The Arts in New York City

In a previous review, I wrote about how documentaries are artistic in the way it appeals to the emotions and feelings of an audience to inform them of a subject. In Al Gore’s documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” Gore tries to use fear and guilt as a tactic. He informs the audience of the global warming situation and their role in it. Sometimes, he ends up being more preachy than necessary. This is especially annoying when he is hypocritical at times. For a guy who travels on jet planes quite frequently, he should not be admonishing others. It is still admirable on his part that he puts his effort in informing people of the situation.

Have you ever notice how much art is actually around us? There is no need to travel a gazillion times to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to see art. We encounter art everyday just by attending Baruch. The Baruch Newman Vertical Campus houses numerous pieces of art. On every floor, you can find at least a couple of paintings or pictures. There are the chrome prints on the third floor; there are the black and white nature prints on the ninth floor; there are the series of “Produce Better, Live Better” ads on the tenth floor. Even the building itself can be considered artistic in its structure. The Vertical Campus is innovative in its organizations of stacked atria with expansive windows that allow so much daylight into the building. Photographs of the external building and internal setting are display all along the walls as you enter the Baruch Performing Arts Center. The BPAC acts as another way of providing the Baruch community with art as many plays and concert series are held there. If you don’t have the time or money to venture elsewhere to experience art, all you have to do is take a walk around the building during your breaks.

        The most common medium for art and communication, in this day and age, is mass media. Media in the form of newspapers, television, and films might be considered by some elitist artists as far too commercial to be real art. However, there are some forms of media that can be artistic in nature and form. One such form is the documentary. Documentaries are artistic in the way that it tells a story, expresses the feelings and sentiments of its subjects and the filmmaker, and informs people.

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Kara Walker, a receiver of the MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant came onto the art scene in 1994 with “Gone, An Historical Romance of a Civil War as It Occurred Between the Dusky Thighs of One Young Negress and Her Heart.” Like her earliest work, her latest exhibition  “My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love” also focuses on the theme of race. Her medium of art is quite interesting – black-paper silhouette cutouts that adorned white walls, other smaller notebook drawings, collages, and film animations starring shadow-puppets. The film animations are the highlights of the exhibition and provide a sort of background for the silhouette pieces. One of the animations shows the origins of slaves. Cast out at sea after being capture and thrown overboard during a storm, slaves are swallowed by a “giant mouth” and then spewed out into cotton fields to face abuses. What is fascinating is Walker’s range of depiction of stereotyped images of black Southern history. There are graphic depictions of rapes and lynchings. Then there are caricatures of sorts where certain features are emphasized such as fat lips, oversize genitals, and other exaggerations. Her art compels you to come to conclusions of race in the past and Southern America. Whatever these conclusions may be, Kara Walker’s exhibition definitely makes you think.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art houses one of the most extensive art collections in the world. At the Met, one can find anything from Ancient Egyptian art to European art to Modern American art. There are nineteen separate departments in the museum that include: Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas, Greek and Roman Art, The Robert Lehman Collection, etc. Having such a widespread collection, the Met draws in quite a big crowd on any given day.

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Different kinds of art can be found everywhere, from museums to galleries to parks to your own home. It can even be found at coffee shops. At Joe’s Coffee Shop, you can experience latte art. Gabrielle Rubenstein, a co-founder of Joe’s says, “the whole thing behind latte art is that it ensures all the elements come together and are correct.” It is really the art of science; the right amount of milk, expresso, foam, and timing is needed to make latte art. Joe’s latte art comes in forms of hearts, leaves, monkeys, and many other things. Not only does it look good but it tastes great too.

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Have you ever had the chance to meet and party with your favorite celebrities? Want to rub elbows with A-list movie stars, politicians, historical figures, and international icons alike? If you haven’t and you want to, then the place you need to go to isMadame Tussauds Wax Museum. With locations all around the world (Amsterdam, London, Las Vegas, Hong Kong, Shanghai, New York), Madame Tussauds’ celebrity wax figures attract people of all ages. (more…)

*pokes*