The frozen Yukon River in winter, Lofoten in summer, Paris in spring ...
The Gates in Central Park.
All awesome ... in these the word has meaning.
In the afternoon of February 22, coming up out of the subway at the globe in Columbus Circle, seeing The Gates for the first time, the entrance engulfed in the melee of people purchasing official souveniers ... then walking into Central Park ... I knew some of the history of The Gates. The story had been repeatedly presented during the few weeks and days prior to "the blooming of 7,500 fabric panels on February 12, 2005." (Read the artists' press release.)
I have since mused about what it would be like to come upon The Gates with no prior knowledge of it. (Or is it best described as "them", plural? I think not, but I'll get to that.) That thought led a parade of thoughts on understanding art as individual experience ... and in the case of The Gates individual experience including not only the changing circumstances internal to the viewer like prior knowledge and the resulting expectations, but also intelligence, acuity, state of alertness, ... ; AND the changing circumstances of the setting itself: day, night, rain, snow, bright, cloudy, calm, breezy, windy, ... presented in the context of the REAL tension that The Gates will be removed starting on February 28. The Gates reached out and grabbed me, Wake up, pay attention! This is a moment of material existence, a totally human endeavor not to be missed.
Upon entering Central Park and coming into The Gates ... being in The Gates ... another gestalt formed. Once there, I understood The Gates. I could have left at that moment and I would have been satisfied. I also knew in that moment that no matter how long I spent in The Gates, I would not experience "all" of it.
I could stop writing here ... and you could stop reading too. But it doesn't end.
Thinking about The Gates, once experienced, is a continuation of that experience ... infinitely rich and varied in finite time and space.
The genius of the conception ... and then the incredible effort to give it birth ... and the acceptance of its end.
The boring simplicity of the frame viewed at close range ... pedistrian in form and placement. The vibrant complexity emerging exponentially as the view rotates or expands ... or the setting changes with weather and time of day ... or with light and wind. This is why it is not "them", but "it."
Contrasted to art that is forever, relative to my existence as is the Mona Lisa ... or scripted ... The Gates is in one sense like an ice sculpture ... but totally different because the dissolution is also a human act ... itself a part of the artists' work.
It will be, it is , it has been ... all eternal facts of temporal creation.
With The Gates as an example of human effort, who of us can doubt our worth?
You can view my set of personal photos of The Gates at:
The Gates
You can also view The Gates in Central Park at the NYC-POV website. Click on the following for a direct link:
The Gates as VR
Or go to the www.nycpov.com website and click on The Gates name or photo.
You can also visit the artists' websites for The Gates:
The Gates (I)
or
The Gates (II)
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