Laziness and Lady Liberty

My apologies for my lack of blog post yesterday.  You see, dear reader, yesterday I was lazy.  I mean, I still managed to walk just over a mile (see below) in the quest for meals and such, but other than that, I did basically nothing.  It was quite nice, actually.

Today, I was a bit more active.  Anu and I brunched with a friend of hers in Times Square, which was far busier than the one other time I was there.  We later traveled down to Battery Park, at the southernmost tip of Manhattan, to see the Statue of Liberty from across the water.  No, we did not actually go out to the island to see it close-up or climb to the top or anything.  That costs money!  And we are being quite cheap at the moment.  Ok, mostly we just had no real interest in going.  But I also saw the Statue of Liberty when my plane to New York City was landing, which I thought was pretty neat.

Yesterday's mileage: 1.06 mi.
Today's mileage: 2.48 mi.

Auctions are not for me

Today's museum culture seminar brought us to Sotheby's for a mock auction.  We were each given a paddle, a mock catalog, and a budget.  My budget was $650,000.  That's a lot of money, right?  Yeah, not so much at Sotheby's.  And the catalog items were...well, let's just say they were not my taste.  I couldn't help but think that I would rather take that money and spend it at Target or Ikea or something.  Ironically, the auctioneer later said something about how when we get our own places and begin furnishing them, we should come to Sotheby's and not go to Ikea - that we should get some furniture that will gain value over time.  Personally, I just want furniture that will serve its purpose and look awesome in my apartment.  And as I said, antique colonial American furniture is really not my style.  Target and Ikea?  Yes, please!

But anyway, there was a mock auction as well.  Ok, I am not one for gambling and I consider auctions to be a form of gambling so I wasn't too terribly into it to begin with.  Wow, it was one of the most stressful things ever.  The auctioneer just kept talking, so quickly and constantly that I couldn't even process it fast enough to bid on anything.  I mean, there were only 8 items so it was only a few minutes of stress, but still, it was crazy.  But hey, now I know to avoid auctions at all costs, you know, for future reference.

Today's mileage: 3.74 mi.

Countdown

So, you may have noticed that I added a countdown to my homecoming on the left sidebar a few days ago.  Yes, I am greatly looking forward to coming home.  And in addition to counting down the days (and hours, minutes, and seconds in my digital countdown), I keep finding other ways to countdown my time in New York City.  From this moment until I fly home:

• I will do laundry once.
• I have 2 whole weekends here.
• I will eat 14 meals from the dining hall.
• I will spend about $75 in dining dollars.
• I have 4 museum culture seminars to attend.
• I will spend 8 days in the Guggenheim library.
• I will walk roughly 45 miles.

If anyone has any more countdown suggestions, I would love to hear them.

Today's mileage: 2.31 mi.

Navigating the job market

We interns had a bonus museum culture seminar today with the human resources department.  They gave a presentation about looking for jobs and going through the application and interview process.  As with many such trainings, it was geared more toward the museum world (understandable) than to the library world.  That is not to say that I took nothing away from it.  On the contrary, it was very informative to hear about the hiring process from the recruiter and human resources point of view.  One thing that they stressed was the importance of utilizing the benefits of LinkedIn.  I've got a profile which I've kept updated, though I have yet to find LinkedIn to be particularly helpful.  However, I figure it can't hurt, I keep it anyway.  And it's got a link to the lovely blog you are currently reading. 

Today's mileage: 2.29 mi

The end of an era

I just submitted my last assignment for my MLIS.  That may possibly be my last class assignment ever.  I'm fairly certain that I should be feeling relieved right now, but I can't help but be freaking out a bit here.  I mean, that's it?  Now what?  You mean I don't have to worry about homework anymore?  I don't know if I can wrap my head around that. 

Today's mileage: 2.36 mi

I'm famous!

I am the new face of the Guggenheim Library & Archives Department.  Ok, maybe that's an exaggeration but this picture of me with the Guggenheim's rare books collection was featured in the Library & Archives newsletter today.  And it went out to All Staff so I feel all kinds of important.  The rare books are kept under lock and key so you can feel special too because you get to see them...even if from afar.

