Whitney Museum Today

I did a search on Bruce's Journal and saw that we had been to the Whitney Museum in June 2007 and August 2010.  One advntage of getting older is that I can begin to take advantage of senior citizen discounts.  Since I am now 62, I was able to save $6 on admission to the museum.  We saw a handful of exhibitions:

• Cory Arcangel: Pro Tools -explores the forms of expression enabled by high tech products
• Lyonel Feininger: At the Edge of the World - the works of this artist who lived from 1871-1956 were featured.
• More than That - Films by Kevin Jerome Everson - these films portrayed the working class African Americans
• Breaking Ground: The Whitney's Founding Collection - the works here were purchased at the time of the museum's founding in 1931
• Xavier Cha:Body Drama - the gallery is a stage where an actor/actress performs while wearing a body mounted camera.  In between performances  the footage of the performance is projected on the wall.

While the Getty Museum that we visited in LA a few weeks ago featured European Art older than 100 years, the Whitney features more contemporary American art.

We found out that there is a new building for the Whitney now under construction in the Meet Packing section of Manhattan.  It is scheduled to open in 2015.

Whitney Biennial Today

Artwork by Ellsworth Kelly - Part of the Whitney Biennial

Sixth months ago we saw the Andy Warhol exhibit at the Whitney Museum.  It was time to take a walk on the Highline from 14th Street to the end to see the Whitney Biennial which opened a few weeks ago.  It is an event curated by Jane Panetta and Rujeko Hockley who want visitors to know what is happening today in American art.  It features 75 artists and collectives working in painting, sculpture, installation, film, video, photography, performance, and sound.  It was introduced by the museum's founder in 1932 and is the longest-running exhibition in the country.

There was obviously no single theme or artist singled out which is obviously opposite of the Warhol exhibition.  I picked out one work at random to put in this journal entry.

The Whitney Museum on Father's Day

I wanted Father's Day to be different this year.  We started out by having breakfast at Uncle Bill's Diner in the neighborhood.  I think this is the first time we have ever eaten breakfast out on a Sunday.  From there I drove with Lee to Forest Park where we found out that they were reconstructing the playground area so Lee could not play basketball.  Instead we took a long hike through the park.

 

In the early after noon we set out for the Whitney Museum (http://whitney.org) on Madison Avenue and 75th Street.  There was an exhibit called "Summer of Love - Art of the Psychedelic Era"  2007 is the 40th anniversary of the summer of 1967 popularly called the Summer of Love.  To quote the website:

Summer of Love revisits the unprecedented explosion of contemporary art and popular culture brought about by the civil unrest and pervasive social change of the 1960s and early 70s, when a new psychedelic aesthetic emerged in art, music, film, architecture, graphic design, and fashion. The exhibition includes paintings, photographs and sculptures by Richard Avedon, Jimi Hendrix, and Andy Warhol, among others.

Visitors of the museum were given an audio tour of the exhibit with an MP3 player that played songs associated with the artwork  displayed.  We enjoyed it.

 

Whitney Museum, Highline and the 34th Street Hudson Yards Subway Station

Since this is a staycation week Karen and I made it downtown for our annual visit to the Whitney Museum now located in the "meatpacking district."  We saw the following exhibits:

• Stuart Davis - In Full Swing
• Danny Lyon - Message to the Future
• Human Interest - Portraits from the Whitney Collection
• Mirror Cells
• Virginia Overton - Sculpture Gardens
• Sophia Al-Mara - Black Friday

When we left the museum we walked along the Highline to 34th Street by the Javits Center.  We found the new 34th Street Hudson Yards stop on the #7 line.  I must say it is very far underground.  From there we went home.

May 1 Visit to the Whitney Museum

I certainly have documented in this journal several trips to the Whitney Museum since 2011.  I thought today would be a good time to have a return visit.  We started out on the top floor by viewing the exhibit Dawoud Bey: An American Project.  Bey is a photographer who chronicles communities and histories that have been largely underrepresented or even unseen.

One of the photographs from that exhibit

Much of the rest of the museum was devoted to samples from the museum's rich collection.

A work by Andy Warhol

For some reason, this statue reminds me of Richard Nixon.

An exhibit was devoted to the works of JulieMehretu, an Ethiopian artist who specializes in abstract art.  She creates new forms and finds unexpected resonances by drawing from the histories of art and human civilization.

by Julie Mehretu

I'll return to the Whitney later in the year when the exhibitions change.

This Time the Entire Family Went to the Whitney Museum

It was time for a return trip to the Whitney Museum since my last visit was on August 15, 2017.  We started on the 8th floor where we viewed Nick Mauss Transmissions which represented a social history of New York's modernist ballet and artistic avant-garde from the 1930s-1950s.  The art on the 7th floor was selections from the general collection of the museum.  Since we had been to the Whitney several times over the years, many of the paintings were familiar.  The exhibits on the 6th floor represented an incomplete history of protest.

