It takes quite a lot to get me––or any other native city-dweller, I'm sure––to head to the 42nd Street area. The lights, the noise, the traffic, the chaos... the mere thought of Times Square can cause a well-justified headache. But this past Friday, I found myself happily in the heart of the Square, super excited for a special moment that will happen only once a night until the end of this month. And if you've ever read George Selden's The Cricket in Times Square as a kid, you'll totally appreciate the experience.
This March, every night from 11:57PM to midnight, Björk's video Mutual Core from her most recent album Biophilia will broadcast as part of a synchronized program called Midnight Moment on more than 15 of the largest electronic billboards in Times Square. Led by the Times Square Advertising Coalition and Times Square Arts, Midnight Moment is part of the city's feature of Streaming Museum's touring exhibition of moving image works by contemporary Nordic artists. Mutual Core is the very first of this exhibition to launch.
Björk is no stranger to creating incredibly visceral and visually stunning music videos, but she, along with LA-based filmmaker Andrew Thomas Huang, has outdone herself with this one. Mutual Core, which was originally commissioned by Los Angeles' Museum of Contemporary Art for its YouTube channel MOCAtv, is an explosion of pyrotechnic color and CGI effects. Inspired by Iceland's nature, the video brings to life abstract sand and rock creatures and multi-colored geological formations, culminating in a phantasmagoric visual interpretation of Björk's song. For three magical minutes, I stood in Duffy Square (near 46th Street), absorbing it with other New Yorkers and tourists alike, open-mouthed and in awe. You just have to be there to experience it.
"Just this once, in the very heart of the busiest of cities, everyone was perfectly content not to move and hardly to breathe. And for those few minutes while the song lasted, Times Square was as still as a meadow at evening, with the sun streaming in on the people there, and the wind moving among them as if they were only tall blades of grass." ––The Cricket in Times Square
Photos by Christine Hahn![]()
.gif courtesy of MOCAtv
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OCHQ's Bettina
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Bettina (in the Opening Ceremony x Spring Breakers SWEATPANTS) and Dan!
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This March, every night from 11:57PM to midnight, Björk's video Mutual Core from her most recent album Biophilia will broadcast as part of a synchronized program called Midnight Moment on more than 15 of the largest electronic billboards in Times Square. Led by the Times Square Advertising Coalition and Times Square Arts, Midnight Moment is part of the city's feature of Streaming Museum's touring exhibition of moving image works by contemporary Nordic artists. Mutual Core is the very first of this exhibition to launch.
Björk is no stranger to creating incredibly visceral and visually stunning music videos, but she, along with LA-based filmmaker Andrew Thomas Huang, has outdone herself with this one. Mutual Core, which was originally commissioned by Los Angeles' Museum of Contemporary Art for its YouTube channel MOCAtv, is an explosion of pyrotechnic color and CGI effects. Inspired by Iceland's nature, the video brings to life abstract sand and rock creatures and multi-colored geological formations, culminating in a phantasmagoric visual interpretation of Björk's song. For three magical minutes, I stood in Duffy Square (near 46th Street), absorbing it with other New Yorkers and tourists alike, open-mouthed and in awe. You just have to be there to experience it.
"Just this once, in the very heart of the busiest of cities, everyone was perfectly content not to move and hardly to breathe. And for those few minutes while the song lasted, Times Square was as still as a meadow at evening, with the sun streaming in on the people there, and the wind moving among them as if they were only tall blades of grass." ––The Cricket in Times Square
Photos by Christine Hahn
.gif courtesy of MOCAtv
OCHQ's Bettina
Bettina (in the Opening Ceremony x Spring Breakers SWEATPANTS) and Dan!
