Art in DC

I've been in DC for two days now and my impressions of the city have been quite varied. I'll organize my posts about this city thematically rather than chronologically because I have not managed to update regularly. My rough schedule over my three days here was:
Monday - see a bunch of museums
Tuesday - National gallery of art (that took literally all day)
Wednesday - saw every major monument in the city (left the camera at home, no pictures of that)
My impressions will be interspersed with photos that will help explain my impressions, both good and bad, of this strange, museum-like city.

A few notes:
I'm using a digital camera for the first time my life. I'm borrowing it from Amherst so I shouldn't be looking a gift horse in the mouth, but... what the hell, the camera's pretty bad. On that note, I've decided to photograph more underappreciated aspects of the city rather than the obvious sights because you could find a better picture of the Capitol on the first page of a google search than anything my "cyber-shot" could pull off. I also don't like to photograph most art I like because I think any tiny digital picture, even a good one, does the work injustice. Actually that's enough notes, let's get out some photos and commentary.

The Art
(if you have no interest in fine art, you can skip this section, there's a lot more coming)
I'd like to start off with my best impressions of DC so if you only read a bit of this long post, you'll leave with a smile. I've seen a lot of great art in the museums in just two days, most of which I didn't photograph, but I'll post a wide sampling of things I've seen.

Modern Art
The Hirshorn museum of Modern Art was my first stop. There were some great Calder and Picasso pieces and a fantastic short film in the basement. Overall, I liked it alot, most of the cool things I saw I didn't photograph, but I would definitely recommend it. A few photogenic highlights:


Words carved out of the metal in English and Russian letters. The sunlight poured through it in a very nice way.


I hate when people photograph with flash at museums because it ruins the paintings. But there were no guards around at the Hirshorn when I saw this piece and I realized it would look cool reflecting the light, so out go my morals.

The East Wing of the National Gallery, another modern art collection, also had a few good pieces, though I thought the space was hugely wasted, and after the West Wing, which had older fine art, the collection was pretty disappointing. The highlight for me were some more Calder pieces, particularly a wire sculpture whose value cannot be appreciated at all via photograph:





A cool thing to notice in the first photo are the animal sculptures beneath the mobile. They're hard to see but they were great. The amazing thing to note about the horse sculpture is that it was made principally with a single wire and yet produces a three dimensional object.

And then there was the seedy underbelly of the museum and of modern art in general: the absolutely impenetrable contemporary art. Obviously criticizing all contemporary art uniformly is stupid, but look at the next photo and try to defend its value:


The whole room was full of these. Call me ignorant if you like, but I'll let this sign, from the Hirshorn, prove a point for me.


There were almost as many guides as guards and each one was occupied with a visitor. I liked the museum and I think modern art is dismissed too easily, too often, but a vast majority of it does not reach an acceptable standard of artistry in my book.

Not modern art

The first museum I went to after the Hirshorn was the museum of African Art. The connection between modern art and African art has always fascinated me so but still, I didn't expect to spend much time there. It might have been my favorite museum, it blew me away. I'll actually let the pictures do the talking here, I can't even pretend to know anything about it, but hopefully this will convince you to visit this gem of the museum next time you're in DC.






There was also a particularly interesting exhibition by a contemporary Nigerian artist, whose show was populated by headless dandies. The best part of it was a section where a series of headless mannequins were committing various sexual acts. I wasn't supposed to photograph any of the exhibition, but I managed to snap one shot. The sexual section was behind a wall and surrounded by guards so I couldn't manage to sneak a photo but definitely check the whole show out.



The final two art museums I saw on my first day were the Freer and Sackler. My favorite sections were the oriental art. This post has been taking me quite some time and there's a lot more different parts of the ccity I want to cover so I'll just post a few more cool photos.





The first two photos are battle standards whose elaborate patterns are actually Koranic prayers. Wow. Must be seen to be believed.

The most impressive parts of these two galleries was the peacock room.






Sorry for the shakes, couldn't use flash and the room was dark. Lock, a newly minted DC native, came down to see me about halfway through my day. In a classic case of not appreciating the place you live, Lock had never been to the museums I was visiting so he decided to come join me.

Unfortunately I had many long elegant commentaries imagined in my mind as I walked around all today by myself, but they've fallen out of my head as I sit here on the laptop, tired and a little frustrated by blogspot's formatting. So to wrap up, I'll leave you with a few highlights from the West Wing of the National Gallery. I wasn't sure I was going to make it to the Gallery because there's simply so many museums to see in DC, especially when you only have three days, but my mom called me in the morning and told me it was possibly her favorite museum in the United States. It did not disappoint.






The first painting delighted me because it's from the early 1700s and depicts someone blowing a soap bubble. I wonder when bubble blowing was invented? Once again there were dozens of more famous pieces (Rembrandts, Poussin, Ingres etc.) that I didn't photograph because you should just go see the works themselves.
Alright that wraps up my first post. Night for now.