I am happy to announce that I now am a member of the visitor services team at Laumeier Sculpture Park. It is the most recent in my assortment of part-time jobs as I continue toward my goal of the permanent museum collections job. Laumeier is an amazing institution that is very different from anywhere I have ever worked before. As an added bonus, it is accredited by the American Association of Museums, which considering the outdoor nature of the park, is very impressive.
I was attracted by its accreditation status and the environment of the museum. The vast majority of the artworks are outside, with some on display in the five indoor galleries. The collection includes and has included many big name artists, including Donald Judd, Andy Goldsworthy, Ursula Von Rydingsvard, Mark di Suvero, and Ernest Trova. All artworks are thoughtfully placed throughout the park grounds, in the field or in the woods. It's always fun to explore nature and art together.
I work weekends as a Museum Services Associate, and it’s quite cool because I am included on the employee contact webpage. That's a first for me and I am quite tickled by it. The position also comes with a lot of responsibility. I work under the direction of the Museum Services Manager and I share my duties with a second Museum Services Associate. Today is only my second day, but so far so good. I like it here.
Now you must be asking yourself: Is this crazy lady working at the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, the Missouri History Museum, and Laumeier Sculpture Park? Does she sleep? Does she live on a diet of coffee beans and lattés to maintain her drive? The answer is nope; I hate coffee. But I have actually resigned one of my part-time jobs, with July 4th being my last day. After five years of working the Pulitzer I decided it was time to move on. I was seeking a job where I had more responsibility and could gain more administrative/managerial experience. Laumeier meets these needs and the Pulitzer, while a great experience, was not a place where I could get those opportunities. I wish them well, I will miss all of my friends and co-workers, and I will be back for plenty of visits. It was just time to go.
So here I am at the start of another adventure. I anticipate that it will be another great experience and I am very happy with my current career choice. The only thing that would make me happier is a full-time job, but I have a positive feeling. I hope it's only a matter of time. And when I do get a Monday through Firday job, I will still be able to work weekends at Laumeier. So yeah, I am a bit crazy.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Monday, June 18, 2012
Grand Pianos at the Pulitzer
Last Tuesday afternoon I was scheduled to attend a concert rehearsal at the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts in my capacity as a gallery attendant. I had done this before, so I was expecting an easy task where I could do a bit of recreational reading and hear a spot of music. The Pulitzer and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra have done many of these collaborative shows in order to promote contemporary art and music. The Pulitzer building provides a great modern space and surprisingly amazing acoustics for such an event, and they are very popular with our visitors. In fact, the concert series from this past weekend was sold out.
So, I went down into the Lower Gallery where I found two grand pianos patiently waiting to be played. I at once developed more enthusiasm for how I was about to spend the afternoon. Though I never excelled myself at playing keyboard instruments, the piano and the harpsichord happen to be my two favorites. The piano for its stoic figure trouncing out delightful pulses of sound, and the harpsichord for being more playful and sending out pleasant vibrations in its plucky way. When the pianist arrived with the event coordinator, I sat up and listened. From the moment he began playing I replaced my bookmark and shut my historical non-fiction book, How The Scots Invented the Modern World, and that is how it remained. Sorry Scotland, but I did give you a year of my life, so you can wait until this rehearsal is over.
First the pianist was trying to figure out which of the two grands to utilize for the concert. Option number one was well tuned and sounded great. Option number two also sounded amazing in addition to having a much more delightful feel to it. The sound was warmer and the reverberating notes just hit my chest in a more agreeable way than the first. The two men discussed and compared the two pianos, and I was thrilled when the pianist turned to me and asked for my opinion. It just made me feel like I had a larger role in the whole process. I told him the second, and they were both in agreement.
Then the pianist began to play. The piece is an approximately one hour long composition entitled The People Will Never Be Defeated! by Frederic Rzewski. I had never heard this music before and I was not even familiar with the composer, but by the time the pianist hit those final keys I felt I knew him. I think perhaps Rzewski was trying to tell a story. It starts with a march that fragments off into a series of rapid fire notes that have the qualities of both a nuclear physicist's mathematical equations and the unpredictable trajectories of shrapnel. In other words, it's complicated and it's all over the place. It kind of sounded like someone took the sheet music of Beethoven, Bach, and Debussy and shot it out of a cannon. Then someone sent an intern around to gather up all the paper fragments, glued them together, and then increased the tempo by ten times. The pianist's ability to play this piece is awe-inspiring since it was so fast and so mentally and physically difficult to play. I think I may have even seen smoke rising off his head at one point. In the end, the piece returns to the nationalistic melody of the march, but includes many of the complex patterns of notes that dominated the middle of the piece. I think a perfect analogy for this music is that of a boy who grows up within a safe and set structure, then he becomes a young man and goes off into the world trying anything and everything that is new, finally, once he has matured he returns to the safety and comfort of home bringing all his experiences with him. That's why I say the piece makes me feel like a know Rzewski. I have to ask myself, did he compose his autobiography in musical form?
