The President on Sullivan Street

I've become so familiar with President Barack Obama's frequent trips to my neighborhood, such as his appearance last night at a fundraiser at Vogue Editor Anna Wintour's townhouse on Sullivan Street, that I know the routine by heart. It goes this way. In the morning, the Command and Control Center, a big white NYPD van, sets up shop nearby, followed by the arrival of hundreds of NYPD policeman, some in patrol cars, others on motorcycles or plain bikes, as well as the blue-shirted community affairs specialists. After the policeman gather to hear their instructions or check their equipment, they fan out to their designated positions. Street barriers begin to appear along the route. A policeman takes a stroll through our apartment's laundry room. For the many of us Village types of a certain age, we have flashbacks to the Vietnam War.

The neighbors go about their business, passing one another on the streets or in shops, but they will talk about the events. Shopkeepers vent worries that no one will be able to get to the stores or restaurants. Typical comments address the enormous taxpayer expense or personal hassle involved with these high security visitations by the President of the United States. Helicopters are involved. There are a lot of sirens and the towing of cars. At every single one of these visits, a poor delivery person on a bike, oblivious to what's happening, ends up casually cruising past a police barricade and into the arms of a nearby patrol officer. Bystanders enjoy these occurrences. Several neighbors panic that they cannot reach their homes.

Then there's a lot of waiting. Knowing the routine, I stayed in my apartment until the arrival of helicopters started shaking the building. Then I knew that the POTUS motorcade was on the scene. Even then, I had no real motivation to leave the house, especially as I was not invited to the affair.  

Walking an Uncertain Wall Street: A Strolling Guide to Stops, Sleepovers, and Anxieties in the Financial District

Bank of New York Mellon at 1 Wall Street.

Maiden Lane

Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress last week that the economic picture remains "unusually uncertain." What a lovely phrase. What did he mean by this? Two words beginning with "un" take a little work anyway, but the Fed Chair was trying to convey, I think, the notion that economic planning remains difficult in the face of good news arriving one minute and bad news the next. The volatility of the market, with its wild ups and downs, thwarts clarity, especially for banker types. For the consumer also, an unusually uncertain economic picture, especially with big question marks about jobs and income, can cause anxieties about future purchases and investments. Wall Street prefers certainty and quickly launched into a sell-off.

Walk where the streets lead

Never mind. The next day stocks rose over two hundred points, giddy with good news over corporate earnings. Expect more uncertainty and volatility ahead. As the new week of trading begins this morning, the news seems happy, but just a bit of bad news can quickly turn the market downhill. Wall Street is subject to tormented mood swings and whims, not unlike a bad romance. Unfortunately, the odds are that a wealthy shareholder will reap most of the benefits of the relationship and so leave the average Jack or Jill playing the sorry part in the unrequited love drama and left crying in the streets. (See the New York Times article, Industries Find Surging Profits in Deeper Cuts, July 25, 2010. )

Wall Street, the actual street in lower Manhattan, as opposed to the highly-charged symbol of high finance, can be coldly seductive. Beginning with the formidable Art Deco masterpiece at 1 Wall Street, Bank of New York Mellon, there's something alluring, dangerous even, in the way the narrow street moves down its shadowed canyons toward the East River. In their steely heights, the famous Stock Exchange on Broad Street, the Morgan building, the Federal Hall, the Trump Building, Tiffany's, the Bank of New York Building, and others, lure the visitor into the corridors of power. The fact that there's a heavy security presence at the Stock Exchange can create an aura of exciting danger. It's helpful to have Trinity Church at the head of the street, praying over the whole dark den of worldly greed.

Matisse at MoMA

A review of Matisse: Radical Invention: 1913-1917 at the Museum of Modern Art (July 18 - October 11, 2010)

The exhibition, Matisse: Radical Invention: 1913-1917, at the Museum of Modern Art (July 18 - October 11, 2010) offers a compelling case to reassess a famous painter too often and too easily taken for granted. Even the most casual of art lovers are in love with the paintings of Henri Matisse (1869–1954) - the sensual bright colors, the nudes encircled in a dance, the sumptuous French interiors, the Jazz cutouts, and his exotic decorative patterns. A good Matisse poster seems to always perk up a dull room. Looking at many Matisse can provide a quick escapist vacation whether it's a window opening to the southern coast of France or to the cliffs of Tangiers. Such a one-sided view of Matisse, however, shortchanges the artist. It's hard to remember that the artwork, so loved now, was once considered by critics to represent an affront to respectable art. The exhibit at MoMA brings the experimental and avant-garde Matisse back into proper perspective.

Henri Matisse (French, 1869–1954)
The Piano Lesson. 1916
Oil on canvas. 96 ½ x 83 ¾” (245.1 x 212.7 cm)
The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Mrs. Simon Guggenheim Fund
© 2010 Succession H. Matisse/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

The exhibit begins several years after Matisse's solo debut at Ambroise Vollard's gallery and the group exhibit of the Fauves. The works from 1905, especially compared to the subdued palette on display in the MoMA exhibit, come across as insane with color, a garish infraction of the rules. You can see where critic Camille Mauclair was coming from when he pronounced, "A pot of paint has been flung in the face of the public." An exhibition at the 1910 Salon d'Automne of two murals, La Danse (Dance) and La Musique (Music), two works signifying a shift in emphasis and made for collector Sergei Shchukin, met with equally harsh critical reception. The artist flees to Spain and Morocco, absorbs new lessons of decorative art and color theory and returns to Paris. The MoMA exhibit includes this valuable prequel, establishing patterns (quite literally) and themes for the artist's developing visual language. He also returns to Paris life more of a Cubist, fixating on geometric forms, a more reserved palette, and a willingness to edit information down to the lowest linear denominator. Importantly, we see Matisse making decisions in his studio, the sort that involves the intellect more than the senses.