I tend to judge cities on the caliber of their museums. It’s the anthropologist in me, also something I learned from my mom. So, imagine how excited I was to hear that the Denver Art Museum is open til 10:00 PM on Fridays!
Sarah made tasty spaghetti and we headed downtown for the museum last night. Turned out only one building (of two) was open. But, luckily, that one building was the one that held all my favorite modern art.
Gee. This might be the building with the modern art in it.
The building itself was, obviously, impressive. It's new, maybe a few years old, parts of it still under construction. It had these odd LCD number counters implanted in the walls of the stairwells, that looked like they were for elevators, but they moved at random. I was pretty fascinated.
The collections were fantastic, clealy Denver has some cash. But, I liked reading that a lot of the pieces were on loan from private collections from the Denver area. It's nice residents taking an active interest in sometimes ridiculous modern art. I was pretty happy to see a Warhol soup can up close and personal for the first time.
I was a big fan of an outdoor sculpture deck, which we happened to stumble upon right around sunset.
Fantastic!
Meet Sarah. She's happy to meet you, too.
They had this FANTASTIC interactive exhibit with these bubble being projected onto the floor from the ceiling. However, they were rigged with some kind of motion detector and actually popped when you stood on them. I WAS IN LOVE. Sarah and I spent a good 15 minutes bubble stomping.
Security at the museum was really friendly. We were chatting with one of them, talking to her about how modern art just asks to be touched. She said, "Oh, you can touch this one." It was a stack of paper, big sheets, that just said "Memorial Day Weekend" in the center. Turns out the artist meant it to be a moving exhibit, we were supossed to take pieces of the paper. Me and Sarah proceeded to take about 5 sheets each. The security guard said, "Yeah, I don't know. The guy shows up about once a month and just brings more pieces of paper. I don't get it. Like, why would he do that?" I laughed a quiet and supremely pretentious laugh in my head. What's up, fine arts degree?
On the second floor, they had the "Western American Art" exhibit (and a make-your-own postcard booth. LOVE) that housed stuff from George Catlin. Homeboy looooved to exploit the savage, just like most white people did in the 1800's. The painting, called "The Cutting Scene" (which I cannot find anywhere...) showed a O-Kee-Pa rite of passage cermony that featured, you guessed it, suspension! They had all this interactive stuff with the painting about it being one of the most controversial pieces of art in the museum. And why? Well, partially the whole "glamourizing the native" thing, but most of the response came from because it was a suspension. I left some grand comments, you better believe it.
All in all, good time at the museum.
Today, Sarah and me are going to track down paddleboats and do some exploring downtown.
2 comments:
Museum looks cooooooool!! I'm totally loving your blind photography. Kenneth came over last night to fix our computers...I was just thinking how interesting it is that so many people in this town are linked by you!
I enjoyed the museum! Now I'll have to go sometime and check out the other buildings. One of my favorite parts of the museum had to be the Japanese exhibit, and the museum security officials around, some of them as still as the artwork, making sure you didn't touch stuff.
I got too close a couple of times...with modern art, you should observe whether there is tape of the floor to keep you back. Thank god Cat was there to point out when I strayed too close, or we might have been booted!
I hope you're having hellacious amounts of fun in Oklahoma Cat! Yay! I can't wait to see you again!
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