The grounds at Watermill Center, Robert Wilson’s art retreat on the east end are always difficult to navigate, what with slippery grasses and rock paths. It would have been good to follow Daedalus’ flight, as the evening’s theme suggested, flying high—but not too high– into the sun. Alas in myth, the sun’s heat melts his wings and he perishes. That’s what happens when you soar too high. Evoking this myth as well as Lou Reed’s lyric, this year’s pre-gala cocktails had hubris galore on the paths through the woods. And there, in the large courtyard, a wall boasts, “SHE OUTWITS HIM/ SHE OUTLIVES HIM.” On its other side, artists, formal in black suits, one from Lithuania, graffiti with spray paint, the art called “Too M@ch Talk.” These days, walls say much.

A pile of bananas, some plastic, some ripening, tempt visitors to grab a fruit for tomorrow’s breakfast, or at least as one man says to his wife: “Stand there. Let me banana you,” before snapping a shot. Nude figures in acts of art abound through the maze of trees, and in the area where art for the auction is displayed, center stage, right near the bar. The most apt response to this, one of the most special of the summer’s events, comes from another visitor: “I don’t know where to look first.”

Regina Weinreich

Graphic Design: Salpeter Ventura