The Arts in New York City » Aniruddha Das

Aniruddha Das’ Final Podcast

admin — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 15:35:31 +0000

Romance in the Subway Station

syed hassan — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 16:30:03 +0000

On an ordinary late night, I truly witnessed the idea that “Art is where you find it” in the Union Square subway station. As I descended the stairs to the platform, I heard music being played. When I got to the bottom, I saw a man in his sixties playing the accordion. A couple in their twenties slow danced in the open space in front of the accordion player. They slowly spun around in a circle as they whispered in each other’s ears. People paused to stare at them, but they acted as if they were in their own little ballroom. Moment later, another young couple joined in. I could not believe what I saw. Although the music coming out of the accordion was not even pleasant to the ears, I began to think that it was romantic sounding. The scene that I witnessed that night was beautiful and confirmed that art can indeed be found anywhere.

Aniruddha Das’ Podcast Review

admin — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 19:51:30 +0000

Diwali

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 02:59:59 +0000

Diwali is a significant festival in Hinduism, which originated in India. It is the celebration of the return of Lord Rama, king of Ayodhya. He returned from a fourteen year exile in the forest. People of Ayodhya celebrated by lighting rows of lamps. Today in present day, people celebrate Diwali by lighting candle at home and also at the temple. In our house, we lit up candles on the stairs and on the front steps. In addition to the candles some also light firecrackers at night. I remember lighting firecrackers when I was in Bangladesh. On Diwali my brother and I used to get money from my grandparents and light them in our backyard. There used to be so many different types of them. However it is hard to do such a thing here in New York City. Instead we light different colored and sized candles in our house. Last weekend on Diwali my sister made a few patterns with the candles. When I turned of the lights, the light was remarkable to look at. These patterns could be seen differently in everyone’s eyes. It is amazing how a religious holiday can result in art.

Hinduism: In the Realm of Gods and Goddesses

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 05:31:09 +0000

The last gallery tour I attended at the Metropolitan Museum of Art has left a huge impression on me. I went back for another visit on October 26, Friday. This time I attended a gallery talk called Hinduism: In the Realm of Gods and Goddesses. The guide’s name was Marie-Hélène Weill. The gallery talk was much more different than the gallery tour I had been to a few weeks ago. Rather than being very informative about the sculptures in the galleries, she told many stories about the Hindu gods and goddesses, which were very interesting.
The evening started out with the usual train delay due to rainy weather. I was running a little late and missed the tour meeting at the Great Hall under the clock. Worried about missing the gallery talk completely, I quickly ran to the Asian Art galleries. After searching for a few minutes, I was relieved to have found Mrs. Marie-Hélène Weill. She began the gallery talk with many different sculptures of the Hindu god named Shiva. He is said to be the most powerful god in Hinduism, which I was not really aware of prior to this gallery talk. Shiva is believed to exist in many forms. His most common depiction is as a dark-skinned ascetic with a blue throat. He is usually found seated cross-legged on a tiger skin. He has four arms and three eyes. The third eye, in the middle of his forehead, is always closed and only opens to annihilate an evildoer. Each of the different sculptures of Shiva had unique styles. They were from different periods of time. I have never seen these different types of sculptures expect for maybe one or two of them in the temples. The sculptures were from different countries too.
After talking about Shiva, she started talking about his wife. Her name was Parvati. All of her sculptures had narrow waists, which was a common theme among Indian sculptures. Most of the sculptures were broken on the sides or bottom, which showed that they were part of a bigger sculpture or a temple. She is the only female deity, who like Vishnu has the ability to change her form. She appears in incarnations as Durga and Kali. As Parvati she is soft and gentle. But as Durga she becomes a powerful warrior and as Kali a bloodthirsty goddess who can even demand sacrificial killings.
I found it interesting how after talking about Shiva and Parvati, she started talking about their son Ganesha. There was not much difference between his sculptures like Shiva and Parvati. It was probably because Ganesha was not well known among the followers of Hinduism. Unlike the other gods and goddesses, Ganesha has a head of an elephant. I was fascinated to hear the story of how his head turned out to be like that. Once Parvati, while bathing told her son Ganesha to guard the entrance. When Shiva, her husband returned, he was denied access into the house, and struck off the Ganesha’s head in rage. Parvati broke down in utter grief and to soothe her, Shiva went out to find the first living being in his path for a replacement head. He found a white elephant and severed its head for Ganesha. Then he attached the head to Ganesha’s body and restored his life. I actually have a sculpture of Ganesha in my house, which looks very much like one of the sculptures I saw in the gallery.
This particular visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art was very different from the last visit. The main difference was that this time it was a gallery talk instead of a gallery tour. This visit consisted of only religious sculptures and along with the sculptures I learned about many fascinating details about Hindu gods and goddesses. The gallery talk was very informative about the gods and goddesses rather than the sculpture itself. This gallery talk is good to attend if you are looking forward to broaden your knowledge about Hinduism and experience sculptures from Hinduism as well at the same time.

