On Tuesday I start my first class for the semester “The Museum,” having received the syllabus at least three weeks ago the volume of reading I will be doing is clear and I have already started to check off some of the books required. As I had said in the last post, these readings have lead to me think a lot about the different museums and ways in which our cultural heritage is managed and the in class discussions have not even started. One of the more interesting things about the history is that the museum in the orderly display of public art is actually “new” in the grand time line of society. There are several different “parents” of the modern art museum, but the first public museum as we would know it was started after the French Revolution when the art which had belonged to the French royalty was displayed for the French public as a signifier of the new France. The Louvre is the end result and from that gesture of giving what had belonged to the elite rulers of the country to the people became a model of how to show to the country and to the world the countries power.
As a treat to myself for completing one of my assigned books and both my readings for the first class I went to the Corcoran Gallery of Art today. They have on display an exhibit “Washington Color and Light” which I really wanted to see. Before heading into D.C. all I knew about the exhibit was that it featured some very colorful pieces and I am a bit obsessed with color. The museum’s website has this as the general overview of the exhibit -
“Washington Color and Light presents major works by the artists associated with the Washington Color School and their contemporaries. These works are united by an exploration of the language of abstraction, a desire to experiment with materials, and a love of color. The exhibition reveals the artistic innovations and individual approaches that shaped new directions in abstract painting and sculpture from the 1950s through the late 1970s.”
Arriving at the museum I took a completely reverse path through all the work on display, I was able to see not only the color exhibit I wanted to see but also “Modern and Contemporary Art since 1945“, “Photography and Media Arts” and “Spencer Finch: My Business, with the Cloud” before taking a walk through the Permanent Collection. The first two exhibits consist of pieces from the Corcoran collection, however they are not always on display.
The very first thing I saw was hanging from the ceiling in the rotunda, “Sunlight in an Empty Room” by Spencer Finch. This image is of the piece at another museum, while the image is very good, it does not have the same impact or really illustrate how incredible this installation is in person.
"Sunlight in an Empty Room" Spencer Finch, 2004 - image from blackeiffel.blogspot.com
I loved it, the Corcoran always picks the best pieces for that space and this was perfect use of the open, high ceiling. While I do not really understand the connection between the idea, the poem and the physical manifestation is the piece, it was a cloud captured in the room which I just wanted to sit there and stare at. I enjoyed it without its context.
"Salut Tom" Joan Mitchell, 1979, Corcoran Gallery of Art - image from www.metrofairytale.com
The next gallery I entered was the contemporary art exhibit and I was happy to see a piece by Grace Hartigan, one of the artists recently read about. Entitled “Summer Street” it is full of color, I felt as if I were looking out a window and a bunch of busy colors streaming by. In the same room was a de Kooning that I did not like very much and one by Joan Mitchell, “Salut Tom” which was my favorite in the room. Recently become very attracted to the color yellow, typically I like cooler colors, however the yellows in this piece were very light, full of Spring. The image online is nothing compared to the physical work itself, which I would say shows Fall yellows.
As I continued through the galleries toward the actual color exhibit the other works reminded me so much of my color theory classes I took in undergrad. So many were examples of colors changing in relationship with other colors, vibrating lines and tricks of the eye. I have not even made it to the color exhibit itself and I was in color heaven, one sculptural piece by Anne Truitt had the added effect of shadow which made the two tone piece change as I walked around it. On display was one of Andy Warhol’s “Mao” paintings, one of Jim Sanborn‘s intricately cut metal pieces and a painting by Lari Pittman, an artist that I want to see some more work from as the texture he creates on the canvas is something I have never seen before. I loved a sculpture by Rockne Krebs, “Ice Flower” – it was clear Plexiglas pyramids with the tiniest bits of color at their intersections so it almost glowed with colors.
At one point leaving as I left one gallery and three more rooms stretched out in front of me with their perfect white walls, duplicate tall doorways, the view down this expanse was empty of people aside from one security woman in all black leaning against one of the door frames. There were pops of color on the walls, but at the very end hung a beautiful draping of fabric. It was a swirl of pastel colors and reminded me of a painted silk scarf. The physical expanse and the repedative doorway shapes could have been a work of art itself. I wished I could set up a tripod and capture it.
The fabric work that I saw was at the very start of the color exhibit, but the last part I visited. It was a massive painted and draped canvas by Sam Gilliam, entitled “Light Depth” which I have attempted to find a good image of online and have not been able to find. The canvas wrapped across two walls and was gathered in several spots at the top. Maybe because I am a girl, but I felt as if it was a fairy world that I could enter if I stepped through this curtain and there would be a soft wind of colors blowing. Really I don’t know why this was the imagery, the draped canvas visually felt light, but I could see that it was a heavy, rough canvas.
Having walked through most all of the rooms on the upper floor I walked into the hall to head down stairs and wander through the permanent collection, this was the view across the building.
