As soon as I walked up the subway stairs, I couldn’t take my eyes off of it, the Brooklyn Museum.

The contrast between the front portion’s Greek influence and the main lobby’s modernness contributed to the “art” of the museum. Not only does the museum contain art, it is art. Many people think that a museum is a mere vessel that contains art, but rarely do they acknowledge the actual architecture and the artistic thought process that goes into the bricks and mortar of the Brooklyn Museum. When I walked into the hall what immediately caught my eye, other than the enormous screen conveying the texts of the excited Macaulay youth, was the symmetry of the room and how it was set up. It was the perfect place to hang works of art. Wherever you look, you see art. Look up, the ceiling looks as if it belongs in the hall of a king. Look down, and you see tiles- but what’s under it? Lights, lights that illuminate the entire hall.

And then there are the paintings and sculptures. The  main attraction.

One of the first paintings my group visited was called St. Joseph and the Flowering Rod. We gravitated toward this painting mainly because of our group’s heavy influence from the Christian Church. That and the painting showed an emotion that just brought people to it. We analyzed the painting with our background in Christianity, but it proved to be difficult. Sometimes it is better just to look at a work objectively. We then switched to the art background that we gained from going to public school in Long Island. We looked at the brush strokes and how they coincided with the emotions that were meant to be conveyed in the painting. Every part of the painting is there for a reason. The mere placement of light can change the context of the story we create from a heavenly standpoint to an earthly, more secular standpoint.  Which was clearly the case in the painting. The lighting from above  created a sense of God looking down on him.that coupled with his emotion made it seem as if he was in an emotional battle with the Lord.

The museum was a great experience overall. Both the paintings and architecture are a must see not only for the people who live in Brooklyn but for the whole world.

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