New York City Museum Celebrates the Culture of Earthquake-Ravaged Nepal

by Allison Meier on May 4, 2015

Ganesha (11th century, Madhya Pradesh, India), sandstone, part of the ‘Honoring Nepal’ installation at the Rubin Museum of Art (all photos by the author for Hyperallergic)

The Rubin Museum of Art opened an installation of Nepalese art today to launch its Honoring Nepal programming series, which celebrates the culture of the earthquake-devastated country. The death toll from last month’s disaster is now over 6,800, with 14,000 injured and thousands missing, and the cultural loss of centuries-old temples, shrines, and historic sites that were damaged or destroyed is still being assessed.

Coins on Ganesha (11th century, Madhya Pradesh, India), sandstone (click to enlarge)

The Honoring Nepal lobby installation is free and open to the public during museum hours, showcasing 13 artifacts selected from the roughly 600 Nepalese objects in the Rubin’s collections. “As we all confront both the loss of life and the destruction of many cultural sites caused by the recent earthquake, our mission to connect museum visitors with the ideas, art, and culture of the Himalayas has become especially relevant,” Jan Van Alphen, director of exhibitions, collections, and research, told Hyperallergic. “Even though Nepal is far away from New York geographically, our world is increasingly smaller, and we hope this installation, along with the other initiatives happening at the museum, brings our visitors closer to the people of Nepal and honors their dynamic and vibrant culture.”
An 11th-century sandstone Ganesha rests in one niche, with visitors this morning placing coins in his hands and a dollar bill in the curl of his trunk. Nearby, smaller gilt copper alloy sculptures include an elegant rendering of Maitreya, the One of Loving Kindness, from the 15th-16th century, and a 19th-century donor figure kneeling in prayer. There are also 19th-century paintings on cloth, a towering 13th-century stupa adorned with semi-precious stones, and a 17th-century wood carving from the Kathmandu Valley of Apsara holding a garland aloft. That area was especially hard hit by the 7.8-magnitude earthquake, and without contrasting the beautiful works on display to current photographs of rubble, the Rubin evokes the rich cultural heritage in peril through these examples of its history in Buddhist and Hindu art.

At the New Whitney Museum, America Is Actually Very Easy to See

by Benjamin Sutton on May 1, 2015

Jasper Johns, “Three Flags” (1958) (all photos by the author for Hyperallergic unless noted otherwise)

The inaugural exhibition at the new Whitney Museum of American Art, which opens to the public today, is predicated on the elusiveness of a cohesive and stable national identity in the United States. The enormous show is titled America Is Hard to See after the 1951 Robert Frost poem of the same name — whose original title was “And All We Call America” — in which he ruminates on the expeditions of Christopher Columbus:

America is hard to see.
Less partial witnesses than he
In book on book have testified
They could not see it from outside —
Or inside either for that matter.

But, with more than 600 works by over 400 artists, it’s actually shockingly easy to spot America in America Is Hard to See. There are works featuring US flags, US presidents (including Richard Nixon, Ronald Regan, and Barack Obama), a US vice-president (Dick Cheney), US soldiers, and the US Capitol building. There are works that have “America” in their titles, and even one that just consists of the word “America” in neon letters. So don’t believe what Frost and the Whitney curators tell you — here’s proof that America isn’t hard to see at all.

Florine Stettheimer, “New York/Liberty” (1918)

ANDRÉ D'InI Na Fábrica de Alternativas em Algés

BUS PARAGEM CULTURAL III

Mais um album de fotos das sessões musicais das terças-feiras na Associação Bus /Paragem Cultural. Desta vez, resolvi levar a flauta transversal e tocar com os "Amigos da Musica" e foi uma noite muito criativa musicalmente e não só!!! Fica aqui o registo do evento para ser apreciado na imagem. Quanto à musica, todas as terças-feiras é possível ouvirem ao vivo as sessões e participarem se assim o entenderem.