Day Three- October 5th 2012

10-5-2012

I think Aesthetically New York is a very beautiful city, and to be more specific, Brooklyn is a very beautiful place. There are old old old buildings, bridges, signs, traffic lights, houses, and that aged look is very attractive to me. On my third day here I decided to make a visit to Coney Island. 

I had to chance to visit a post office in Coney Island, and I just had this feeling that everyone in that post office knew each other, but mostly every neighborhood I went to in Brooklyn, I got that same feeling. That small town feeling, but maybe that was just me. 

Coney Island has this charm to it. This charm might be very hard to describe through writing but I think I can try. Skating through the small town with tiny shops packed onto the blocks, I noticed that most of the store front signs were hand painted. That kind of craftsmanship is something I kept noticing and appreciated very much. And when I arrived at the amusement park, all of that craftsmanship was so noticeable and prevalent. 

I wish I looked half as cool as these little kids. 

So the MoMA has branches in NY, this gallery space is called MoMA PS1. It's located in Long Island City, Queens. Unfortunately for me, they were in the middle of putting new work in all of the galleries except for the handful of permanent installations, so all the exhibition rooms were empty. I was warned, but I decided to check it out anyway.

This space is so amazing, it's a very old building that looks like it used to be a school. So hallways full of doors that lead into a small/big rooms. And when the gallery is up and running, these rooms are filled with all kinds of art. 

The best permanent room was James Turrells, "Meeting".

You walk into this room expecting it to have four walls and a ceiling, and you walk in to get four walls, some huge wooden benches with a huge square cut out of the ceiling. 

Being in this room with the sunlight seeping in was one of the most surreal moments I've ever had, and one of the most peaceful moments of this entire trip. Just lying on the bench, looking up at the sky and hearing faint sounds of traffic, birds chirping, a slow breeze, and the sound of footsteps in the hallway next to me made me feel so small. Reminding me that, as Kimya Dawson says, "I am just a tiny speck in a giant's eye." 

One of my favorite places back home is in fact another James Turrell installation. But this one, located at the Pomona College, is completely outdoors, with a large shallow fountain in the center and the ceiling actually has a light show every evening. Much different experience but both are still very great experiences. 

And it was back to nyc for some late lunch which I brought to the Hudson River Park. On the west side of nyc, there are lots and lots of long piers that I wouldn't really consider piers but they essentially are, and these piers are mostly long stretches of parks. It's a nice place to get away from all the busy people that fill up the sidewalks in this city. The stretch of buildings in the background is New Jersey. 

And I turn around to see that fall has arrived on the east coast.