NGA: East Building

My only piece of advice if you are either 1) Rusty on your art history movements since Impressionism, 2) Not knowledgeable at all about anything with modern art, or 3) Want a docent's perspective, is to definitely go on a tour!  The docent for my tour of the East Building (containing works from Impressionism on to the present) walked us through the history of the building, of each art period and how they progressed and why, some advice on how to approach the art in each movement, and she was really nice.  I felt a lot more confident after that tour to be able to say, "I can appreciate modern art," instead of the bewildered feeling that might have ensued or the thought, "My almost-15-month-old nephew could do that."

Fifteen Pairs of Hands, Bruce Nauman, American, 1996, white bronze with painted steel bases

Just like with when I visited Rodin's home in Paris, I took a lot of photos of the hand sculptures, I couldn't resist here either. I love sculptures or bronze casts of hands. Even with paintings, I always look at how the artist depicted the hands. 

Part of Fifteen Pairs of Hands

I liked this sculpture because it reminded me of how Cody and I hold hands sometimes.

Part of Fifteen Pairs of Hands

This one has both of them saying, "I love you" with sign language, which is really cute.

Part of Fifteen Pairs of Hands

This one is just cool. I love how much they both look like they are floating.

Synecdoche, Byron Kim, American, 1961-present, oil and wax on wood

This was the last piece that the docent showed us on our tour.  Her first question was, "What do these colors remind you of?" All of us mentioned skin tones. And that is what they are!  The artist started this piece in 1961 by going out and matching his oils to people's skin tones.  Not only does he just match it and paint a block of wood (as shown), he keeps track of which block goes with which person. There was a diagram off to the side of this piece that showed every person's name in order by first name that is in this piece. Isn't the diversity amazing? Yet at the same time, it's just monochromatic.

Beasts of the Sea, Henri Matisse, 1950, paper collage on canvas

I mostly got these next few pictures for use in my class this next year. I thought doing some paper collages would be fun, especially if they can see that it really is real art, not just an arts-and-crafts activity at summer camp.

I also wanted my students to see the scale of this paper collage piece by Matisse. Talk about HUGE!

Cow, Alexander Calder, American, 1929, brass and copper wire

This is for my students.  It's a cow made out of wire. There was a quote by Calder saying that by using wire he is able to create 3-D creations that look like a 2-D design. I'm still thinking about how I can incorporate this idea into a class art project, but it would be really fun, however I'm able to do it.

Tableau No. IV; Lozenge Composition with Red, Gray, Blue, Yellow, and Black,  Piet Mondrian, 1924-1925, oil on canvas

Okay, okay, the infamous Piet Mondrian whose only "claim to fame" is that he can paint rectangles, squares, and lines, right? Actually no.  That isn't really why he is famous.  He's famous because he can completely flatten out the colors. Instead of the warmer colors popping out at you (i.e. the red and yellow), they are seen on the same level as the cooler colors (blue, gray).  It's because of the varying widths of the black lines that Mondrian is able to do this. When the docent explained this, my opinion of Mondrian went from, "Why is this even in here?" to "That really is a big deal that he could do that." The docent also informed our group that Mondrian's work really influenced architecture and that modern architecture is what it is now because of Modrian. He streamlined it--no more curlicues and grotesques--just the lines.

Piano mecanique, Joan Mitchell, 1958, oil on canvas

Here it is. The painting my nephew would make if only my sister let him have access to paint.  It's also a visual image of what a mechanical piano sounds like to this artist.  And look at the lower painting detail--look at how thick that paint is! That's all I'm going to say about this one; you can think about it yourself.

Detail from Piano mecanique