Metropolitan Museum
I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art last night after work. To be totally honest, regular and frequent access to the Met was one of the top five reasons I chose Columbia for grad school. Friday and Saturday nights are my favorite time to go, because it's much more peaceful and parts of the museum are really gorgeous at night. (Unfortunately the NY Times agrees, and they just wrote about it, which meant it was far busier than it usually is at this time.) When Dave and I lived uptown we used to just pop over for an hour or so almost every month, but now that I live in Brooklyn I make it there less frequently.
Since I had a Friday night to myself, I thought it would be fun to go poke around for a bit and see some of the new galleries I haven't spent much time in yet. I spent about an hour and a half on a speed tour of new exhibits and my favorite spots--I managed to hit the new Greek and Roman galleries, visit the Etruscan chariot, walk through the new Oceania galleries, the Costume Institute, a special exhibit on central African reliquaries, and hang out at the Temple of Dendur.
There's a set on Flickr of some of my favorite pieces I saw last night. I especially loved the incredible Oceanic carved pieces. The slit gongs from Vanuatu and the bis poles from New Guinea are huge and striking. There is something about the Greek statue above that particularly struck me...perhaps it the way the marble looks so much like gauze as it wraps her face. It's just gorgeous.