GIA Reader (2000-present)

Wonder

To my eye, nothing is quite as uplifting as the startling sculptures that erupt before you as you stroll through Socrates Sculpture Park, home to these stems of welded steel and stone, nestled among gritty iron foundries, masonry suppliers, and auto repair shops in Long Island City, Queens.

Every decade or two, the professions of architecture and city planning are captivated by a movement with a particularly catchy name. Currently, the popular term is placemaking — a fairly loose term that is running neck and neck with “sustainability.” Within the design professions, this movement — really more a philosophy — suggests that people’s lives can be made better by intentionally designing interior and exterior spaces to embrace a wide range of users, provide for safety, and create artful expressions that endure over time.

I’m sitting with sixteen artists around a table filled with Russian food. As we introduce ourselves, a poet says, “I’d like to share my work with you all later.”

“Now, now! Go ahead!” the others respond.

The poet nods, stares down at her plate, taking a few seconds to compose herself, and begins:

Immediately following Hurricane Sandy, the Andy Warhol, Lambent, and Robert Rauschenberg Foundations (“the primary funders”) approached the New York Foundation for the Arts to administer a fund to provide grants to individual artists in all disciplines from Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York. In addition to the substantial and catalytic support from the three foundations, NYFA also raised additional funds for this project through further donations from our generous individual and institutional supporters and collaborators.

While I was volunteering at the Park Slope Armory evacuation shelter I asked for advice from a member of the clergy when I encountered a problem I couldn’t solve. He told me to follow my instinct. I said I didn’t trust my instinct; the situation was far beyond my experience. He responded, “This is your opportunity to stretch yourself.” A lot of stretching has been going on in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. People, organizations, and communities have been coming together to meet a challenge and stretch in ways we had no idea were pos-sible.

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   Sandy versus NYC (11Mb)

Cheese and crackers in the boardroom? Standard fare.

Puppetry and handwriting analysis? Not so much. Nonetheless, there was a line out the door of the boardroom at the Marriott Hotel in Los Angeles, where the Council on Foundations’ annual conference was taking place. Conferees awaited their personalized encounter with the LA-based arts group the Machine Project, which was also offering mind-reading workshops, cheese music, and concerts of Renaissance lute and vocal music.