01.14.23
My parents came down to the city today. My mom brought one of her newer paintings up to my apartment to hang in a blank spot over my bed, then we all met my brother at the Guggenheim to see the Alex Katz show.
A security guard halfway up the rotunda keeps excitedly stopping passersby to point out a “Mona Lisa eye-following effect” on one of the pieces. He tells them to stand in a certain spot and keep their eyes on one of the figures as they mosey around it. He has a huge smile plastered on his face. It is clear to me that he is the sweetest man there ever was. The show gets better as you go up.
We pop into the galleries displaying Nick Cave pieces on our way back down. His soundsuits are incredible. My mom says she wishes the exhibit afforded people the opportunity to see them in motion, because it’s pretty spectacular. They remind me of the costuming and set dec in The Wiz.
The rest of the Nick Cave show is not as good. While some interlocked hands descending from the ceiling remind me of the scene in Labyrinth when Sarah falls down a hole where the walls are made of hands, and I tend to love anything that reminds me of something Jim Henson, I don’t like it very much. It’s a little disturbing in a way I find ineffective. I lean to my dad, who is looking at it next to me, and say, “I’m never buying an off-brand Barrel Of Monkeys again.” Everything other than the soundsuits just feels a little dumb. Around the corner there’s a sculpture of a screaming man’s head laying on a pile of folded American flag shirts. “Bit on the nose,” I joke to my brother. He shakes his head and says some people only seem to have one good idea.
Making our way back down, I pay more attention to which Katz pieces people are photographing. Whenever I see people looking at something on the street, I always turn to see what they’re looking at, to see if I think it’s worth looking at, too. I spent a lot of years intimidated by art, because my brother and mom are both artists and it just feels like they know a lot that I don’t. I didn’t want to voice an opinion and learn it was wrong. But at some point it occurred to me that I can just like or not like things. Some people are taking pictures of paintings I don’t really like, but what do I know? No one was photographing the ones I liked the most.
The security guard is still pointing out the eyes that follow you on our way down. He is as enthusiastic as ever. I hope he gets placed in that spot every day he works until the show closes.