Today's mileage: 2.29 mi

Getting away from the city without leaving Manhattan

Because the weather was slightly nicer today than it has been the past few days (it was a mere 90 or so degrees), Anu and I took the opportunity to visit The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Cloisters Museum & Gardens.  Although it took us a 45-minute subway ride to get there, it was totally worth it.  The air was wonderfully breezy, it was gloriously quiet, and fantastically beautiful.  It was as if we had been transported from the mean streets of Manhattan to a wonderland of peace.  And that was just the gardens!  The Cloisters themselves were fabulously air-conditioned and a treat to enjoy as well. 

After our lovely trip to the Cloisters, Grace and I ventured out to see the movie Horrible Bosses to escape the now-tolerable-but-still-unpleasant heat.  It was very funny and a good end to the day.

Today's mileage: 5.12 mi

Yay for air conditioned museums!

Yes, my appraisal of museums has been reduced to my enjoyment of their air conditioning.  I met up with Anu today for a trip to the Whitney.  We had a good time, mostly soaking up the a/c, I'm not gonna lie.  My supervisor mentioned to me a few weeks ago that the Whitney recently got a new library and the librarian offered us a tour, which we are in the process of arranging.  But back to my Whitney experience.  As I always do when I visit a museum , I took a quick poke around the gift shop and this time I found something worth buying.  It was a book called I Feel Relatively Neutral About New York.  While both Anu and I are currently learning more toward the feeling-negatively-about-New-York-City side at the moment, especially considering the heat wave, we do recognize the good things that the city has to offer...like its awesome museums.  In any case, I purchased the book as a rather telling reminder of my time here.

As I just mentioned, New York does amazing museums, but there is one that I have a bit of a beef with at the moment: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.  As you may or may not know, one of my primary missions in New York has been to see Madame X at The Met - a wish that I have been unable to fulfill thus far as the wing in which the painting resides has been under renovation.  Said renovation was slated to be completed July 22nd - yesterday.  However, upon my visit to The Met today for the explicit purpose of seeing my dear painting, I found that the wing was still closed.  I am quite frustrated.  And needless to say, the heat did not help.

In another attempt to seek shelter from the sweltering heat, Anu, Genevieve, and I went to see the final installment of the Harry Potter saga: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2.  It was pretty epic.  I cried...kind of a lot.  I mean, not full-blown sobbing, but tears definitely came to my eyes quite a few times.  It's the end of an era, man. 

Today's mileage: 3.30 mi

Beating the heat with museum field trips

This photo is actually from our museum culture seminar to the MTA Arts for Transit program last Friday.  It's a sculpture of a tree hanging upside-down from the ceiling, dripping with Swarovski crystals in Grand Central Market.  You can learn more about it and see more photos of the sculpture here.  (Also, I just uploaded the other photos from that trip as well as my second trip to The Met in case you're interested - see the link to my New York photo album in the left sidebar of the page.)

As for today's museum culture seminar, we learned about the Guggenheim's exhibition management department.  In addition to the exhibitions installed in the Frank Lloyd Wright building, the speakers also discussed the international (and a couple of domestic) exhibitions and satellite endeavors pursued by the museum.  They are currently working on establishing an institution and collection in Helsinki.

After our time at the Guggenheim, I sought refuge from the heat in another exhibition space: The Center for Book Arts.  It was not really what I expected, though I couldn't tell you what exactly it was that I expected.  It seems that their primary purpose is to provide a space and materials to those pursuing various books arts and print-making techniques.  But it was air-conditioned so I'm not complaining. 

And speaking of air-conditioning, I am currently planning my life around the pursuit of it.  It's no wonder as the temperature today was in the triple digits for most of the day.  It's sad when it's so hot that I long to return home to Florida.

Today's mileage: 3.36 mi

Heat wave

New York City is experiencing a heat wave at the moment.  It is unpleasant.  Very unpleasant.  Tomorrow's high is in the triple digits.  It is currently cooler in Florida than it is here.  That is not ok.  Apparently the heat is making me rather cryptic as well.  Fingers crossed for cooler weather soon.

