Berlin = New York ??

Listening to Christo and Jeanne Claude's critics in New York reminds me of the Reichstag installation 10 years ago [yes, I support the Sierra Club, but c'mon: it's Central frickin' Park!]. For very different reasons, it took the team of artistes 20-some years to get their projects off the ground in both cities, and there's all sorts of folks who are--according to the media [but that's all part of the show!!]--unaware that it's happening or are totally against it; but when it's all said and done [then as now] it'll be a big boon [financially] for a big city--a city in both cases that also has a life of its own, and problems that far outreach what art can mend on its own. OK, I realize that was way a run-on sentence, but here's the point: The "artistes" [or installers?] say more or less the same thing then as now: we paid for it, art has no practical purpose, just deal with it...we'll make sure to keep the proceeds. I'll be 10 years older now. I'll be there now as I was then. I suspect I'll be amazed as I was then. Beyond that, I'd like to think that there's a place--a good place, a fruitful place--for the creativity and spirit of these two people and their work and their vision in our open spaces, in our public areas, in our society. I suspect there's others out there who agree.