Hot Town, Summer in the City

With the east-coast heat wave in full force, I sought respite at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Before spending time in the galleries, I went up on the roof.  Is this a crime scene or an art installation?  You decide.

(It's actually an art installation by Pakistani artist Imran Qureshi.)

The back of my neck getting dirty and gritty, I went inside for the Met's Spring 2013 Costume Institute exhibition, "PUNK: From Chaos to Couture," which examines punk's impact on high fashion.  Punk is about chaos, anarchy and rebellion.  The Met guards were about order, not getting too close to the fashion, and absolutely no photography.  I took photos anyway, and felt so punk while doing so.

Dolce & Gabbana

A dress made from trash bags

Alexander McQueen

There Will Be Owls

The cranky gallery girl is off to Detroit, Michigan and environs to explore the once glorious (and sadly, the now officially bankrupt) mid-western metropolis that brought us the automobile, the Motown sound and Cranbrook which is where this story begins. 

The Cranbrook educational campus was founded in 1904 by newspaper mogul George Booth in the Detroit suburb of Bloomfield Hills.  The sprawling campus is known for its architecture in the Arts and Crafts style and was designed primarily by Albert Kahn and Eliel Saarinen.  It's sprawling campus consists of the Cranbrook middle and high schools, The Cranbrook Academy of Art, the Cranbrook Art Museum, the Cranbrook Institute of Science and the Cranbrook House. All of these institutions sit on 319 acres of lush gardens, outdoor sculpture and beautiful vistas.  While I had heard of the Cranbrook Academy of Art, I had absolutely no idea of it's rich history and legacy of art and design in Michigan and beyond.  Today I visited the museum and it's current exhibition Michigan Modernism: Design that Shaped America and yes, in the end, there will be owls.

The Smith House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1941. Interestingly, the Smiths were Lithuanian, Jewish immigrants (original named Smiefsky) and teachers in the Detroit public school system.  It was Mr. Smith's dream to have a Frank Lloyd Wright house and despite their teacher's salary, they were able to build the house in stages and achieve his dream.  Like most Frank Lloyd Wright homes, it is built in a beautiful setting, beside one of Michigan's many ponds.

Sculpture by Robert Schefman

And last but certainly not least, here are the magnificent owls that have been rescued and are lovingly cared for by the Cranbrook Science Center staff.  What a beautiful surprise they were.

Brooklyn Bound

Remember the "Sex and the City" episode when Miranda moved to Brooklyn and it was as if she relocated to another state, another country even?  Having never been to Brooklyn, I had no idea how spot-on SATC got it.  As it turns out, Brooklyn is very far away from my upper east side home-away-from-home but worth the trek in oppressive New York summer heat (via a sweltering subway) to visit the famed Brooklyn Museum.

On view: the first solo show in New York of globally-renowned contemporary artist El Anatsui.  Born in Ghana and living in Nigeria, Anatsui expresses themes of freedom, movement, globalization and the concept of a "nonfixed form" through a unique artistic medium: linked metal bottle caps.  The artist's discovery of a discarded bag of aluminum liquor-bottle tops over a decade ago inspired him to explore their artistic potential.

Anatsui employs up to 40 studio assistants to flatten, cut, shape, and manipulate the bottle caps into more than 30 different shapes which are hand-stitched together with wire into blocks of color and patterns.  The artist then selects and assembles the blocks on the studio floor; the composition growing and changing until the artist is satisfied with the overall pattern and form.  In linking the scraps of metal, Anatsui sees himself linking the histories of the individuals who previously touched the objects.

Two monochromatic works brought to mind luxurious fabrics and the work of painters Mark Rothko and Gerhard Richter.

Waste Paper Bags (illustrated below, foreground) is made from discarded aluminum printing plates (used for printing everything from newspaper sports pages and obituary pages to wedding invitations) manipulated to look like crumpled newspaper and formed into the shape of monumental bags.

Many of Anatsui's early works are made out of used mortars and discarded wood.  The work illustrated below is composed of individual strips of wood which can be arranged differently each time it is installed, reflecting the artist's desire for his work to remain dynamic.  These wood pieces were among the artist's first experiments in the "nonfixed form."