The most popular exhibit was Grant Wood: American Gothic and Other Fables.  Much of this artwork concerned farming in Iowa.

There was also Juan Antonio Olivares video Moleculas made using the 3D-animation software.

It was an enjoyable afternoon for the entire family.

Andy Warhol From A to B and Back Again at the Whitney Museum

Lee in Front of Elvis Presley

Today we went to the Whitney Museum to see the highly touted Andy Warhol Exhibition.  Most of it was located on the 5th floor, but there was something on the third and first floor as well. It included over 350 works of art across all media representing all phases of his career.  I was impressed by the room on the first floor that showed commissioned portraits.

The 6th floor's exhibit titled Programmed: Rules, Codes, and Choreographies in Art, 1965-2018 featured over 50  works of conceptual, video and computational art.

The 7th floor featured selections from the Whitney's Collection.

Portrait of Neil Sedaka

Nixon on the Wall

Marilyn Monroe

Dick Tracy

Superman

Yearly Trip to the Whitney Museum

It seems to be a yearly ritual for Karen and me to visit the Whitney Museum during the summer.  The exhibits that we saw were:

• Calder: Hypermobility -featured the sculptures of Alexander Calder
• Where We Are: Selections from the Whitney's Collections, 1900-1960
• Helio Oiticica - To Organize Delirium
• Willa Nasatir
• Bunny Rogers: Brig Und Ladder

Since it was raining when we left the museum, we could not walk along the Highline to the end to pick up the #7 train at the Hudson Yards Station.

Afternoon at the Whitney Museum

A Painting by Roy Lichtenstein seen today at the Whitney

Since I was last at the Whitney in June to see the Biennial exhibit, I thought this would be a good time for a return visit as most of the exhibits have changed over the past 6 months.  We started out on the 8th floor where we saw an exhibit featuring video performances of Jason Moran, one of today's leading jazz innovators.  The 7th floor included selections from the collection from 1900 to 1965 where I saw the Lichtenstein above.  Making Knowing: Craft in Art. 1950-2019 on the 6th floor showed how visual artists explored the materials, methods, and strategies of craft.  The exhibit on the 5th floor featured the works of contemporary artist Rachel Harrison.  The exhibit incorporated room-size installations, autonomous sculpture, photography, and drawing.

Going to a museum kept me away from the TV set on a Sunday afternoon.  I would have watched the football Giants who even won today 36-20.  I am just not that much into the winter sports, anyway.

Sinister Pop Art at the Whitney Museum Today

We decided to be "culture vultures" today by taken our annual trip to the Whitney Museum on Madison Avenue at 75th Street. They had an interesting exhibit called Sinister Pop which featured some of the counterculture pop art of the 1960s and 70s including artists such as Andy Warhol.  There were a few funny pictures of Richard Nixon including one portraying him in a negative fashion and encouraging people to vote for George McGovern.  This exhibit on the second floor will be shown until March 31, 2013.

Wade Guyton and Richard Artsschwagel were featured in other exhibits in the museum.  It is nice to do something different once in a while.

Staycation Trip to the Whitney Museum

I think I have spent enough time on this staycation driving to local parks in Queens to read books and magazines so Karen and I took a trip to the Whitney Museum of American Art. I had been there once before in June 2007.

The featured exhibit was Heat Waves in a Swamp: The Paintings of Charles Burchfield

It was something different for us.

Walking in the Rain by the Ronettes - It Didn't Happen for Me Since I Stayed Home

 

I was thinking about going to the Whitney Museum in the Meat Packing district of Lower Manhattan today.  I would have to take the A, C, or E train to 8th Avenue and 14th Street and then have to walk several blocks to the museum.  The weather forecast was for the chance of heavy showers with wind in the afternoon.  Since I feared being caught in the rain, I decided not to go.  At 4:15 PM there was a 1 hour and 49 minute rain delay at Yankee Stadium.  There was only a little rain in Flushing, Queens.  I don't know how much it rained in lower Manhattan.  I can go to the Whitney another time.

Meteorology is not an exact science.  I don't know if I would have been drenched in Manhattan or Queens had I gone.

Today's Trip to the Whitney Museum

 

The last time I was at The Whitney was in December 2019.  I obviously could not visit over the past 6 months so we thought it was time to see what was there.  We had to make a reservation in advance and wear a mask throughout our visit.

We decided to start our visit on the top floor where we saw an exhibit called Agnes Pelton: Desert Transcendentalist.  Agnes Pelton (1881-1961) was an American visionary symbolist who depicted the spiritual reality she experienced in moments of meditative stillness.  Below are two of her paintings.

Below is an interesting work by Roy Lichtenstein.  I guess a bathroom can be considered a piece of art.

Another exhibit was Vida Americana: Mexican Muralists Remake American Art.  It included works by leading Mexican Muralists José Clemente Orozco, Diego Rivera, and David Alfaro Siqueiros.

It was an enjoyable afternoon.  I am certainly glad that museums have reopened.

