Pop star Lady Gaga received the Young Artist Award from the arts-education nonprofit American for the Arts at its annual gala at that cathedral of catering Cipriani 42nd Street on Monday, Oct. 19.
Vulture reported that friend and art-mentor Klaus Biesenbach presented the award, which is a gleaming lapdog-scale Jeff Koons balloon dog. The curator-at-large for the Museum of Modern Art elucidated that the pop singer had done it all - sold millions of records, work on behalf of bullied youth, and not to mention a grisly turn in the current season of "American Horror Story: Hotel" - before reaching the age of 30.
The "Bad Romance" songstress appeared especially moved by the fact that this eminent group was taking her earnestly as an artist. "Thank you so so very much. It is hard to know exactly what to say, I have some small notes but they are not very well-written, and I don't know," the singer said. "Actually, I suppose every artist writes things down differently but what made mine pretty horrendous - I don't know how anyone I work with reads back what I write, and understands it, let alone myself."
Lady Gaga also gave shoutout to Koons and performance artist Marina Abramovic. "My manager Bobby, Klaus, Marina Abramovic, for being the best rehab I have ever had," she said. "You eat art or it will eat you. These people that remind me why I'm here. I'm so inspired every day, I'd rather be here any night of the week, than anywhere else in Hollywood. We're at Cipriani."
"This is real old New York, and thank you so much, I'm so sorry I talked so long. This is just the best thing that has ever happened to me," she continued. "And a toast to a new age of romantics, and let's lift each other up and take care of kids as they struggle with depression and anxiety, while they ask themselves every day why do I feel so sick, and the answer is because you're meant to make things. So let's help them make things."
The Grammy winner said there wasn't "a single award that means more to me than this one." You can read her full speech here.