Architecture in Downtown

This past Friday we visited Downtown Houston to look at some "art deco" I believe. It was an interesting field trip.
We took the light Rail into Downtown where we visited the J.P. Morgan Chase Building. The building was completed in 1929. At the time that building was considered the coolest thing in Downtown. During the time not many people lived in Houston. It was only the 3rd biggest city in Texas. The building itself was very expensive to make. It had a ton of nickel used in in the interior. The entrance area had paintings that depicted important events in Texas history such as winning our independence from Mexico in the 1800s. I liked the building because of the fact that some of the tables were made from a popular silversmith. We got a tour from an employee who worked there name Greg. He seemed to know alot about the building and gave us some cool facts about it.
From the buildings we went down to the tunnel system underground. We traveled underground to the Chase Tower where they have an observation deck at around the 60th floor. This is the highest place in Downtown that's open to the public.
Looking down from the top was scary because the windows are floor to ceiling across the wall. I'm not that afraid of heights but I sure do feel bad for the window cleaners!

Ghost Tour

This Friday we visited 4 places. All were supposedly haunted by ghosts and stuff. The places we went to were a haunted abandoned hospital now a apartment complex. The hospital was called Jefferson Davis hospital and was built over a cemetery. People who were buried in the cemetery most likely died from the Yellow Fever epidemic that came over in the 1800s. We talked to a lady who lived there. She said that she didn't believe the place was haunted but that they don't dig around the grounds in the apartment complex because there is most likely bodies that are still underground. Although we couldn't go inside the complex it was still cool to see the buildings and learn about there history.

The second place we went to was an old tree located somewhere in downtown Houston I think. This tree is called "Hanging Tree". Some people were hung from the tree but that's not what it's known for. Back in the day when they had the jailhouse next to it families who had relatives on death row stood under the tree to wait for the news that there loved one had been executed.

The third place we went to was the Spaghetti Warehouse. It was located near the University of Houston Downtown campus. This building was originally a warehouse back in the day. But then they turned it into a restaurant. Back in the day the manager of the restaurant accidentally fell down the open elevator shaft at the back of the building and broke his neck. His wife died 6 months later from all of her grief. The building it's self is really cool looking and I would love to live in it if it wasn't for the ghosts. The whole area had a creepy feel to it. We ate on the second floor and that is the most haunted part of it.

The last place we went to was optional. It was an old abandoned crypt that belonged to the Donnellan family. It's located under a bridge and was hard to access so that's why it was optional. This place was really cool and the history behind it was interesting as well.

The Mullet

The Mullet is a place near the Almeda Mall behind it I think. The man who owned it has a son who is autistic and all the money he makes from renting out the place to concerts and stuff is donated to autism research. The place itself is really big. It's surrounded by smaller buildings that are also converted in graffiti.
When you first walk in there you get a feeling of a party. Or at least I did. I felt like that place would be the coolest place to have a party at. Anyways the buildings that are surrounding or around the main building are done by local graffiti artists as well as some international ones. The ones who are international are among the best in the world.
We saw pieces where it had a Alice in Wonderland theme but with a twist. It was cool to see because you knew that it was all for a good cause.
We also met one of the owners of The Mullet and we got to talk to him and he gave us a mini tour of the place. He explained that people are welcome to come and paint here without having to worry about heat. He also has plans to get a grant from the city for about 5 million bucks to turn The Mullet into a tourist attraction.
I thought that this place was really cool and that I might come and visit when it's an attraction.

The Orange Show and Art Car Museuem

This Friday we went to the Orange show and Art Car Musuem. It was certainly like nothing I've ever seen with both locations. The Orange Show was super cool with its homemade buildings while the Art Car Museum was unique with its crazy cars.
The Orange Show was built by a guy who absolutely loved oranges and believed that life wouldn't exist without them. I think the buildings in the Orange Show were really cool because EVERYTHING was hand made from the staircases to a boatlike vehicle. It seemed somewhat dangerous to be walking on top of a homemade rooftop with 8 people on it because it somewhat felt like it would break. I thought the Orange Show was cool because it had a bunch of cool sayings on the wall written in small tiles. I think that the guy who made this wasn't crazy but actually had a passion for oranges.
The Art Car Musuem was different. I thought that the 3 cars that were in it were really cool also. They had so much detail to them. I can just imagine sitting there for weeks maybe months gluing pieces to a car. It also had some cool pieces of art there as well as the cars. They seemed to have a liking for the Abarth Co. You may recognize that company from Fiat's new 500 car. The pieces also had a bunch of stuff relating to Texaco. Overall I thought that both the Orange Show and Art Car Museum were cool in their own way.

