Art. Not Modern, Contemporary

            Last Wednesday, I got to partake in one of my most favorite activities, going to an art opening.  I love them, and I am always surprised.  This particular show was much anticipated and took place at three different locations with a bus that took museum goers from location to location.  Very happily, my ever charming friend Kaska joined me for the excursion since she and I are – as she put it – the Beavis and Butthead of the local arts scene. 

Unfortunately, neither Kaska nor I have clothing that is appropriately artistic for an art opening.  One of our fellow patrons was donning a hot pink dress with hot pink stripper shoe accessories.  She was either a well dressed art viewer or a personification of a flashlight.  She looked pretty good.  A distinguished, middle-aged German man was wearing a well tailored grey business suit punctuated with man jewelry made out of red Legos.  He was similarly delightful.

            We moved on to the next gallery and met a woman who had a hat made out of a ball of yarn and another who wore a single earring made out of drapery tassle.  We saw some fascinating fountains and saw a little dollhouse with a tiny man sitting at a tiny desk.  Then we went to another room, but it was the same room from the dollhouse, but it was life-size, and the man was a life-size statue sitting at a life-size desk.  Then we went out of a doorway that was HUGE and we were ourselves the man sitting at the desk in the dollhouse.  It was the most Alice in Wonderland of all my previous life experiences. 

            The show was absolutely packed.  We saw a painting of a man vomiting out a second story window onto the lawn below.  “You see,” Kaska said.  “This is what happens when you don’t have a balcony.”  Good point, Kashkers, good point.

            The focal point of the museum was a very attractive young woman naked in a tube filled with water.  It was a clear plastic tube, about two feet in diameter and seven feet tall, and it was constantly replenished with warm water.  Set against a set made to look like a turn of the century laboratory, two men in white lab coats moved lights and old fashioned surgical implements around the scene.  The woman's head was above the water level, and she chatted with the artist, and turned around, and moved up and down.  I think the idea was that she was supposed to look like a frog in a laboratory jar or like a butterfly pinned to a mat.  I think the artist was going for something deep, something about how human beings are just animals after all.  Something about how scientific study is important for progress but also ultimately dehumanizing.  But, since he picked a ridiculously attractive woman instead of your average Joe, I bet the artist also wanted an excuse to hang out with a beautiful woman naked in a tube. 

            I kind of wanted to go up and talk to her.  I didn’t, of course.  She was working.  But she was also an American, speaking English. Even though she was a naked woman in a tube of water, hearing the accent again was comforting.   Nevertheless, it would have been so strange to talk to her.  How would you introduce yourself to a naked woman in a tube?  You can’t shake her hand. 
            On the way out of the show, we took a quick look in the gift shop.  There was a mouse pad printed with the words, "Ist das Kunst oder kann das Weg?"  Which translates to, "Is this art, or can I throw it out?"  Good question, mouse pad.  I'll think about that and get back to you.