chapel of sacred mirrors

This past Thursday involved a trip to Alex Gray's Cosm: Chapel of Sacred Mirrors. An artist who "specializes in spiritual and psychedlic art", Gray produces intricately detailed works that focus on issues such as birth, death, and humanity. He often depicts auras in his paintings, and includes symbolism from various religious traditions in much of his art.

The Chapel of Sacred Mirrors was located in a slightly-hard-to-find location on 27th Street in Manhattan. (In an odd twist, the famous strip club Scores is located across the street.) An old cargo elevator is the entrance to the chapel, which is located on the 4th floor of an otherwise nondescript warehouse type building.

The entrance fee to the chapel is $5, although if you have less, that's alright. (A girl behind me got in for only $3.) You are surrounded by Alex Gray's art from the moment you walk in the doors. His work is everywhere, and with it, a very calm and cool vibe that goes nicely with the trance music playing in the background.

I spent about an hour there with friends, taking the time to examine each painting and sculpture closely. One work, called 'Caring', brought me close to tears. Another, his famous anatomically correct portrait of a couple kissing, had such an aura of love and calm around it that I was glued to the piece for a lengthy period of time.

The gallery comes in two parts. To the best of my understanding, one side is 'Cosm' which is mainly paintings, and the other side is the 'Chapel of Sacred Mirrors', which houses more sculptural work. My favorite artwork on the Chapel side was a mirror that reflected your own image back at you, with the word 'God' in the middle, right where your head should be if you are of average height. For me, being short, it floated somewhere above my forehead, but that's alright.

I got a positive feeling from the place and plan on going back again. There is also a nice gift shop, full of t-shirts, incense, books and posters. While the commercialization of Grey's work is a little bothersome and makes everything feel a little less pure, it is still nice to be able to wear or look at his art anytime you want in the form of a postcard or t-shirt.

And, in other news, I leave for Paris in less than 48 hours!!