Art

I had a great weekend. It was Veteran's day, so I had Friday off. Nice!

I went to lunch with a friend of mine and she started to tell me her plan to learn to paint and then give all of her relatives paintings for Christmas this year.

This talk of painting reminded me of the Monet exhibit currently at the NC Art Museum. So since neither of us had any prior plans for the afternoon, that's where we went. We walked around the grounds, we looked at some of the permanent collection, and then it was time for Monet.

One of the neatest pieces in the regular collection was a recreation of The Mona Lisa's face, upside down, and out of spools of thread. The upside down part made much more sense as I approached the work because another part of the piece was a sphere, which inverted the image when you looked into it, so there she was staring out at you and right side up.

I thought it was interesting that for the permanent collection pieces, I felt like I got more out of the experience by reading the accompanying blurbs. But with the Monet collection I enjoyed it most when I just experienced the art viscerally.

On Saturday I took a little road trip up to Richmond, Virginia. And as it happened, I ended up at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. I really liked this gallery. I like that it was a neat building in and of itself, not just because it houses neat stuff. There was a room of Faberge (and Fauxberge) pieces. There was a room highlighting the artistry of silversmiths--with beautifully intricate and very polished and shiny serving trays, teapots, candelabras, etc. Their highlighted temporary exhibit was called "Speed" and included pieces that expressed speed and motion in the work (paintings of roads, dancing sculptures, etc.).

There was also a room where you go to do some hands on things (this was related to the silver collection). You could do rubbings. Or mix and match parts of magnetic versions of the tea sets they had on display--put the base from one dish with the bowl of another with the spout or lid or handle or whatever of another. I like museums that not only have great things on display to look at, but give you a chance to be a part of it too--to do.

I didn't get a chance to see everything. In fact, I felt like I was just getting started when they started roping off rooms--they were gently letting us know that it was 5 and they were closing.

Now here's another great thing about both of these museums--they are free! Mostly. The Monet Exhibit here in NC wasn't. But it is to see their permanent collections. And the VMFA while technically free, they ask for donations to allow it to remain free. But it's well worth their suggested $5 donation. It's worth more than that even. And I didn't even get to see everything. I definitely want to get back to both of them to finish what I started.

So there you go.