When working with living artists, museums often encourage them to be present during the layout and installation of their exhibitions.  One of the museum guards informed me that Anatsui did not arrive in Brooklyn until the majority of his works had been installed by museum staff.  Anatsui wishes to inspire creativity in the people charged with installing his works and says he merely provides "data" for others to reenvision and manipulate.  He was pleased with the museum's installation with one exception: a work entitled Peak (below, in the foreground).  Museum staff installed the work in such a way that the skirt part laid flat on the floor; Anatsui scrunched it up a bit to create a more wavy form.

Peak is made from the tops of Peak brand milk tins.  Drainpipe (below) incorporates the same materials.

"Gravity and Grace: Monumental Works by El Anatsui" was a jaw-dropping exhibition of one of my favorite contemporary artists.  Equally magnificent was the museum's exhibition of watercolors by John Singer Sargent.  I was not permitted to take photographs in that show.  Click here to view Sargent's beautiful watercolors and learn more about that exhibition.

Merci and vielen dank, Basel

Our weeklong art adventure has come to a close, but before saying au revior and auf wiedersehen to Basel, we squeezed in one final day of fun.

1. We visited the Vitra Design Museum which was presenting a retrospective of architect Louis Kahn.  As it turns out, the Vitra Design Museum is not in Switzerland but in Weil am Rhein, Germany.*

Main building designed by Frank Gehry

Claes Oldenburg sculpture

Cafe, store, and Vitra showroom designed by Herzog & de Meuron

2. In a Frank Gehry state of mind, we went to the corporate campus of Novartis to see its Gehry building. Unfortunately, the campus is only open for tours on Saturday mornings, and we were there a few hours too late.  We could only see a tiny fraction of the building from the street.

There it is - between the two trees on the right

3. We rode a ferry across the Rhine a couple of times.  The ferry is attached to a cable that spans the river and is powered only by the current.

4. We made good use of our public transit card.  Kevin mastered the streetcar and bus routes!

5. We visited an old city gate, which was inaccessible and almost completely covered with scaffolding.  Oh well.

6. We learned of another section of Art Basel called "Parcours" consisting of various sculptures and installations placed in unusual spaces (schools, restaurants, retail shops) in a historical area of the city.  Our favorite work was by Martin Walde entitled Choice, an interactive piece in which a wax figure sits in near-total darkness. As the viewer walks through the space, a series of infrared lights is triggered and the heat generated from the lights will ultimately melt the wax figure unless the viewer continues walking thereby switching off the lights.

We climbed four flights of stairs to the attic of a school to view a video work by Lisa Oppenheim entitled Smoke.  It was worth it.

7. Lastly, we enjoyed a beer at a bar called Union.  Almost every surface is covered in copper.

*Our flight home departed from Basel's EuroAirport, which is located in France, not Switzerland.  That makes two countries accidentally visited on this trip!

Fondation Beyeler

The Fondation Beyeler (made up primarily of a private collection amassed over 50 years by art dealers Ernst and Hildy Beyeler) is Switzerland's most visited museum.  Designed by architect Renzo Piano, the museum is situated just a short tram ride away from the Basel city center.

The next-door neighbors

One foot in the door and it is clear why the Beyeler is the most visited museum.  Each gallery is filled with multiple top-tier examples by the most important artists of the past century.

Alberto Giacometti

A whole gallery of works by Alexander Calder

In addition to its amazing permanent collection, the museum presented a retrospective of the work of Max Ernst (1891-1976), considered one of modernism's most versatile artists.

One complaint: the sign pictured below was everywhere in Basel!  Seriously, we saw this advertisement at least 700 times around the city and in every art fair publication.

"Maurizio Cattelan - I LOVE Maurizio Cattelan!" I exclaimed to Kevin, "I'm so excited to see another exhibition of his work!"  I grabbed Kevin's hand and dragged him through the Beyeler galleries to the beginning of the show, flying past de Koonings, Rothkos, Calders, Monets, and other masterpieces, only to find this:

The "exhibition" was just one room displaying the five versions of Cattelan's famous horse sculpture.  Sure, this is the first time all five versions have been shown together, but does this display constitute an exhibition?  The wall text credited two people for "curating" this show.  Seriously?!?!  And what about the work pictured in the show's advertisement?  It's not here!  I left feeling like one of those five horses' behinds.