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“New York, New York, it’s a fabulous town, the Bronx is up and..” all the restaurants have that offputting “choking victim” poster that scares me into suspiciously chewing my food very carefully whenever I’m in town. Apologies to all the swell New Yorkers we didn’t get to see, but this visit was for but a few days to see the new MoMA, Dia Beacon, the Christo/Jeanne Claude gates, and the Fra Carnevale show at the Met. I tend to fall victim to Stendhal’s Syndrome (Dizziness, panic, paranoia, or madness caused by viewing certain artistic or historical artifacts or by trying to see too many such artifacts in too short a time) when traveling in major cities. We did get to hang at the new MoMA with Joey, who is about as charming as they come, plus he has this totally adorable wisp of back hair creeping over his collar that provided pleasant aesthetic counterpoint to the cold modernist surfaces. We took a walk around the park and through the gates and met up with fellow SFite, Philip. The gates are quite successful as social art, and even aesthetically, too. The curtain of fabric creates an illusion of a low orange ceiling, and walking among them feels like a very regal or pomp-filled activity. And everybody’s smiling. The color and movement of the fabric stood out brightly against the dull gray of the landscape, and then even more so a few days later against the snow. After flying over Michael Heizer’s “City” on the way into town, we were treated to seeing the orange gates from the plane as we flew in on a very sunny day.
On our last night, walking into one of my east village fave’s, Veselka’s, we were seated smack next to one of the many of Bob’s exes currently residing in the area. Of all the eastern european stuffed cabbage joints in all the towns in all the world, he walks into mine. Actually it was nice to see him without Bob–and as the newest member of the post-Bob club.
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The Dia Beacon is one heck of a museum. We took the train up from Manhattan, about an hour though the snow, snaking along the river through the beautiful and surprisingly rural countryside. The galleries are the size of football fields, with theme-park installations by Richard Serra, Dan Flavin, Louise Bourgeois, Andy Warhol, Michael Heizer, etc… We did get to see the White: Whiteness and Race in Contemporary Art show at ICP, which Nayland was in, drawing from his bi-racial background and folk stories/storytelling. His work and William Kentridge’s animated films, well, and Cindy Sherman’s early self-portraits as bus-riders, bring narrative and experience together for me like the gothic novel. They were also showing Bellocq’s Storyville Prostitutes at ICP, which had a profound effect on me in college. The negative plates were found by Lee Friedlander in an antique store in the 60’s, and he printed up these amazing images of relaxed sexuality in the red-light district of early 20th century New Orleans. The Fra Carnevale show at the Met was super–with little Renaissance gems from Piero della Francesca and Fillipo Lippi. Then up to visit the Rembrandts and the Vermeers and my Italian faves.
On the first night in the city, I got a call from a Chelsea dealer who wants to show my work there. What is going on with my horoscope? He’s young, very young, 25, and cute, a fast talker, and has a super location. Plus he’s interested in installation! So I’ve been sending slides (unsuccessfully) to New York for like 100 years, and this guy stumbles across my site while probably looking for pornography. I seem to have no control over my fate. It blows around like a plastic sandwich bag in a tropical storm.
