Reason I Love NYC No. 9,765,342: Unexpected Adventures

When I suggested to LeiLani E. Quiray that we meet before dinner and New York City Ballet to pop in to the Madison Avenue Art Walk, I had no idea what was in store.

I’ve only ever seen work in person by my favorite artist, Geoffrey Johnson, once. So we climbed four flights of stairs to H|G Fine Art to see some of his work. My favorite large-scale paintings of Grand Central weren’t there, but when the gallerist heard me talking about large scale, she told us a secret: Geoffrey Johnson had done a rare commission for his church on 64th Street, and there are four of his works hanging on each floor — in the staircase!

We were two blocks away and up for adventure. We went to Central Presbyterian Church and talked to the maintenance worker, Jim. He ushered us into a million-year-old elevator, up to the sixth floor and down the stairs. Lo and behold, on each floor was a giant Geoffrey Johnson painting of NYC, along with a tiny light switch about six feet up the wall, which I could just reach to shine light on each incredible, fantastic, awe-inspiring painting. #WOW

On our way out, we stopped in the sanctuary to watch a wedding rehearsal before consulting the Art Walk map for one more stop.

Di Donna Galleries was having a surrealist collage exhibit a block away, so we headed there. We entered the building into what looked like a black-and-white Willy Wonka hallway. We walked into Di Donna to come face-to-face with a Magritte, followed by Picassos and Dalis and Miros, and, and, and. We looked at each other in a bit of confusion. Why were these here? They didn’t seem to be for sale, which is what most galleries are there for, right? It felt like a little tiny museum had been put there just for us — except we could practically touch our noses to these collages.

We left, headed through the park for dinner and the NYC Ballet (at which I did not adorably snore).

Any one part of our Saturday would have been enough (dayenu). Strung all together in one evening could really only happen in the greatest city in the world.