MoMA, Top of the Rock and so much more!

Today is our last chance to use our NY City Pass, and so we plan to get to a number of things over the day. We started out by heading up to 53rd street, to be there when MOMA opened at 10.30. On the way we noticed barricades being put up along streets from about 48th street and along 5th & 6th Avenue, and a large number of police around - it turns out it was all for the "lighting of the tree" at Rockefeller Plaza.

The MoMA has an amazing collection and also had some interesting exhibits. We started up on the top level and saw the exhibition "Is Fashion Modern?" This depicted a range of clothes from the little black dress, t-shirts, shoes, boots, head wear, sneakers, turtle neck skivvies, etc. It was very interesting. We also went through the level where all my favourite impressionists are displayed, including Cezanne, Matisse, Van Gogh (The Starry Night & Portrait of Joseph Roulin), Picasso, Monet, Marcel Duchamp and Giorgi Chirico. We then saw some of the more modern works by Jackson Pollock, Rene Magritte, Phillip Gaston, Cy Twombly, Andy Warhol, Frank Stella and Roy Lichtenstein.

We also saw an exhibit by Louise Bourgeoise "An Unfolding Portrait". Her work was interesting and at time confronting; she painted until she was well into her 90’s, even though her eyesight was deteriorating. The last exhibition we saw was by Max Ernst - Beyond Painting.

When we finished our exploration of MoMA we decided to have lunch in their cafe. This was a good move, because it wasn’t crowded and the food was delicious. We all had toasted paninis. After lunch we headed to the Rockefeller Centre to go up to the Observation Deck. It has been a fairly mild and very sunny day, so it was a bit difficult to take shots that faced downtown (into the sun). I think I got a couple of good shots, but the rest have too much glare. Once we had spent enough time on top of the rock, we headed for the subway as we wanted to go downtown to catch the Staten Island Ferry (which is free), get a closer look at Lady Liberty, and also get some shots looking back towards Manhattan and the Financial District. We went past the famous Bull Statue on Wall Street on our way to catch the ferry.

We got back to our apartment just after 5 pm and had a little downtime before we headed out for dinner at Sardi’s, followed by "Hello Dolly" starring Bette Midler, and also David Hyde Price (he played Nile Crane in Frasier). He was excellent, as was the entire cast, and we had great seats and thoroughly enjoyed the show.Read more