A Different Look at Love
February 16, 2019
From crying fits to hour-long Netflix marathons, your room has seen absolutely everything. Yet, no matter what you go through, it’s always there for you with its familiar smell, tattered posters and squishy pillows. Our rooms often feel like a place of comfort, a place where we can be ourselves and do as we please without interference from the outside world. With this idea in mind, artist Sarah Verity crafted perhaps one of the most heartfelt and lovingly crafted exhibitions I have ever seen.
Located downtown on 44 E. St., the Special Special gallery has long hosted new and inventive art installations, but its current exhibition, “Love Hotel Rooms,” certainly takes the cake. As soon as you walk into the space, you’re hit with a wave of warmth. Perhaps it’s because the people working there do everything in their power to make you feel comfortable or it may just be the many small heaters located throughout the room. Nevertheless, it conveys a loving feel with its pink walls, paper plants and the small wooden craft table decked out with pens, pencils and markers of all colors and sizes for your decorative pleasure.
Unlike many installations, “Love Hotel Rooms” allows the viewer to participate in the exhibition by inviting them to recall and recreate a room they once loved or one they have been loved in. I chose to recreate my freshman year dorm at Fordham Lincoln Center. This was the first room I was able to decorate how I truly wanted, from the colossal amount of posters to the army of plants that sat on my desk. It’s where I met some of the best people and have done some of my best thinking. When I think of love, I find myself thinking of that room.
Sketching my room was fantastic and one of the most wholesome things I’ve ever done. However, what I enjoyed the most about the exhibition was how it encouraged the sharing of different perspectives and the building of new connections through old recollections stuck deep within.
For anyone looking for a way to spend an hour or two, I highly recommend stopping by Special Special to participate in this unusual way of looking at love. You never know what you’ll end up sketching. The gallery closes on Feb. 21, so stop in while you still can.
