The Rubin Museum

The World is Sound exhibit in the Ruben Museum was very exciting for me as a musician. I have been a musician since I started piano lessons when I was five years old. The most interesting part of the exhibit was the Om Room. It was a room which played recordings of visitors saying “om” on top of one another. Each om was unique yet, they worked together to create a kind of music. I’m not sure if it is because I am trained in music, but for some reason I could hear an imaginary melody over the background oms. It was a relaxing place to sit and just listen to all these people. They never met each other yet all their voices came together to make art.

I honestly regret being late for this trip. It was fascinating being able to compare the religions of the west with those of the east, especially when it comes to death. The journey that a person after death takes is so much more detailed in Buddhism than it is in many other western religions. For example, there is what’s called The Tibetan Book of the Dead that describes the steps between when a person has passed until the next rebirth. To people who are prepared, it’s a way of discovering who they are and what they want to be. For the unprepared, they are riddled with temptations and hallucinations that may cause a undesirable rebirth. You don’t really have this detailed of an explanation of death in many western religions. However, it is interesting to note the similarities religions have when it comes to the overseer of death. Western Religions like Christianity there’s the Devil who resides in Hell, while in Buddhism there’s Yama the god of the underworld, and punishes people who have done wrong. This trip has made me appreciate different religions and how they can shape people’s beliefs.

Prior to our visit to the Rubin Museum of Art, I was expecting some small exhibit in the museum. I was surprised when I saw how every aspect of the museum embodied the spirit of sound, and how interactive the actual museum was. The central staircase itself had the element of sound incorporated into it, which I found very fascinating. Furthermore, the “Om” room for me epitomized how interactive, powerful, and hypnotizing sound can be. The “Om,” room was one of the many examples of how interactive yet simultaneously soothing the power of sound is.

I was impressed by the amount of effort the entire museum put towards this exhibit. It wasn’t just one area that was immersed in it, the central staircase was an integral part of getting visitors engaged with the exhibit.

I also liked the variety of things that were shown. Not only items, but concepts and sounds were put on display. I liked the interactive portions, especially the “Om” Room and the prayer areas. Both transported you into the exhibit fully, in a way that you can’t get just by looking at artifacts.

I thought our tour guide was very enthusiastic and knowledgeable. I think she mentioned that she had really gotten into studying sound as a concept and it showed in how she led us around. I really appreciated having someone passionate explain the exhibit to us because it was a way for us to get enthusiastic about it too.

The Rubin Museum: Sights and Sounds

The Rubin Museum was one of the most rewarding experiences I had during this entire semester. At first I was super exhausted, because of all of the exams during the week, and truthfully dreaded going somewhere after classes. I was truly proven wrong. This museum, even to someone of another faith-me- made me not only appreciate the art of Buddhist culture, but the religion itself. First of all, the gift shop was amazing! I wasn’t ready to leave, and I was kind of underestimating the rest of the museum at that point, but I was soon taken in a completely different direction, once i got the sight of those amazing stairs. The fact that the used the structure of the museum itself as a part of the display of sound in Buddhist culture, was absolutely ingenious. I also found, those mantras in the walls pretty cool as well.

Apart from the beautiful art and structures that really encased the peacefulness and tenets of Buddhism, my favorite part-apart from the gift shop- was the Om room. As college students, just 1/2 an hour in a lecture and bring our blood pressures up higher than it should be, especially if there are exams and quizzes to follow. However, that room, filled with the voices of not only monks, but also regular people who just wanted to participate, was so peaceful, so healing. I felt the good of humanity manifest itself from the 5 minutes in that room, and I would surely visit just to experience that again.

The museum was so much more than a museum, it was more than art or sculptures, and it was more than learning- more than adding to the known. It was an experience to feel and to become, in that moment, part of something unknown.

*[Image Credit: Google.com]

The visit to the Rubin Museum was a Macaulay seminar trip that I’ll cherish. Located in the magnificent Chelsea neighborhood, the outside view of the museum was very unique. It didn’t look like a traditional museum, which basically is a big building with Greek or some form of traditional architecture. It’s different, modern exterior already made me realize that this was going to something unexpected. The inside was a whole different world. Our first was the gift shop. There was such mix of cultures in just the gift shop that I felt as if I was standing in some international airport. The gift shop actually reminded me of a gift shop I went to in the Delhi International Airport. I even found a book on Sikh art, which is so rare to find! Our museum guide was also very well versed in the subject and very passionate about it as well. Her passion made the tour much more lively and enjoyable. The spiral staircase was also a grand feature of the building. The staircase was left intact from the original Barneys building and it fits in with the museum perfectly. The idea behind the staircase, ascending up the Himalayas, just says how thought out and unique an attempt the Rubins have made to represent South Asia. My favorite part of the tour was the ‘om’ room. It was really peaceful to just sit down there and listen to the meditation. The part where we put our hands on the wall and listen to the chants was also a great feature. During an orientation dinner at Brooklyn College a neonatologist gave a presentation talking about the connection between meditation and recovery from surgery. He focused on the Rubin Museum and talked about how it shows the meditative culture of the Himalayan people. He even takes his medical students to the Rubin Museum because he himself is a volunteer there! Because of this prior history, it was even more satisfying to visit the museum. Overall, it was refreshing and assuring to see that such an unique culture from a different part of the world is preserved, respected and revered in this land.