The Metropolitan Museum Of Art is one of the richest galleries in the world, and boy can you tell. The place is a constant stream of old and new masterpieces. Klimt, Pissarro, Van Gogh, Monet, Picasso, Singer-Sargent, Modigliano they got 'em all. It's a bit overwhelming really as you just get over seeing van Gogh's Irises (valued at over $100 million) when you turn a corner and there is Monet's "Bridge over a pond of water lillies", then a string of Turners and a run of Whistlers. Then there are all the modern works too by Warhol, DeKooning, Rothko etc. The list is endless. Then you go into another wing and it's full of Roman, Greek and ancient Babylonian treasures (which did make me wonder if the Greek government is trying to get all their stuff back from other museums, not the just the Elgin Marbles from the British Museum). There seems to be a lot of people in New York who leave all their art or money to the Met. Must be trying to buy a bit of immortality I suppose but good on them, at least the rest of us mere mortals can enjoy all this stuff.
It's much preferable to those billionaires who decide to spend their money building temples to themselves and their glory. I talking about you Donald Trump. I went into the Trump Tower today and I'll tell you money certainly doesn't buy taste. The whole place looks like the foyer of a Hilton Hotel circa 1982. Brown marble, gold plated door handles, water features and escalators going in every direction. It's interesting to compare to the other vanity projects in the city: The Rockefeller Center and Chrysler Building. These are both extravagant and obviously very expensive and built by megalomaniacs but I somehow don't think that the Trump Tower will date as elegantly.
Just like The Don's hair.
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