blög!: the met of art

the metropolitan museum of art (also called the met, like the opera house) is quite large and has a lot more than just graphic art. while i didnt make it through the whole thing because it closes early, i did see a large chunk of it. the met, along with most of post-giuliani nyc, has recently been renovated -- actually, to be more accurate, the renovation is partially complete. the modern sculpture collection is housed primarily in a terrific gallery with a huge sky light and entire wall of glass. it has the burghers of calais (rodin, 1884-86) as more or less the center piece. the greek and roman sculptures are in a hall thats almost as cool, but looks somewhat more traditional.

the mets modern graphic art collection benefits from a particularly good curator who takes his time with artists unlike the MoMA. this isnt a criticism of the MoMA, its just that the MoMA has to prove it has everything and hangs just the best pieces from every artist. thats the job of a MoMA. thats not to say that youll never see a room with 5 or 6 from the same artist, but unless youre monet or van gogh or picasso this is rare. d'Orsay does the same thing and the one in prague is just so enormous it can do whatever it wants, but like most other MoMA's the met has limited floor space they try to hang just the best.

at the met, the ground floor is dedicated to relatively few artists who are not as mainstream but at least as good. this sort of lets you get to know an artist as opposed to jumping around, which generally gives a good overview of a particular school of art and its stars (like say, impressionists). for instance, if you see monet, sisley, degas and pissaro and then one painting of somebody youve never heard of, youll just overlook it. all that aside, its done extremly well and still manages to hang all the necessities that a major gallery shows off. AND its free for columbia students so ill be heading back...

addendum: its free for everybody but the they dont guilt you if youre a columbia student