Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out :: Summer of Love in The Big Apple

The Whitney Museum of American Art is celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Summer of Love.

The Whitney’s Summer of Love: Art of the Psychedelic Era exhibition revisits the unprecedented explosion of contemporary art and popular culture brought about by the civil unrest and pervasive social change of the 1960s and early ’70s.

The exhibition includes paintings, photographs and sculptures by Richard Avedon, Jimi Hendrix, and Andy Warhol, among others. You’ll also view important posters, album covers and underground magazines.

A special emphasis is placed on environments as well as on film, video and multimedia installations. The art in the exhibition is conceptualized through a wealth of documentary material highlighting events, people and places. Journey from the 1967 Monterey International Pop Festival and Timothy Leary to the UFO nightclub in London.

In keeping with the “turn on, tune in, drop out” theme, the ultimate “hippie” hotel in New York City has to be the landmark Chelsea Hotel. But a mighty change is blowin’ in the wind.

BD Hotels NY, led by acclaimed hoteliers Richard Born and Ira Drukier, have been hired to preserve, restore and invigorate the hotel. This is the dynamic duo that brought The Mercer and The Chambers to Manhattan.

The 12-story, 250 room Chelsea Hotel was built in 1883 as Manhattan’s first cooperative apartment. It was the tallest building in New York until 1902. Located at 222 West 23rd Street, it was converted into a hotel and residence in 1905.

The hotel is recognized as an American cultural icon and renowned for the artists, writers and musicians who have lived and created art there. They include Sir Arthur Clarke; Leonard Cohen; Bob Dylan; Stanley Kubrick; Arthur Miller; Joni Mitchell; Dee Dee Ramone; Larry Rivers; Dylan Thomas; Mark Twain and Tennessee Williams.

BD Hotels will work with The Chelsea Hotel to improve customer service and amenities; create more inviting and livelier common areas; continue to modernize the hotel’s major mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems and better activate the Chelsea Hotels historic spaces.

Photo: Unique garden sculpture at the Tofino Botanical Gardens, located on the west coast of Vancouver Island in British Columbia. Photo by Sue Frause.