First stop, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum,the
Smithsonian's design outpost.
My favorite little museum in New York,where I always find something redeemable.
Back in 1995 I viewed a show there called "Kitch
To Corbusier- Wallpaper From the 1950's", which was really fantastic.
According to their current catalogue,"The Cooper-Hewitt has more than
10,000 papers.
It is the largest such collection in the nation"
(-Landscape Wallcoverings).
Now before you totally roll your eyes and think, why the hell would anyone be interested in wallpaper,I have to tell you its amazing what people have put on their walls for decoration. And it's incredible the amount of extravagance that went into producing some of those papers. Wallpaper really is a glance at history and a reflection of what was going on in the culture at the time(of course that's still true).
The current show "Rooms with a View: Landscape & Wallpaper" did not disappoint my enthusiasm for more wallpaper knowledge. This show specifically focuses on the theme of landscapes, spanning in time from 18th century stunningly beautiful, flowery motif extravaganzas,to mass produced, simplified images from the 1950's,and squeezing in a brief mention of those photo wall murals from the 1970's .
In the museum,entire rooms are installed with panorama papers,wallpaper created with a 360 degree view in mind,in attempts to transform each room into a natural setting.
As far as placing the various papers into an understandable and historical context,the museum provides helpful references scattered about the exhibit,including lots of handy information as to how the different paper styles evolved. For instance you learn that wallpaper is a remnant of people's interest in the burgeoning travel industry at the turn of the last century. With quicker and cheaper means of travel available,adventures to exotic locales(or the desire for them)subsequently led to a popular interest in landscapes and landscape wallpaper. Later on,with with technological advancements allowing for a mass production of affordable wall coverings,landscape wallpaper became a popular theme among everyone.
With out going on and on,a wonderful thing about the Cooper-Hewitt is they really plan their exhibits thoroughly,to engage viewers on a number of different levels. You can pretty much count on each show to offer up videos to showcase design techniques,a side room where you can sit and view the current catalogues and access to an interactive computer,besides the thorough design execution they always put into the exhibit its self.
The Cooper-Hewitt doesn't get the throngs of crowds which usually plague some of the higher profile institutions, making a stop off here all the more enjoyable.
My burden on this visit was actually due to the
fact that not many people were there. I attempted to ignore those "Absolutely
No Photography Allowed" signs and tried to take some photos on
the fly. Unfortunately with out many other distractions the plentiful
museum guards were right on me. The few shots I took, didn't come out
so well anyway as my camera doesn't do great in low-lighting. C'est la
vie. If you really want to see a nice example of what is offered in this
exhibition check out
The Cooper-Hewitt's
web site.
Rooms with a View:
Landscape & Wallpaper @ the Cooper Hewitt
Vermeer and the Delft School
@ The Metropolitan Museum of Art
_________________________________________
This weekend I broke my first cardinal rule
of living in NYC: "Never, ever go to any major museum on a Saturday.
Ever". The crowds are wearing, it's too much work, it makes me want
to kill people. Unfortunately I realized late in the week that this weekend
was my last chance(and everyone else's of course) to see the Vermeer show
that's been up at the Met. Feeling like a total sloth, I would have kicked
myself had I missed it.
On blustery weekends you can pretty much count on capacity crowds at museums. It's been raining all week, and the Memorial Day holiday to boot. I bite my tongue and venture uptown to see two shows.
On to The Met. Even though I had made an early start to the day, by the time I was leaving the grounds of the Cooper-Hewitt I noticed the Central Park crowds were already buzzing. They proceeded to increase heavily as I walked the few blocks down to the Met. I'd dug my own grave on this one. Upon climbing the ant hill which turned out to be the museum entrance steps,I was greeted by a sign "Wait For the Jacqueline Kennedy Exhibit- One and 1/2 hours". Oy vey. Luckily I had no intention upon entering that mob scene today, but I was pretty sure everyone else did,there were lengthy lines everywhere.
Up to Vermeer and the Delft School. The waiting crowds on the floor holding both the Jackie and Vermeer exhibits were so massive and ridiculous I actually started laughing. Totally absurd. We stood and waited in a roped off area having to bide our time before being let in. It was not lost on me that the personal fantasy that I always carry around with me to museums,the one where I think it's just me and the art and no one else, was obviously going to have to be suspended today.
When they finally let down the rope, a huge pack of visitors ran one way to the Jackie show and much to my chagrin another equally massive and salivating pack of museum goers, the one I was standing in the midst of,ran into the Vermeer show. I started to laugh again, because I knew that for the next 45 minutes or however long I spent at the show, I would be basically looking at the backs of peoples heads, not art.
Prepared at this point to be in a really bad mood, I noted that ironically the paintings and works we were all there to see were scenes of serenity, orderly domestic moments and peaceful landscapes- which we were all hunched and bunched together vying for a glimpse of.
I might point out that another agitating factor
became quickly apparent as well. Most people had rented those "talking
museum guides", which supposedly function as private headsets. Unfortunately
the end result of these gadgets is not actually all quiet on the western
front. If you've ever been at the library, trying to concentrate and some
Walkman(TM)wearing buffoon stations his/her self
by you,all cranked up and emitting loud but muffled and unintelligible
noise, you'll know what I am speaking of. Multiply this incident by a
irritation factor of 300 and you'll find yourself at The Met surrounded
by an incessant,distracting buzz-buzz-buzz of art history gibber jabber.
Who the hell invented those things?
All right, so I got my self in the thick of a total and complete complainathon. All said and done though,in the end I was extremely grateful I had forged the crowds to get a chance to see the few works that I did. 17th Century Dutch painting is stunning,and I have a strange soft spot for it, enough that I felt my trek was worth it. Of course the crowds spun around every Vermeer,the star of the show, like a slow moving hornets nest. One woman panicked to her companion,"I'm getting claustrophobic!"
I stood waiting,I swear, for over ten minutes attempting to get a good glimpse of Vermeer's "Girl With A Red Hat" (it is so small!)but the five people blockading it would not move.
Luckily there was a lot to look at besides Vermeer. Yes, it was a blockbuster show, but for once the hype was warranted. The chaos of the crowds actually worked to my photo-op advantage. All of the guards looked to be in utter harried dazes,and with everyone handling those headphone gadgets you could be pretty obvious about your own intentions and nobody gave notice. However, As can be seen by the state of the images I did bring away from the exhibit,it is obvious I didn't do to well. The lighting in the galleries was very low due to the age and fragility of the art, causing my silly camera to see red,literally. Secondly,(as I mentioned previously)my view frequently consisted of the backs of fellow museum goers heads. I should have just taken head and crowd shots and called it a day. So much for being sneaky.
So mission accomplished. I departed the crowds and headed to the American Modern Wing where I knew there would be solitude. No one was there,and I enjoyed the whole Clifford Still room to myself.
So what's the point of this little review session? To grace one of our more common clichés: "two thumbs up to two good shows". One, unfortunately will be down by the time this gets thrown up on the web,but the other show, at the Cooper-Hewitt is going on through the middle of October this year. And may I recommend going there on Tuesday nights when it is free?