Today mileage: 3.07 mi (despite the weather)

Museum bonus trip

As you may know by now, Wednesdays are not my usual days for museum culture seminars.  However, we had an optional museum field trip after work today, mostly due to the schedule of the museum in question.  We convened at El Museo del Barrio, an institution dedicated to promoting Latino culture and displaying the works of artists of Hispanic heritage.  Mid-week, the museum hosts WEPA Wednesdays, which we were attending.  We were given a lovely tour of the galleries though our tour guide was a bit more interested in having a conversation about the works than we were, having come from a full day of work - and the oppressive heat outside.  This led to quite a bit of awkward silence moments.  It was kinda like when you have class first thing in the morning and the teacher wants to discuss last night's reading assignment, but no one did it, nor is anyone awake enough to form cohesive sentences anyway.  In any case, it was a charming, if not a bit curious, museum and certainly worth the trip.

Today's mileage: 2.43 mi

Back in business, baby!

Yes, it appears as though the saga that was my computer issues has come to an end - knock on wood.  My laptop is back up and functioning though I am still working on re-installing and re-bookmarking everything.  I know that I had a zillion bookmarks and at least a couple dozen in just my bookmarks toolbar, but I'll be damned if I can't remember them all.  It makes sense really - we bookmark something so that we don't have to remember it.  And I suppose if I can't remember it, it must not have been all that important to begin with.

At work, I have been getting more comfortable with original cataloging and creating Library of Congress call numbers.  As I've said before, it's a tedious process but I am getting faster and better so it's worth it.

Monday's mileage: 2.34 mi
Today's mileage: 3.22 mi

Computer troubles, original cataloging, art on the subway, and weekend fun

Thank you, dedicated reader, for staying tuned for the exciting continuation of my New York adventures.  As you may know, last week my computer decided to be very uncooperative and has left me pleading with it to work.  Although it is still not yet functional, I believe I have isolated the problem and intend to get it back in top shape as soon as the necessary components arrive (fingers crossed for Tuesday).  Thus, please excuse my lapse in posting - it has not been for lack of excitement or interest.

I suppose I will work chronologically as I always do.  Thursday, I learned to do original cataloging!  I have been doing a great deal of copy cataloging in my internship and in the process ended up large piles of books in need of original cataloging so I decided it was time to expand my skill set.  It is a very tedious process but I am slowly but surely chipping away at my piles of books.  There are certainly some that I am still unable to do as they do not have enough English or another language using the Latin alphabet for me do be able to describe them properly.  But there are plenty of other books to keep me busy.

Friday was another museum culture seminar in which we learned about the MTA Arts for Transit program.  This is the program that commissions and maintains all of the wall murals, sculptures, and other art manifestations in the subway stations as well as some of the posters in the subway cars themselves.  It was interesting to learn about the mediums that they favor as it is necessary to have art that is very durable and able to withstand the daily interaction of hundreds, if not thousands, of people.  A particularly popular medium is the tile mosaic and I found it interesting that they commission both an artist who creates the work and then a fabricator who translates it into tile. 

My friend Phil arrived for a weekend visit on Friday!  On Saturday morning, we met up with one of his friends for a trip to The Met - they went to see the Alexander McQueen exhibition and I took the time to see the rest of the museum.  Unfortunately, the exhibit with my beloved Madame X is still under renovation but it should be open again later this week so I should be able to see it soon.  But back to my visit from Phil - he has been quite helpful in the moral support department in terms of my computer issues.  I am very grateful for his visit, indeed.

Thursday's mileage: 2.31 mi
Friday's mileage: 2.28 mi
Saturday's mileage: 3.81 mi
Today's mileage: 2.50 mi

Journal Entry #3

Forgive me for my delay in posting.  My computer has incurred some technical difficulties.  It insists that it is unable to locate the hard disk drive, however I am quite secure in my belief that it is indeed there.  I have found some battle tactics to take on the issue so hopefully it will be resolved soon...and at little to no cost.  In the meantime, if anyone has any suggestions, I would love to hear them.  Also, should my posting be intermittent for the next week or so, you now know why.

Much has happened since my last journal entry.  In the library, I am mainly been copy cataloging the backlog of books that need to be added.  I also asked my supervisor if I could learn to do original cataloging as well and she said that she would show me how later this week.  And because I have been doing a lot of cataloging, I suggested to my supervisor that I complete the free online MARC training through OCLC.  The class was called TMQ MARC21 in Your Library Part 1: MARC & Bibliographic Info Fundamentals and the last couple of modules were helpful but most of it was really basic review.  I was also able to try my hand at some archiving.  There was a major grant-funded project that I was recruited to help with in order to complete the project on time.  Primarily, I was numbering folders and confirming their place on the finding aids, but this also let to a decent amount to finding aid editing.  In addition, my supervisor and I have been working on weeding the collection of duplicate items as well as consolidating records to clean up the catalog a bit.