I only got to watch the rehearsal, since I did not work the concert, but I feel I got the better of the two shows (though the pianist says the actual performance was the best he'd ever played it). I think I got the superior show because I got to interact with the pianist, discuss the piece, hear certain parts more than once, and help pick the piano. That just tickled me, really. Very cool. Experiences like this are the reason why I have always enjoyed working at the Pulitzer. Music in the Pulitzer is unlike any music you have ever heard. And others have noticed this as well, which is why the concerts sold out months ago.
Have you ever attended a musical performance at a museum or gallery? How do you feel the environment and the music compliment each other?
So, I went down into the Lower Gallery where I found two grand pianos patiently waiting to be played. I at once developed more enthusiasm for how I was about to spend the afternoon. Though I never excelled myself at playing keyboard instruments, the piano and the harpsichord happen to be my two favorites. The piano for its stoic figure trouncing out delightful pulses of sound, and the harpsichord for being more playful and sending out pleasant vibrations in its plucky way. When the pianist arrived with the event coordinator, I sat up and listened. From the moment he began playing I replaced my bookmark and shut my historical non-fiction book, How The Scots Invented the Modern World, and that is how it remained. Sorry Scotland, but I did give you a year of my life, so you can wait until this rehearsal is over.
First the pianist was trying to figure out which of the two grands to utilize for the concert. Option number one was well tuned and sounded great. Option number two also sounded amazing in addition to having a much more delightful feel to it. The sound was warmer and the reverberating notes just hit my chest in a more agreeable way than the first. The two men discussed and compared the two pianos, and I was thrilled when the pianist turned to me and asked for my opinion. It just made me feel like I had a larger role in the whole process. I told him the second, and they were both in agreement.
Then the pianist began to play. The piece is an approximately one hour long composition entitled The People Will Never Be Defeated! by Frederic Rzewski. I had never heard this music before and I was not even familiar with the composer, but by the time the pianist hit those final keys I felt I knew him. I think perhaps Rzewski was trying to tell a story. It starts with a march that fragments off into a series of rapid fire notes that have the qualities of both a nuclear physicist's mathematical equations and the unpredictable trajectories of shrapnel. In other words, it's complicated and it's all over the place. It kind of sounded like someone took the sheet music of Beethoven, Bach, and Debussy and shot it out of a cannon. Then someone sent an intern around to gather up all the paper fragments, glued them together, and then increased the tempo by ten times. The pianist's ability to play this piece is awe-inspiring since it was so fast and so mentally and physically difficult to play. I think I may have even seen smoke rising off his head at one point. In the end, the piece returns to the nationalistic melody of the march, but includes many of the complex patterns of notes that dominated the middle of the piece. I think a perfect analogy for this music is that of a boy who grows up within a safe and set structure, then he becomes a young man and goes off into the world trying anything and everything that is new, finally, once he has matured he returns to the safety and comfort of home bringing all his experiences with him. That's why I say the piece makes me feel like a know Rzewski. I have to ask myself, did he compose his autobiography in musical form?
I only got to watch the rehearsal, since I did not work the concert, but I feel I got the better of the two shows (though the pianist says the actual performance was the best he'd ever played it). I think I got the superior show because I got to interact with the pianist, discuss the piece, hear certain parts more than once, and help pick the piano. That just tickled me, really. Very cool. Experiences like this are the reason why I have always enjoyed working at the Pulitzer. Music in the Pulitzer is unlike any music you have ever heard. And others have noticed this as well, which is why the concerts sold out months ago.
Have you ever attended a musical performance at a museum or gallery? How do you feel the environment and the music compliment each other?
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
An Afternoon at Laumeier
On Sunday I decided to spend a couple hours hiking around one of St. Louis' nicest outdoor locations, Laumeier Sculpture Park. Laumeier is home to many unique and incredible artworks that populate the park's nature trail, fields, and area around the museum shop and indoor gallery. As I drove out there I was expecting some time to myself; a simple and quiet excursion with local fauna and some great, larger-than-life sculptures. So imagine my surprise when I found myself as one of the many attendees of the PNC Arts Alive: Discover Laumeier Festival. The afternoon turned out to be a lot more fun and interesting than I had originally intended. Not only did I enjoy the festival, I also got to reconnect with an old friend who was volunteering at the event. He and I got some henna tattoos, one of the many free and fun activities at the festival, and then I got my own personalized tour. There is nothing like a walk in the woods where the inhabitants are the site-specific creations of artists' imaginations with your own guide. I would compare it to Willy Wonka taking you around his chocolate factory, except at Laumeier I imagine they would frown on it if I tried to eat any of the artworks.
