this was the first time i've been at the met - and my god, it's huge and intense. it reminds me of the british museum of art, where there's just so much that you practically go insane amidst the maze of rooms and art periods. thankfully - even though i was there on the weekend, i was able to skip the long admission lines since a very handsome young man offered me his met button as i was walking up the stairs.
i met jasmyn there and i was late (surprise!) so i ended up walking around the gustave corbet exhibition by myself with my audio guide. it was pretty good - at first - then it was just too much. the self-portrait painting that the met uses on their exhibit brochures was the most interesting, which was ultimately disappointing since it was at the start of the exhibition. i love how he's staring at you, his madness simply dripping off his face.
(it's this one)
corbet, i have to admit, must have been a pretty dashing young upstart in his time, causing all types of controversy. he has a whole series of nude paintings and these "realist" works that upset juries because they showed regular peasant people in what would typically be a rather aristocratic portrayal. i love the fact that when he was rejected by one exposition and he set up his own booth outside the space, with the painting that was rejected and other works that he produced.
later, after looking at a few pieces in met's contemporary art collection (i find jasper johns everywhere!), i went to find jas. i didn't find her so i just meandered towards the superheroes: fashion and fantasy (!)exhibition. i didn't know what to expect - although i did know it was supported by armani.
once i stepped in the space, however, i knew i was done. way too much fashion. not enough superheroes. i'm a geek by nature so i was very disappointed. there were a few choice pieces - mainly commercial tie-ins, like the actual costumes from batman begins and iron man. for the most part, i breezed through.
that trip to the met wore me out. that place needs to be taken in small doses during the weekday - early - when the tourists are still struggling with the time difference. i'll return again, but not any time soon.
cai guo-qiang @ the guggenheim:
i went to this exhibition knowing two things: one of my friends liked it; the other did not. i came out of it understanding both sides.
i liked three things in this exhibition:
1) inopportune: stage one - this installation is the signature image. nine cars suspended, beginning in the lobby and ending at the top floor of the guggenheim's spiraling space. if you go here, you'll find the installation video for it. it's impressive. i particularly was enamored by the sense of movement and placement of the cars.
2) new york's rent collection courtyard - these sculptures were made of clay and were based on actual pieces made during communist china. i appreciated that they were left unfired and left to naturally break apart. i liked looking straight into the faces... a few of them had marble eyes. their expressions were just so well captured, i couldn't help but feel the impact.
3) the videos for his explosion projects. it was a quite a journey to these videos, since they were at the top floor of the museum and after quite a number of his gunpowder paintings (blegh). but they were good.
other than that, i think the show suffered from being in the guggenheim space, from too many of those gunpowder pieces, and from one odd room that was a self-curated mini retrospective of his career (let's just say there was a boat and mini-man-made river. believe me - it wasn't doing much for my aesthetic sense). for instance, this one piece - inopportune: stage 2 consisted of tigers, bespeckled with arrows, and suspended in different positions. it would have been better in a much bigger and more open space, like they showed in the exhibition brochure, instead of in guggenheim's spiraling space.
the whitney biennale:
i actually went to this already, but i stopped by again with my friend. it really is one of those hit or miss type of things, since there are so many disparate artists. this time around, i grabbed one of the audio guides to see if they would help enlighten me (which, for the most part, it did not).
i don't want to go into it all - but i watched more of olaf breuning's videos. he is odd and funny. but also somewhat offensive. if you get a chance to see any of his stuff, i suggest checking it out. i can't decide where i stand with this boy.
i think i'm suffering from museum overexposure. i've been thinking of going to the new museum, but first, i need to go to a gallery show with some good underground, contemporary art. these more established artists are killing me. haha.
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