The Waterfalls

Okay, so maybe Olafur Eliasson's The New York City Waterfalls really does pale in comparison with those "saffron" Gates of some years back. That doesn't mean one can't get something out of them. And just like The Gates got people to explore a somewhat untrafficked zone of New York City (Central Park in the winter), so can The Waterfalls get people to do very much the same thing.

So far I've gotten the most out of viewing The Waterfalls from two "unusual" vantage points. One is Governors Island, which has been a wonderful "must-see" weekend destination throughout this summer. From Governors Island you can see one waterfall up close (left) and also view all four in roughly one glance, appreciating the different ways the water appears to flow.

That was good, but I have to say that the entire Governors Island experience overshadowed the Waterfalls experience. My very favorite Waterfalls experience so far—something that compared favorably with The Gates—involved walking downtown on a hot night. BAT (and GFNYC) fan Ellen and I ambled through Chinatown and discovered a street fair, some dark and mysterious alleyways, and a crowd of women doing a kind of Asian "alley cat" dance in a public park as we wandered to the shore of the East River by the Manhattan Bridge. Once we got to the walkway, we joined a smattering of people including fishers (no relation) chilling out in view of some of the waterfalls, which were illuminated and fascinating to behold. Suddenly, the work made a lot more sense to me. Eliasson is, after all, known for his use of artificial light, which was fully in play around 9pm—though not at each waterfall. (And, if you are unthrilled by the industrial look of the structures, you'll be pleased to find that they are less visible at night.)

Give the Chinatown walk and East River vantage point a try, especially if there are any more steamy nights left before The Waterfalls runs dry on October 13. And try to take advantage of the visiting hours at Governors Island, too.

Photo: David Marc Fischer

MOMA OVERVIEW

Right now there's a electric fan blowing in the big atrium of the Museum of Modern Art. It's hanging from a long cord, and swinging in (what I believe is) a semi-predictable pattern. It's simply fascinating—that is, fascinating in a simple way. And it's probably much more interesting than it would've been had the artist, Olafur Eliasson, used an air conditioner instead of an electric fan.

I'm not sure I qualify as a big fan of Eliasson's work at MOMA, but it was fun to sample it. Aside from the fan, I liked the hallways that he saturates in light that makes everything look like it's in black-and-white. Another work is a circular enclosure (right) that changes colors—make sure you look out from within the enclosure, because the colors inside the enclosure somehow change one's perception of the color of the outside area. Got that?

The online Olafur Eliasson exhibition is here.

Elsewhere in the museum, there's a bunch of small shows worth tracking down. George Lois: The Esquire Covers offers a glimpse of how Lois, a cover designer with attitude, was able to get okays even when his edgy work was at odds with the internal copy.

And Focus: Ad Reinhardt and Mark Rothko offers another of MOMA's well-presented rooms of art.

But that's not all: The photo exhibition Bernd and Hilla Becher: Landscape/Typology presents industrial images in groupings that encourage appreciation of their similarities and differences. I love this kind of thing and dream of one day doing something similar with post offices.



















Images courtesy of Museum of Modern Art