I have also been busy with museum and non-library internship events.  There have been a number of museum culture seminars since my last entry including trips to exhibition spaces, public art programs, and an in-depth explanation of the Guggenheim’s current exhibition.  Speaking of which, I attended the Members' Opening Party and Private Viewing: Lee Ufan a couple of weeks ago and while I wasn’t particularly taken with the exhibition itself, the event was certainly something I was glad to have experienced.  There was also a program put on by Sotheby’s Institute of Art featuring the director of the Andy Warhol Museum which a number of us interns attended.  Finally, I went to the recent all-staff meeting for the museum.

As for extracurricular New York City activities, I have been visiting a lot of museums.  I have been taking advantage of my free pass to all of the museums in the city – otherwise I would be spending a fortune on admission.  I have gotten in the habit of visiting a different museum almost every day that I am not at work.  I am still blogging daily and more details of my adventures and daily happenings can be found on my blog (here).  I am greatly enjoying my internship but I think I have determined that New York City in general is not for me.

Wednesday's mileage: 3.03 mi

Manhattanhenge

Manhattanhenge is an event that occurs twice every year, 3 weeks before and 3 weeks after the summer solstice.  The first one of the year happened just before I got here so I was excited to find out that I only had to wait a few weeks to see its second annual occurrence.  This modern phenomenon occurs when the setting sun aligns with the numbered streets of Manhattan.  Manhattanhenge is, of course, named after the famed Stonehenge which has similar solar alignment properties.  Last summer, I visited Stonehenge on my whirlwind trip to London and the UK.  As you can see from my photo here, I had little to complain about heat-wise.

Today's mileage: 3.06 mi

A few words about air conditioning

Take note of the air around you at this moment.  It probably feels deliciously cool upon your skin despite the rising temperatures and suffocating humidity that is summer outside the comfort of your indoor space.  I bet you didn't even notice it before I said anything.  You were just sitting comfortably, perhaps you were even feeling a bit chilly (this is a shout-out to all my ALF people, by the way), unaware of just how lucky you are to be enjoying the benefits of air conditioning.  Be grateful.  Be very, very grateful for air conditioning.  Because when it's hot and you don't have it, it's all you can think about.

And indeed, as you may or may not know, my New York City dorm does not have a/c, and as you can probably tell, it is all I can think about.  I fantasize about it.  I look forward to being at work and bathed in the cool air of the library - note that I did not say that I look forward to going to work as that act of going to work entails me walking a mile in the miserable heat of the city.  And I'm often reminded that I am from Florida, so I should be accustomed to the heat.  While this is true to a certain extent, we in Florida learned a long time ago that it is best to have air conditioning wherever possible.  We have air conditioning at home, in our cars, at work, even on school buses.  In fact, the man who invented air conditioning is from Florida.  The National Statuary Hall Collection in the US Capitol building holds two statues of important people from each state.  One of Florida's statues is John Gorrie, the father of modern air conditioning.  I learned this bit of trivia on my fifth grade trip to Washington, DC and have remembered it ever since.  So thank you, Mr. Gorrie, thank you.

Today's mileage: 3.05 mi

Oh baking, how I have missed you

A week or so ago I found out that there are kitchen supplies available to check out in the communal kitchen on the first floor of my dorm here in New York City.  Having accepted a lack of kitchen, and in turn an inability to bake, for the summer, this was an extremely exciting discovery for me.  I resolved to bake bagels at some point as those are one of my favorite things to bake, they require very few utensils and ingredients, and said ingredients do not need to be refrigerated.  My roommates were excited as well as they would no doubt benefit from the bagel-baking endeavor.  Thus, after collecting the ingredients from a number of different locations (the grocery stores here aren't what they are in Florida - read: they're no Publix), I turned over my ID in exchange for the key to the kitchen cabinets.  All went well except for a slight hiccup when it came to the amount of salt I had; a hiccup that was easily remedied by sweet-talking the RAs at the dorm front desk with the promise of a fresh homemade bagel in return for access to the staff stash of condiments.  Needless to say, they determined that a delicious bagel was worth a teaspoon of salt.  And soon the bagels were baked and two-thirds of them have already been eaten, leaving just enough for breakfast for my roommates and I tomorrow morning.  Having not baked in 6 weeks, this was a happy day for me and I look forward to doing it again.

