John Burridge

Since I didn't have to catch an airport bus until noon, I spent a few hours on another gargoyle photo safari.  This time around I stayed on the west side of Central Park, and slowly wound my way to the American Museum of Natural History.  The outside has cool bas relief and sculptures... and, wow, is it White Euro-Centric Male.

That didn't stop me from photographing it; I think if I'd had the time I would have hung around until the sun could swing around 30 degrees further along the ecliptic, because then its rays would have made the bas relief bears and bison and moose really pop.  As it was, the mountain lions were the only frieze properly lit.  I suppose if I were hardcore, I would have had an assistant with a mylar reflector bring out details.  But it was just me, and already the morning temperature pushed toward 90F.   More Museum of Natural History photos are here.

After the museum, I wound my way back to LGL's apartment.  I probably could have stayed out another hour, but the anxieties of getting to Newark Airport from downtown NYC prompted otherwise.  

As I was walking west along 81st Street, I saw some folate heads and intricately carved balusters.  I'm not sure if I'd call it Gothic Revival -- but when I looked up at the brownstone, there were dragons!  OMG!  It was like someone had taken an old bestiary and turned it into a sculpture.
The dragons flanked a roundel.  At first I thought this was Adam and Eve.  Later, when I was looking at the photo from home, I noticed these figures look like women.  And there's no Tree of Life or Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil behind them.  And they're sharing an open book between them.  I can only conclude this is some sort of Lesbian Library Heaven that I haven't heard about and it's Guarded by Dragons.
The whole building was covered with faces and lions and twining vines.  More Photos Here.  I felt like finding the building was a reward and the final hurrah before I'd have to pack the camera in its special pack and pack the pack into my soft cary-on luggage and get into the travel stream.  I'd leave the magical Upper West Side, Upper East Side, and the other gilded boroughs with their djinni of granite and steel.  I'd say goodby to the totem animals and spirit helpers of sandstone and brass.  I'd get on a bus to the airport, wind through TSI security, eat airport food, file onto a plane, and fly for five hours back home, where the cats were waiting.

I managed to wake up, kiss everyone (well, almost everyone) goodbye, take a bus to The City, get to LGL's apartment, and by 10 AM was more or less hoofing through the streets of New York City's Lincoln Center District and headed in the general direction of the MET.

"Oh! Paparazzi!" LGL's doorman said as I left the apartment.  "Nice camera."

"Yeah," I said, "I'm going to bag me some gargoyles!"

Many years ago, on 70th Street near Amsterdam Street (which I keep wanting to call Holland Street), there used to be a place called "Cafe Motzart," that served hot chocolate and pastires -- alas, it is no more.  However, across 70th are some pretty fierce looking gargoyles that I took pictures of long ago...possibly  with film.  This time around I managed some close-ups.   And then I got the old Knights of Pythias Temple next door--complete with Sphinxes and Lamassu.    

Eventually I passed Strawberry Fields in Central Park, and retraced our path to Bethesda Park.   I  should say at this time it was about 11 A.M. and close to 90 F, with a heat index of 95.   "Sweat is fat crying," I thought to myself as I found a water fountain.   A street musician played his guitar along with a recording of "Black Magic Woman."   The sun was in a different part of the sky from that last time Mark, The Child and I visited, and new panels were in shadow.  I found the Owl and Bat from last time, and a Halloween Witch sculpted into one of the columns.  More Bethesda Terrace pictures here.


I walked and walked and found Cleopatria's Needle.  By now it was close to noon, and the concrete plaza around the needle was fiercly bright and hot.  The needle seemed to be on a bike path--there were little chalk arrows directing traffic around the needle, and cyclists kept wheeling around it.   I took some obligatory pictures of the needle and then found a water fountain to drink from (while a virtual Mark reminded me to stay hydrated).

