se la vie

I think this mural has been up sine July 4th 2003

The Waterfalls Project

Oh Olafur, you make some pretty great things. Sorry about your waterfalls. It's not a cheap trick, it's a pretty expensive one. To bring in the tourists, artists may be sold out but that is ok, we have to make money any way. Well, someone does.

Taking the Governors Island Ferry allows you to see all four of the waterfalls. Interesting, but what ever. The falling flow is so thin they are transparent. Not like those real waterfalls that you see in advertisements with the heavy flowing white water. What's the point? Like I said, I'm ok with it. Money for art, money for artists. Maybe he took the $$ and ran to his next project which may be more for him rather than a tourist attraction.

One of the perks for working for a museum is getting into them for free. Sometimes we get invited to places in the off hours. We were invited to Governor's Island on an off day and we were fortunate for a beautiful sunny day with low humidity which is rare in NYC this time of year. A ferry ride is usually a cheap little treat. We were given a tour of the island. It has a great history. It was a fort to protect lower Manhattan and then a high tech base for the Coast Guard. They even still have the building that looks like a home with the blinds shut but the entire interior is covered with copper to prevent them from being spied on themselves.

This entire place is pretty amazing and we strongly suggest a trip out there. There are bikes to rent if you do not have your own.

Playing the Building

When Talking Heads lead man started making art, I thought "alright, this could be cool." But, when he came to my undergaraduate art school and gave the longest lecture and slide show ever, with only a few interesting pieces, I was a bit disappointed. Some of the work was also really bad. The cool stuff was his pics of street art and odd sightings. An aesthetic eye but may be missing the heart.

David Byrne has a privilege about his work. I am not going to go into details to explain my thoughts on this. It is more of an intuitive hunch and nothing I dare to dissect right now.

It was a last minute decission for me to visit his newest installation titled, "Playing the Building." I was more fascinated with the space than David's concept and piece. He had an old piano rigged with some wires that would set of air compressed dings and small engine noises as well as some soft whistles. These noises were spread throught the large space that once was the Brooklyn ferry terminal before the Brooklyn Bridge was built.

Too bad for Mr. David Byrne that the building was much more grand and interesting than his concept and not so fun to play piano. I think it needed more sounds or at least more depth to the sounds.

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