by Yaeli Vogel
My Artsy trip in the City
I live in one of the most saturated art communities of the world - New York. Its highly dense art society lives in NYC. I figured it was time to put on my sneakers and explore it all. I purposely say sneakers, since we were extremely bold and walked everywhere. (We - since I went with my husband. I will switch off from we and I - bear with me. ) I love walking. So you can follow my footsteps of ride on wheels. Whatever floats your boat ( no pun intended!) I'm writing it down for you - here goes:
My number one rule wherever I go, is the hotel must be beautiful. So we researched and without even meaning to we booked such an artsy hotel - The Whitbey Hotel. I loved the look of it in the photos and the reviews were marvelous but when we got there there was SO much art all over!
The hotel had each room decorated in a slightly different variation with fun wallpapers and tufted walls. We admired the custom double frames on some of the artworks and the interior design details.
We hit the road and walked and stepped into a gallery off of fifth avenue and 57th street called The Cavalier Gallery and saw the most fascinating elephant made out of bullets by Frederico Uribe. It had this elegant feel to it and completely not grungy, even with its material. Absolutely incredible.
We then headed towards the Guggenheim Museum. On the way we popped into the Met but it was about to close to we basically walked up those flights up stairs and then some more stairs and made our way back down. There was some amazing street dancers right outside and we stopped to catch their act and then continued on our walk. It was a pleasant walk, up fifth ave along central park.
The Guggenheim is great. It's constructed in a circle architecture so it's easy to see the entire museum fairly quickly. I always like to start from the top and work my way down. I like to go to museums to refresh my eye, gain inspiration, learn some history and broaden my perspective. Right when we go to the top floor, I saw it. Or I didn't see it. I'll explain - I have poor far sighted vision, and while it's not significant enough to wear glasses full time, I can sometimes miss things that are far away. So when we got out of the elevator, I saw what I wanted to see. A black image with velvet on it, all over. I thought that was fantastic and wanted to incorporate it into my works somehow. When I got closer, I saw holes inside the black which I mistaken-ed for velvet. The rest was down from there, we strolled our way downwards, checked the gift shop and were out.
Day two we decided to walk downtown to the lower east side and check out the Tenement Museum. The walk was long but fun. We stopped in random shops on the way and got to really learn the city streets. The museum was moving and very interesting to gain insight as to how those early New Yorkers lived. There wasn't that much art there but defiantly a place to check out.
We then continued walking a bit north to the Soho neighborhood. We hopped into a gallery and asked them how to get to Soho. They told us we were in Soho:) There was art on the walls and a table in middle with silver handcrafted jewelry. I loved two of the bangles and love supporting artists and purchased two of them. We walked around a bit more and then headed for dinner.
Day Three was the Whitney. I did't realize before going but I was museum d out! We started on the top and made our way down very quickly. My favorite painting was on the top floor with the very large abstract pieces. I actually forgot the artist but I have the picture so I'll show it to you, if I can post it here!
We then went across the street to a fabulous gallery with works by artist: Nick Georgiou, who works with books. Yes, real books. He collects old books, paints the edges and uses them to construct his paintings. You have to see it to take it all in. It's so worth it. Then we walked up 10th ave and started making our way to the famed Chelsea galleries. The galleries started on 19th street and went all the way up to 28th. There were too many to name here, but it's a great place to explore. We went on a Thursday afternoon since they all open late on Thursdays. The inspiration was endless. I walked out of each door feeling like I had to make a quick sketch of what was on my mind or I would loose it. I didn't bring a sketch nook with me so the next best thing was my iPhone notes. It is currently exploding with ideas! I will literally stop typing right about...now so that I can get to work!
Hope you enjoyed our Artsy tour. I encourage you to explore too. Whether you're an artist or art lover, there is so much endless inspiration out there and a beautiful aliveness that comes out of viewing some good ol art!
