NYC Arts: The Complete Guide to Art and Culture

The nascent and grassroots Slow Art movement echoes the philosophy of Slow Food, but focuses on how we view art, not on how it is made. Slow Art is a project of the Reading Odyssey, a nonprofit dedicated to helping adults—especially non-experts—play with culture and not feel intimidated by it. The second Slow Art Day was held on April 17, 2010.

Slow Art follows a simple concept and recommends the following:
 
1. Visit a museum.
2. Look slowly at a few pieces of art—for five or ten minutes or longer.
3. Have lunch to talk about it with others.
4. Do it the same day as thousands of others around the world. See SlowArtDay.com for a list of all participating cities.

Phil Terry, the founder of Slow Art, shares with NYC-ARTS.org three of his favorite slow art experiences in New York that anyone can do at any time:

1) The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Met is so big that many who visit get overwhelmed. I designed a tour aimed to make one particular collection more manageable. Experience the Met's Ancient Near Eastern Art galleries using a downloadable literary tour I created.

The free guide quotes ancient historians like Herodotus and the great poet Homer and explains how some of the Assryian, Sumerian, Akkadian and Babylonian artifacts (including one I call "Booty Man") tie into ancient literature. The tour starts in one of the most stunning rooms in the museum: the Palace of King Ashurnasirpal. The tour focuses on just a few objects so that the first-time visitor to these galleries is not overwhelmed, but can leave feeling inspired rather than tired.

2) The Jewish Museum

Last year I was able to sit in front of a Hans Hoffman and a Gorky painting for an hour by myself and look at two beautiful works of art as if I were sitting in my own living room. I didn't see any other visitor during that entire time. I was also able to look at a Pollock and de Kooning for 30 minutes without anyone passing by. If you go on the free Saturday, make a donation online to support the museum's good work, if you can.

3) Get lost in Brooklyn's Prospect Park

Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, creator of Central Park, this is one of the most beautiful urban parks in the country. I was a trustee of the park for several years and my customer experience consulting company ran a pro-bono project to better understand the park experience. We found, among other things, that most visitors stayed on the rim of the park and had no idea that they could venture into the beautiful interior where there are waterfalls (in the Ravine) and the first urban Audubon Center, among other things. Take an afternoon and bring your family or friends and venture into the middle of the park and allow yourself to slowly get lost in the park that Olmsted himself considered to have been his best design.