Checking out the “ARTiculture” scene in Philly

PHILADELPHIA, PA – When I first discovered at a special press reception in Old Montreal last November that the City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia, was also a major hub of art and culture, I couldn’t believe that there was more to this city than cheese steak sandwiches, Rocky Balboa, American Bandstand, and the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

When I was invited to participate in a special press tour with nine other journalists and travel writers at the end of February on behalf of the Visit Philly tourism bureau, I discovered to my surprise after spending four days there that Philadelphia was a city that had a thriving “ARTiculture” scene … and it was my mission to share this discovery with my readers here in Montreal.

I checked into my home for the next four days, the Loews Philadelphia Hotel on 12^th and Market streets, in the heart of its Center City neighborhood. A national historic site, the 581-room luxury hotel originally housed the Philadelphia Savings Fund Society (PSFS) bank, and was built in 1932 at a cost of $8 million.

Although a hotel for 14 years, the décor of the Loews Hotel still retains many of its 1930s art deco design and its banking background (including the door of the bank’s vault in the lobby and the omnipresent PSFS neon sign on the building’s roof, and is a dominant part of the Philadelphia skyline). And its restaurant on the 33^rd floor offers one of the best panoramic views of the city; in fact, from that vantage point, you can even go face-to-face with the statue of the city’s founder William Penn, which is perched atop the tower of Philadelphia City Hall (pictured below).

After being on the run since six o’clock that morning and hungering for some lunch, my first instinct was to get an automatic taste of something uniquely Philadelphia: the Philly cheese steak sandwich. I was directed to the nearby Reading Terminal Market, where I would have no problem getting my hands on one of those signature meat-laden sandwiches. Regarded as one of the largest and oldest public markets in America, the Reading Terminal Market was built in 1892, and until 1984, was a station for the Reading Railroad, while doubling as a marketplace for a wide variety of vendors. These days, as a public market, its 80 independently-owned small businesses attracts 100,000 visitors a week, offering everything from meals, to fresh foods, cheeses, seafood, candies, flowers, cookbooks and between Wednesday and Saturday, a group of Amish vendors from Lancaster County offers their unique brand of farm fresh products and crafts. And by the way, there is no shortage of Philly cheese steak vendors at the market (I chose Spataro’s, which has been selling those sandwiches since 1947); just be sure you let them know as quickly as possible whether or not you want provolone, cheese wiz and/or fried onions with your sandwich.

Philadelphia Flower Show and the Philadelphia Museum of Art

We started the first full day of the press tour with a exclusive preview visit of the 185^th annual Philadelphia Flower Show, which took place at the Pennsylvania Convention Center. A Philadelphia rite of spring that's presented by the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, the flower show decided for this year’s milestone edition to work alongside about a dozen of America’s best known art museums, such as the Getty, the Guggenheim, the Smithsonian’s Portrait Gallery and the Philadelphia Museum of Art to come up with “ARTiculture: Where Art Meets Horticulture”.

If you thought the annual Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena was the model example of how flowers can be used in an artistic, creative manner, then the Philadelphia Flower Show can easily inherit that mantle, as it became a 10-acre living canvas of beautiful landscapes, gardens and floral arrangements. It was stunningly exemplified the moment you walk into the exhibition hall, as the show’s entrance garden paid tribute to internationally-renown Philadelphia sculptor Alexander Calder, as one of his widely recognized mobiles came alive in all of its colorful, artistic glory … and all beautifully reconstructed with flowers (pictured above).

During the media preview of the flower show (which included Serena Altschul and her crew from CBS News Sunday Morning) we were told one very important rule of thumb: not to disturb the judges while they were judging. At the same time, a group of judges were examining selections of flowers and floral arrangements that were part of the show’s competition aspect, and were awarding prizes to the best arrangements; basically we had to keep our distance. And to make sure that happened, there were countless flower show volunteers who literally cordoned the judges off from the rest of the spectators using rolled up barrier tape and wearing signs on their vests saying “judging in progress”.

