Paris/New York exhibit

Over winter break, I visited the Museum of the City of New York for the first time since a fourth grade class trip. I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to go back, because I love New York City history, and I’m glad I finally did. Located on 103rd and 5th Ave, right across from Central Park, the museum is actually New York mansion from 1930, with an large entrance receded from the sidewalk. The museum’s permanent collection includes historical New York art, photographs, trade artifacts and models, theater collections, toys, clothing, and models of rooms in New York homes throughout four centuries.

I went to the museum specifically to see a special exhibition on view through February 22nd called “Paris/New York: Design Fashion Culture 1925-1940.” The professor of an art history seminar I’m taking this semester recommended that we go see the exhibit if we got a chance, because of its relevance to the course. This is the course description:
Designs for Living: Modernity in Hollywood Movies. This seminar investigates how American films of the 1920s and 1930s used stylish costumes, hairstyles, body language and settings to embody the theme of modernity. The films of Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Cary Grant, among other stars, are examined, along with the work of art directors like Cedric Gibbons and Hans Dreier. We focus on issues of gender, consumerism, class mobility and other social transformations of early twentieth-century America.

Also basing itself on the theme of modernity, the Paris/New York exhibit explores the relationship and cultural exchange between the cities in the years between the two world wars. Paris was renowned for its elegance and cultural refinement, while New York was modern, cutting-edge, and daring. The exhibit begins with the 1925 World Exposition in Paris and ends with the 1939 World Exposition in New York. It features photographs, original clothing (read: dresses from the ‘20s and ‘30s that you just want to steal off the mannequins) and art deco furniture designs, and explored concepts of modern architecture and living spaces. It presents the rivalry and mutual admiration that Paris and New York developed in the years between 1925 and 1940, which had a great influence on each society’s artistic tastes and ideas of modernism.

If you get a chance to go to the exhibit, you can download a free podcast of the audio tour and listen it on an mp3 player while visiting the show – it adds a lot to the experience, for free.