 Shopping is perhaps the common ground between us all. We go to stores looking for something: a striped pair of socks to match our fabulous red corduroys. We drive an extra five kilometres to the pump selling petrol at Rs. 45 as opposed to the ridiculously obscene Rs. 47 at the pump around the corner (how dare they!) We want to experience the difference between a non fat, half caffeinated, pumpkin vanilla spice latté and the average cup of coffee. We use the same skills to surf the internet. I typed in the phrase "Striped socks to go with my fabulous red corduroys" on Google and received 321 web sites to wade through.
Visiting a museum can be a daunting task for the uninitiated. Here, in grand halls, are hundreds of paintings that the culture has deemed worthy of study (why else would they have gilded frames?) After walking up, putting hand to chin as if in a gesture of deep thought, and muttering "beautiful," about five times, most people start thinking about pumpkin spice lattés and how long they have to hold up the façade of being interested.
Because my life is spent making pictures and teaching others to make them, I'm very comfortable in museums. It's more libraries that I find daunting. The sinking weight in my stomach when I see those thousands upon thousands of books on the shelf has provided me with a sixth sense of locating restrooms quickly in libraries across the nation. I know for many, museums have a similar effect, but I'm here to tell you that looking at art can be very much like shopping. And those honed skills in web surfing are a great intro into art viewing.
Artists can be very focused on a particular subject or theme in their work and may take a trip to the museum to see the works through the scope of that subject. Say for instance, I need to paint a pair of hands and am having difficulty. I may take a run through the galleries, shopping strictly for that purpose. My agenda is a trip through the Museum of Handom . Obviously, there is no Museum of Handom , but for that day's purpose the local art museum goes by that name. Now because I'm looking strictly for well-painted hands, Rembrandt might be the worst painter ever born, so I quickly dismiss his paintings and spend my energy elsewhere. Now if I was shopping in the Museum of Deep Insight into the Human Psyche through Facial Expressions (MoDIHPFE), Rembrandt would be my man. Part of what makes paintings accessible is that the paintings don't get insulted if you dismiss them. They happily wait for the moment you are ready for them.
My point is, there are far too many works in a museum for one to contemplate them all. Being selective or having someway to engage with the pictures, no matter how absurd, is the best way to prevent becoming overwhelmed and disconnected. It also might lead you to something more rewarding than what you sent out to find.
Setting out through a clothing store to find those striped socks that will match my fabulous red corduroys allows me to disregard 90% of the products in the store, but as I roam towards the socks section, I pass by a paisley shirt and - voila- I suddenly realize that paisley is the answer to my fashion trouble.
Art students are often made to draw from paintings in a museum. There are plenty of artist-related advantages that come from this activity and teachers will be the first people to load you up with these reason. "Ah, you will channel the masters so that when you draw nature you will already have an idea of what to look for because you have seen it through the eyes of a master." This is all good and true, but I would like to argue that the greatest reward from time spent with art happens on a human level, and you needn't be an artist to experience it.
Ten years ago I was strolling through the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York) trying to find the most complicated composition to draw from. I had some time to spare and was hoping to improve my abilities on sketching. I chose Poussin's Abduction of the Sabine Women (left) strictly because it was busy and complex. About forty-five minutes into the drawing I noticed in a section of the painting the wielded swords of three different soldiers formed the sides of a perfect pentagon (image below)!
The abduction of the Sabine Women
(1633-34)Nicholas Poussin,
The Metropolitan Museum, NYC
Why in a painting depicting male aggression, physical brutality, and chaos between the sexes, was there also such a sense of orchestrated rhythm and clarity? The idea fascinated me and from this quirky little detail, I was led to contemplate larger issues of humanity. It was as if the painting was presenting visually a thought something along the lines of "we can't change incidents from the past but we are in control of our responses to them, we can bring clarity to them, and we can even let negative things eaffect us in positive ways". Now I didn't set out to come to this realization when I sat down in front of the painting. My purposes were much more mundane. Certainly the success of the experience wasn't the drawing, which looked like any other drawing, but the fact that I was engaged in a thought process and activity with the art, allowed something much better to happen.
Art seldom gives you what you're looking for, but what it does give you is usually something better. Really understanding and appreciating art is dependent upon spending time with it. Paintings are waiting to tell you things, but they do it in their own way. Overtime you learn to look at an image in many different ways. Experience breeds sensitivity and insight. In the same way, someone that regularly cooks may look at a bag of flour very different than one who bakes cookies for the first time. The experienced cook sees bread, dumplings, cake, pasta, pancakes, soufflés, tempura, and gravy. But even for the newbie, if the cookies come out right, there is incentive to return and engage again.
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