Exploration of the MET

As someone who loves museums, this Macaulay Seminar allowed me to explore a museum I probably would have never entered on my own will. I have never been a big fan of looking too deeply in art. I was always one of those people who just looked at it for it’s physical appearance and never thought too deeply as to why the artist made it or the underlying meaning behind art. However over the course of this semester, I’ve began to become more comfortable with art and the depth behind it. This is when I decided that I would have to see the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a museum revered for it’s great art collection by New Yorkers. On October 28th, I met up with Maryam and Victoria who have been to the MET several times already. Others also joined us to explore this museum.

The first thing that caught my eye was the size of the museum. It gave a grandeur feeling with the stairs and pillars that surrounded the entrance of the building. It reminded me of my first encounter with the Central Library. The inside of the MET did not disappoint me either, with statues everywhere and huge paintings. It was also the day the roof would be opened so I’m glad I got to experience it.From the roof you could see beyond the horizon and I could see the trees that surrounded the city and the sky even looked more clear. The city seemed so distant compared to when the days when I would be in the middle of it.

One of the exhibits that impressed me the most was the one with Greek and Roman art. I’ve always been a fan of Greek and Roman mythology so it was interesting to see other aspects of their culture. Compared to the other exhibits I saw, it was the one where it seemed most pure. Everything was mostly white and there were pillars everywhere.  Besides the statues, there were a lot of vases. Many of them had similar color and patterns yet all of them were distinctly differently. Each vase gave a unique feel and it was amazing to see how the artist was able to create so many innovative ideas with the same one idea. Below is a picture of how this exhibit looked when I first walked in and you can see how it just blows you away with its beauty and grandeur.

Another exhibit that peaked my attention was the one with all the musical instruments. The gallery brought together instruments from all over the world into one room. As someone who loves music and has played several instruments, I really enjoyed learning about other istruments that existed outside of America. One thing I saw was this instrument called the Koto from Japan. What I found interesting was that to me it looked like a combination of the guitar and piano. It had the shape of a keyboard but there were no keys but strings on top. It would be like played the guitar on your lap. The instrument however compared to the guitar seemed more elegant and classical. Another instrument was the Yangqin from China. It was similar to the Koto but had a lot more strings and it was also weirdly shaped. It makes me wonder how one would play it and what kind of sound would be produced.  Below is a picture of the Yangqin.

Another gallery that blew me away was the Asian Art gallery. I was really impressed with how they created it since I’m Asian myself and it really made me feel like apart of my culture was there. One thing I enjoyed looking at was this piece called Gathering Water Chestnuts. It was a drawing on top of a fan.

It was just different for me to see art on this type of surface. It wasn’t surprising me for me but seeing it up close was just different since I don’t have anything like this at home. All my grandpa collected was usually paintings on scrolls. We can see how delicate the artist worked on this from the small brushstrokes. The scenery seems to come out at you. The brushstrokes are really detailed from the trees to the rocks. I feel like the artist did a good job combining nature with the house. It’s as if they gradually became one. Compare to the other forms of art I saw this one wasn’t as grandeur and gave me a more soothing feeling.

There were a lot of other notable exhibits that I saw that day like the Egyptian and American art. I really enjoyed exploring the museum and I felt like I didn’t have enough time to absorb all the art I encountered. In the future I’ll probably go to the MET again to look at things more clearly.