I had the tv on while cleaning up after dinner tonight, and the show on was “My Lottery Dream Home” with David Bromstad. The couple being featured had won $15 million on a lottery ticket and decided to shop for their dream home with a budget of $700,000 … my first thought was, if you’ve got $15 million, why limit yourself to $700,000? But fantasies aside, I was drawn in by their search for their dream home in Miami, since I visited the area on a long-weekend trip a few years ago.
I was smitten with the high-rise condo they looked at, with incredible views through large windows and lots of sunshine streaming in. The unit didn’t have an ocean view, but it had expansive city views in multiple directions, as well as a terrace.
At any rate, I turned off the tv, went about my business, did some chores and even took time to make a watercolor painting, but the thought of that high-rise apartment stuck in my head for a few hours, so I decided to sit and write this post.
One thought I kept having was, what would it be like to paint while living high in the sky? Having bright light coming in and the presence of other tall buildings, how would that affect the art I might make if this were my view every day? This is in fact the view I had from the hotel where I stayed in Miami Beach on my trip in January 2020.
But when I think back, I did have a similar situation back in the early 1990s when I lived at 333 East 45th Street in NYC, seen from the outside in the picture at the top of this post. I also found a picture of the interior of an empty unit which looks pretty much the same as what I had (I don’t remember my exact apartment number at this point, but I think I might have been on the 19th floor), and I’ll never forget when the real estate broker opened the door to show the apartment to me: I went straight to the window, looked at the midtown view, and knew I had to live here. Who cares about the kitchen or bathroom, it’s the view outside of New York City!
I looked back through some old photo albums and found the following pictures – I had this plywood easel set up next to the window, and as you can see, a few small canvases leaned up on the window sill. I definitely remember enjoying high vantage point as I would sit to paint there with that incredible view to my right side.
The view in the other direction was great too – the building is near the United Nations and has a view of the East River and out into Queens – here’s another old snapshot of the view from that apartment:
What’s interesting is that the question of whether the view affected my art is actually answered in these last two photos … if you notice the red flag with the moon and star against a red background – the flag of Turkey – and then notice the painting I have leaning up against the window in the previous picture, which features white symbols against a red background – it’s pretty clear the view affected my artistic ideas quite directly!