Earlier this afternoon, my friend Shabbir Kazmi, my wife Margit, and I met at Strawberry Fields to begin an arty excursion through The Gates in Central Park. The weather was beautiful. Shabby bought and ate a hot dog from a street vendor. The Gates looked inviting enough (though they are quite huge and imposing, maybe 15 feet tall–much bigger than they look in photographs) and we entered… After wandering southward through the saffron tunnels (the gates are so close together that the paths do feel tunnel-like, especially as you are walking on them) for a bit, my wife had the bright idea that there might be a good overview of some of The Gates from the roofgarden at the Metropolitan Museum, so now we headed north and east to 84th street through more of the orangeness. At some point, after a mile or so of The Gates, Shabby started feeling quite dizzy and started walking off the path. Five minutes later, I suddenly felt nauseous (I am not making this up!), and soon after, Margit also fell victim to the emetic vertigo of The Gates. We made a mad dash across the lawn, staying as far from The Gates as possible (it was like being in a horror movie!), to 5th Avenue, and finally breathed free again on the sidewalk there, carefully keeping our backs to Christo’s creation, lest it overcome us, even at a distance!
Make of this what you will. There are some other people’s reactions here.