hey hey.. today was our fourth day! dani, dora lee, robert, and i had plans to go to ps1, but luckily, we ran into katherine, emily, and vanessa on the subway who told us it did not open until 12! so we went to the whitney, which to my surprise was so much fun! dan graham's installations were so much fun because we got to interact with the pieces of art, and not just look at them. we could walk inside of them, see ourselves in the mirrors, and even on the delayed tv screens. dani and i took lots of funny pictures:) also, we watched videos by carolee schneeman which were very interesting, and possibly a bit disturbing. they contained lots of nudity and people rolling around in raw meet. crazy stuff! 

afterwards, we went to the met which was crazy amazing and HUGE. i hope i get to spend a whole day there the next time i come back to ny, because there was so much more i wanted to see. the roman statues were great for drawings; robert and i got some good final drawings out of the way. the installation on the roof was super cool too! after the met, we had dinner at cafe habana (for the 2nd time this trip, it's so good!) and then came back to our rooms and worked on our collages. they were lot's of fun! but now it's time for bed. see you at 10!

sj

The Museum Mile

This morning, Sarah, Dora Lee and I enjoyed breakfast at the little cafe across the street from our dorm called Tazza. It was delicious, and I'm sure we kept the other customers and staff entertained with our photo shoot!

Next, we journeyed over to the Whitney Museum to take in all the art it had to offer! Dan Graham's installations were absolutely fascinating! The security guard encouraged Sarah and I to play inside one of the pieces, where he secretly allowed us to take pictures!

 This double-sided room was so much fun! I also loved the installation where two cameras and televisions were placed on opposite sides of the room and delayed images were used. 

My time spent at the Whitney allowed me to learn about different, contemporary artists I can take an interest in. Needless to say, I wrote down many names and pieces. I was really amazed by Claes Oldenburg's music inspired pieces. I

n comparison with MOMA, the Whitney Museum was not quite as interesting, but it was less crowded and that to me was a definite plus! A lot less overwhelming.

After eating a delicious hot dog from a local street vendor, we went to The Metropolitan Museum of Art. It is giiiiiiiinormous. I could literally spend 5 days in there and still not see everything. I really enjoyed the tour we went on with the Met intern where she showed us her favorite pieces. The Met definitely has the overall selection of all the museums we have visited. Not to say it's my absolute favorite, but it's pretty amazing! It has so much to offer anyone and everyone. I got some good drawing time in, sketching out a few of the Roman sculptures. The view from the roof of the Met was so great. I can't believe it's almost Friday!

Day Five: Whitney Museum and the Met

This morning I ventured over to the Whitney Museum of American Art. Honestly, after having been to the Museum of Natural History, The MOMA, and looking forward to going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I was not to thrilled about the Whitney. Upon entering the museum, I walked to the top floor where the museum holds its personal collection, and I was just in awe of several works. First, John Sloan's "6th Avenue Elevated at 3rd Street" and Joseph Stella's "Brooklyn Bridge" were two paintings that I really fell in love with. I love paintings that just capture scenes in a unique way from a city, and these paintings did just that. The Brooklyn Bridge piece showed the bridge abstractly from all sorts of angles and used many colors, and this revealed just how awesome the real Brooklyn Bridge is with its height, length, and design. The 6th avenue painting just showed a busy, night-time scene in New York city with much detail, and I just sat there for maybe ten minutes looking at it. I was not in awe of the special exhibits they had there, but my favorite part of the museum came when I noticed a collection of five or six paintings from one of my favorite artists: Jacob Lawrence. I have been a huge fan ever since I did a master copy of one of his paintings in high school. I love his colors, his subjects, his compositions, and his themes. The series here in the Whitney was his "Wartime Series." Each painting seemed to show a different scene from world war one with both black and white soldiers. From elaborate greens, yellows, browns, and blues as the main colors, Lawrence really reveals powerful and moving scenes in this series from soldiers charging a trench to five men sleeping in their bunks at night on a boat across sea. Seeing these paintings basically made my day. Too bad the Whitney would not let me take pictures or I would have taken one of each painting and put them all on here. 

I have been to the Met before, but today I got to explore a little more of it. The roof garden was just amazing with its views of the city and its design of the silver branch/tree that snakes its way around the rooftop. As you can see in my pictures above, I loved the American landscape paintings. The colors, the scenes, and the light appear to be so real just like a photograph. I am glad I discovered those. 

As far as museums go, today has been my favorite day to visit them.

Day 3- 8/5/09

To start this off, last night Dora Lee, Wyatt and I had a very interesting experience at an Irish Pub down the street. We saw two federal judges get in a bar fight and met Eric Mabius from Ugly Betty. Anyways........

