Can we use the forum to make fun of art?
So. We were in NYC a few weeks ago, and stopped in the Gugenheim.
Let me say up front that I'm a dolt when it comes to art, and therefore can't possibly have an appreciation for it. Except for the exquisite job that God did when he created Woman. And that's the one art form that (being married with children) I'm not *allowed* to appreciate. Go figure. < big grin >
Anyway. So the first thing that you notice in the Gugenheim is that most of the art seems to have been taken down for cleaning or something. There are more blank walls in there than in the rubber wing an insane asylum. But no - the art hasn't been removed. You know this because there's a line on the floor in front of that blank wall, and if you step past it to see if they left any nail marks when they took down the art, the security guard yells at you. So there must be an artistic way of doing nothing, and some methods must be more effective than others - I've done a lot of nothing in my time, and none of it was ever displayed in a museum.
Now, I have to admit that there was one piece of nothing that was more impressive than the others. It was a blank wall that was painted (or something) to make it look like the wall was three feet further away than it actually was. So when my youngest son stood on the line and bent in to get a closer look at the blank wall that was three feet away, he bonked his head against it since it only *looked* like it was three feet away. But even that was just a blank wall.
Then there's the "ten small piles of sugar" exhibit. Only to be eclipsed by the "one very big pile of sugar" exhibit. Next to that is the "ants who were captured by security guards while trying to cross the line on the floor" exhibit. One would think that encasing them in amber would be an artsy thing to do, but these looked like there were just stepped on and thrown onto a pile. Maybe there were going to have a funeral pyre, using the "sticks I found while walking through the woods and thinking about art" exhibit.
I think some of this art hold importance not because of the art itself, but for what was going on with the artist while they were creating it. For example, the one was a big canvas with a very even coat of red paint. I think it's the same color we have in our dining room - "ruby lust" from Sherwin Williams. And my painting job was just as good as this one. So the artist must have been creating this painting in some important place, or while something important was going on. I think that maybe there were two painters at the Last Supper - daVinci and some other guy who had a raging case of ADD and therefore forgot to show up prepared. He only brought one bucket of red paint, so he tried to make himself look busy and just covered every square inch of the canvas with the same color. Holding up his thumb now and then to make it appear that one stroke of red was any different from another.
Some of the art did inspire curiosity. Like the big ball of something that looked like it had a hole drilled into it. Was there something in there? Maybe the artist was encased in there, and was breathing through the hole? But they didn't let you get close enough to look in, and poking your finger into the hole was right out. And for the record, no - you can't unbend a metal hanger and poke it into the hole, even if you stay on the correct side of the line on the floor.
There were some "real" art exhibits there as well. Monet, Picasso, etc. But they put them way up on the uppermost levels, so that you have to see all the other ... um .... art ... on the way.
On the way out, we took the elevator. It was pretty crowded with just a few of us in there, and I postulated that this was due to its odd shape. I wondered aloud if it was wise to install an elevator that was designed by Picasso. (and the laughs from the others told me that I wasn't the only one who "didn't get it")
Didn't we have a thread many moons ago on art? I recall posting some Monet there at one time...
