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Thoughts on The Gates
Yesterday I did my usual Friday assignment at Lazard in Compliance, and the woman I support has an office that overlooks Central Park. It was quite sunny and lovely yesterday, and I had a great view of the Park as I walked in and out, filing engagement letters and indemnifications. The Park looked...really cool, with mostly bare trees punctuated by marching lines of vivid yellow-orange going in and out, this way and that, like lines of ants. I don't quite understand what Christo and Jeanne-Claude are trying to say with The Gates--I have some thoughts like, is it an exercise in community, in the diversity that New York attracts? A purely aesthetic project, are they trying to draw your eye to certain physical features of the Park or are you meant to feast your eyes on the beauty of the yellow-orange against the greens and greys? Whatever. It's just nice to contemplate. A nice mental exercise, a welcome diversion in mid-winter.
Last Tuesday there was this mean-spirited LTTE in the Times:
Calling the works of Christo and Jeanne-Claude "audaciously imposed" is an understatement.
As I went to have lunch on a park bench on Thursday, I was shocked that the park that I and many others adore had been turned into a horribly ugly orange construction site. I was witnessing a desecration of a sanctuary, a nauseating display of egocentrism and an unabashed disregard for the cherished respect of nature so assiduously attended to by the workers of Central Park.
Instead, what we have here is that money talks. That New Yorkers have to be subject to a personal opinion of "art" in this place that is set apart from "human" creation is an outrage. Create "art" and please invite those who are inclined to see it as a choice, not a requirement.
With the $20 million it cost to foist this on the public, surely the imaginations of the artists could have created such a space.
Don't tell us what we need to see in Central Park. Leave us alone.
Lynn Heller
Hey, grouchy--don't speak for me. Don't like it?--you don't have to go. I am laughing at some high-maintenance people who are so misanthropic they can demand that something be removed from their city that's 1) Free and non-taxpayer supported; 2) Only here for two weeks; and 3) Yes, in fact a choice, something you must actively seek out because it's in the Park and not on the street. Why be so angry? Why choose negativity? If it's not to your liking, face the other way at lunch. Life's too short to write a LTTE demanding, with angry little hands, that everyone stop and remove this project because you don't like it. The last sentence says it all.
But I liked this LTTE in today's Washington Post:
While reading about and visiting the impressive Christo and Jeanne-Claude installation in Central Park, we recalled our visit to downtown Washington a week before Inauguration Day. The sight of chain-link fences and concrete barricades gating off every cultural and governmental institution on and around the Mall was quite a contrast to the jubilant display in New York's much-beloved public space.
New Yorkers have been given the gift of a joyous visual image, one that is much needed to nudge aside, if not away, the last horrific scene embedded in their minds. New Yorkers and visitors are looking up and smiling.
A joyous visual image. A glorious feast of color. Who knows what it means? It's pretty and shiny and makes me smile.
Last Tuesday there was this mean-spirited LTTE in the Times:
Calling the works of Christo and Jeanne-Claude "audaciously imposed" is an understatement.
As I went to have lunch on a park bench on Thursday, I was shocked that the park that I and many others adore had been turned into a horribly ugly orange construction site. I was witnessing a desecration of a sanctuary, a nauseating display of egocentrism and an unabashed disregard for the cherished respect of nature so assiduously attended to by the workers of Central Park.
Instead, what we have here is that money talks. That New Yorkers have to be subject to a personal opinion of "art" in this place that is set apart from "human" creation is an outrage. Create "art" and please invite those who are inclined to see it as a choice, not a requirement.
With the $20 million it cost to foist this on the public, surely the imaginations of the artists could have created such a space.
Don't tell us what we need to see in Central Park. Leave us alone.
Lynn Heller
Hey, grouchy--don't speak for me. Don't like it?--you don't have to go. I am laughing at some high-maintenance people who are so misanthropic they can demand that something be removed from their city that's 1) Free and non-taxpayer supported; 2) Only here for two weeks; and 3) Yes, in fact a choice, something you must actively seek out because it's in the Park and not on the street. Why be so angry? Why choose negativity? If it's not to your liking, face the other way at lunch. Life's too short to write a LTTE demanding, with angry little hands, that everyone stop and remove this project because you don't like it. The last sentence says it all.
But I liked this LTTE in today's Washington Post:
While reading about and visiting the impressive Christo and Jeanne-Claude installation in Central Park, we recalled our visit to downtown Washington a week before Inauguration Day. The sight of chain-link fences and concrete barricades gating off every cultural and governmental institution on and around the Mall was quite a contrast to the jubilant display in New York's much-beloved public space.
New Yorkers have been given the gift of a joyous visual image, one that is much needed to nudge aside, if not away, the last horrific scene embedded in their minds. New Yorkers and visitors are looking up and smiling.
A joyous visual image. A glorious feast of color. Who knows what it means? It's pretty and shiny and makes me smile.