Visiting the Heavenly Bodies exhibition straight from a red-eye flight was equivalent to waking up in art and fashion heaven. And I got blessed being the first one in, meaning my pictures are relatively crowd-free compared to what you can see elsewhere. So seek the limelight, walk the red carpet, your eyes might even see some angels! Spanning both the Metropolitan Museum of Art on 5th Avenue and their Cloisters location perched on the highest point of Manhattan, Heavenly Bodies is truly a visual tour-de-force. Let’s face it, if I tell you “come with me to the museum, there is this fantastic exhibition on medieval art at the Met”, I can already hear a thousand excuses. And I am with you: despite having come to appreciate how rich this art can be during my Art History studies, I would not put Medieval or Renaissance art on my walls. But what about if Byzantine art comes with this little Dolce & Gabana number? With Heavenly Bodies, there are many mutually reinforcing forces at play, and they all compel the viewers to look and learn from this cleverly orchestrated dialogue between past, present and future. Perhaps finding mannequins wearing haute couture gowns […]
Honoured to travel with the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art, I had the opportunity to lunch and look into Nick Cave’s eyes last week. What struck me besides an incredible kindness, was the intensity of those eyes. They translate his double vision of the world perfectly: how intensely he sees and feels the divides plaguing our society and how resolute he is to shake this, with a dance and many Soundsuits.
Nestled in New Canaan, Connecticut, Grace Farms is a bucolic place where art meets architecture in a natural setting of green meadows.
Have you ever wondered how art can affect us all so much in spite of the strange paradox that you can’t touch itt? What seems fair enough for paintings and installations sometimes seems questionable for sculpture, especially bronze sculpture. A gentle touch of skin on bronze would do no harm and go a long way in elevating our perception of the sensuality of the body rendered by a Degas, Rodin or Maillol, amongst so many others. For me, the one sculptor where the “Do Not Touch” sign is irrelevant is Constantin Brancusi (1876-1957). Even though I know I can’t touch a Brancusi sculpture, it does the work for me, it touches ME. But why? and how?
Like last week, I am playing with Spark Page to share strong visuals I recently experienced on the Second Avenue Subway line in New York City. Make sure to visit these striking permanent art installations by renowned artists Chuck Close and Sarah Sze (Part 2, this week) and Jean Shin and Vik Muniz (Part 1, last week) when in New York. At 86th Street, I met a member of staff who proudly showed me his picture taken with Chuck Close in front of one of his mosaic work. These art installations definitely made him re-think his appreciation of his working environment…something that should apply pretty much everywhere for everybody’s benefit. Please click the link below and enjoy the ride! https://spark.adobe.com/page/dDwPrItKfsYho/ © 2017 Ingrid Westlake All pictures by Ingrid Westlake, unless otherwise stated.
This week and next, I am playing with Spark Page to share strong visuals I recently experienced on the Second Avenue Subway line in New York City. I hope you will enjoy the pictures and go visit these striking permanent art installations by renowned artists Jean Shin and Vik Muniz (Part 1, this week) and Chuck Close and Sarah Sze (Part 2, next week). Please click the link below and enjoy the ride! https://spark.adobe.com/page/VSTzqOrHVAQ5j/ © 2017 Ingrid Westlake All pictures by Ingrid Westlake, unless otherwise stated.
I often hear my associations of ideas are off-beat or décalé (or off-the-wall, depending on how polite you are :-). So let me throw you at the cross between yoga, running and art and see what you think! To me, breathing is at this intersection on my grid – often underestimated, so underrated yet ESSENTIAL! I practice yoga 3 times a week, no matter what. I am also half way through my marathon training program. So let’s just say I have learnt to pay attention to breathing because my life (an your life) depends on it 🙂 There is a meditative quality to breathing that helps me get through the discomfort of a crescent lunge on my weaker side or the pain that usually comes without a fail after running 17 miles. I made breathing a life tool and a habit but like most things, I refused to make it bland. My wonderful yoga teacher Karoll B. uses the visualisation of a ball of color that I can match with my mood or my needs of the day. It works wonders and allows me to power through most days! So much so that I found myself thinking of my yoga practice, breathing and […]
If you think about Seurat, dots should be the next word popping into your mind. My 5th grade daughter and her class made their own version of Seurat’s The Channel at Gravelines, Evening to be auctioned at the school gala. They used a multitude of dots to recreate local and illuminating colors and paid a brilliant homage to Seurat. He formalised scientific discoveries on color theory as a systematic approach applied to his painting technique. His breakthrough was termed Pointillism and was achieved with just six major paintings that are so familiar to all. He did not have time for more: he died aged 31.