That afternoon we decided to check out the Victoria and Albert Museum. We gathered a map of the place and headed to the cafe for a beer, Pim's cup and snack so we could decide what exhibits we wanted to see. It was readily apparent that you could spend days, even weeks, traipsing through the galleries and still not see everything. We decided to check out the Architecture, Furniture, Glass, and Stained Glass galleries. Along the way we walked through some of the Ceramics rooms where you could peer into the 10 foot tall glass cases absolutely filled to the brim with ceramics from every corner of the globe. It was totally overwhelming and like I said there is NO way you could ever look at every piece. And this was just one of several ceramics galleries that was just one of the many different types of galleries at the Victoria and Albert. Given the chance we will definitely go back.
The next day we visited our favorite museum (so far in the trip): the Tate Modern. We love modern museums and art so this one was a slam dunk even though we only had enough time and energy to see two of the many galleries: Structure and Clarity, and Energy and Process. We entered the first gallery to see several cubist selections. I was looking at the one captured in the first photo below as I found it very interesting. Then I looked at the description and just about had a heart attack; it is a Picasso, the first I've ever seen close up. :) Amazing! Next we saw a Kandinsky (second photo) and a personal favorite (for both of us): Josef Albers (third photo).
We continued to move through the galleries and saw these beauties from Piet Mondrian, Jo Baer and Ellsworth Kelly, respectively.
Throughout both exhibitions we saw various intriguing sculptural pieces. The first was the most intimidating piece of art I've ever seen: the Trip Hammer. And now I realize that we should've taken a picture with one of us standing next to it for scale purposes. The, unconnected, pieces of steel are simply balanced together barely touching the wall. Tim was incredulous and tensely gesticulated that a piece of steel like this just a foot square would be impossible to pick up with your hands due to it's incredible weight. Yeah. They achieved their goal with this piece: terror. As you might expect we gave it a wide berth when leaving the gallery at the end of our stay. :)
Other sculptures were less intimidating but no less fascinating. There were what looked like geodesic domes made of thin metal, groups of fluorescent lamps mounted onto the walls, a painted jumble of portions of small tree trunks as well as a series of wooden planks cut with several different patterns. At first glance they look like they would all fit together however upon closer inspection you can see that they aren't pieces from the same puzzle. :) The last photo deserves special mention because it is incredible! I don't know how the artist saw the finished shape inside what started as a huge chunk of wood. The most interesting aspect of this sculpture is that he didn't just cut a shape out of the wood but he followed the knots that existed naturally in this tree trunk. It's almost as though he followed the growth of this tree in reverse and you can imagine that as a sapling it looked something like what is represented at the top of the sculpture. Now I dabble in the arts from time to time but it's things like this that completely escapes me. I have no idea how artists see shapes, colors and patterns because, for the most part, I cannot see them when I look at pieces of art. Perhaps that's what makes art so fascinating; you get to see something other than what you yourself can see. I may be having a lightbulb moment here, that or synaptic misfiring but I'm realizing this may be why I so enjoy looking at art: I get to see things that I cannot see on my own. The things you learn. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment