Exhibitions NYC | IBM THINK

At Lincoln Center, on the corner of Broadway and W. 65th Street, you encounter a remarkable exhibition: IBM THINK

THINK celebrates IBM Centennial, exploring the potential of science and information technology to make the world work better. The exhibition includes several displays, interactive in varies forms.
A 123-foot digital wall installed at street-level digital streams real-time data from sensor placed in the area surrounding Lincoln Center; the data visualize several urban life realities, from traffic to air quality to water consumption and potential of solar energy in NYC. Following the wall you can enter the exhibition area which requires tickets, free of charge and available at the exhibition entrance.

The interior exhibition features a 12-minute film and interactive experience across 40 digital screens 7-foot tall,  narrating how technology can transform and improve our lives. The film presents images from space exploration, weather prediction and personalized medicine; it also include sequences from the 1968 documentary "Powers of Ten" by Charles and Ray Eames.

 After the film the digital screens turn into touchscreen media panels, where the visitors can find a concise, yet well documented and visually clear, information (often displayed as a timeline) on the history of scientific discoveries and inventions which transformed our life. The explored themes are Seeing Understanding Mapping Acting.

The visitor exits the exhibit viewing Icon of Progress, where several (static) panel illustrates the milestone of the hundred-year IBM history from his funding to today, with all the implication of computing from credit cards to the space missions.

IBM THINK

September 23 - October 23, 2011; 

information on free tickets and hours of operation can be found at www.THINKexhibit.com

Events NYC | Occupy Wall Street

Since September 17 thousands have been gathering in Liberty Square in a non-violent protest.
Who is Occupy Wall Street? A concise answer from the movement website :

Occupy Wall Street is leaderless resistance movement with people of many colors, genders and political persuasions. The one thing we all have in common is that We Are The 99% that will no longer tolerate the greed and corruption of the 1%.
The original call for this occupation was published by Adbusters in July; since then, many individuals across the country have stepped up to organize this event, such as the people of the NYC General Assembly and US Day of Rage. There'll also be similar occupations in the near future such as October2011 in Freedom Plaza, Washington D.C.   

For calendar of events and more information visit  Occupy Wall Street 

Events | Lecture by Tibetan Bon Lama Tempa Dukte at the Spencertown Academy

Today the Spencertown Academy hosted a lecture presented by Eight Branches Healing Arts:

The Intimate Mind: Illuminating Emotion & Transformation. Public Talk & Book signing With Tibetan Bon Lama, Tempa Dukte. The Intimate Mind is our natural potential to provide space to let everything manifest in its own way. It is the practice of Open Presence through which we can experience the miracle of each moment. However, our divided mind creates obstacles that do not allow us to abide in this experience. Tempa Lama will talk about overcoming these obstacles through a practice of gentleness and awareness.  Tempa Dukte Lama is an ordained Tibetan Bon lama. He is an artist, poet and writer, and the founder and spiritual director of Olmo Ling Tibetan Bon Center in Pittsburgh, PA. He trained in Menri Monastery, India under the guidance of H.H. 33rd Menri Trizin, the spiritual head of Bon. He teaches in the US and Europe on healing and other Bon practices, being with dying, meditation, and the path of compassionate beings.

Tempa Dukte Lama, a soft speaking Tibetan Monk, engaged the audience with his smile and kindness. These are the topics which I found most captivating:

• Everything comes to an end. 
• Accept impermanence of life and being here and now. 
• Search for happiness finding your own personal meaning and needs. 
• Embrace flexibility. 
• There are three demons: attachment anger ignorance. 
• To change your life change your thinking into positive. 
• Express joy and happiness in what you do. 
• The mind is consciousness. 
• Be patient. 

An uplifting lecture, greatly needed after the sad and unsettling event of the past week.

