Brilliance at Beacon

Dia: Beacon, I must say, was extraordinary.

The journey up there, to me, felt magical. From the metropolis of the city, we journeyed to the picturesque hillside of New York. The change in scenery made the Metro-North become the Hogwarts Express for me. I felt as if I was about to enter a surreal world and feel, well, enchanted. I was not at all disappointed.

Dia: Beacon was larger than I expected. It was like a maze with each corner and turn presenting a new surprise. I must admit some of the exhibits were a bit strange. The halls with just the pure solid colors in the form of different geometric shapes and the random dates plastered on black canvases confused me. But, some of the exhibits were just simply brilliant.

Franz Erhard Walther’s Work as Action exhibit was extremely exciting. Sari, Aniqa and I were in the “white room” exhibit, as Connie so aptly named it, when I discovered that this exhibit was interactive. When the three of us first entered it, we thought it was just a display of mismatched items that were folded together. But, upon reading the pamphlet, we realized that the items in orange were actually usable, and, I must admit, I yelped a bit out of excitement. When we re-entered the exhibit, we did a number of activities from bumping our heads onto a headrest planted to the wall to putting a rather “fashionable” vest on to creating a box with five people. It was so creative, and the artist made us part of the art which was so different and unique from anything I have ever experienced.

Another exhibit that I thought was brilliant was the holes in the ground in the form of a cylinder, a triangular pyramid and a square box. It proves that art not only has to be standing up, as Sari so eloquently pointed out. Oh! The strings were amazing. At first, it looked like a mirror was somewhat placed in the middle of the hallways, but then you realize that it was an illusion. The question that was posed in everyone’s mind was what was the artwork? Was it the geometric alignment of the strings or the imagination of the viewer? Quite interesting to say the least.

The Richard Serra iron sculptures were amazing. I could not stop being in awe of them. I felt like I was in a Tim Burton movie moving in a constant spiral. It was brilliant, nothing less than brilliant. And, if you walked out the door in the back, you would have seen another brilliant part of the museum: the garden. It honestly felt like being in Alice in Wonderland with the trees being symmetrical to one another and the staircase slowly narrowing.

Lastly, Sol Lewitt’s exhibits simply dazzled me. His Drawing Series made me want to jump up and down out of excitement. The reason why? It was an EQUATION. Everything was an equation! It was paradise for me. I am a mathematics lover, and I was blown away. He drew his lines on the walls. DREW THEM. How much more meticulous can a man get? And everything was so precise. How is that even remotely possible? I have no idea. That exhibit was amazing. I would go back to Beacon and spend hours in those rooms studying those lines and graphs. Also, his directions were pretty ingenious, I must say.

I know that we went to Beacon mostly for the dance, but I hated it. I was so disturbed. It disturbed me to my core. The first lady frightened me to no end that I was becoming squeamish.

But all in all, Beacon was phenomenal. I would not mind going back up there again. I was so enthralled by it. It was just brilliant.