Art in the 74th Street – Roosevelt Ave. Station

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 18:35:36 +0000

The last place i thought i would find art is in the subway. I have been using the 74th Street – Roosevelt Avenue station for about the passed nine years. Nine years ago this subway was not in such a good condition. There were a lot of graffiti, broken down doors and dirty walls in the subway station. But over the passed four to six years, there have a lot of renovations done in that station. Part of these renovations included new stairs, more entrances, and other things. I had noticed the changes when I would go to the subway once in a while. A few days ago I was waiting for the 7 train for a long time due to a problem on the track and noticed some artworks on the glass wall of the platform. Instead of boring one colored walls, they decided to put in these glass walls. There were many different abstract designs done the glass. These designs consisted of simple shapes transformed and colored. This reminded me of the exhibit called recollections from the Hall of Science. I was amazed to find art in such a place as the 74th Street subway station. I did not even notice these till few days ago. So look at your local subway stations I bet you will notice new artwork and will be amazed by it.

Last One Standing

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 21:04:42 +0000

Hall of Science

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 18:22:54 +0000

I had never been to the New York Hall of Science till last week. While I was walking into the Hall of Science, I was thinking how am I going to find art here? After all it is the Hall of Science, where little kids go to learn science while they are having fun. I was absolutely wrong. The Hall of Science has great deal of artworks. There are art galleries on the second level as well as many opportunities to create your own artwork.

At first when we were walking into to the Hall of Science, it was a little awkward because there were mostly little children there on their school field trips. Wendy, Eilene, and I got our tickets to our childhoods and started having loads of fun. Most of the art on the main level were art of illusion. My favorite was the checkered room with the slanted floor. This slanted floor of the room creates an illusion of size. While Eilene walked from the entrance of the room to the back of the room, I was watching through a window on the side. It appeared as if she was growing while walking to the back of the room. This is because the room gets smaller towards the back of the room due to the slanted floor. We took some crazy pictures of our experience in the checkered room.
It was so much fun creating our own artworks and being kids again. We went into an activity called the recollections. This was the coolest thing ever. There was a wall made of tiny glass beads that you have to walk in front of in order to see the artwork take place. When I walked in front of the wall, I blocked the light from hitting the wall and created shadows. The camera under the huge projection screen in the front recorded these shadows and showed them on the screen colored and manipulated. After a few seconds the images changed and showed a different manipulation.
Another art of illusion were the spinning disks. It was a very simple exhibit. After spinning the spiral disk, stare at the center for about fifteen seconds. When you look up at the room, the wall of the room would seem to spin. This happens due to the detection of the inward and outward motion of the mechanisms in our eyes and brain. While the eyes see a plain wall, the brain translates the wall to a moving image due to the exposure to the spinning spirals before.
My visit to the New York Hall of Science was really amazing. When I walked in, I did not think I would have this much fun and also experience art at the same time. I had such a great time there because my friends were with me. If you go there alone, it won’t be as fun as going with a bunch of friends. I can’t wait to go back there and play around more with the visual activities. I think we should go the New York Hall of Science as a class trip and experience our childhoods again.

