re-appreciation (and why america is great)

{from my NY journal during my summer 2010 internships.  i originally started writing this the day after the 'statue of liberty' post. then i was going to publish it on july 4, 2010, in light of the holiday. however, things got just a little crazy, and i totally forgot about it! so now, a year later, enjoy ellis island with me!}

this is part II of our day-trip to the statue of liberty and ellis island. this is...well, the ellis island part.

i wasn't honestly sure what ellis island really entailed, even after we hopped on the ferry to get there after visiting the statue. however, during our small journey on the boat between the two, the automated voice in the speaker informed me that it was the island that all the immigrants came through to get to America. "imagine," the too-cheerful female voice invited, "that you were one of those people, coming to this country. can you imagine the shock and excitement it would be to see this, the manhattan skyline, rising up above the waves? after all that time traveling, this is what you saw...."

and i started to imagine. and then i got excited.

we got to the island, and headed to the museum (shown in the above photos). the inside of the museum looked like this:

we toured it early in the day. first, we watched a small movie explaining the significance of the museum and the island, which was awesome. you can actually find it by clicking here! ah, how convenient. you are currently thirty minutes away from a great education of our history.

natasha and i stayed to tour the museum thoroughly before we left, and i'm so glad we did. completely packed with historical, thought-provoking information, it turned out to be a huge highlight of my first adventure in new york. the museum was formatted to be something of a time-line in photos and other memorabilia. the walls in the rooms went through different categories.


leaving home, the journey, transportation, living conditions on the journey, etc....

i loved seeing all the gigantic photos depicting the stories. they also had a bunch of postcard-sized pictures of the ships that the different groups came on. one of my favorite parts was the passports. there was a whole area just filled with framed passports. for some reason, this kindled a great longing to love these people who'd gone before me, these people filled with such hope for a better life. i think the reason was, that i realized these passports had really belonged to them. specific people. i studied these passports, with both their handwriting and photos. (their handwriting was beautiful--i'll spare you the tangent along the lines of my sadness that handwriting is being lost these days...for a different post).  to me, it was just so cool--that many years later, i could be looking at these, the original copies of important things that belonged to these individuals.

the history continued through the walls. the arrival to America, the adjustment, the oppression and racism...

this part really saddened me, especially after building intangible connections to some of these people. this was America...they had given up so much to be here. it's so unfortunate how such small things can tear great things apart so easily.

the walls went on: living conditions on land, making a living, politics, diversities....

i really appreciated how many different cultures were represented in this museum. there were many quotes and photos of and from individuals, depicting their journey. just like new york today, one common goal can bring together people that may not have found each other in any other way.

the captions continued: the 'go-betweens', the new immigrants, the womens' rights activists, and finally the immigrants of today.

lovely natasha and the womens' rights wall

{okay, here's the fun part: another reason i didn't post this until now was because i started making a little movie of some of the pictures i took. i started making it..last year. between my crummy point-and-shoot and the fact that i can barely navigate the unintuitive movie program on my computer, it's hardly a cinematic wonder. BUT. i'm pretty proud of some parts of it, and it's more interesting than just posting all the pictures. either way, it helps me remember how i felt at that museum; hopefully you can get a taste of it too, until you visit for yourself. the post would have been done earlier today, but after creating it, uploading took oh, all of 5+ hours, then glitched. and now you know how i spent the rest of this holiday...anyway, it had to be compressed for the interwebs, which i didn't consider, so you might have to pause it to read some of the quotes. sorry! but...enjoy!} :)

i came away from the museum with a lot of fresh thoughts and a lot more respect and appreciation for both my freedom and my country. i felt my long afternoon was well spent and it helped me remember why America is so great. i am so fortunate!

happy fourth. :)

i carried this

{from my new york journal, regarding the society of illustrators internship in june}

for all you illustrators out there::

i got to carry this piece down a couple levels from the permanent collections room into the society of illustrators' hall of fame gallery (in the dining room). i was completely art-twitterpated.

this was illustrated by n.c. wyeth, who was trained by howard pyle, who is known as the father of American illustration.

i'm so glad i took both of bethanne's 'history of American illustration' classes before my society internship. i feel really grateful that i was able to more fully appreciate all the amazing art by which i found myself surrounded.

hopefully i'll be able to expound on that later. unfortunately, you'll never know til you see it. ;)

miss liberty

when i wrote about my internship with brett, i neglected to say that i can see the statue of liberty on the way to and from brooklyn. the first time i saw it out his window was a real shocker--i remember just glancing out the window one day, and it was just...there!

view out the window (to the left of the pirate picture in the previous blog post)

for some reason, it resonated with me as some sort of piece (and peace) of home. or something. it was sort of shocking and comforting, somehow, to see that well-known monument i've known about since kindergarten, just chillin' there outside the window. [in real life you can see it much more clearly than in this photo! promise.] it has become my little ritual to look for it on the train to brooklyn, and my eyes automatically notice it while at brett's studio. i don't mind.

...

today [sat. june 26] i went with my roommates natasha and jodi, along with our friend jonathan, to visit miss liberty herself, along with ellis island. we didn't get tickets in time to actually go inside the statue, but it was okay; i felt it was worth my time--i spent really good quality time on both islands.

the four of us headed to battery park to catch the ferry. i loved being on a boat. all i could think about the whole time i was on the boat today (i believe that was 3 times) was this. natasha and i quoted thoroughly through much of our boat time. :]

fabulous roommate natasha on the boat headed to the island

the excitement grew as we neared the statue, and i realized she looked a lot smaller than i thought. it's interesting because usually things that look so small from a distance look bigger up close and personal, but it wasn't the case here. which i thought was kinda cool, because she can be a beacon to those far away but still small enough to be personable. at least, that's what my mind [which incidentally tends to characterize many inanimate objects, including shoes and chocolate milk] tells me and i'd like to believe it, thank you very much.

when we got to the island, here's what we saw:

roommate love!

and pretty skylines (with pretty roommates)!

i just kept looking at the statue. from the side, she has some very pleasant rhythms to her stance:

and i really started to just love her aesthetics, something i hadn't paid as much attention to when i'd see her in photos or from a distance. little things like her body type, how well drapery was designed, the actual design of the drapery, the weight of the stance, etc.


so, i decided to figure-draw the Lady. i started with a sketch, then inked part in. i looked kinda funny...but i wanted to get the angle right. so, here's what i looked like, and here's what the sketch looked like:

oh, that's jonathan on the right. and the statue on the far right...if you couldn't tell....

 and then got brave and tried some color. i'll post that later. too lazy to fish for the camera card now.

we walked around and found some statues. they were all sorts of wonderful. they depicted various historical figures (Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, Édouard René Lefèbvre de Laboulaye, Emma Lazarus and Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, to be exact. More about these in a later post. Hopefully.) along with plaques explaining their significance.

i don't even know how anyone could tell me and mr. hearst apart.

all in all, glad i got the opportunity. i still look at the statue when i travel to brooklyn, but now my thoughts are directed differently.

stay tuned for part II: ellis island.