Fake Memories for Sale at the Edge Observation Deck
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It‘s a whole operation giving life to the “Edge” observation deck at Hudson Yards. Tickets start at $35 USD. You go through security and into a dark hall where you’re nudged into posing for a camera that takes your photo, no explanation given by staff. After the flash, you are ushered into a fancy elevator clad with high definition displays. “Enjoy the show!”, says the staff member as the doors to the elevator close, referring to the video that plays on the walls as you're lifted to the top.
The elevator doors open. “The deck is right ahead and our champagne bar to the left.” Champagne goes for $21 a pop, $17 if you buy ahead of time with your ticket. At least they thought about giving you something to do other than waiting for people to clear the view of the city where you want to take your selfie. The behavioral disruption caused by people’s cameras becomes the protagonist of your visit. Cameras, they need to be fed your moment. As beautiful an artifact as they are, they afford fetishization at the expense of your senses.
The moment comes when you feel like the visit is done. The purpose is gone. You look for a way out, it’s obviously after the gift shop. You now discover that the exit is controlled. You can’t just go, you have to be let go. You want to get off, but there’s a long line. You start looking for other exits. Eventually you accept it, you got to line up. There’s something abnormal whenever you have to queue up for something, it speaks of inharmony, of scarcity. “Ladies and gentlemen, we have more elevators upstairs with no line”, shouted the security staff. Shouting was the only way people could know about the elevators upstairs, there is no signage.
You climb the stairs, the elevator is there, you feel relief. Another highly-produced video plays on the walls as you’re taken down. In full irony, the video is an animation of the view you would have if the elevator actually faced the city. The video is meant to fill the awkward gap created by a very tall building almost fully inaccessible to the common New Yorker. Ding! The elevator stops.
You're now back at the lobby. Before you leave, would you take a look at this picture? It's a photo of you and your family, photoshopped onto the view of the deck that everyone wants but no one gets because of the crowds. It’s the photo the staff took with zero explanation as you were rushed into the elevator on your way up. It’s a moment that didn’t happen, in a photo booklet that goes for $50. It feels like a lot of money but it feels wasteful, leaving behind a living trace of you.
“What happens to the photos people don’t buy?”, you ask a staff member. “We recycle them”, they reply. It wouldn’t be surprising if they shredded them. The burden is placed on you of leaving the photo behind. The strategy reeks of greed, a place willing to do anything for a chance to make a buck out of it, even if that means siphoning people up through a building that is not meant for them and printing for them fake photos, so they may take a brief look and get a whiff of how it feels to live in a monumental luxury glass tower.
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