So glad that the meteorologists were wrong, and we were not rained on today! Went to Central Park and worked on a big drawing. To be honest, the smell of the park was very disappointing. I think I heard someone say that it is close to a zoo, so maybe that explains it.
Song Dong's "Waste Not"

After a quick lunch, we went to the MoMA, and I was so overwhelmed (in a good way). I thought it was interesting to see really famous artwork, but it bothered me that many of the people there only admired the popular ones. The pieces that were my favorites all had one thing in common, repetition. Song Dong's "Wast Not" was easily my favorite. The arrangement of the different items was so repetitive. More than that, I felt so attached to the installation. I could easily see myself becoming like Song Dong's mother. After recently sorting through my great-grandmother's house, a Great Depression survivor, I realized that I have seen many of those habits before. Our generation is unknowingly falling into the same tendencies.

having my height recorded for Roman Ondak's "Measuring the Universe"

Wednesday in NYC

I was so excited to finally visit both Central Park and MOMA today! Although I wish I could have seen more of the park, I absolutely loved the area I chose to sit at and sketch. I sat on a park bench to the left of this little restaurant called The Ballfield Cafe. I chose to focus in on the interesting roof design and tops of the umbrellas. 

We had lunch at a little pub a few blocks down from MOMA, and they had delicious hamburgers! When first arriving at the Museum of Modern Art, I experienced an instant fascination. I literally could have spent all day long in there just walking around and gazing at every single piece of art. The installation on the second floor where the guy had organized everything from his mother's home was insane! I was so excited to see the famous works of artists, such as Van Gogh, Picasso, Warhol, Mattisse, and Lichtenstein. To my surprise, Van Gogh's Starry Night was so small. Since middle school, I had always pictured it to be this gigantic painting; a sky the size of an entire wall that one would simply get lost in. I absolutely fell in love with Picasso's Lady in the Mirror. I have seen pictures of it before, but never knew the suggested story behind it that Sarah shared with me. 

Another artist that I enjoyed was Jackson Pollock's work. I never was one to say it isn't art, but seeing it up close and from all angles was really intriguing. If Pollock's work can be argued over, then much more should be taken into consideration. The part of the museum where our height was written on the wall as part of an installation wrapping around the room was so exciting. I can now say that I contributed a piece to MOMA...haha! I chose to do a master copy of a painting featured along one of the staircases leading down from the fifth floor. It was called Moby Dick, but I can't remember the name of the artist at the moment. It was a colorful painting, that I attempted to translate into black, white and hues of gray using my charcoal pencil. I attached some pictures below to look at. We had fun visiting the museum and taking goofy pictures with some of the installations! I even bought a poster. I am so excited about visiting PS1 and the Met tomorrow!

wednesday!

hey everyone! i can't believe our class is halfway over! so sad! today was the third day,  and we started out in central park. it was so pretty!! I've been to central park many times before, but it seems like every time i go there i discover a new part i've never been to before because it's so huge. after riding the carousel with katherine, i started drawing and surprisingly finished 3 while there. after a fast lunch, we went to MoMA which was amazingggg... i'm not sure which was more amazing, seeing all the different types of modern art by newer artists, or seeing the classics which i've always imagined seeing in real life but never really have. after seeing warhol's campbell soup cans, i can now die happy.. kidding, but seriously, it was all so awesome! i did 2 matisse master copies, one of 'goldfish & palette' and one of 'the moroccans'. i also did a mastercopy of duchamp's 'network of stoppages'. oh but my very favorite was the 2nd floor. ahh so awesome. 

well after class, boy did we have a hard time. dani, robert, and i got on the subway. it was during rush hour, so of course it was crazy and people were packed on there. we questioned even getting on the subway car because it was so packed we weren't sure if we could even fit, but we squeezed on anyway. WELL... after being on there for about 1 minute, we noticed that the air conditioning went off, and then the cart came to a complete stop in the tunnel and whadda ya know.. the electricity was cut off because a man had fallen into the tracks! we were stuck on this packed subway cart for 40 minutes in the boiling heat. TERRIBLE. i think the three of us had anxiety attacks. i was even passing out pieces of my bristol board for people to fan themselves with. moral of the story? don't get on a packed subway cart i guess? 

tomorrow will be a better day:)

sleep well! 

sarah j 

MoMA

Considering the Museum of Natural History was the first museum I have been to outside of Fernbank, I was blown away by the art museum today. I had never seen an original Van Gogh, or an Andy Warhol, or Picasso. Henri Matisse is one of my favorite artists. Seeing his work close up was more effective than I imagined it would be. The work is striking from a few feet away, but even more interesting with your nose right up on the work-I thought master artists would be focused on perfection; but it seemed to be more about the intention and effects of each brushstroke. Online or in a textbook Matisse is interesting, but the depth brought to a painting or sculpture in real life is beyond what you can interpret from a photograph. 

    I learned that art is not black or white, from the chair display on shelves to the shattering plates and glasses composing a chandelier, everything has its own place in a museum like MoMA. Floors and floors of artists who've pursued their dreams makes for an interesting day. It was also new for me to see all the different mediums artists work with. I saw Matisse sculpture, paintings, and drawings. The skill level is so high, and all of the creativity it takes to produce all of his artwork is beyond me. There were so many artists outside of Matisse that I really enjoyed today. I have always enjoyed Piet Mondrian, Rene Magritte, and today I added new favorites like contemporary artist Carol Bove. Seeing all of this art as it stands in real-time was very worthwhile.