Manhattan, NYC

Cheap Shots Neighborhood: Manhattan/East Village 140 1st Avenue (between 9th St & St Marks Pl) New York, NY 10009

Radio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue located in New York City's Rockefeller Center. Its nickname is the Showplace of the Nation. The Music Hall opened to the public on December 27, 1932 with an spectacular stage show, featuring Ray Bolger and Martha Graham. The opening was meant to be a return to high class variety entertainment. Unfortunately, it was not a success and on January 11, 1933, the first film was shown on the giant screen: The Bitter Tea of General Yen starring Barbara Stanwyck. The theater is also home to the Radio City Christmas Spectacular, a New York Christmas tradition since 1933, and to the women's precision dance team known as The Rockettes. The theater, which is managed by Cablevision, is also used for a variety of concerts and special events. Designed by Edward Durrell Stone, the interior of the theater, by Donald Deskey, incorporates glass, aluminum, chrome, and geometric ornamentation. Deskey rejected the Rococo embellishment generally used for theaters at that time in favor of a contemporary Art Deco style. Radio City has 5,933 seats for spectators; it became the largest indoor theater in the world at the time of its opening. The Great Stage, measuring 66.5 feet (20 m) deep and 144 feet (44 m) wide, resembles a setting sun. Its system of elevators was so advanced that the U.S. Navy incorporated identical hydraulics in constructing World War II aircraft carriers. According to Radio City lore, during the war, government agents guarded the basement to assure the Navy's technological advantage. The Music Hall's Mighty Wurlitzer pipe organ is the largest theater pipe organ built for a movie theater. Twin identical consoles flank both sides of the Great Stage, 144 feet apart. As it was installed in 1932, the instrument, the largest produced by the Rudolph Wurlitzer Manufacturing Company of North Tonawanda, New York, was not built to accompany silent movies, but rather to be a concert instrument, capable of playing many styles of music, including classical organ literature. Its 4,410 pipes are installed in chambers on either side of the proscenium's arch. A restoration of the historic organ was undertaken that was completed in time for the theater's restoration in 1999. A smaller Wurlitzer organ was installed in the theater's radio studios, but was put into storage when the studio was converted into office space. The 12 acre (49,000 m²) complex in midtown Manhattan known as Rockefeller Center was developed between 1929 and 1940 by John D. Rockefeller, Jr., on land leased from Columbia University. Rockefeller initially planned an opera house on the site, but changed his mind after the Stock Market Crash of 1929. The names "Radio City" and "Radio City Music Hall" derive from one of the complex's first tenants, the Radio Corporation of America. Radio City Music Hall was a project of Rockefeller, Samuel Roxy Rothafel who previously opened the Roxy Theater in 1927, and RCA chairman David Sarnoff. For much of the theater's history, it presented both a movie and a stage show as part of the same program. By the 1970s, changes in film distribution made it difficult for Radio City to secure exclusive bookings of many films; furthermore, the theater preferred to show only G-rated movies, which became less common as the decade wore on. Regular film showings at Radio City ended in 1979, although movies have occasionally been shown there in succeeding years. The Music Hall is the regular home of the Daytime Emmy Award ceremony (though the 2006 show were held in Los Angeles) and the Tony Awards, is the frequent site of the annual MTV Video Music Awards (although the ceremony has occasionally been held since the 1990s in Los Angeles and Miami), and has often been the venue for the Grammy Awards on years when New York has won the bid to host the show, although Madison Square Garden, owned by Cablevision, hosted the Grammys in 2003 while the Staples Center in Los Angeles most recently hosted the awards in 2006. In addition, Radio City Music Hall is also the regular home of commencemen

Jim Dine (born June 16, 1935) is an American pop artist. He is sometimes considered to be a part of the Neo-Dada movement. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, attended the University of Cincinnati and received a BFA from Ohio University in 1957. He first earned respect in the art world with his Happenings. Pioneered with artists Claes Oldenburg and Allan Kaprow, in conjunction with musician John Cage, the "Happenings" were chaotic performance art that was a stark contrast with the more somber mood of the expressionists popular in the New York art world. The first of these was the 30 second The Smiling Worker performed in 1959. In the early 1960s Dine produced pop art with items from everyday life. These provided commercial as well as critical success, but left Dine unsatisfied. In 1967 he moved to London, England where he was represented by the art dealer Robert Fraser spending the next four years developing his art. Returning to the United States in 1971 he focused on several series of drawings. In the 1980s sculpture resumed a prominent place in his art. In the time since then there has been an apparent shift in the subject of his art from manmade objects to nature. In 1984, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, exhibited his work as "Jim Dine: Five Themes," and in 1989, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts hosted "Jim Dine Drawings: 1973-1987". In 2004, the National Gallery of Art, Washington organized the exhibition, "Drawings of Jim Dine." Text from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Dine

