"WATERFALLS" A New Art Display on the East River or a Copy of Canadian Artist Peter Lewis

"WATERFALLS", a new art project begins today on New York's East River which is scheduled to run till November 2008. Remember "The Gates" art show Central Park 2005, a colossal saffron-colored artwork created by the husband and wife team of Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

Some 7,500 vinyl arches, each festooned with orange hue fabric panels, had been set in place along 23 miles of Central Park pedestrian walkways. The 16-foot-high gates took some 600 workers to unfurl the saffron fabric cocooned in the tops of the gates into drapes that extended seven feet off the ground.
"The Gates" stretched across paved paths throughout the park from 59th to 110th Street. Christo and Jeanne-Claude have used fabric in the past to encircle islands in Florida's Biscayne Bay, drape the Pont-Neuf in Paris and the Reichstag in Berlin. 200,000 tourists were expected to visit each day. The City's Economic Development Corporation estimated that "The Gates" would have generated more than $80 million of additional revenue. Don't ask me how.

The installation cost $21 million which was paid for by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who have lived in New York since 1964. They typically finance their projects through the sale of related artworks like drawings or lithographs and said that they did not earn any income from the project.

This latest display by Olafur Eliasson features a total of four waterfalls strategically placed on the east river. One of the falls is placed underneath the historical Brooklyn Bridge. Besides mercury, lead, asbestos, arsenic being sprayed throughout the air as well as the occasional dead rat...I got friends who ended up in the East River.

Mayor Bloomberg claims the privately funded 15 million dollar project which Bloomberg's media company donated 13.5 million dollar will bring in 55 million dollars revenue to the city..I can't imagine how.

Although it is not as large as the egos these artists possess I would rather take a ride to upstate New York and see a real waterfall. It's called Niagara Falls.
Also in Canada there is artist Peter Lewis who stated he executed the same idea 30 years ago in Edmonton, Canada. The Edmonton Waterfall which lined the High Level Bridge was completed in 1980 at a cost of $3.6 million. Lewis sent a letter to Bloomberg's office stating that he had done it before as an unconditional gift that didn't cost the citizens anything. City Hall said the mayor responded on June 11 stating that great minds think alike. A crafty reply from a typical politician.