When Michelangelo’s ‘Pietà’ Came to New York, Vincent J. Cannato
Saturday, September 21, 2024
A World’s Fair Could Be Just What We Need
September 13, 2024, https://time.com/6991999/worlds-fair-history
Our Lady of the World’s Fair: Bringing Michelangelo’s “Pietà” to Queens in 1964 by Ruth D. Nelson September 13, 2024
I’ve called Queens home for two decades, and yet I’m still constantly bumping into some new oddity about the New York World’s Fair, which, for better or for worse, may be the thing for which we’re best known. The 1964 edition was like an Olympics for culture, akin to the Venice Biennale in scale and a pop-up in commercialism, stranger than them both. Hosted at Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, the event boasted 139 pavilions by 80 nations, with exhibitions, rides, food; it brought Belgian waffles and the Ford Mustang into American popular consciousness.
It also marked the first — and only — time Michelangelo’s “Pietà” (1498–99) left its longtime home at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. In Our Lady of the World’s Fair, author Ruth D. Nelson explains that the marble masterpiece made the Vatican’s pavilion the second-most visited one of the event, “after General Motors.” Nelson’s got a winkingly wry sense of humor, but she’s first and foremost a scholar. The book is well-researched, grounded in historical context, and neatly subdivided into chapters and sections. But a subtle warmth lights this book from within: The author visited the fair as a child. “Though I do not remember much,” she writes, “what remains in my heart is a sense of wonder and happiness.” It introduced her to the “Pietà,” possibly sparking her interest in art history; she’s come full circle with this book. —Lisa Yin Zhang
Big City Catholics Podcast with Bishop Brennan and Fr. Heanue of the Diocese of Brooklyn
September 13, 2024
“Making the World’s Fair a Masterpiece” by Michael Gannon, Queens Chronicle, September 12, 2024