On Friday I went to the MET, and took a tour of their “highlights” with a curator, stopping at a few particularly interesting pieces in their collection. Here are some of them, and what makes them particularly interesting:
In the Greek/Roman hall, the sculpture of fabric: while the greek sculptors portrayed the idealized human figure (even turning it into a mathematical formula) and the romans followed that tradition, fabric was the only part that was sculpted as it was, from thick to almost transparent, with embroidery, motifs, etc.
After j-CATION and having lunch at Mr. Ks</a> (one of the best Chinese restaurants in Manhattan), yesterday I went to <a title="https://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/film_screenings/14846" href="https://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/film_screenings/14846" target="_blank">MoMA</a> Film to see Gosfilmofonds copy of the 1935 USSR film Loss of the Sensation (87 min.), directed by Aleksandr Andriyevsky.
Virtually unseen in the U.S., Andriyevskys liberal film version of Karel Capeks popular 1920 play, R.U.R. (in which the notion of robots was introduced), the movie tells the story of Jim Ripple, an engineer, who invents robots controlled by saxophones and radio signals.
Yesterday, since I had to go to the Japan Society to take care of some business, I took the opportunity to visit the Deco Japan: Shaping Art and Culture, 1920–1945 exhibition (I was invited to the opening, but I could not make it that day).
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Curated by Dr. Kendall Brown, Deco Japan: Shaping Art and Culture, 1920–1945 subtly conveys the complex social and cultural tensions in Japan during the Taisho and early Showa periods through dramatically designed examples of metalwork, ceramics, lacquer, glass, furniture, jewelry, sculpture and evocative ephemera such as sheet music, posters, postcards, prints and photography.
Lego web design, anyone? 😉
On September 28, 2011, Hou Hanru, Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs at the San Francisco Art Institute said on a lecture (Curator`s Perspective) in New York:
I think the worst exhibition in the world is the exhibition that is organized like a book. We see this a lot, an exhibition that takes the artwork as an illustration of a concept. I think an exhibition is not necessary for this: frankly, it`s too expensive.
From the #thisIsHowItsDone (not the movie adaptations, but special events to make people go more to the movie theaters) department, here is an awesome initiative from AMC movie theaters:
Get ready to watch the greatest Marvel movie event ever held at your local AMC Theatre on May 3rd! Experience THE ULTIMATE MARVEL MARATHON with six movies on one epic day. Watch the heroes’ stories unfold as they assemble for the midnight premiere of The Avengers 3D!
Tonight I went and see Tatsumi at the MoMA Film (Theater 2), a 2011 animation film from Singapore, directed by Eric Khoo, with the voice of Yoshihiro Tatsumi (who brought innovation to Japanese comics through works of social commentary aimed at an adult audience in postwar Japan in the late 1950s). A Drifting Life, Tatsumi’s epic graphic novel memoir, forms the foundation for the film.
Interesting the unavoidable paralel one can draw between Italys neorealism postwar cinema and Tatsumis works.
