Surreal: New York City 42 Stories In The Sky!

Wednesday evening's launch event for travel webbie MetroGuest.com, a community in which property owners link with potential guests, was quite a win. Sponsors included tasty, just-released Balls Vodka—ripe for an endless array of ribald jokes—as well as catering by Thomas Preti (five spice chicken in Wonton cups=good god almighty good), Hint Water—another sugar-free, all natural, organic flavored bev (blackberry, ewww)—and, oddly, SecureWrap, a tamper-proof luggage bag wrapper.

But the real star was the view: 42 stories up from the Skyhouse condos on East 29th Street just off Fifth Avenue. It's one thing to say you can see the Empire State Building from your apartment, but 42A offered one serious unobstructed glorious sight to behold.

Add views from three sides and you've got some of the most beautiful skyline panoramas I have ever seen. Imagine being up so high that you're not only looking down on the Flatiron Building, but it looks quaint. Amen!

Now, let's allow the photos to tell the rest of the story.
More after the jump!

What Is Art: Gallery Exhibits vs. NYC's Lower East Side

Thursday evening, Donna Mae Moose, Leo and I cavorted to New York's Lower East Side for an art gallery crawl, soaking in its Third Thursdays event, in which nearly three dozen exhibits are open until 9 p.m. The galleries are centered around Orchard, Rivington, Essex, Grand, Hester and Eldridge streets, allowing for a wide swath of walking.

I found much of the showcased gallery art pretentious, painstakingly precious and downright fussy. One proprietor explained to me the technique her displayed artist employs: dashing a bucket of paint on a canvas, then waiting up to six months for inspiration to guide her toward the ultimate creation. Oh, please, Mary!

The best art I saw was along the streets, on walls, signposts and among the fashionable New Yorkers inhabiting the nabe. That, cool cats, is true art... not a fucking strawberry constructed out of electrical wire that bears a $12,000 price tag.Kara Walker's grainy shadow puppet film Miss Pipi's Blue Tale, at the Lehmann Maupin Gallery, portrays the "surreal and violent mythology" surrounding white southern woman and hyper-sexual black men amid slavery in the Mississippi Delta. Furthermore, I just love neapolitan ice cream... Oh, heavens, I got momentarily distracted there... zzzzzzz... Truly inspiring! Along the LES's Freemans Alley... Above and below... truly the best of the gallery bunch. Sheila Gallagher's Deute, a stunning 96x108" fall scene made of assorted melted plastic pieces. Dodge Gallery, 15 Rivington Street. I like.Then again, left, this dude sports a wonderfully unique artistic quality that I wholly dig. And his beautiful daughter offers an ideal juxtaposition to his rustic demeanor. On right: Real (happy) hippy chicks.

Lower East Side... Still Gritty Enough To Feel Like Genuine NYC

While New York's super seedy Bowery is being overtaken by high-rise $$multi-million$$ condos, the Lower East Side remains as non-gentrified as any remaining nabe in Manhattan. Whole Foods Market changed everything along Delancey Street, where there are now McDonald's, Subway, Bank of America, Chase & other national retailers, but along such streets as Orchard, Rivington, Ludlow and Eldridge, there's still much magic.

Thursday eve, Leonard, Donna Mae and I spent four hours traipsing around the locale, soaking up the culture, including a finale at the famous Katz's Deli. This was a new one on me: bicycle polo. Orchard Street, where much of New York's original tenement housing was located... Beautiful boutique hotel in the LES. The border of Chinatown. Something smells fishy to me... Movie-making with character actor Luis Guzman.

Renaissance NYC Exhibit In NYC's Tribeca

Friday evening I attended Renaissance NYC, a showcase of works by up-and-coming young artists, at Brick in New York's Tribeca neighborhood (two blocks from where I lived in the late 1990s, on Reade Street).

Among the exhibitors was Clayton Calvert, who displayed his acrylic Color Box models. Leonard first exhibited the works in Southampton last August, at 4 North Main gallery, which have now been duplicated in miniature fashion.
Leo and I also had a nice conversation with Blair Spieler, whose paintings evoke both whimsy and angst, depending perhaps on your frame of mind.

Another work in the exhibit that I found intriguing...

Above: guests, onlookers, artists; below: now that's art!Facebook: The Renaissance NYC/Group Page; Twitter: @RenaissanceNYC;
Email: TheRenaissanceNYC@gmail.com.

National Geographic: NYC's Lush High Line Park By Night

The beautiful High Line Park on the west side of New York's Meatpacking District was once a decaying black steel structure supporting an elevated rail line built in the early 1930s that brought freight cars into factories and warehouses.

During much of the '90s, NYC Mayor Rudolph Giuliani was frothing to tear down the 1.5-mile structure, which was abandoned in 1980, so that the gentrifying nabe could build more generic red brick condos. But fortunately a private group, Friends Of the High Line, raised funds to convert it into a stunning urban oasis that leaves the original train tracks, with a rich tapestry of foliage & fauna.The first section opened in June 2009, with an extension scheduled to debut later this year. The April 2011 issue of National Geographic offers some lush picolas of the park at night in a spread called "Miracle Above Manhattan."

Andy Warhol Extends 15 Minutes (Again) With NYC Statue

On Wednesday, New York City welcomed a new public art work in the heart of Union Square, before hundreds of onlookers. The 10-foot Andy Monument, honors the iconic work of Andy Warhol, is within view of his famous Factory, a la 1968-1984, at the Decker building, 33 Union Square West, where he and his collaborators produced silkscreen paintings, films, music, books and magazines.

The figure, designed by Rob Pruitt for the Public Art Fund, is based on a combination of digital scanning of a live model and hand sculpting, with a chrome surface, mounted on a concrete pedestal.

The statue is only on display through Oct. 2, and shows Warhol wearing his trademark blazer and Levi’s 501 jeans, along with a Polaroid camera, carrying a Bloomingdale’s bag—perhaps filled with Interview magazines.

Pruitt wrote for the unveiling, “Andy spawned a generation who believe they can make it in New York. Every day, a thousand more kids come from Eastern Europe or the East who believe they can make it here. He has made New York York a destination to believe all things are possible.”