Going to the Guggenheim

 On a bus from East 118th Street downtown to Park Avenue at 89th Street is a trip into an area of gracious, well kept apartment buildings with fabulously well cared for gardens around the grand entrances, dogs with their dog walkers, nannies with their beautiful charges, tourists many of whom are French with a spattering of Aussie accents, tree-lined streets and Central Park across the road.
When we reached the Guggenheim I was taken by surprise at the human scale of Frank Lloyd Wright's amazing building. Then I remembered it's a thirties building. I think it was built between 1937-39. It is a wonderful building but I think must be very difficult to work in, especially as a contemporary art museum. It would be a priority for students of Museum Studies to learn how the staff deal with the smallish spaces and sloping floor. FLW apparently wanted visitors to go straight up to level 6 then saunter slowly down the spiralling concourse looking at the art. Well that's what we did. However the lift or elevator as they call it is beautiful inside, a rose colour and unusual shield shape but not so big to easily handle C21st crowds.
The detailing in this building is magnificent - FLW was a megalomaniac after all. The central large rotunda is light filled and the spiralling concourse beautiful. The geometry of the design is curving and elegant. Everything seems to be based on arcs and sections of curves in contrast to the triangular sections of the large rotunda skylight, the six sided small rotunda skylight and other triangular details.
I felt I was inside a sculpture. Everything is rendered and white. For those with vertigo viewing the works would be difficult as the wall which forms the boundary between the sloping floor and the seven storey drop to the ground is only about a metre high. I really don't think it would get past our OHS building codes at home. However obviously in the 1930's the general population were responsible enough to take care not to fall over. Visitors today are the same. It was amazing to stand and look from any level. I watched the team of technicians on the ground floor use a great pulley system to raise an extremely heavy and large double sheet of plate metal onto the packing support and then I guess into a crate. It took all afternoon with at least six on the team and others coming and having a chat then going. At 3.30 on the dot they all traipsed off for afternoon tea I guess then back again after a while. It was fascinating. All the crates were in the 'lobby' in preparation for bumping out. Huge rocks were wrapped in plastic then carefully had blocks of wood nailed down to keep them stable before going into their crates.
We caught the last day of an extensive exhibition of the work of Lee Ufan a Korean artist who has worked in Japan, Korea and France since the 1960's. The show 'Marking Infinity' was amazing, a retrospective from early works, painting, sculptures to recent very minimal huge paintings. He was one of the instigators of Mono Ha which was a 1960's Japanese art movement which used materials of the everyday, was very political and has been compared to Arte Povera.

 Manicured gardens outside some of the neighbouring apartments.

 Saw many dogs being walked with their friends. So many large dogs around as well which really seems counter intuitive. I'll never feel bad about the extent of our backyard for Mischief to run around.

 Hard to show the wonderful light filled chamber.

 This gives a better idea of how the natural light floods down from the skylight. Check the height of the walls of the concourse.

 The scale of the building isn't overwhelming like so much post-war architectural International Style architectural design.

 The smooth geometry contrasts with the local vernacular.

 This is a poor shot of a band of rough masonry with the 'shield' shape motif which can be seen in the interior of the small rotunda as well.

 One of Lee Ufan's boulders 'wrapped in plastic'- very special rocks for which he hunted high and low. Some of the 3D works had a feeling of what Ken Unsworth is on about - tension and balance and opposite forces.

 From any angle the space is beautiful.

 Outside, these groovy skylights are to the lower floor of the building.

 Looking back to the entrance from the southern corner.

Another angle across the skylit lower floor into the ground lobbly. The entrance hall provides the only large area of flat floor to work on. Getting shows in and out must be very tricky.

Photography is only permitted on the ground floor - I think I am the only silly obedient person who didn't take photos elsewhere. But there are some great postcard images plus a terrific brochure for kids which is all about the geometry of the building.

One week in NY minus today's visit to Guggenheim

Our local subway station at East 116th and Lexington - many subway stations have mosaics and many types of tiles from different decades. Getting more adventurous - changing lines, catching buses - you can go anywhere just as long as you have a map handy. New Yorkers or at least the ones I've spoken to are proud of the MTA. It's really efficient and well used. Unlike at home the MTA is very successful but apparently lost a lot of money as owners of the WTC and are investing in the re-development.

Many ceilings and walls of pressed metal have survived which is a treat. Here 'new' is not 'best'. Much of NY is a bit shabby but fine, and, because of the slight degree of neglect many wonderful architectural details have been preserved. 

 The studio at the NYSS where the painting class is held. This is a very loved art school and I'd say it's a little 'out' of the C21st current global world scene. The emphasis is on face to face teaching and hands on practice.

Amazing books and objects in our apartment, every nook and cranny is full plus the walls covered with masks, artefacts, embroidery, mirrors and artworks.

 This is the elegant memorial at the site of the WTC South tower. It is the size of the tower's footprint and has the names of those killed from the fire department, plane, tower, the pentagon and plane that crashed into it.

 The fence surrounds the next phase of the redevelopment looking north at sunset. How many more surrounding buildings were not destroyed or condemned is amazing.

 Looking south east across the planted trees of the generous open space of the re-development.

 From the fifth floor of MOMA looking south west along 53rd Street. The mix of old ornate buildings and more recent skyscrapers is wonderful.

From the first floor of MOMA later when the sun is no longer finding its way to street level.

A Visit To MOMA

Yesterday, fifth day here. decided to go downtown on the subway then walk up to MOMA on 53rd St. I saw the Willem de Kooning Retrospective then two floors of work from Cezanne through to late 70's. Not used to shelling out $25 per visit but it certainly makes you concentrate and you are immersed in more art works on three floors of this gallery than is imaginable. De Kooning's large expressive abstractions from 1955 are wonderful in fact that whole room is a blast, also the two paintings of 1960 the 'Door to the River' ones which are high key blue with strong yellow.
I think when he returned to abstraction after the violence of the figurative women series of which he did at least three, he could really hit his stride in paint. The most boomy boomy woman series is the one from the late 40's early 50's. 'Woman V',  part of the NGA's collection is on loan to MOMA. It was a treat to see how it stacks up against the other four works in the series and it looks really good.
On the 5th level you are straight into an excellent survey of paintings from French 1880's-90's, all the names. Multiple examples of Cezanne, Seurat, Gauguin, Van Gogh, Rousseau, a terrific nocturne by Munch and two wild Ensors. Overwhelming plus you are allowed to take photos - I can see the value of the $25. The second room a wonderful overview of Picasso with two figurative works leading up to Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and works concurrent and later. Just fantastic to see the lead in to the work he and Braque did after they saw the big Cezanne retrospective after he died in 1906. There are two Braques side by side both of views in L'Estaque a year apart, the earlier has the Fauve colour then the latter is a homage to Cezanne. Great to see how they learnt as they crept towards the works for which they are most remembered. The Cubist works on show were just wonderful.
Every painting is a treat to see because you remember they are objects not just small, smooth rectangles on a book's page.  The highlight in the end was the Matisse room. 'The Red Studio' which is a much stronger red almost an Indian Red that you see in a reproduction; the 'Moroccans' a huge and complicated work; many magnificent compositions; luminous colour and surfaces that he really worked, thin colour scrubbed even scratched in places - every mark is quite anxious and thoughtful nothing syrupy or over indulgent or over confident. Just wonderful.