Dia:Beacon

While walking into the art exhibit, I felt no real connection to the art there.
I’ve seen art before, and it never really speaks to me.
Then I saw the Sol LeWitt series.
It was so interesting. I saw math and sequences being used in ways I never expected, and it appealed to me greatly.
I then moved on to the holes, and felt such a weird effect of negativity and darkness. It was scary and sad at the same time. But the shapes appealed to me. I don’t know why, but the shapes were familiar and inviting. They seemed so elementary that I felt that nothing could be wrong with them. But something was off with them, which caused the darkness and negativity.
As I moved on, I wandered into the strings exhibit, which was interesting. I particularly enjoyed that the art was transparent, that it had similar views at similar angles, and yet, at other angles it was entirely different. Seeing it from the side made me see one string which really demonstrated to me the idea of dimensions. You have one string, or the first dimension. Then you see it from the front and you see four strings, or the second dimension. But if you looked at the ones on the walls, you would notice yet another dimension. The third dimension was the one giving it volume.
And then, I saw the Robert Smithsons. I was troubled by the fact that the same person who made that beautiful spiral jetty could make such unsettling sculptures which involved such dangerous and hazardous materials, not to mention the fact that these objects give off such disturbing vibes of violence. I didn’t see how they could possibly compare. I could not connect creator to destroyer, but maybe that is just me.
I then moved on to the large Richard Serras, of which I loved, as everybody very well knows. I don’t know how to put it in words, but I just felt like it was home to me.
Finally, it was time to check out downstairs. I don’t know if I regret going downstairs, or just was disgusted from the exhibits down there.
It was really creepy down there and just really unpleasant. There were freaky images, strange videos, and distorted structures. I didn’t like it at all down there. It gave me such a strange and unpleasant vibe of freakiness. Also, the basement added some tension and some creepiness to the whole environment, which added to those feelings of disgust, etc.
The last exhibit that I wanted to comment about was the do-it-yourself art, which, thanks to Maryam, Anika, Sari, and Emily, I enjoyed greatly. Being a piece of art feels so much better than appreciating it. It reminded me a little bit of what it means to be a singer (again, only extremely loosely used). It reminded me of having fun with it, of improvising, making mistakes, and truly enjoying what I am doing (with our cantors, we can definitely improvise and sometimes will need to to achieve the right atmosphere).That definitely was one of the highlights of the trip.
Lastly, I wished to speak about the ballet.
Unfortunately, I could not possibly fathom this as art. I found it more humorous than beautiful, but maybe that was the goal. Maybe the art was in the embarrassing of the artist. I could not relate to anything that happened in that performance.
Maybe I’m still too shallow.
I could not see that as art.

But, as you can glean from my comments, overall, I enjoyed the trip.

Joey Kabariti