Art that's 'good for nothing'!

Artist Christo's wife, talking about his art project 'gates', says there is none to the "good for nothing" art. The project has being installed in New York's Central Park.

Love it or hate it, you won't be able to miss the 7,500 saffron-colored "gates" being installed in New York's Central Park by the artist Christo in one of the biggest art projects ever attempted in the city.

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And if you want meaning, the artist's wife says there is none to the "good for nothing" art.

Christo, who gained fame wrapping the Pont Neuf in Paris in sandstone-colored cloth and Berlin's Reichstag in aluminum-fabric, said the biggest challenges he faces in creating his work are "to get the permits."

He, and his wife and partner Jeanne-Claude, first proposed lining the 37 km of footpaths with "The Gates" in 1979.

About 100 workers using forklifts to place the steel bases along the pathways and raise the 16-foot high gates are expected to finish the installation by February 12.

Large pieces of saffron cloth will hang from the top of each gate and billow in the cold, rainy winds until February 27.

"We have chosen February when the trees are leafless so that from far, far away you can see," Jeanne-Claude, her own saffron- colored hair billowing in the wind, said.

Emerging from a gray Maybach, a vehicle whose price tag rivals that of Bentleys and Rolls-Royces, Christo and Jeanne-Claude supervised the installation. They estimated that the project would cost no more than $21 million.

"We do not accept sponsorship," she said. The couple says they finance their projects themselves through the sale of Christo's art work.

Why decorate Central Park's walkways for two weeks?

"We create works of joy and beauty. We do not create messages. We do not create symbols. We create works of art," the artist's wife said. "All works of art are good for nothing, except to be a work of art."

Christo has said elsewhere that the temporary quality of the projects imbues them with a sense of urgency to be seen and their value comes from the fact that they will not last.