Swimming with the Razorfishes

Saturday, February 12, 2005

The gates are absolutely beautiful.

The Gates
click for high-res

Thank you so much, Christo.

Commuters
click for high-res

posted by Eric Hancock at 10:01 PM

11 Comments:

  • It really is an amazing project. I was just looking over my pictures again, and I can't wait to get out there again tomorrow to see what's below 81st Street. Did you see the Times "review"? I think it comes about as close as words can to describing what's so powerful about the project.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 10:10 PM  

  • What's so wonderful about it. Christo is bullshit. His "art" interferes with the ecology of every site he selects to inflict his uninspired imgination upon.
    He is a showman, not an artist. He does not respect the land, nor the animals of the area, who were doing just fine without his hideous, screaming- orange, flapping, synthetic Gates to Hell.
    Wake up people. Get real.

    By Blogger isabella, at 10:43 AM  

  • leave Mother Nature alone, christo. she was doing fine without you and your nylon.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 10:55 AM  

  • I'm not quite sure how these gates interfere with "the ecosystem." They are free-standing, and will be entirely removed and recycled after the event.

    Regarding what is or is not art, that is a more difficult distinction. If your conception of art requires that it be painted on canvas and be hanging in a museum, then I understand your problem with this work.

    However, suggesting that we people are all asleep, well that is rather rude.

    By Blogger Eric Hancock, at 10:57 AM  

  • Not any more rude that your presumption about my conception of art. Anything CAN be art.
    However I tend to respect authentic artists who respect the natural environment and those who frequent it.
    And I tend to intesely disrespect "artists" (aka professional publicity seekers) who foist their ego-and-money-driven conceptualism upon everyday natural surroundings, much as industrialists did and do each and every day all over the planet.
    How does this installation interfere with the ecosystem? Well,a small example would be this: in many vegetable gardens people tie luminescent orange tape to fence railings and poles to ward off the birds. It seems to work. That's one big way it can interfere. And, for those who don't already know, mid-February is the start of mating season for various birds in the park.
    p.s. For a look at an outdoor conceptual artist who's work takes into consideration the sensitive nature of Nature, see any article you can find about Andy Goldsworthy.

    By Blogger isabella, at 1:31 PM  

  • p.s.s. See article titled "What is art...what is an artist?", and the page featuring Goldsworthy's work at http://www.arthistory.sbc.edu/artartists/photoandy.html

    By Blogger isabella, at 2:51 PM  

  • This is an odd line of attack on this project. There's no sense in which Central Park can be described as a "natural environment." Prior to human intervention at the end of the nineteenth century, the area was mostly flat and mostly swamp. Just about every hill, tree, lake, brook, etc. was placed where it is by humans. (In fact, part of what makes The Gates so viscerally appealling is the way in which it highlights the genius of the park's original design and construction, which might be jarring to someone who preferred see it as a natural space.)

    I don't see any reason to be more concerned about the impact that this will have on the wildlife in the park (which, in a park that's already trodden by tens of thousands of visitors a day anyway, is likely to be pretty minimal, bearing in mind that no gates were placed in the more "natural" wooded areas of the park--The Ramble, etc.) than about the impact that subway work has on the rats that live there. Is it because the wildlife in Central Park is more attractive than the rats in the subway? Or that Central Park looks "more natural" than the subway? Both environments are equally natural, or equally synthetic if you prefer.

    As to whether this is art or not, I don't think that question ever has an answer, and even if an answer could be found, what difference would it make? What would you do with the answer? This isn't something to think about or talk about--it's something to experience. And I've noticed that most of the criticism of this project come from people who haven't actually experienced it (well, aside from the criticisms from those who are missing some basic information, like that this doesn't use--and therefore doesn't waste--public funds). I can't imagine how someone who has only read about the project or seen pictures of it can presume to offer valid judgments of it (again, assuming that there's some need for judgement at all).

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:28 PM  

  • Oh, and...

