A Vacation on The Gates in Central Park
Beth Saidel, Assistant to the President, spent a week working in Central Park to bring to life the monumental art installation 'The Gates' created by artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Taking a one-week vacation from her writing duties in the President's Office, Saidel said working to install 'The Gates' was an extraordinary experience. "Christo and Jeanne-Claude interacted with everyone on a daily basis, driving from area to area, signing books and crew vests, and generally sharing their excitement and gratitude. 'The Gates' is a tribute to their vision - a vision that could not have become a reality without the involvement of hundreds of slightly crazy, very passionate individuals lending a hand," said Saidel, whose own creative background includes the visual arts and dance.
The Gates, a 23-mile-long installation that winds through the park, was unfurled on Saturday, February 12. The project will be on view for 16 days, through February 27.
For Saidel, this was a once in a lifetime experience. Long an admirer of Christo and his work, she jumped at the chance to get involved. Everything else in her life was put on hold for the week, which began on Saturday, February 5, with a four-hour training session at the project warehouse in Queens. The gates themselves were erected by nearly 650 paid employees in groups of eight. Saidel was assigned to be a crew leader for Section 6, Area 11 (Central Park was divided into 7 areas, each with an area director and subdivided into zones and sections). Area 6, Section 11 consisted of a loop of 94 gates just above the North Meadow baseball diamond at 102 nd Street. All of the 7,500 gates that travel along 23 miles of pathways were in place by Friday, February 11, just in time for last Saturday's fanfare-filled unfurling, led by Mayor Bloomberg.
 Each day, the workers arrived at the Central Park Boathouse at 7:00 a.m. for coffee, pastry, announcements, and regrouping. School buses drove to the outermost parts of the Park, including Area 6. Saidel and her crew then walked to the 102 nd Street drop-off point to collects materials (16'verticals, horizontal beams of varying widths, buckets, crowbars, and hardware that included bolts, flanges, leveling plates, and ball pins). Carts were loaded and pushed, usually uphill, to the appropriate spot (and re-supplying occurred several times daily). There, the parts were set in place so that the gate could be assembled ( www.christojeanneclaude.net has excellent photos that illustrate the process). Assembly required various members of the 8-person crew to perform specific tasks, sometimes solo, other times in tandem. To raise each gate at least six people were needed.
By the time the 1:30 lunch rolled around (buses returned everyone to the Boathouse), the crews were ravenous. Plates were piled high with hearty food that disappeared in minutes. Then, it was back to 102 nd Street for more, with the work day ending at 4:30 p.m. Everyone headed home - exhausted, dirt-encrusted, and very happy.
For Saidel, nothing can compare to the camaraderie and energy that ensues when you put together a group of otherwise unrelated individuals and give them a creative task, especially one of this magnitude.
"I will always feel a certain ownership of the part of the Park where I helped raise the Gates. And I may even have become a full-fledged installation groupie. Who knows? A few years from now you might find me at work on Christo's 'Over the River' project in Colorado."
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