, where all the trees
have changed colors and colored the city with brilliant red and orange and
green and blue, with roads and the trees form a dance of light and shadow, the
soft caresses of the cool wind, beg for lovers to cuddle and kisses. They say
spring is the season of love, in Central Park it is the Autumn. Well, when you
are in central park you know that no one owns the city, the park alone stands 4
blocks wide and over 50 blocks length. You can’t get everything at the same
time. In the autumn the best place to sit and marvel at the city most precious
jewel is at Loeb Boathouse, right on the edge of the lake over looking the tree
line to all the skyscraper of 59th Street and beyond. It is the best
description of Park in the City.
And in the Summer, you get all the
perks in the park, free concert, free movies on the grass, all the sports
activity. One place that everyone herded over is the Sheeps Meadow. Even if you
are not a people person, the meadow is vast enough for anyone to find a spot to
just lie down and be yourself, sunburn and all.
Of course as one of the city with
permanent theatre fixture, such summer entertainment doesn’t escape from the
Park. There’s a round wooden open air theater in the park near the castle
that’s Called Shakespeare in the Park, as the name suggested there’s free
Shakespeare to be enjoyed, which is most suitably.
I’ve only got in once, because the line
to getting the free tickets is usually several miles long and people would line
up since the early morning before the sun rises. The show that I went to is
King Lear, don’t you think that since it’s free that the production is not
worth watching, the cast usually are great actor and actresses mix with new
comers. King Lear is cast with John Lithgow and Annette Bening, both are Oscar
nominated, and John Lithgow is also twice Tony Winner. And I believe the only
reason I got the ticket is because that the weather forecast the storm was
approaching that night, the few days of rain that I’ve experience in New York
really. However, the forecast is right, it rains heavily that night, but it is
a sunny enough day, so a little bit of rain wasn’t too bad. But it does beg to
show to stop for a while for fear of the electrocution from the equipment. But
we stayed and it might be the best King Lear ever. Because the rain came the
second time when it was at the scene when King Lear gone main in the woods on a
stormy night, with God have made the most suitable add in to the most dramatic
scene ever of the whole play ever.
We shall discuss more about the Theater
on my next chapter.
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