Metropolitan Museum and Knickerbocker Hotel

Wonderful John Singer Sargent show at the Met.

What a painter, what energy, what verve - how very theatrical!

How the contemporary onlookers look so deadly dull.

A splendid Henry James afternoon in Venice. How the figures are disposed in light and dark.

Most of the visitors were between sixty and death

and fun to observe.

 

Nice to see lots of the paintings that are so famous gathered together in one place. I enjoyed this show more even than the over the top wonderful Chinese fashion one.

We had been waiting for The Knickerbocker Hotel to reopen on 42nd Street. Times Square is not really the part of New York I most enjoy  - tacky and touristy. However the hotel is wonderfully situated

to look down from the roof bar on the crowds below.

Then the bright lights come on

and the sun sets over New Jersey.

Indoors the bar is very chic and luxe.

Field Trip: Metropolitan Museum

The flower arrangements are always astounding, dramatic and exotic. You could go to the museum for them alone.

Of course, on a vacation-time Thursday there were a million billion people there, and most of them were taking photos on their cell phones --just like me. Never quite know what to look at, since if you look at everything you get major  sensory overload.

So looked at the modern photos exhibit, then retreated to the Spanish courtyard

to see the young man playing music.

Such a pretty young saint! You can look through the porthole in her chest to discover that she is a reliquary and has real bits of bone inside.....

No one there for an instant.

Then looking down at the hall

and wondering which particular treasures were absorbed that day.

Spring has Almost Sprung

In the grounds of the seminary there are magnolia and japonica.



And scilla with dead leaves left over from last year.



This looks like a spring wood almost anywhere.



It was very cold and windy near the Metropolitan Museum yesterday.
But the daffodils put on a cheerful face.



The bright clouds scudded through a blue sky.