Imagine wandering through Times Square, drunk or on some other kind of substance, when all of a sudden, right at midnight, the looming video advertisements suddenly transmogrify into a masculine figure in make-up singing Blue Moon to a flaming head of lettuce. This is in fact exactly what occurred throughout Feburary, when Times Square Arts brought a video work by Alex Da Corte to the screens of Broadway, kicking off the project on 1 February with a sing-along. (The lyrics to Blue Moon, for those unversed in the 1934 popular hit, ran along the bottom of the screens.) “I like the democratic nature of this,” said the Whitney’s curator Chrissie Iles. “Anyone, tourists or anyone who’s hanging around Times Square, can join. Art always makes public spaces—it lifts them up somehow, counteracts any commercial stuff.” Participants on that chilly winter night were given delicious hot cider, gratis. The singing itself was of middling quality. And most people did indeed seem to be drunk or on some other kind of substance.
