Installation View from Thierry Mugler: Couturissme at The Brooklyn Museum (All Photos By Gail)
Designer Thierry Mugler (1948 – 2022) believed that beauty and seduction are instinctual. His most imaginative designs took inspiration from the natural world, including a host of birds, butterflies, insects, undersea creatures, and reptiles.
Continue reading Eye On Design: Thierry Mugler, La Chimère Gown
Photo By Gail
This Pink Winged Pig Unicorn (Unipig? Pigicorn?) was spotted inside one of the themed-rooms at midtown’s sweetest attraction, The Candytopia. If memory serves, I recall that this room, located towards the end of the exhibit, is the one where enthusiastic-but-misguided docents threw a cup of paper confetti in my face as I walked through the entrance, completely obliterating the only-half-drunk cocktail in my hand. Huge bummer.
All Photos By Gail
There is no doubt that the costume designer plays an essential role in cinematic storytelling. For the Elton John biopic Rocketman (2019), costume designer Julian Day’s guiding principle was: the louder, the better.
Continue reading Eye On Design: Winged Devil Costume from Rocketman
Photo By Gail
The Griffin on this Throne Leg (Western Iran, Late 7th – Early 8th Centuries) exemplifies the use of powerful winged animals (real and imaginary) as symbols of royalty. The mythical beast’s long history stretches back to about 3000 B.C., when it appeared in the art of Egypt and the Middle East, and it may have been introduced to western Iran through contacts with Sogdian, Central Asia. Here, the creature has been adapted to a tradition of animal-legged thrones in Iranian art. In pre-Islamic Iran, the griffin — a combination of lion and eagle, two animals associated with the sun — was seen as a vehicle of ascension, implying the ruler’s elevation to the status of god. In the early years of the Islamic period, new rulers appropriated the symbol to convey power and legitimacy.
Photographed in the Metropolitan Museum if Art in NYC.
All Photos By Gail (Thanks to Dave Manilow for The Tip on How to Get This Great Shot!)
Memorial Day Monday was not the hoped-for sunny day here in NYC, and the grey sky with threat of rain lent itself to indoor activities like Museum visits! Thus, I was inspired to head out to the Museum of Modern Art, followed by a short walk downtown to Rockefeller Center to see the new summer public artwork. This year’s monumental work is the first site-specific outdoor public sculpture ever to be commissioned for the United States from German artist Anselm Kiefer (b. 1945). Entitled Uraeus, the work consists of a gigantic open book with eagle’s wings spanning 30 feet, both made of lead, on top of a 20-foot-tall lead-clad stainless steel column. Continue reading Anselm Kiefer’s Uraeus Sculpture at Rockefeller Center