Art: A la mode at Weinstein
If a Parisian holiday is not an option, the next best thing is a stroll through Weinstein's elegant exhibit of behind-the-scenes photos of Versailles by Robert Polidori and French fashion shows by Alec Soth. With more than 20 large-format images, the show is expansively luxurious.
Weinstein has shown some of the Polidori images before, but they're always welcome and the additions are riveting, especially a picture of rows of marble and plaster busts of French dignitaries -- writers, mayors, philosophers, aristocrats -- in a low-vaulted Versailles storage room that looks like a converted wine cellar. Mysterious blue light lends the scene a slightly surreal glow, as if the assembly were a gathering of spirits sitting in judgment or waiting for cocktails. By focusing on atmospheric effects and strange details -- smoky lighting, sawhorses and ladders, a gilded bed in an empty salon -- Polidori reveals Versailles as a palace of intimate dreams and unfulfilled longing.
Soth was a fashion novice in 2007 when the Paris photo agency Magnum commissioned him to create a "Fashion Magazine" featuring his own photos, text and ads. With unfettered access to high-end shows, model-prep sessions, designers' studios and homes, Soth revealed the industry's calculated excesses, bizarre characters and extravagant beauty. Featured photos include some that do not appear in "Magazine," as well as a classic image of Yves Saint Laurent's bulldog, Moujik IV, squatting on a green brocade chair under the watchful eye of his bodyguard who is, incongruously, a dead ringer for Todd Palin, Alaska's former "First Dude." It alone is worth the trip.
Three smoked-glass sculptures by Nicholas Africano of his exquisitely beautiful wife/muse are breathtaking additions to the display.