Surprising Visit to the MET

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 03:32:18 +0000

I am sure everyone here has been to the MET sometime in the passed years. I remember going to the MET almost every year for my school trips. Since I have been there so many times and basically seen the same exact exhibits over and over, I thought my visit to the MET would be another boring one. But there was an unexpected turnout. I went to the Robert Lehman Collection tour last Friday. I had never been on a tour before inside the MET. It was a new experience for me. The tour guide Carmeta Barone, was very informative. But since there was a time limit on the tour, she had to get through a lot of painting in a short amount of time. I would rather have her spend more time on a few specific paintings. The tour consisted of paintings from Renaissance to Impressionism. That is a lot to cover in an one hour tour. It would have been better if the tour focused on only the Renaissance paintings. I knew some of the Renaissance paintings from before but the information about the other paintings were hard to follow. I think this tour is mainly for people who are already familiar with the paintings in the Robert Lehman Collection.

New York Divided: Slavery and the Civil War

Aniruddha Das — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 17:27:40 +0000

The exhibition, “New York Divided: Slavery and Civil War”, takes an in-depth look at not only the impact of slavery in the state of New York, but the toll that it had on the nation as a whole. The progress ofNew York State came after an era of controversy concerning slavery. The exhibition shows us the struggle of the African American slaves as well as the after effects of the abolition of slavery in New York.

A modern interpretation of the significant of the slaves to the cotton trade is shown in a sculpture displayed in the exhibit. In 1992, Leonardo Drew made a massive sculpture of cotton batting. This colossal piece of art was made from mattress stuffing. It was painstaking made by cutting and rejoining each piece to create a geometric form. This painstaking labor is implied as the forced and free toil of the African American slaves. Their importance is relevant to the slaves who contributed greatly to the source of American wealth.

A strong issue in the time of slavery was the issue of slave-rapes. These atrocities were committed upon women of all ages, and status in the slave trade. A beautiful representation of this issue is displayed in faith Ringgold’s “Slave –Rape Quilt.” This quilt is a breathtaking view of the sins committed against all African American slave women. The stories told on the quilt display to us the horrors of the intolerable acts committed against the women. This work contains the magnitude of the unheard sounds of the women’s objection against their rape and enslavement.

There was also a very interesting exhibit replicating the confinement of a fugitive slave for seven years. Harriet Jacobs was a run away slave who hid in solitude inside a pitch-dark cramped attic space for seven years. This exhibit is an actual replica of the attic and it can be experienced from the inside. I found this to be one the most stimulating exhibit.

In the exhibition, there were numerous pieces of art referring to the act of lynching. One such piece was “Frame” by Whitfield Lovell. This painting was made in 1993, and it displays to us a horrifying image of the lynching of a black slave. These lynching were nationwide and public, and they were murderous acts of violence. This represents the meaning of an African American experience in the slave periods of
New York. There was also another exhibit, which shows us metal sculpture of lynch by Melvin Edwards.

Another very interesting exhibit was that entitled “Rosa Park of 19^th Century
New York.” This was a comparison of a 24 year old black schoolteacher to Rosa Park. Elizabeth Jennings boarded a trolley and when the white driver told her to leave the vehicle, she did not. On the trolley it was not indicated for colored people, so the driver told her to wait for the next car, which would indicate “colored people allowed into this car.” When she refused to get off, the driver tried to forcefully remove her, until the police arrived and forcedly thrust her off the trolley.

This exhibition is wonderful interpretation of the African American presence in
New York. It shows us all the different people that took a role in the fight for equality. While textbook can only recite information to us, the exhibition gives us a much more satisfying and intriguing hands on experience and approach to the issue of slavery.