Getting Medieval - The Cloisters

So far, February has been about as pleasant and mild as a day in April. The spring flowers are about as confused as we are. On a particularly bright, warm day last week, I made an afternoon trip to the Cloisters Museum far up in Manhattan’s most northwestern corner. It is an extension of Midtown’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, housing the main collection’s spillover of Medieval art. The area boasts breezy views of the Hudson and the cliffs of the Palisades on the New Jersey side.

The Fort Tryon Park heather field.

One room displays a series of seven tapestries chronicling the hunt and capture of a unicorn. The image above, The Unicorn in Captivity, is probably the museum's most famous image. As I looked around the room, the woven pieces appeared to become increasingly violent and somewhat sad. I felt for this poor creature. As I learned by eavesdropping on the three o'clock tour, the horn of the unicorn was highly sought after in Medieval stories because the possession of its horn was thought to remedy any potential poison in one's wine. The fear and suspicion of being poisoned in these times must have been pretty high - this is also the storied origin of the tradition of clinking glasses during a toast. Each person holding a cup of wine was to tip a little of his/her beverage into the other's so that if poison were a possibility by the other party, each would then have the poison and be expected to drink.

It’s been a while since I have revisited my “early”artistic roots for my graduate thesis when I studied the relationship between modern art and Byzantine art with a focus on Matisse and Picasso. I was particularly interested in seeing some stained glass and illuminated manuscripts from Spain that I studied many years ago. Walking around the museum’s enclosed herb gardens and having its corridors practically to myself made for a really spectacular day.

God Save McQueen

....or at least his legacy. The late Alexander McQueen's risk-taking creations will be on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art through July 31st. In conjunction with the Met's Savage Beauty exhibit, Bergdorf's also has a collection by the troubled genius featured in its windows.

Goth-looking mannequins peek out from behind the birch trees of a dark forest. A billowy red dress updates Alice in Wonderland's Queen of Hearts under the protective wings of a stunning giant, red eagle. And the horned trio frolicks in the moiré patterns and reflections of the funhouse mirrors.

Museum Buttons - Collecting

Every time I come back from a museum visit, I dutifully put my little metallic badge in a jar that I have for such items. I don't even remember how this peculiar little collection started. It was probably when I first noticed that there was a different color every time I went. It soon became a small obsession like hunting for the prize at the bottom of the cereal box - collect all five! 

Most of the buttons are from multiple visits to New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art each emblazoned with a giant "M" diagrammed like Leonardo's Vitruvian Man. They are from the days when I was a student practically living in one perfectly-ventilated environment or another. Others are from the New Museum, the Whitney, the MFA in Boston, DIA in upstate New York, the Morgan Library, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art (identified and distinguished by the gryphon on a colorful background). As I see them all spread out, I realize, that's a lot of looking at art!

Encounters with Greatness - Sol Lewitt

Sol Lewitt's colorful sculptures on the roof at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (2005)

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Several years ago, as a recent graduate from the arts program at Trinity College, I was invited to participate in a special project lead by artist, (the now late) Sol Lewitt and his assistants. The project was to implement one of Sol Lewitt's drawings into the new student center on Trinity's campus in Hartford, Connecticut.

I was part of a team of art students ready to carry out the project. Above are the plans for the space that were sent over by the artist. Mr. Lewitt later came to the site at Trinity to meet all of us and show us in person  how to re-create his design. There was scaffolding, cans of paint with Lewitt's usual bright colors, brushes of all shapes and sizes, and the sketches  you see here. Having plans to travel to Italy for a friend's wedding, I was not able to stay for the entire project. Upon my return from Italy, I was shocked and pleasantly surprised to find a package from the Lewitt studio with an original gouache by the artist inside as a thank you gift for my help. I don't keep it with me, but someday, I hope to enjoy it in a real house.

Several months later, we were all invited back to Trinity and honored along with the dedication of the completed space. Trinity's art department compiled a special binder of photographs for each of us. The final project also made headlines in the alumni magazine.

A photographer captured me taking in the finished product at the dedication (1998).