![\"Gallery](\"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/144\/2016\/05\/simple-smile.png\")
<\/p>\nPhilosophy is a bit hard. To me, studying it can be compared to the experience of holding too many marbles in your hands. Some of them slip out, and as you’re reaching down to scoop them back up, another few fall, and so on and so forth. Which is not a static quality–it’s a matter of honing fine motor skills.
\nThere is something to be said about that, though. In the spaces where the “-ists” and “-isms” should go are spaces that I bridge with other things–more personal ideas, I guess. Whatever that means. But. This weekend is Berlin’s Gallery Weekend. I’ve already spent one day meandering, and will continue to do so today. But I’ve been thinking about the experience of the gallery.
\nOne walks in and finds a dense informative blurb about the artist and their work, serving as a guide of sorts. These blurbs are so dense because they are packed with dense terminology. I have mixed feelings about them. I don’t like being told what to see from the very beginning in heavy academic language, yet I also feel I need to be. More marbles are added to my pockets, and I don’t usually want that. I have plenty already.<\/p>\n
All of this is difficult for me to articulate.<\/p>\n
This isn’t a new idea, but contemporary art is borne of the countless “-isms” floating around in our atmosphere, a child of philosophy. One could argue that all art is the fruit of that wordy womb.
\nBut galleries. Galleries are a site of intellectual activity, oftentimes, simultaneously self-conscious and ignorant of this fact. Self-conscious insofor as it employs these dense ideas; unconscious because it is also the mere act of experiencing artwork. And of course, museums are like this–however, they are built for the masses and depend on tourists and visitors. The gallery is exclusive, painstaking, and nit-picky. The gallery is not built for a group of bumbling tourists, but for the intellects to gather with wine and one another to exchange their philosophical marbles. I’m not sure if this is a criticism, an us\/them situation, because I also partake in the activity (albeit without the plastic cup wine) for the joy of discussing art as it is, in the moment, with a pal. It’s good brain exercise. I get to play with my favorite marbles and listen to the others jangle in the background and on the floor. <\/p>\n
I guess my issue is the delineation between the exclusive, intellectual, boujie qualities of the gallery, and the understanding and non-judgmental museum. The former (aggressively?) insists upon its hand-picked artists and their philosophical abstractions and expressions, the latter merely offers a name and date. A clash of direction, of space. And of course, time. It’s funny, the museum makes me want to stay and think hard, and the gallery makes me want to scan and leave. Why is that? All of these ideas will be kept in mind when I go today to more.<\/p>\n
I’d love your feedback, and maybe help with molding these ideas a bit more! Bitte <\/p>\n
To be continued, with pictures…. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Philosophy is a bit hard. To me, studying it can be compared to the experience of holding too many marbles in your hands. Some of them slip out, and as you’re reaching down to scoop them back up, another few fall, and so on and so forth. Which is not a static quality–it’s a matter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3316,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"geo":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3316"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.evergreen.edu\/ofbloodandbeauty\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}