    And I tend to intesely disrespect "artists" (aka professional publicity seekers) who foist their ego-and-money-driven conceptualism upon everyday natural surroundings...All art is foisting ego-driven conceptualism upon everyday surroundings (natural or not, which is a distinction with which I'm not very comfortable anyway). In fact, though I'm not really seeking a definition of art, that actually sounds like a necessary prerequisite to anything that might be called art. Without ego driving us, we wouldn't do anything--if it just happened without our intervention, it wouldn't be art. Art (and pretty much everything else we do) is acting on our environment in response to or as an expression of our conceptualism.

    As to The Gates being money-driven, could you explain what you mean by that? Christo and Jeanne-Claude did sell their preliminary work as a way of raising the $21 million they needed to execute this project, but there doesn't seem to be any way in which they're going to be making money from this. They certainly aren't getting anything from the sale of related merchandise. This actually seems less money-driven than most art with which I'm familiar. Shakespeare got rich through his art, Renaissance painters were supported by patrons, and so on up to the present day.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 5:08 PM  

  • There is nothing odd about what I have said. I am certainly not the only person who has, over the past many years, voiced objections to Christo and Jeanne-Claude's installations,including The Gates, which C and J-C first proposed over twenty years ago, and which was held up for all these years by many objections. Nor am I the only one to say it is not art but showmanship, nor am I the only individual who has voiced serious concerns about the impact of their installations on the pre-existing environment.

    Quite right, the park was designed and built by human beings, who evicted quite a number of people from their homes in order to reclaim the land for the purpose. There is nothing I can really do about that as it happened before the Civil War.

    I am concerned about the Park as it is now, and the fact that is has become a "natural" habitat for many species of birds, as well as other animals.

    Though the Park was man-made, the plants and animals who live there and hunt there and breed there are not. They have taken advantage of the opportunity offered by the park, to make it their home, a place in which to thrive.

    As far as I know, trees, birds and mammals are not "synthetic".

    In the case of CP, the plants and animals were already living there, had created a habitat, and co-existed well with another group of non-synthetic frequenters of the space (human beings).The Gates was imposed upon an pre-existing environment.

    Conversely, the subways existed first, then came the rats. Rats are not a protected species,they are consummate survivors and have thrived in urban environments for centuries. Therefore no one has protested any work within the subway system that might disturb their feeding or breeding habits, as far as I know.

    If you want to nit-pick about word usage, as in "ego-driven", although you knew perfectly well what I meant, I will amend it and say "ego-centrically driven".

    I would also say that something is "foisted" upon others when one has little or no choice as to whether or not to view it, endure it, experience it, or , in the case of the wildlife of the park, to live with it.

    In 1991, one woman had the full impact of Christo's foisting, as she was crushed to death by one of the umbrellas in his installation of them in California, which came loose in a wind and fell on her.

    "There doesn't seem to be any way that they are going to be making money from this"?? They made 21 million. The fact that they choose to spend their money on the next project does not preclude that fact.

    By Blogger isabella, at 3:43 PM  

  • Oh yes, one more thing. A direct quote from the Christo/Jeanne-Claude symbiosis: "None of the work is designed for the birds."

    Quite.

    By Blogger isabella, at 3:52 PM  

  • 1) I wasn't nit-picking (or didn't mean to be). All art--all creative efforts for that matter--come from a basic belief on the part of the artist that their effort will change their environment for the better. I can't imagine anything more egotistical or egocentric than that. Let's be honest about what motivates artists, rather than selectively ascribing that motivation only to those artists whose work we don't like.

    2) The bulk of the wildlife in Central Park is found in more densely wooded areas like the Ramble, the woods running north from the Ravine and below the Great Hill, and other smaller areas. No gates were placed in any of those areas.

    3) The $21 million that Christo and Jeanne-Claude raised from the sale of their preliminary work for The Gates was spent on this project, so they won't be able to "to spend their money on the next project." It's already been spent (or will be by the time this project is taken down).

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 9:28 PM  

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