A day of looking

Today, I spent the early afternoon with Judy who was in from Minneapolis. After I left her off I went to meet my son at the Metropolitan museum to see this exhibit. I took the 6 train o the east side. I just loved the mosaics in the station.

Some of the eagles were cast in relief.

Others were done only in mosaic work.

 

I love that renovations over the years left the fancy tile work even if the type faces  for the station names were modernized.

Even the ceiling was pretty, despite the schmutz

 

Why am I writing about a local subway station rather than the exhibit at the met that I had thought had my name written all over it??

 

I guess I was expecting an exhibit with a different focus. I’m really interested in the earliest centuries of the silk/spice road trade.

 

What I can tell you on one foot is that the motifs on the junky Indian bedspread you bought while you were in college are very similar to the textiles that were the hottest thing in Versailles. The quality that was bought for Versailles was a whole lot nicer. They were doing chain stitching that was so fine that you could go blind just trying to look at individual stitches.

I took some photos with no flash before being told that no photography was allowed. here you see some pretty spectacular chain stitching.

And a quibble…it’s OK to inform the viewing public that colors have faded and that the embroideries that look like they were cream on white were probably bright 500 years ago.

 

And the first real snow of the season has just begun.