Evening at the Metropolitan Museum: Regarding Warhol, Sixty Artists, Fifty Years; Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop

Briefly, a visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art on a Saturday night when it’s open late is a nice treat, and has become a minor ritual of mine.  Usually, I like to go for less than an hour: that way I don’t get overwhelmed.

Of note is evening where:

Faking It: Manipulated Photography Before Photoshop, a mostly historical show of manipulated photographs which includes many lessor-known photographers.  Across the hall was contemporary fine art photography work, which I’m glad to say, also did not include, “the usual suspects.”

A brief stop to my newly discovered 17th Century House section perched above the American Wing, past the silverware (on the Westside) was soothing and interesting.  This secret, un-visited place feels private and attic-like.  I only discovered it two weeks ago after bypassing the mysterious looking stairway up for many, many years.

Regarding Warhol, Sixty Artists, Fifty Years is a great show.  But what struck me among the range of influence was the video of television shows.  The American Family made by PBS in the early ’70s is great.  Also included was the first episode of MTV’s the Real World, which I loved too when it first appeared in the early ’90s.  I think both these shows helped lead the way to things like social media where Facebook currently dominates the public/private world of communication.