Today's mileage: 1.11 mi

More museum madness

I met up again today with my good friend Anu for a trip to the Brooklyn Museum to see the Vishnu: Hinduism's Blue-Skinned Savior exhibition.  Having a bachelor's in Religion and a minor in Art History, I am always up for a trip to see the two combined.  The avatars of Vishnu with which I am most familiar are Rama, Krishna, and the Buddha.  Thus, I was best able to appreciate the pieces featuring them.  All in all, we both enjoyed the exhibition greatly.  There were, of course, other exhibitions as well.  One piece that I particularly liked was Portrait of a Lady by Giovanni Boldini.  I took a photo but the painting is under glass so the picture has an awful glare to it.  But I was so very happy to spend the day with a friend from home, though I'm not exactly sure if that is good or bad for my homesickness.

Today's mileage: 2.97 mi

Ah, predictability: museum field trip Friday!

I took a break from art museums and made it over to the American Museum of Natural History today with my roommate Genevieve.  We kinda turned into little kids over the dinosaurs.  I think there must be something about the reconstructed bones of enormous, extinct creatures that is somehow alluring to everyone.  I also managed to peek into the Hall of Reptiles and Amphibians to get a quick shot of me doing the good ol' Gator Chomp with a real alligator carcass. (I love that there's a Wikipedia page for the Gator Chomp.  I guess the Gator Nation really is everywhere.)  I will probably get some flack from my mom for not finding an exhibit of the Seminole Native Americans for a photo op of me doing the FSU tomahawk chop (I would like to note here that there is not Wikipedia page for that gesture, I'm just saying.). 
And in true female fashion, we made a point to visit the Hall of Minerals and the Hall of Gems.  It's all just so shiny and pretty and colorful.  But anyway, this museum was a rather different experience because it is so kid-friendly and visitors are not simply allowed to touch portions of the exhibitions but encouraged to do so.  Needless to say, hands-on experiences are generally frowned upon at the average art museum.

In other news, I finally got Google+, Google's developmental social networking service.  It's still in its testing phase so it isn't open to just anyone.  You have to be invited by someone who already has Google+ and even if you know someone with such a hook-up, you have to wait until they open the invitation option, which seems to be rather random and very fickle.  In any case, I am still figuring it out and the funny thing is that my friends and I have been discussing it all via Facebook and Twitter (and now Blogger) rather than Google+ itself.  I feel like I need a crosswalk from Facebook to Google+.  If anyone happens to know of such a thing, please share.  Also, should anyone like an invitation to Google+, let me know and I will do my best to make that happen the next time an invitation window opens up.

Today's mileage: 3.02 mi

Guggenheim exhibition explained

This week's museum culture seminar was held today rather than the usual Friday.  That's because we got a super special tour of the current exhibition, Lee Ufan: Marking Infinity, by the senior curator of said exhibition Alexandra Munroe...and the museum is closed on Thursdays so we had it all to ourselves.  Now, I saw this exhibition a couple of weeks ago at the member's party opening so it wasn't really new to me in terms of seeing the artwork.  However, it was far more enlightening to hear the curator explain a lot of the background of the pieces, series, and exhibition in general.  I still can't say that I am now in love with it, but it did give me a better appreciation for the artist and his work.

Today's mileage: 4.42 mi

I'm smack dab in the middle of my trip

Yep, that's right, I'm halfway through my stay in New York City.  And in light of this landmark occasion, I'd like to reflect on some things I've learned and some musings I've been having lately.  First, this is the longest I have ever been away from home.  That sounds so very sheltered, but I don't think that's really the case - I've been to Europe twice, visiting 6 countries altogether, and, obviously, I've lived in Manhattan for over a month now.  I think it's just that I haven't seen much reason to leave home aside from simply exploring the world.  I'm finding that sometimes the best part about traveling is coming home.  Can you tell I'm a bit homesick?

