Showing posts with label sightseeing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sightseeing. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Illustration Workation in New York - Part 4 - Extras

Alright! So after the library we also popped by the Grand Central Station. It was very cool, but very very busy.



And then we dashed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We only had about two hours to be there before closing so we didn't get to see everything, and the things we saw we didn't get a chance to appreciate as much as should. But here are some pictures anyhow:

Ceiling in the Greece section
That's just me

The Boxer
Some wonderful Greek ceramics
These were funny to upload to Facebook when it kept asking me to tag the faces
Egyptian wall

And a sucky cell picture of the fantastic armor and weaponry section
We saw phenomenal variety of famous paintings too, but there was no time to take pictures of all of them, and they're better documented somewhere else online anyhow.

On the last day (Saturday June 29th) we went to the Guggenheim but there were no photos allowed indoors so that's my only picture of it below:

I've got to say though - that the main portion of the James Turrell light show was wonderful - very meditative. Here's a lovely photo I've found on the internet of it...well part of it. The colour of the light changed slowly but constantly, and there were several light illusions located around the spiraling halls of the Guggenheim.

ames Turrell, Rendering for Aten Reign, 2013. Daylight and LED light. Site-specific installation, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York © James Turrell. Rendering: Andreas Tjeldflaat, 2012 © Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation.
That's right - NO STOPPING! Go go go!

The end!

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Illustration Workation in New York - Part 3 - Extras

Happy Tuesday!

Today I'll just be throwing on some photos and random stories that happened during our trip.

Let's start with the New York subway system.
First of all - it's huge! So many different lines, stations, transfers, and travel options. This makes transit in this city quite fast, but possibly confusing at times. My favourite part was that transit was super cheap, compared to Vancouver. In New York one can buy a weekly unlimited rides metro pass card for $30 dollars. And the city is huge, and there was no 'zoning' as far as we were aware. To compare in Vancouver for $30 dollars you can ride unlimited for 3 days (through most of the Metro Vancouver area) if you get a day pass for each of those days. Don't get me started on this.
Anyway - lots of fun things can happen on the NY subway. There are people who sing and even break-dance when the train is moving. And my favourite part was seeing these ads inside:
"The Cheese Dunce's Brain cannot process the bold flavors and fine, natural ingredients of Finlandia cheese. Hence the title Cheese Dunce."
"The Cheese Masochist loves the pain of denying himself the natural ingredients of fine Finlandia Cheese."
My least favourite part of the NY subway experience was having a spider fall on my arm somewhere in the tunnels. It could have been worse. It could have fallen on my head.

Now for some pictures from the NY library:

I wonder what that cluster of green lights is...a ghost?
Wonderful exhibit on historic children's books
Alice in Wonderland


Participating in the interactive part of the exhibit

Part of a book arch

Maurice Sendak section
The Blue Fairy Book
Randolph Caldecott
What pop up books should aspire to
William Blake pages
"The Frog Princess" - a Russian folktale which is one my favourite books/stories from my childhood.
In the gift shop I found this little treasure - best pun ever!

Inside the library itself:
Look! It's the ghostly green lights again!

And here too. Ok, fine. They may have something to do with my camera metering the light fixtures, but it's more fun to think of them as apparitions, so shush.




There's me, pretending to read a book. though I did actually read some of them later, as you'll see in a sec.


Glancing around at the shelves I spotted some old bibliographical dictionaries. So I looked up my last name in some Polish books, where my fathers lineage supposedly stretches from.

possible relative?
And look! My very own name twin, with a different spelling though. I like how there's no death date there.
So, when I got home I Googled this Maria Olszewska and found this Wikipedia entry. Pretty neat. We may be related, or we may not, but still a neat find. Here's a couple of nice pictures of her from the web:


Wow, ok - this post is getting long with all these pictures. So I think I'll just keep stretching this adventure on and have a post again next week about the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, and something else that I'm forgetting right now.

Cheers!

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Illustration Workation in New York - Part 2

Welcome back to Illustration Workation. In this second episode we'll have a glimpse of the remaining educational days of our stay and next week I'll make a post about our free time activities and also possibly make a post that will feature advise and interesting tidbits of stories from all the people we met.
So here we go:

Day 4 - Wednesday - Comics day - Ok, fine. The day wasn't all about comics. First, we dropped by Lotta Jansdotter's studio/shop where she talked to us about patterns, textiles, and licensing. It was our fist time taking the subway to Brooklyn.

Look at the neat tile hats decorating some subway stations!
Apparently Brooklyn is very patriotic when it comes to graffiti
Lotta's
Lotta's shop

Lotta's shop

Lotta's shop

Lotta's shop

After meeting a pair of awesome illustrators based in Brooklyn we traveled back to Manhattan to learn a bit about the comic industry at DC comics

In their elevator hallway they have an amazing wall with all their characters. We all took turns posing next to them.
After DC we had a meeting with Archaia comics where we learned about more the indie comics and copyright. And after that my friends and I went to see "Pippin" on Broadway:


Day 5 - Thursday - Back to Brooklyn - We went back to Brooklyn to some very seasoned art directors and children's books illustrators.

Yours truly
After our official activities were done for the day - we walked the Brooklyn Bridge
The closest we ever got to the Statue of Liberty


Day 6 - Friday - Books, Bread and Brisk art. On this last official excursion day we went to Penguin books and then the Society of Illustrators.

Bookshelf at Penguin Books

Best book on that shelf. I haven't read it yet, but I'm certain it's solid gold.
Just arrived at the Society of Illustrators for a luncheon
Norman Rockwell’s 'Dover Coach' at the SOI

SOI library fireplace.

And here's our merry band of misfits on this NY adventure

And again - check out my friend's video-blogs for her takes on some of our experiences on her YouTube Channel - http://www.youtube.com/user/SweetPetitePea/videos

Till next Tuesday!