Jim Dine (born June 16, 1935) is an American pop artist. He is sometimes considered to be a part of the Neo-Dada movement. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, attended the University of Cincinnati and received a BFA from Ohio University in 1957. He first earned respect in the art world with his Happenings. Pioneered with artists Claes Oldenburg and Allan Kaprow, in conjunction with musician John Cage, the "Happenings" were chaotic performance art that was a stark contrast with the more somber mood of the expressionists popular in the New York art world. The first of these was the 30 second The Smiling Worker performed in 1959. In the early 1960s Dine produced pop art with items from everyday life. These provided commercial as well as critical success, but left Dine unsatisfied. In 1967 he moved to London, England where he was represented by the art dealer Robert Fraser spending the next four years developing his art. Returning to the United States in 1971 he focused on several series of drawings. In the 1980s sculpture resumed a prominent place in his art. In the time since then there has been an apparent shift in the subject of his art from manmade objects to nature. In 1984, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, exhibited his work as "Jim Dine: Five Themes," and in 1989, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts hosted "Jim Dine Drawings: 1973-1987". In 2004, the National Gallery of Art, Washington organized the exhibition, "Drawings of Jim Dine." Text from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Dine

After World War I few equestrian monuments were created in the age of the automobile. An exception is the muscular bronze Theodore Roosevelt by James Earle Fraser, centered on the Roosevelt Memorial at the American Museum of Natural History. Text from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equestrian_sculpture

Fernando Botero (born April 19, 1932) is a neo-figurative Colombian artist, self-titled "the most Colombian of Colombian artists." He won the first prize at the Salón de Artistas Colombianos in 1958, He paints and draws in a style somewhat similar to Pablo Picasso whilst he lived in Dinard, Brittany, 1922, for example "Deux femmes courant sur la plage" (The Course). He strives in all his work to capture an essential part of himself and his subjects through color and form. His work includes still-life and landscapes, but Botero tends to primarily focus on situational portraiture. His paintings and sculptures are, on first examination, noted for their exaggerated proportions and the corpulence of the human figures and animal figures. The "fat people" are often thought by critics to satirize the subjects and situations that Botero chooses to paint. Botero explains his use of obese figures and forms as such: "An artist is attracted to certain kinds of form without knowing why. You adopt a position intuitively; only later do you attempt to rationalize or even justify it." He is an abstract artist in the most fundamental sense of the word, choosing what colors, shapes, and proportions to use based on intuitive aesthetic thinking. This being said, his works are informed by a Colombian upbringing and social commentary is woven throughout his work. Text from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Botero

Fernando Botero (born April 19, 1932) is a neo-figurative Colombian artist, self-titled "the most Colombian of Colombian artists." He won the first prize at the Salón de Artistas Colombianos in 1958, He paints and draws in a style somewhat similar to Pablo Picasso whilst he lived in Dinard, Brittany, 1922, for example "Deux femmes courant sur la plage" (The Course). He strives in all his work to capture an essential part of himself and his subjects through color and form. His work includes still-life and landscapes, but Botero tends to primarily focus on situational portraiture. His paintings and sculptures are, on first examination, noted for their exaggerated proportions and the corpulence of the human figures and animal figures. The "fat people" are often thought by critics to satirize the subjects and situations that Botero chooses to paint. Botero explains his use of obese figures and forms as such: "An artist is attracted to certain kinds of form without knowing why. You adopt a position intuitively; only later do you attempt to rationalize or even justify it." He is an abstract artist in the most fundamental sense of the word, choosing what colors, shapes, and proportions to use based on intuitive aesthetic thinking. This being said, his works are informed by a Colombian upbringing and social commentary is woven throughout his work. Text from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Botero

Done with a film Canon Rebel K2, non-macro.

Done with a film Canon Rebel K2, non-macro.

City Hall Park Fountain Manhattan , City Hall Park Location: South end Architect: Jacob Wrey Mould Description: Square pool with candelabrum at each corner; central column consisting of circular basin with umbrella above, surmounted by fixture Materials: Pool and column (except for fixture)--granite; Candelabra, fixture--bronze Dimensions: Pool L: 30' W: 30'; Basin Diameter: 10'; Column H: 15' (all approximate) Cast: 1872 Dedicated: Rededicated October 7, 1999 Donor: Purchase Text from: www.nycgovparks.org/sub_your_park/monuments/monument_info...

The Ziegfeld Theatre was a Broadway theatre formerly located at the intersection of Sixth Avenue and 54th Street in Manhattan, New York City. It was built in 1927 and razed in 1966. The theatre was named for Florenz Ziegfeld, who built the theatre with financial backing from William Randolph Hearst. It was designed by Joseph Urban and Thomas W. Lamb. It opened on February 2, 1927 with the musical Rio Rita, which moved to another theatre when Show Boat opened at the Ziegfeld on December 27, 1927. The theatre became the Loew's Ziegfeld movie theater in 1933 until showman Billy Rose bought it in 1944. NBC used the Ziegfeld as a television studio from 1955 to 1963. The Perry Como Show used the theatre beginning in 1956. It was one of the locations used for the Emmy Awards in 1959 and 1961. In 1963 the Ziegfeld reopened to theatre. Rose began to assemble abbutting properties, and the Ziegfeld was torn down in 1967 to make way for the Fisher Bros. skyscraper Burlington House (later renamed the Alliance Capital, and then AllianceBernstein building.) A movie theatre was built down the street (at 141 W. 54th Street) with the name "The Ziegfeld," and houses photographs of the older Broadway theatre. A fragment of the Joseph Urban facade, a female head, can be seen in front of the private home at 52 E. 80th Street.. The box from the cornerstone, and its contents are in the New York Public Library Billy Rose Theater Collection-Special Collections. Text from: www.answers.com/topic/ziegfeld-theatre