Another interesting part of the Philadelphia Flower Show was its “Butterfly Experience”, where visitors literally got the chance to commune with nature. In this case, it was to visit close up about 20 species of butterflies (10 of them exotic species) and feed them, as well as witness over 1000 pupas develop and hatch into beautiful butterflies that were allowed to roam in their specially built habitat.

Our next stop was the Philadelphia Museum of Art, in which its claim to fame was thanks to Sylvester Stallone, because he was seen climbing up the stairs at the front of the museum and raising his arms in triumph every time he finished his morning jog in the first two “Rocky” movies (there’s even a statue of Rocky Balboa that’s located at the foot of that famous staircase).

However, we were at the museum to preview a new exhibition that features the art of an Asian ruling dynasty that continuously defined its culture and way of life for over 500 years. Called “Treasures from Korea: Arts and Culture of the Joseon Dynasty 1392-1910”, which runs until May 26, the exhibition is a partnership between this museum and the National Museum of Korea, in which 150 artifacts, many of them regarded as national treasures, are on display for the first time outside the geographic boundaries of South Korea.

Ranging from silk screen paintings, porcelain vases, traditional costumes, rare manuscripts and traditional objects, the exhibition gives a once in a lifetime look at how the long-running Joseon Dynasty ruled Korea, and how its way of life still reverberates in modern Korean society. One of things that caught my eye was its detailed paintings and drawings, and how its penchant for detail gave them a remarkable photographic quality (especially one book from the 18^th century that illustrated the graduates of an elite military school). One of the most amazing items in the exhibition is the 40-foot tall hanging scroll that portrays the Buddha, which dates back to the 1650s. This massive banner painting, which originally hung in one of Korea’s largest Buddhist temples, is so large in size, that it couldn’t fit into the exhibition space, so it had to be placed in the museum’s Great Stair Hall, where it majestically looks over all the visitors who come by and marvel at its artistic splendour.

And if you want a quick take home souvenir from the exhibition, there is a computer screen near the exhibition gift shop that gives you the opportunity to see how your first name is written and pronounced in Hangeul, the official language of Korea. You then get the chance to trace the characters that make up your Korean name onscreen, which is then printed on a ticket-sized card to take home with you (here is my Korean name, pictured on the left). 

The Brandywine River Museum and Longwood Gardens  

Our second full day was spent 45 minutes west of Philadelphia, in the Brandywine Valley region of Pennsylvania, in which we visited two places where art and nature came together. The Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford is a converted grist mill that was built during the Civil War and is dedicated to the paintings of a three generations of painters who not only lived and painted in the area, but also helped define modern American art: N.C. (pictured on the above right), Andrew and Jamie Wyeth, whose works dominate the museum’s permanent collection of 4000 paintings (some of my favorites were the series of paintings that N.C. Wyeth was commissioned to do in 1911 for a reissue of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel Treasure Island). Also, we got the chance to see N.C. Wyeth's art studio, which he built to his specifications in 1909 (pictured below on the right). The studio was left as it was when Wyeth died in 1945, and it gives you the chance to see Wyeth's creative world by the type of studio he kept, the tools of the trade he used, as well as the vast collection of books and magazines he kept (including a orderly collection of National Geographic magazines, in which each stack was placed on the shelves according to year), which was a testament to his penchant for the historical accuracy and detail that he placed in his paintings. As well, the museum is committed to the preservation of its surrounding environment; the area surrounding the museum is filled with landscaped gardens, as well as local wildflowers, trees and shrubs.