As for a few things I've learned about New York City:

• The essence of New York City is, apparently, waiting is horrifically long, chaotic lines.
• Customer service is not a top priority for most businesses here.
• I don't think I will ever get used to having to pop my ears because the elevator goes up just that high (I work on the 12th floor).
• Building numbers do not coincide with street numbers - a fact that I find quite frustrating.
• There are some really cute dogs up here.
• As much as we complain about the price of gas, taking the subway is way more expensive (It's $2.25 every time you get on the subway or a bus which would equate to driving about 15-20 miles in terms of gas prices, yet I rarely take the subway more than about 4 miles.).
• It is really easy to find a sandwich with brie in it here (!!).

And speaking of mileage, if you've been following along like the dedicated reader I know you are, you've noticed my daily mileage counts at the bottom of each post.  So far, I have walked a total of almost 120 miles and I average about 3.3 miles per day.  For all my fellow Gainesvillians out there, that's like walking along Archer Road from I-75 to 13th Street, everyday.  Yes, yes, it's good for me, I know, but I can't say that I'm enjoying that part of my stay here.

In an attempt to end my rant of a post on a positive note, I would like to express the fact that I am indeed enjoying my internship, as well as the benefits it has to offer.  As I hope you can tell from previous posts, I do take great pleasure in visiting the amazing museums that the city has to offer, made possible in part by my internship and its free-admission-to-any-museum-in-the-city(-except-the-Museum-of-Sex) benefit.

Today's mileage: 3.33 mi

The age old art of shifting

Ah yes, shifting the necessary evil that any library must undertake at one point or another.  Shifting is the act of repositioning books or other library materials in order to gain more shelf space to fit additional library materials.  And if you have ever worked in a library for any amount of time, chances are good that you have done a bit of shifting.  This can happen in small scale daily, to accommodate for an extra book or two on a packed shelf or on a large, in-need-of-hardcore-project-planning scale.  Having worked or volunteered in libraries since I was about 8 years old, I have certainly done my fair share of all kinds of shifting.  On a large scale, it is quite a grueling process.  I mean, you are moving large amounts of books, often from a very bottom shelf to a very top one, for a decent period of time - that takes dedication, let me tell you.  In any case, today I was shifting the auction catalogs held in the Guggenheim library and although I was only moving about 3 shelves up a couple of shelves, those things are heavy!  And slippery as all get out.  They all have very heavy, glossy pages in order to best display the items up for auction and man does they weight add up.  But now it is done, and probably won't need to be done again for another year or two...at which point I will be long gone!

Today's mileage: 3.32 mi

Fireworks!

Today, fireworks won out over museum field trips.  Yes, fireworks and fellow Gainesvillians.  Ok, just one fellow Gainesvillian, my friend Anu.  We met up earlier this evening to have dinner and go see the Macy's Fourth of July Fireworks show over the Hudson River.  Things did not go quite as planned, however.  We had a restaurant all picked out but failed to remember that today is in fact a holiday and thus may be closed.  Needless to say, it was.  So we started walking towards a fireworks viewing spot and eventually found a place it eat.  When we left, it was just in time for the fireworks show to begin but the police were not letting anyone past 9th Avenue, where the primo views were.  The problem was, 9th Ave is just east of the High Line, making said High Line in the line of sight for the fireworks.  Thus, Anu and I ended up standing right in the middle of 9th Ave to see the show - don't worry, there were a ton of other people standing in the middle of the road as well.  In any case, I discovered that the best way to photograph fireworks is using the burst mode on my camera which takes picture after picture as long as you are holding down the shutter button.  So if you flip through the photos I took - see the link below -it's as if you are watching them too!

From NYC fireworks

Today's mileage: 3.88 mi

Keeping it rollin'

My primary goal of the day was to visit and explore the Morgan Library & Museum which just so happens to be located near a number of other New York City landmarks.  So I took the subway to Grand Central (landmark #1) and wandered from there to the New York Public Library (#2) which wasn't open due to the holiday weekend, but I figured the facade is enough of a landmark to count.  I continued west past Bryant Park (#3) to Times Square (#4) mostly just to say I'd been there - being a dreary Sunday, there wasn't much going on outdoors.  And speaking of the dreary weather, I've found that New York City weather has somehow figured out a way to be both cool and disgustingly humid at the same time, which makes for difficult decisions in the attire department.