I was on a mission to find a freize of Hygiea & Aesculapius at 1213 Fifth Avenue.  I thought it was near the MoMa.  But it wasn't.  I thought it might be beyond the Museum of Jewish History.  But it wasn't.  I thought it might be beyond the Engineer's Gate.  But it wasn't.  By this time I'd convinced myself that the address was 1513, and as the building numbers slowly climbed my heart slowly sank.
Fifth Street went over a small rise.  I walked past Mount Sinai General Hospital and then The Children's Hospital and then the Woman's Hospital, and I thought, OK.  Maybe,... just... one... more... building.

But it wasn't.
Despite hydrating at various water fountains, I was feeling like I'd sweated a half-gallon, and I was kind of hungry.

  

There was one more building that looked like it could be interesting, and then I should turn around and head to the MET for lunch (and water and shade).  

As I drew closer, I saw ... animal grotesques!  This was it!  I went around the corner of 101st and Ascepilus and Hygea were there, arms wide with bowls and a serpent.  And a ton of other grotesques. The reference book I'd seen them in had only really covered one or two of the many figures decorating the building.


And then the half-full battery icon appeared in the camera's screen.  I photographed the whole building with wild abandon, capturing more snakes, and pigs, and healers, and gargoyles, and other building motifs.  Full photoset here.

Then it was time to head back to the MET.  Along the way I took photos of gargyoles and other interesting features I'd missed coming back the other way.   This stretch of Fifth Avenue was slightly sketchier than the bit around the museums, but not horrifically so.  I reminded myself to be aware of where I was and who was around -- but really, downtown Eugene at Broadway and Charnelton is much worse.   The trees shading the west side of Fifth Street gave welcom respite from the sun and occassional support for super-zoom shots.  The small of my back and my forearms were sweaty.

I entered the MET.  Normally, I might have eaten somewhere else, but I was hungry and resigned to the sticker shock of lunch.  I traipsed through the "Heavenly Bodies" installation in the Medieaval Wing and to the cafeteria.  Actually, traipsed isn't the right word because there were tons of folks in the way and gawking at Catholic Mass Inspired Haut Couture.  I have a vague recollection of a mannequin crowned with a wide swath of crumpled black ribbon...  

After lunch -- by this time it was 1:15 -- I returned to the Mediaeval Hall and looked at the fashion.  There was an Over The Top Crown and some other, sort of Madonna-or-Billy-Idol-inspired, bridal dress, and nuns and choir gowns.  I took a few sculpture shots, and a better shot of the brass bird finial, and then the camera's battery died.  I love the camera, but I wish it gave a more nuanced reading of the battery's power level.  

I kicked myself for not having the spare battery I'd charged on me, and then I went to look at all my old MET friends.   I spent long moments just looking at Death Staying The Young Artist's Hand, and the Elamite Cow (yay! The Cow was back!), and the Temple of Dendur, and the Matte Black Sarcophagus That Defies Photography, and the Statuette of Falcon-Horus Protecting Phaoroh. I visited Queen Hapshutsut Seated ("Oh My Queen...") and lingered over the gazelle head crown of a Harkonian Princess.   The Music Wing was open, and I went up to view the Pipe Organ -- which I don't remember having visited before.  I enjoyed seeing the cut-away view of the brass reed pipes and the risers.  I especially appreciated how the curators had arranged various horns so that they radiated away from what is probably the oldest horn ever:  a conch shell.

There's something to be said for walking through the halls of the MET without a working camera.  When I'm taking photographs, the artifacts of the MET become subjects to arrange into a 3x5 composition, my relationship to the items becomes acquisitional--if I can't own the object, I will collect an image of it--and the visit turns into a kind of birder's checklist; when I don't use the camera I can take time to appreciate the pieces as art, or religious tools, or scientific implements, or luxury goods.  

My legs were sore from so much walking, so I wound down in the final hour of my visit with the Babalonian Lamassu with the lion claws (the other one has bull hooves).   I'm not too keen on the texts of Ashurnasirpal's ordering everything, but something about the bird-headed genni tending the tree of life with their pinecones and wrist-watches and little purses is relaxing.  

I managed a quick jaunt through the Greek and Roman wing, gazed at a collection of Medusa's heads, and then MET security began shooing people out.