patrick leader wrote: > > i'm excited about this too; have been about the possibility for a long time. > i grew up in northern california, where in the early '70s they had a project > called 'running fence', a miles-long series of white curtains running from > the inland hills of sonoma county all the way to the sea. as a budding > environmentalist, i was kind of against as all the debate and rancor went > on, but when i saw it, i was totally transformed. the curtains expressed a > deep respect for my beloved nor cal hills, and made you see them anew.
I've seen pictures of that and it looked beautiful. Without that white line it was impossible in the photo to see all the nooks and crannies of the land. It must have been striking in person. I read about how Christo had to get permission from each person who owned land the fence crossed, so the project eventually involved thousands of people (as most of his projects do). One rancher, who'd been one of the most adamantly opposed to the project at first, was so smitten with the "fence" once it was installed that he slept next to it, as a combination of watching over something he'd come to love and also being protected by it. Like you, Patrick, he was totally transformed. I found that very touching. Art rarely seeps into someone's life so thoroughly. > this project has been through a lot of struggle to happen (though christo > and jeanne-claude have for years now said they consider the whole > pre-process to be part of the art work). They first proposed it in 1979 and it was denied for environmental reasons because the plan involved digging holes in the ground for the poles to go into. It's such a huge park that would mean thousands of holes. The latest plan doesn't involve any digging. And very definitely the political process, the approvals, the arguments, the required public hearings, the court cases, etc. are all a part of the artwork. It pulls people into it so they (often people who wouldn't go near a work of "Art") then have a stake in the finished project. Christo and Jeanne-Claude would probably say that is as important as the actual two-week "showings". This time the Sierra Club is trying to stop the project, saying it will harm the park's wildlife. It's appropriate that they do that (it is their raison d'jtre after all) and appropriate, too, that Christo and Jeanne-Claude work their way past that. I admire their persistence as much as the beauty of their installations. > our park commissioner under > giuliani, the ignorant and racist henry stern, wouldn't know art if it bit > him on the ass. he made a comment (i can't remember it exactly) about this > project that struck me as one of the most ignorant things i've heard. I missed that particular comment. I don't know who was mayor in 1979, Koch maybe. He was in office for what felt like forever and was never a friend of artists. And Giuliani wasn't either. His threat to take the Brooklyn Museum to court and withdraw its city funding because of a painting in one of the exhibits was infuriating. All of a sudden the openly adulterous mayor got religious, and became offended by the way an African portrayed the Virgin Mary. Jeez, Rudy, get real. But that was pre-9/11. He redeemed himself with his leadership on 9/11 and after. I'll never forget him ordering 6,000 body bags, and the press conference where he said "it may be too much for anyone to bear..." It felt like exactly that at the time. He held it together, while I fell apart. > our current mayor bloomberg, whose poll numbers are down but who i'm mostly > impressed with, certainly had something to do with moving this forward. > he's a huge fan of public art, having brokered deals that have gotten > museums lending large sculptures to public areas. he also walks the walk as > a private citizen, being a strong patron. Being a billionaire helps with that. And, yes, he probably did have a lot to do with getting the project going again. I'm sure he has lots of contacts in the art world, and he's shown that he's good at knowing what would be an appropriate and uplifting symbolic gesture. The billowing golden cloth throughout the park when it's at its grayest will be one of those. > i could wish it wasn't the first week in february. if we are in the middle > of a cold snap like the one we've been in, visiting the installation will be > 'no walk in the park'. Oh, yeah, even the hanging cloth would probably protest. And if it's as wet as this winter has been, in addition to the cold, the cloth would freeze and be heavy and possibly dangerous, the way slabs of ice falling off buildings in midtown during a brief thaw were so dangerous the streets were closed. Now that's a tough winter, when there's a possibility of death by icicle. It's so cold here, it's like, what?, Canada or something, although I have yet to get my keys stuck anywhere. So, let's hope for a milder winter in 2005. (Next year would be nice, too.) Debra Shea