We then paid a visit to Longwood Gardens, located in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania (pictured on the left). Built in the early 1920s by industrialist and longtime conservationist Pierre S. du Pont, the 4 ½ acre glass encased conservatory attracts over a million visitors every year to its vast collection of flowers, gardens, trees and plant life from around the world. Walking through its many gardens, fountains, fruit plants, the current orchid extravaganza, collection of palm trees and cacti, the conservatory certainly gives a visitor a welcome preview of the spring and summer to come. Longwood Gardens also combines the arts and horticulture, as it exhibition hall, open air theatre, and ballroom offer a full schedule of concerts and recitals throughout the year. During our visit, we were treated to a preview of Philadelphia’s 16-day Flamenco Festival, in which a quartet of Spanish Flamenco dancers performed at the exhibition hall an exotic original dance piece called “Complices”, by Flamenco artist Rosario Toledo.

The Liberty Bell and the National Museum of American Jewish History

Of course, a visit to Philadelphia isn’t complete unless you experience some of its best-known historical sites. And the one historical site that is automatically associated with Philadelphia and the birth of the United States is the Liberty Bell. Cast in London in 1751 to commemorate the 50^th anniversary of the drafting of Pennsylvania’s constitution, the bell was hung in the steeple of Independence Hall and was used to summon legislators to the next Assembly session. The bell was permanently removed from Independence Hall in 1976, and is currently housed in the Liberty Bell Center on Independence Mall, where it receives a steady stream of visitors every day who want to have their picture taken with this revered historical symbol (like me, I am pictured on the right with that famous bell). The center tells the story of the Liberty Bell and how it became associated with the birth of the United States and the concept of liberty and freedom that was the foundation of the U.S., not to mention its place in history and pop culture (including John Philip Sousa’s “The Liberty Bell March”, in which you can hear an original 1890s recording of the tune, which was also used as the theme for “Monty Python’s Flying Circus”). By the way, the bell’s famous crack dates back to 1752; and when the crack widened in 1846, the Liberty Bell was never rung again.

Not far from the Liberty Bell Center is the National Museum of American Jewish History. Opened on July 4, 1976, the museum tells the story of how the American Jewish community established itself from different parts of the globe to American shores and helped build their newly adopted country over a period of 350 years, a story that is told through its collection of 25,000 historical objects and permanent exhibition, which tells this 350-year saga of the immigrant experience and nation building on four floors of the museum, starting with mid-17th century colonial America on the fifth floor, to the present day on the second floor. The main floor is dedicated to the museum's very own hall of fame called "Only in America", which pays tribute to 18 prominent American Jews for their contributions to the American way of life, from Albert Einstein, to Leonard Bernstein, to Barbra Streisand. Each individual's achievements are honored with a single authentic artifact that best associated with them; for example, there's Steven Spielberg's very first movie camera, a vial of the polio vaccine that Jonas Salk developed in 1954, and one of my favorites, Irving Berlin's piano that he used to compose many of his best-known songs (and includes the original written manuscript of "God Bless America").

And from now until October 26, baseball fans should pay a visit to the museum to catch its new exhibition "Chasing Dreams: Baseball and Becoming American". Using 130 rare baseball artifacts, "Chasing Dreams" tells the story of how such players as Sandy Koufax, Hank Greenberg, Jackie Robinson and Roberto Clemente faced and conquered adversity -- and got their shot at the American dream -- through the National Pastime. Although I was at the museum just a mere two weeks before "Chasing Dreams" opened, I did purchase the excellent exhibition catalogue, which includes photos and objects from the exhibition, as well as baseball-related excerpts from such classic American novels as "The Chosen"and "The Natural". In fact, according to one of the gift shop employees, the "Chasing Dreams" catalogue has been selling at a very brisk pace even before its official opening, which proves that this will be a popular exhibition throughout the 2014 baseball season.

After experiencing the City of Brotherly Love for the first time during those memorable four days at the end of February, I guess I can say that native son W.C. Fields was right ... "on the whole, I'd rather be in Philadelphia."

Finally, a special thank you goes out to Donna and Adriana from Visit Philly, who were excellent hosts and tour guides throughout my trip, and to the staff at the Loews Philadelphia Hotel for their outstanding hospitality. To find out more about many of the cultural and historical attractions that Philadelphia has to offer, go to www.visitphilly.com.