Vernissages NYC | Chelsea September 22

 After the saddening news of one the latest human cruelty and irrationality (see previous post) the show (or life) must go on. Below my visual memories of the evening:

 Milton Resnick "The Elephant in the Room" at Cheim & Read

Frank Stella "Geometric Variations" at Paul Kasmin

Carsten Nicolai "Pionier" at The  Pace Gallery

In Memoriam | Troy Anthony Davis

A very sad day: the state of Georgia executed Troy Davis on September 21, 2011 despite serious doubts about his guilt.
For more details and action please visit here

Events NYC | Dedication of Frederick Douglass Memorial

"I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong."  are the important words from Frederic Douglass (1818-1895), the American social reformer,  writer and statesman, who after escaping from slavery became a leader of the abolitionist movement.

 Douglass was celebrated with a memorial —a public art work  in the traffic circle at Central Park West and 110th Street.  The memorial includes a bronze portrait of a Douglass, inspired by nineteenth-century photographs, crafted by Hungarian-born sculptor Gabriel Koren and an environmental art work by Harlem-based artist Algernon Miller.

 

Miller's site specific artwork merges with the landscape and civil design of this major urban traffic intersection, to include granite seating and paving patterns based on traditional African-American quilt motifs, as well as a bronze perimeter fence with a wagon wheel motif. I found most compelling the bronze water wall depicting the Big Dipper constellation that guided the slaves to freedom on the “underground railroad.”

Event MIAMI | Wynwood Gallery Walk

NOW Contemporary Art Gallery

Long-Bin Chen's Bookface at NOW Contemporary Art

Gallery Walks are a fact of modern life; Miami has a plethora of scheduled nights throughout a variety of artist enclaves.

Nick Gentry's paint on floppy discs at Robert Fontaine Gallery

Wynwood is an old area that has, in the past 10+ years, risen from a lonely warehouse section of Miami, to housing a vibrant and eclectic art environment. Today, it still can vacillate wildly from streets lonely with tumble weeds (speaking metaphorically, of course) to a vital neighborhood pulsating with life on Gallery night.

Michel Bickford's Intergalactic World's Fair Portal at Harold Golen Gallery

Every few months I check in with Wynwood’s offerings on second Saturday eve. Apparently “people” are back in town from their summers in the Berkshires/Hamptons/Maine, as it was a jam-packed street “mise en scene”.

Galleries are already ramping up the volume on exhibitions in prep for Fall blending into Art Basel season. During Art Basels December onslaught, Wynwood is awash with pop-up galleries in empty warehouses along with satellite fairs erected in large tents or any available space.

Dozens of gourmet food trucks gather in an empty Wynwood lot on Gallery Night

Many of Miami’s voracious collectors house their collections in warehouses open to the public year ‘round: Rubell and Margulies, plus the de la Cruz Collection just to the north in the Design District. Bernice Steinbaum from NY’s SoHo district was the first to build a stylish gallery in Wynwood at the turn of the century (this one), along with gutsy pioneer Brook Dorsch, who took over a lamp factory and crack house in a tiny, unloved back street for his Dorsch Gallery. Dorsch and Steinbaum both have sites front and center in the action, where once there was darkened streets of potholes and questionable characters. You may still find a selection of both, truth be known.

Miguel Parades, Urban Realist

The Wynwood Second Saturday takes place monthly from 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. North Miami Avenue to I95 and runs from 10th to 36th Street.

Martin Carbajal's BLACK BONE series tells short stories at Waltman|Ortega Fine Art

Miguel Paredes fine Art Gallery

..and the people pepper galleries with personal visual "art"

Vernissages NYC | Chelsea September 15

 Hiroyuki Hamada @ Lori Bookstein Fine Arts

Tine Lundsfryd @ Lori Bookstein Fine Arts

John Chamberlain "Pictures" @ Steven Kasher Gallery

 "Live Theory" @ Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery

David Byrne "Tight Spot" @ Pace

 

 

Vincent Desiderio @ Marloborough

 

 Social Media @ Pace

 

 Tabaimo "Dandan" @ James Cohan Gallery