“The Gates”

Christo and Jeanne-Claude closed their Excibition “The Gates, Central Park, New York City, 1979-2005” today.

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I was lucky enough to see the Exibit, on the second day. It was a beautiful day with blue sky. Conciously, we entered the park on 86th Street (West Side), as we correctly assumed it would be less crowded there than on 59th Street. The first impression was… anticlamactic. After having seen pictures of the German Reichstag, initially, the installation felt small. But after strolling through the park for only a few minutes, everything started to sink in, and it was a beautiful, meditative experience. There was so much to discover, everybody had time and it felt like learning to see all over again. Did you ever have the experience of visiting a new city, looking at every building and going “wow”? Did it ever occur to you that you’d do the same in your home town, if it wouldn’t be your home town?

We strolled through the park for three hours, and it was worth it every minute of it. As a highlight, we saw Christo and Jeanne-Claude drive by in a limo with their entourage. I didn’t feel the need to come back – still today, they day the installation is taken down, I feel a little melancoly and still happy that I was lucky enough to experience this.