For those who aren’t familiar, and I suspect that’s true of many people, the NYC Waterfalls are a public art project. The basic construction is a scaffolding system with a set of pumps placed near the East River. Water is pumped up to the top of the scaffolding and allowed to fall. The effect is, in some ways, quite waterfall-like, hence the name.
The first time I saw the waterfalls was while my dad was in town at the beginning of August. We had hopped the Q-train, I think on the way back from Central Park or something. The train goes across the Manhattan Bridge, and it has an excellent view of the Brooklyn Bridge. One of the waterfalls (there are four) is erected beneath the Brooklyn Bridge on the Brooklyn side. He asked what it was, and I wasn’t sure. That particular waterfall, due to its placement, looks almost like part of an industrial process. It’s hard to see it as free-standing as opposed to some auxiliary structure attached to the bridge.
I didn’t think anything more of it until we got to our first meeting of Comm Lab here at ITP where one of the week one assignments is to visit the waterfalls and write a reaction. Upon realizing that this was an art project, my initial reaction was relatively negative. A sort of “you’re spending public money on what now?” thing.
Having hopped on the IKEA ferry which goes by three of the four waterfalls, and viewing them myself, I was less than impressed. They’re sort of cool, yeah, but nothing spectacular. They don’t evoke the same sense of wonder that real waterfalls do. I suspect that this is due to the lack of waterfall context. Part of what makes waterfalls so awe-inspiring is the sharp cut in the landscape that accompanies them. The sense of insane natural power involved in carving rock and all that water rushing down. When it’s man-made some of that impact is somehow gone.
That said, I can’t actually be unhappy about the waterfalls for one simple reason: while we were waiting in line for the ferry I watched this family a couple of places in front of us. One of their children was a boy who looked to be maybe seven or eight. (Sadly I’m really bad with ages of this sort, which is deeply ironic considering how much time I spent working with kids in the age bracket.)
Anyway, there was this kid, and he was so excited by the prospect of getting on the ferry. He wanted to see the waterfall! He wanted to go to the waterfall! He wanted to play at the waterfall! (I suspect that playing at the waterfalls is not actually permitted, but he didn’t care about that.) So while I, with my world traveling and my viewing of massive natural waterfalls may find the constructed forms lacking and almost a mockery, there is value in them nonetheless.
That value is for the city of New York. I suspect that it’s something I’m going to have a hard time maintaining a proper view of. ITP is an international community, it is peopled by the well-traveled and in many cases by the travel-obsessed (like myself), but New York City itself is like any other place: a huge percentage of the population never leaves. There are kids, probably thousands of them, who will never come closer to a waterfall than this in their entire lives.
While the New York waterfalls may be sad ghosts of the real phenomena they try to emulate, there is power and suggestion in them anyway. A kid seeing them, and applying sufficient imagination, may grasp some of the wonder that comes from such structure. Perhaps they will not experience the same thing that (say) Niagara can instill, but then again maybe they will.
Thomas
Tags: comm lab
I think it is wasting a city’s money. It is requited daly electric expenses.