But anyway, I finally made it to the Morgan Library & Museum which was fantastic.  This is another small museum like yesterday's Frick Collection which I quite like.  There were a number of things I took note of while there.  First, in the Illuminating Fashion: Dress in the Art of Medieval France and the Netherlands exhibition, there is one illustration described as "Saint Julian accidentally kills his parents."  Now, I don't know about you, but at this point I'm thinking, "This kid accidentally murdered his parents and he still became a saint?  Really, Catholic Church, really?"  I did some investigation and found that the story of Saint Julian the Hospitaller is somewhat similar to that of Oedipus.  That being said, I still don't quite understand what got him sainted.

The next item that sparked my interest was in the Lists: To-dos, Illustrated Inventories, Collected Thoughts, and Other Artists' Enumerations from the Smithsonian's Archives of American Art exhibition.  One of the lists was written by one Robert Smithson with notes for his Spiral Jetty piece.  And why might this have caught my attention, you ask dear reader?  Well, both Robert Smithson and his Spiral Jetty are mentioned in a song by one of my favorite bands, Vampire Weekend.  The song I reference was not officially released except on the internet so you may not recognize it, even if you are a Vampire Weekend fan as well.  It's called "Giant" and you can listen to here (you can ignore the accompanying slide show/visuals). 

Finally, once I made it to the library portion of the collection, I spent quite some time browsing the shelves for titles that I recognized or seemed interesting.  The books are beautiful, or their spines are at least - everything is behind glass so it's not like I could actually look at anything.  But anyway, one book that made me chuckle a bit read "Heywood History of Women 1657" on the spine.  After a bit of research (I am almost a librarian, after all), I found that the book's title is actually The generall history of women: containing the lives of the most holy and prophane, the most famous and infamous in all ages [sic].  Sounds interesting, does it not?

Today's mileage: 2.89 mi

Museum field trip weekend!

Today's wanderings took me to the Frick Collection which holds older, more classic works in a domestic setting.  The collection is held in the former home of Henry Clay Frick who was an avid art collector.  The museum is a mix of portraits, landscapes, and various other paintings by the Old Masters.  It is always exciting to see artworks that I have learned about in my art history classes and such.  One painting in the collection is the Sir Thomas More portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger which is at the center of the novel I am currently reading, Portrait of an Unknown Woman.  The museum was small and not terribly crowded which was nice as I was able to see the entire thing in about an hour and at my own pace.

Being so close to Central Park, I decided to wander around that for a bit.  I found my way the the south end of it where there was some sort of Bollywood thing going on or something.  I honestly don't know what it was, all I could tell was that there was a mass of people, some dressed in traditional Indian garb and others wearing tuxedos or fancy dresses, dancing around to Indian music.  If I discover the meaning of any of this, I'll let you know.

Today's mileage: 3.79 mi

Another museum field trip Friday

I am finally getting around to visiting various museums on my days off and today's locale of choice was the Museum of Modern Art or MoMA.  My roommate Genevieve and her friend Tony came with me and we wandered about the museum for a couple of hours.  We came across a piece that was just pieces of individually wrapped candies piled in a corner - candy that we were encouraged to take and enjoy.  Something about when the artist died, his wife was overweight so she resolved to lose 25 pounds and whenever the candy runs out, the museum sends a photo to her of the empty corner and she sends a photo back of her weight loss.  So far she has lost 5 pounds, the guard told us.  Coincidentally, it is a rather festively colored piece, considering the upcoming holiday.  On the third floor is the Architecture & Design Gallery which is reminiscent of an IKEA.  And I do love IKEA.  The fourth and fifth floors hold the museum's Painting & Sculpture collection which held much more familiar names and pieces than the rest of the museum - I could list them off but just think of just about any big name in modern art and chances are they had at least a piece or two up there.  I mean, it is MoMA after all.

After our MoMA excursion, I dragged my cohorts a few blocks north to see the Ai Weiwei Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads installation.  Maybe you remember me mentioning it a couple of weeks ago?  Anyway, it was pretty neat and it will be taken down on July 15th so I made a point to go see it before that.  There I am, standing near my Chinese zodiac sign, the tiger.  This is, of course, slightly different from one's astrological sign which is based upon the time of year one was born.  Below is a panorama of the entire installation:

Today's mileage: 4.02 mi