We went to the
Ganesh temple canteen in Queens - it's located in the basement and is nothing much to look at, but offers huge servings of delicious food. Afterward, we showed ourselves around the outside of the temple a bit.
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| Every house of worship should have one |
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| Elephants |
Afterward, we went to Flushing Meadow Corona Park. We checked out the
Hall of Science, which was very cool.
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The beautiful curved wall of the museum (inset with stained glass)
is under construction. I'm looking forward to the grand re-opening!!! |
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| Here's looking at you, kid |
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| Images designed to be viewed as reflected onto metallic cones |
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| A visitor to the museum |
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| Self-portrait in shadows I |
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| Self-portrait in shadows II |
The fountains were on at the Unisphere - a rare sight indeed, these days!!
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| The Unisphere's fountains are on - it must be the 50th anniversary of the World's Fair!!!! |
The
Queens Museum was also interesting. We started with the room devoted to a scale model of New York City - all five boroughs, complete with miniature airplanes flying in and out of La Guardia!
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| Detail of the scale model of NYC |
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| Central Park |
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| World Trade Center |
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| Bridges |
At the top of the ramp is their exhibition of merchandise and memorabilia from the two World's Fairs held in Queens.
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| The manufacturer of my favorite instant espresso was apparently represented at the 1939 World's Fair |
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| Nice license plate! |
At least one bona fide Queen attended the 1939 event.
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| Guess who decided to see what the bloody Colonials were doing for the 1939 World's Fair? |
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| The future is science. Or magic. Or something! |
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What do we want? Bag-o-Dinos!
When do we want it? Now!!! |
After the 1939 and 1964 World's Fair memorabilia, we saw this more modern artwork:
And a cultural events type dance:
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| Some bins and other miscellany on their way somewhere else |
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| "Library II-II" by Liu Wei, of Beijing |
"
Liu's ongoing Library series translates the chaos of his native city: a sprawling metropolis in a state of constant development and demolition. Made out of massive piles of school books sourced from secondhand markets in Beijing, his sprawling installations waver between utopia and dystopia, depicting eroded cityscapes."
A few details from a Tiffany exhibit:
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| How the sausage was made in the Tiffany workshops |
A far less typical work:
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"Fathers of the Church" by
Tiffany Glass & Decorating Co
ca. 1892 |
This large, hand-drawn spiral timeline, "Study/2014," a site-specific work, was certainly arresting in its own right:
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| An artist's hand-crafted timeline... |
It is described as "
a timeline of a world history spanning 5000 years transcribed into a concentric organic shape. The artist transforms the history of human civilization into a micro-biomorphic form on a monumental scale..."
But I was even more intrigued when I saw that the artist has the same given name and hometown as a friend of mine! Yes, this is by one Hikaru Hayakawa of Osaka. My understanding is (or was) that Hikaru is a very unusual name in Japan, taken from an obscure ancient poet... What are the odds?
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| Close-up of Timeline |
When we'd come out to FMCP before for a World's Fair themed tour, the fountains had been off, as usual. This time...
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| The Unisphere! |
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| What may happen if they forget to turn off the fountains... |
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