The Jewish and Guggenheim Museums All in One Afternoon

 

Our original plan was to visit the Whitney Museum but when I checked its website this morning I found out that the second Sunday in the month is free and that visitors needed a reservation.  Since it was sold out, we decided to go to the Jewish Museum instead. We could visit the Whitney another time.

When we arrived we found out there was only one open exhibit on the ground floor and that the admission charge was lower. It was titled Overflow, Afterglow: New Work in Chromatic Figuration which featured New works by seven emerging artists who use supernatural color and uncanny luminescence to challenge the boundaries of traditional figuration. 

Since it didn't take much time to view that exhibit we walked over to the nearby Guggenheim Museum.

Jenny Holzer: Light Line was the main exhibition. Climbing all six ramps of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed rotunda to the building’s apex, the site-specific installation transforms the building with a display of scrolling texts, featuring selections from her iconic series, such as “Truisms” and “Inflammatory Essays”.

Saturday Afternoon at the Whitney Museum

 

Since it was a cloudy and dreary day, I thought it would be a good day to visit a museum.  I have documented several visits to the Whitney in Bruce's Journal.

Every museum has permanent and temporary exhibits. From February to July, the featured exhibit was Christine Sun Kim: All Day All Night. She is a contemporary deaf artist. Kim draws directly on the spatial dynamism of American Sign Language, translating it into graphic form.  Below is one of her works

Another exhibit was titled Shifting  Landscapes. The exhibit considers a more expansive interpretation of the category, exploring how evolving political, ecological, and social issues motivate artists as they attempt to represent the world around them.

It was an enjoyable afternoon,

Visited the Whitney Museum at its New Site Today

About once a year Karen and I go to the Whitney Museum which was located on Madison Avenue and 75th Street,  Today we visited the museum at its new location at 99 Gansevoort Street in the Meat Packing District.  We took the subway to 8th Avenue and 14th Street and walk west to the Highline and then south one block to the new location.

It was absolutely beautiful both inside and out.  It opened on May 1 so it was crowded with people wanting to see the new building.  The opening exhibit is called "America is Hard to See."  This exhibit examines American art from the begining of the 20th century till today.  It includes over 600 works in various formats that  elaborates on the themes, ideas, beliefs, and passions that have galvanized American artists.

It was a good way to spend a staycation day.

Edward Hopper's New York at the Whitney Museum

 

Self-Portrait of Edward Hopper

According to this journal, I last visited the Whitney Museum in May 2021 .  Today's featured exhibit was Edward Hopper's, New York.  Hopper (1882-1967) was an American realist painter and printmaker. While he is widely known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolorist and printmaker in etching.  New York City was his home for 60 of his 85 years thus this exhibit represented depictions of the city that showed utilitarian structures and out-of-the-way corners.   This exhibit was on the fifth floor and just as crowded as during the Andy Warhol exhibit in 2018.

Other exhibits we saw today included:

• Puerto Rican Art in the Wake of Hurricane Maria
• Early Twentieth-Century American Modernism
• Time Management Techniques

Whitney Museum - October 2025 Visit

 

It was time for a return visit to the Whitney Museum.  The main attraction today was Sixties Surreal, an ambitious, scholarly reappraisal of American art from 1958 to 1972, encompassing the work of more than 100 artists. It recontextualizes some of the decade’s best-known figures alongside those only recently rediscovered..  Below are two of the many works we saw today.

Serendipity at the Met Breuer Museum

The big Metropolitan Museum of Art has a few satellite locations including Met Breuer at Madison Avenue and 75th Street, the former home of the Whitney Museum.  A New York State resident can be admitted for whatever amount he/she wants to pay.

The first exhibit I visited was called Everything is Connected: Art and Conspiracy.  When I got off the elevator there were large murals of Lee Harvey Oswald and Jack Ruby.  It included 70 works by 30 artists in various formats that explore the hidden operations of power and the symbiotic suspicion between the government and its citizens that haunts Western democracies.  There were several photographs of Henry Kissinger of all people.  Anyway, as you can see above there was a work by John Miller of the Wheel of Fortune with Pat Sajak and Vanna White.  It doesn't fit in with the theme of the exhibit, but it was the highlight of the day for me.  Apparently, John Miller drew more paintings of game shows as indicated in this press release.  I am going to see if I can find out more information about this.

The second exhibit was Odyssey: Jack Whitten Sculpture, 1963-2017.  Whitten's sculptures, which he first created in New York and later at his summer home on Crete, consist of carved wood, often in combination with found materials sourced from his local environment, including bone, marble, paper, glass, nails, and fishing line.

It's August Staycation Time

An advantage of working for a university is that one gets 20 vacation days and 3 personal days a year.  I don't do much traveling so that I spend much of that time taking it easy at home.  I always feel that if I have the time I may as well take it during the summer when activity at the library is light.  I think this time I will make some day trips to museums.  Today Karen and I will go to the Paley Center for Media.  Later on I'd like to see the Whitney Museum at its new location and the Jewish Museum.