Yesterday my friend and I ate at a tea room, and then saw the Stein collection. It is such a huge show that we were exhausted, and sort of breezed through the last rooms, swearing to return another time. It is super well curated, and easy to follow the collecting, the places were the paintings resided and what happened to them. It is also chock a block with photos of the family and personal items. The family members come alive, and you feel you understand who they are from their choices. I will be back to see it again, but I bought the catalog so I could refresh my memory from yesterday. Art addresses all the senses and awakens them. I felt jolted into a new level of interaction with my environment and the people in it. I know I'm alive more fully when I've just seen some art.
My friend was talking about Vermeers she'd seen and where, and I remembered a show I'd seen in New York years ago - and there we were - excited, having that interior world called up. We discussed how the Netherlands with it's idea of separate houses for one family, caused women to be in these rooms, solitary, and able to reflect. And we recognized that feeling of inhabiting a room by yourself for even a few moments, without children or duty or obligation. So the room becomes your field and resonance chamber. What was a woman in a room without a task? What was a woman in a room with a window?
Art is glorious to see, but it's almost as much fun to discuss. My art buddies and I have had some of the most insightful and passionate talks of my life. Which leads me to be believe that art is central to who we are as human beings.
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