(no subject)
It's difficult, almost, to write when it matters most. When something important happens. When decisions of exposition might make someone read into an experience that you want so truly to share- or might make them turn away. You wonder if you should explain how you got there, how much detail should be included, the flavor of the coffee had on the way, the sounds discovered and ignored, the detour taken to get into the building. It's tough. It's art. It's a museum. Big deal. But really. Something was difficult, different about it today. It was the James Turrell room that I finally encountered having lived in the city for the better part of 5 years now. It's called Meeting. It's just a room in P.S.1 ( a former school converted into an art space) with no roof. Wooden seating borders the interior perimeter. The ceiling exists until a point. Perhaps about 3 feet in on all sides. The hole in the ceiling is a rectangle, about 10 feet by 8 feet, maybe. I sat in the frigid room with warm lighting. A smattering of people did too. I looked up and didn't see sky. I saw a color field painting. It started to drop into the room so that it was a canvas attached to the ceiling. But for some reason it was cold and cars could be heard in the distance. Sometimes it was silent. I kept reminding myself to expect a plane or a satellite. Remind myself I was looking at sky. The color of sky started to turn into an Yves Klein can of blue paint, or a Klein painting all together. I felt international and silly. I started to laugh. If we, myself and the dozen or so others, just walked out onto the roof, wouldn't we be looking at the same work of art? Why was this different? We were all looking at the sky and feeling the sublime. Experiencing beauty and tone and pure color, pure vibrancy and throbbing artistry. By simply looking through a hole in the roof. I giggled uncontrollably and definitely ruined some European woman's experience but I felt giddy. I felt silly. I felt ridiculous and beautiful and light. I loved that this was a gift to me.
This day was a strange day because Meeting happened and so did something odd. I walked back to another work of art I've seen many times before - in fact, it's called Take Your Time by Olafur Eliasson. It's a huge circular mirror being circular, rotating and shifting in the upper portion of the former gymnasium. People lay under it. People lie under it. Roll around. Look at themself and themselves. Make shapes.
I look at other people. I look at myself. I see a family of four. Parents. A toddler and a baby. The baby is laughing because everyone is happy. She rolls around on the floor and somersaults back to her mother. Mom plops her between herself and her man. The baby hides in the man's sweater while he takes a picture in the mirror. The toddler grabs the baby's foot and lets go when the baby moves it. Everyone is so close. A living organism in its entirety. All of a sudden, I start to cry. Just a little. Like choked up sorta. But a tear runs down into my ear as I look at them. It's almost like I want it but it isn't at all. It's simply an outsider loving someone else's love. Because when you're in it so deeply, it's hard to even feel love as something distinct, something happy, something other than what you are experiencing. This is because it envelops you and you it. There is no distinction between the self and the other selves where there is love. Blurring bodies make my eyes water. I know I have that too, it's just so hard to see it when you can hardly feel it it is so much of you.
The Borre Saethre installation knocked me off my feet earlier in the day, and I'm angry it did. It was so overdeveloped, highly stylized, Gucci meets Matthew Barney and Damien Hirst in a supergay fagbag, that I hate myself for loving it. But taxidemied animals reconstituted as mythical beings really tickles me. I must be wary of this spectacle so as not fall victim to its lusciousness. I am certain that this polarity is what maintains my attention.
Also...I am getting love from many sources and beings. Found a new confidant. Fell in love again a little bit. Discovered Casey Benjamin and the keytar when I saw him play on Friday and my brain went flying splat against all six surfaces surrounding me....
Check him out here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCDiIbnPB0k&feature=related
Saethre...I approach him with trepidation because I could love him.
This day was a strange day because Meeting happened and so did something odd. I walked back to another work of art I've seen many times before - in fact, it's called Take Your Time by Olafur Eliasson. It's a huge circular mirror being circular, rotating and shifting in the upper portion of the former gymnasium. People lay under it. People lie under it. Roll around. Look at themself and themselves. Make shapes.
I look at other people. I look at myself. I see a family of four. Parents. A toddler and a baby. The baby is laughing because everyone is happy. She rolls around on the floor and somersaults back to her mother. Mom plops her between herself and her man. The baby hides in the man's sweater while he takes a picture in the mirror. The toddler grabs the baby's foot and lets go when the baby moves it. Everyone is so close. A living organism in its entirety. All of a sudden, I start to cry. Just a little. Like choked up sorta. But a tear runs down into my ear as I look at them. It's almost like I want it but it isn't at all. It's simply an outsider loving someone else's love. Because when you're in it so deeply, it's hard to even feel love as something distinct, something happy, something other than what you are experiencing. This is because it envelops you and you it. There is no distinction between the self and the other selves where there is love. Blurring bodies make my eyes water. I know I have that too, it's just so hard to see it when you can hardly feel it it is so much of you.
The Borre Saethre installation knocked me off my feet earlier in the day, and I'm angry it did. It was so overdeveloped, highly stylized, Gucci meets Matthew Barney and Damien Hirst in a supergay fagbag, that I hate myself for loving it. But taxidemied animals reconstituted as mythical beings really tickles me. I must be wary of this spectacle so as not fall victim to its lusciousness. I am certain that this polarity is what maintains my attention.
Also...I am getting love from many sources and beings. Found a new confidant. Fell in love again a little bit. Discovered Casey Benjamin and the keytar when I saw him play on Friday and my brain went flying splat against all six surfaces surrounding me....
Check him out here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCDiIbnPB0k&feature=related
Saethre...I approach him with trepidation because I could love him.