Glenwood and Olivewood Cemeteries

On Friday we went to go to some of the oldest cemeteries in Houston. One was real fancy and well kept. The other not so much.
We saw some pretty old graves at Glenwood. Now this is the fancy one where wealthy people in Houston are buried. Anyways so some of the graves we saw were over 150 years old! The graves were in really great condition for being that old to. They also had some interesting statues there to. Some were old tombs. Others just regular statues.
At Olivewood however the condition of it was poor. Some of the stones were in the woods and covered with trees and bushes. I even saw one grave that appeared to be carved by a knife. The oldest grave I saw there was from 1846. The whole place looked like a haunted cemetery but I'm sure it's not. One epitaphs that I found cool was this: "In my fathers house are many mansions"

Public Art in Houston

We went to go see the public art in Houston in the second trip in HOTG. I personally like art especially this kind. I like it because most art isn't made for people to actually touch or anything it's just for your eyes. And this stuff (if you wanted to) you could climb it. They don't really care because its there for the people.
So we went to Sam Houston park to go look at a old statue carved about 20 years after the Civil War. This statue was definitely more traditional than the other art we saw. It wasn't that much modern. I personally don't like the art that's traditional because it seems bland. I'm into the modern stuff.
Geometric Mouse X was a really cool piece in Downtown. It's like smack in the middle of it. It's pretty big, made of metal, and red. A whole lotta red. I wasn't to sure what it represented but that's how art is. You have your own thoughts of what it represents. To other people it might not mean the same thing. Geometric Mouse X appeared to be chained to the ground.
"In Minds" was a different piece we saw because it looked like it had faces in it. I couldn't really see the different faces but I knew they were there. That piece is more modern than the other ones as it was made during 2001-02.
"Seven Wonders seemed to be cool to. It was basically a bunch of children's drawings etched into stainless steel. They were seven towers the drawings were on so that's probably why it's called seven wonders. It was next to another piece of art we saw to. It was this guy who put a red button on a bridge. He wanted to see if people were curious amd would push it. Whenever you push it it makes the water in the bayou it covers turn into like a whirlpool.

Hindu Temple: Shri Swaminarayan Mandir

This was the first trip in my HOTG class. It was certainly the most interesting trip. We visited a Hindu Temple somewhere near Downtown Houston I think. It was a huge hand carved temple made up of various stones. The floor was made up of marble and the outside a mixture of ash and concrete.
The whole temple was mostly white except for a few gold toned poles on the dome. You could definitely tell you were in a holy place whenever you first walk in.
Here are some figures the guide told us:
Over 33,000 pieces of stone
1,500 angel statues
3,000 human figures
1,500 horses
1,000 elephants
To carve one pillar it took 9 months over 3 people carving it at once.
When we got there we just happened to get there at a time whenever they do there prayer session. We had to go to the center, sit cross-legged, the women sat behind the men. During that time they would light a candle at a gold statue of one of their gods and pray. They had music you could sing to whenever you were praying.
I thought the temple was very cool and I would love go back. That trip was definitely the most culturally diverse so far.

Houston MFA Trip

So on Friday we went to the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. I thought it was pretty cool. I got to see a lot of different and generic pieces of art. I thought that they weren't gonna have cool paintings like Van Gogh and stuff but they did. We walked around the whole musuem in about 90 minutes.
During the trip I kept trying to find some Andy Warhol pieces of art there but it seemed nobody there knew who he was. But I did like the art there especially the abstract art like Picasso and stuff.
One thing I found interesting was the fact they had 2 or 3 Vincent Van Gogh's there. I thought it was cool because you basically were standing in front of painting thinking that the last time someone was there was Van Gogh himself.
They also had some ancient art from Greece and Egypt there also. Some of the that art was probably over 800 years old.