Sentimental Value Behind this picture...
Friday, October 3rd
Today a small group of us went to the TATE Modern. I am more of a realist, but over the past few years, I have tried to explore the world of abstraction and have come to appreciate it much more. I really enjoy seeing some of the texture, forms and pattern, and intense concepts behind some of these works, and have tried achieving some of these qualities in my work as well. However, there is still some that can appreciate the concepts, but to me, a solid blue canvas hanging on the wall is not going to be the most impressive piece of art I have ever seen in my life.
Walking into the museum you feel like you are in a giant parking ramp and take an escalator to the various floors from there. We explored eras from cubism, fauvism, and vorticism, and minimalism to material gesture and surrealism. Various artists included works by Picasso and Braque of course, in addition to Mondrian, Matisse, Gris, Jackson Pollock, Francis Bacon, Kandinsky, Brancusi, and surprisingly, Monet (I guess he did some abstract expressionism in his later years- no where near as adventurous as some of his colleagues though).
One piece that stuck out in particular to me was by a British artist named Cornelia Parker. The piece is called “30 Pieces of Silver.” Imagine 30 discs of silver materials such as platters, flatware, elegant candle pieces, and musical instruments all flattened by a steam roller and suspended by the ceiling hovering just above the ground. Her concept behind the piece was that these objects, found in thrift stores and junk shops, once had great sentimental value and were perhaps wedding gifts or other important value. She wanted to show the deeper meaning of the unwanted value and show the metamorphosis of form.
I enjoyed seeing Jackson Pollock’s work and the energy of the dripped paint that caused such motion in his pieces. I remember watching videos about him, working outside of a huge barn, during art classes in my younger years. We saw the incredibly crazy deal of birds impailed by arrows to the wall, which was supposed to symbolize death of imaginative freedom (a work by Jannis Kounellis, 1936), and saw more political works such as the Roman symbol, transformed to Hitler’s salute, with three arms projecting from a wall (Ave Maria, Cattelan 1960). Of course, we also saw the classic single, premeditated rip through the page (Lucio Fontana). I understand the thought and concepts behind these works, but once again, not exactly my style.
A piece by Otto Muehl had such great texture and rich dark color and it inspired me. I tried creating a piece like this in my painting class last semester from gesso, plaster, and oil paint.
One other piece I found rather interesting was three mops, coated with bronze, with extremely enlongated handles (To an Unknown God, 1989, Pepe Espaliu). The mops were supposed to represent cleansing and healing, and the elongated handles (probably about 25 feet high or so) point skyward, obviously the concept of heaven. Having three of them, I’m sure is supposed to be the religious symbolism of the trinity. The artist created this piece in his later years, as he was dying of AIDS, so I’m sure that was part of the inspiration.
We looked around for a while more, and I could write so much more about these pieces, but that would take forever, so I will spare you all… I went into the gift store and found a good book on life drawing that I bought to correspond with my independent study, and also found a cool booklet of the timeline that s across each main hallway in the museum, encompassing the entire history of art and each era. It was a cool design as well with interesting packaging. It is sick how much graphic design has made me look at everything differently…
I made it back just in time to change into some nicer clothes and to meet Luke for dinner before heading to the opera. Luke has his internship at the English National Opera House, so he gets free tickets every now and then. I was first on his list to go since I was the first one to talk to him about it, so I was really excited. Walking out of our exit from the tube, we walked directly up to Trafalgar Square. I had not been to this part of town yet, so it was really cool to see something new. In the square, there is a giant statue of Nelson, with Nelson’s column directly in the middle of the plaza, flanked by two giant lions. On either side of that is two giant fountains, and behind this entire area, is the National Gallery. If you look down the street, not too far away is Big Ben and Parliament. I had no idea that we were that close when we went there last.
We walked about a block away to the Opera House and it was absolutely beautiful inside and out. We weren’t allowed to take pictures, but I got a few good ones anyway… Out of all of the theatres we have been to so far, this one definitely wins first place. The inside was gorgeous. I also got pretty excited about the fact that the pit was huge and basically had a full orchestra inside.
The show itself was rather bizarre. We saw Cav and Pag (Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci). Both shows were perhaps the most bizarre I have ever seen, and the second show was supposed to be a comedy, but was also quite dramatic. They were both twisted dramas based around adultery and most everyone important dies at the end. However, the music was great and I particularly enjoyed watching the energy the conductor put forth and the beautiful arrangements by the stringed instruments. So really, overall, great night.
After the performance, Luke and I decided to wander around a little bit and explore the city of London lit up at night. We went back to see Trafalgar Square lit up, and then saw an interesting footbridge in the distance we decided to explore. We walked across and got a wonderful view of the London Eye and Parliament lit up over the Thames. Once again, there is no way my pictures could ever do it justice.
After wandering and admiring for some time, we decided to take the tube back and head in for the nite.
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