Posted on 02/12/2005 9:05:35 AM PST by Vision
NEW YORK (AP) - With flowing fabric the color of a sunrise, "The Gates" - a massive public art installation - was unfurled Saturday for the start of a 16-day stay transforming miles of footpaths in Central Park.
The project opened with Mayor Michael Bloomberg dropping the first piece of saffron-colored fabric to the cheers of a huge crowd. He was joined by exhibit creators Christo and Jeanne-Claude.
The crowd counted down the seconds before Bloomberg, a longtime backer of the project, opened the exhibition at 8:30 a.m.
The weather was windy and cold as the first fabric dropped from one of the 7,500 16-foot-high gates, creating what the artists billed as "a visual golden river" along 23 miles of the park's footpaths. More than 1 million square feet of fabric was used by the artists.
Its official title - "The Gates, Central Park, New York, 1979-2005" - refers to the artists' conception of the idea 26 years ago. It was expected to take about two hours to drop the fabric from all the gates.
"It's a bit insane, but that's why everybody is here," said Ali Naqui, who was brought to the unveiling against his will by his fiancee.
Among the first folks there were 17 fourth-graders from an elementary school in Queens. The group boarded a bus before sunrise and made the trip into Manhattan, where they were suitably impressed by the spectacle.
"It's a waste of money, but it's fabulous," said student Shakana Jayson. "It brings happiness when you look at it."
Visitors to the park had already admired the vinyl gates, even with the fabric still tucked inside "cocoons" on top of the structures.
"I think it's fantastic," said Dominique Borel, who was walking her dog, Mickey, on Friday. "I love it. I think it's exhilarating." Mickey was wearing an orange scarf around his neck in honor of the project.
The artists have said there is no best place to see the piece, but art connoisseurs and the merely curious staked out the best views. James Ellis said he planned to see the piece from Belvedere Castle.
"February's always been a dreary month for me, so I think it kind of spices it up a little bit and makes me want to come out to the park at a time when I usually wouldn't," Ellis said.
The artists are paying for the project - which could be as much as $21 million - themselves.
"I can't promise, particularly since this is New York, that everyone will love 'The Gates,' but I guarantee that they will all talk about it," Bloomberg said Friday at a news conference with the artists. "And that's really what innovative, provocative art is supposed to do."
Although Christo and Jeanne-Claude's have invested so much time and effort in the project, they were reticent to discuss "The Gates."
"It's very difficult," explained Christo. "You ask us to talk. This project is not involving talk. It's a real, physical space. It's not necessary to talk. You spend time, you experience the project."
"The Gates" is the pair's first major project in New York City. In their most recent project, "Wrapped Reichstag" (Berlin, 1995), they used a silvery fabric to wrap the building, creating a flow of vertical folds.
The city has said tens of thousands of visitors may come to "The Gates," over 16 days. Some of them have seen other works by the artists, who have created temporary art projects around the world.
Sibyl Rubottom, who saw the artists'"The Umbrellas," in which 3,100 umbrellas were opened in California and Japan in 1991, said she started planning her trip to New York from San Diego last spring.
Rubottom said she planned to return to the park on Saturday and would go to an "apres-'Le Gates' opening party" at a friend's house. Rubottom was wearing an orange jacket and scarf, and her orange eyeglass frames happened to match, too.
"I dressed for the occasion," she said.
They exist for the moment and then are gone..
Experiencing the moment is part of the art..
I will agree however, NYC needs a new, majestic symbol to represent the new century..
I propose we bulldoze the UN buildings and build something "artistic and symbolic" there..
Especially like #8.. high up, wide shot, showing the way the path wanders through the park..
I saw the Gates (without the fabric hanging down) from the 16th floor of an office building on the SE corner of the park last week and the aerial views are very interesting as it allows you to see the paths delineated by the Gates throught the transparent canopy of the leafless trees. I imagine it's even more striking now.
I always buy art with gut feelings. I really have no way of judging whether it's worth the price or not..
I bet it didn't hurt that Blue Dog is a Cajun artist.
Beautiful! Now I want to go and see NYC!!!
The fabric OTOH is too opaque and overpowering for me. There's so much of it that now the installation looks like it's trying to steal the spotlight away from the beauty of its surroundings rather than showcasing and blending appropriately with it.
Those are beautiful.
Very nice!
Beautiful.
LOL! No kidding! How much "thought" do you think it took to come up with ORANGE MATERIAL?!
Good photos... thanks. It's silly art but I'll have to admit it looks good in the wind.
"Did any of the leftoid glitterati press think to question how many starving children in the world could be saved with $21 million?"
Yes, and can you believe they wasted all that money on that ostentatious display when we had a war going on and a tsunami that just killed thousands of people?
Why didn't they just have a quiet little chicken sandwich lunch - it would have been so much less insensitive, and they could have invited the starving children, too.
As Anthony Weiner, who is running for mayor of NY said, "Precedent suggests that inaugural festivities should be muted -- if not canceled -- in wartime"
But then again, he was talking of the inauguration of the Republican president, not a bunch of 20 million dollar orange curtains set up for two weeks in NY.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/01/18/MNG49AS6N51.DTL
Those are good photos. I'm going to central park this week to see in person. I'm glad Bloomberg was a strong supporter of this project. Everyone in town, whether rich or poor, will enjoy it. Even the curmudgeons that don't like it will get pleasure out of endlessly complaining.
"He sickens me, yet I can't look away."
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