One of my favorite pieces at Laumeier, which my friend and I interacted with and talked about, is actually a bridge by Dan Graham entitled Triangular Bridge Over Water. This piece is really interesting because it plays a number of tricks on the eyes. As you step onto the iron grating of the structure your gaze it drawn downward to the water, which is viewed through numerous small rectangles, like a grid. While staring at the water babbling passed the assurance of solid ground melts away. Once you look up and rub that optical trick from your eyes there is another. To one side there is a second grid, no longer below your feet but vertical and rising over you at an angle, with much larger rectangular sections. It looks like multiple windows stacked on top of each other and it divides the landscape into categories. Like the artist is trying to organize the view for you into individual blocks, meant to be taken in one at a time. This view is less disorienting than the first and makes you feel like the world has been put back into its proper place; nicely packaged and organized in a way that makes visual sense. Just as you are feeling at peace with the world again, you turn 180 degrees and are met by four panels of two-way mirrors that reflect you, the grating and stream below, the grid and landscape behind, and still allow you to view the landscape in front. The eyes try to focus on something but they really can't. All you can see are leaves forming a human silhouette that moves as you do and as you don't, because it waves as the branches dance in the breeze and shimmers as the sunlight bounces off the stream. The world that surrounds this silhouette is made up of large grids, small grids, no grids, leaves, water, branches, sky, tinted glass, and the occasional squirrel. Dan Graham's bridge is marvelous. What appears to be a simple conduit from one side of a stream to the other is actually a composite of frames that completely reshapes how the viewer sees the landscape.
My other favorite piece at Laumeier is also out hiding in the woods. This is a piece by the artist Mary Miss called Pool Complex: Orchard Valley and it touches on a lot of archeological themes and focuses on the passage of time. Mary Miss actually incorporated an abandoned pool that was built back in the early 20th century when Laumeier was not a public park but instead someone's private land. The family that originally built the pool also incorporated a kitchen and dance floor, and the site was often used for entertaining. The artist built several wooden structures that invite visitors to circumvent and explore the area surrounding the original pool. Her attraction to the site was the ruinous feel of this old, cement-lined hole. Like so many cultures that have built up on top of the architectural remains of their past, Mary Miss wanted to redevelop what she viewed as an archeological site. The material she used, mostly wood, is not treated with any type of protective coating, so it too will reflect the passage of time as it ages and decays. Her point, I believe, is that time eventually erodes away everything we create, sometimes with the exception of the basic forms and foundations which are buried. Buried and lost, or perhaps buried with the hope of eventual rediscovery. She calls our attention back to the past and how it shapes our present and maybe even our future. That's pretty deep for a six-foot shallow swimming pool. It's an amazing piece. I also just want to add that the name Mary Miss is an incredibly endearing name and makes me like the piece more.
There is so much more art to be discovered and explored out at Laumeier Sculpture Park. In addition to the permanent pieces they also put on rotating exhibitions, both in the indoor galleries and out in the park. The current exhibition is Camp Out: Finding Home In An Unstable World. Tied into this exhibition are programs and activities, like the festival I happily stumbled into, and I already have plans to return for the September 7th campfire chat with the Camp Out artist Michael Rakowtiz (with the added plus of ghost stories), as well as the September 8th-9th overnight in Laumeier. Setting up a tent and toasting some s'mores next to a work by Donald Judd!? Yes Please!!!
Have you ever visited a sculpture park or garden? How did you feel about viewing art out in nature rather than in a traditional museum?
One of my favorite pieces at Laumeier, which my friend and I interacted with and talked about, is actually a bridge by Dan Graham entitled Triangular Bridge Over Water. This piece is really interesting because it plays a number of tricks on the eyes. As you step onto the iron grating of the structure your gaze it drawn downward to the water, which is viewed through numerous small rectangles, like a grid. While staring at the water babbling passed the assurance of solid ground melts away. Once you look up and rub that optical trick from your eyes there is another. To one side there is a second grid, no longer below your feet but vertical and rising over you at an angle, with much larger rectangular sections. It looks like multiple windows stacked on top of each other and it divides the landscape into categories. Like the artist is trying to organize the view for you into individual blocks, meant to be taken in one at a time. This view is less disorienting than the first and makes you feel like the world has been put back into its proper place; nicely packaged and organized in a way that makes visual sense. Just as you are feeling at peace with the world again, you turn 180 degrees and are met by four panels of two-way mirrors that reflect you, the grating and stream below, the grid and landscape behind, and still allow you to view the landscape in front. The eyes try to focus on something but they really can't. All you can see are leaves forming a human silhouette that moves as you do and as you don't, because it waves as the branches dance in the breeze and shimmers as the sunlight bounces off the stream. The world that surrounds this silhouette is made up of large grids, small grids, no grids, leaves, water, branches, sky, tinted glass, and the occasional squirrel. Dan Graham's bridge is marvelous. What appears to be a simple conduit from one side of a stream to the other is actually a composite of frames that completely reshapes how the viewer sees the landscape.
My other favorite piece at Laumeier is also out hiding in the woods. This is a piece by the artist Mary Miss called Pool Complex: Orchard Valley and it touches on a lot of archeological themes and focuses on the passage of time. Mary Miss actually incorporated an abandoned pool that was built back in the early 20th century when Laumeier was not a public park but instead someone's private land. The family that originally built the pool also incorporated a kitchen and dance floor, and the site was often used for entertaining. The artist built several wooden structures that invite visitors to circumvent and explore the area surrounding the original pool. Her attraction to the site was the ruinous feel of this old, cement-lined hole. Like so many cultures that have built up on top of the architectural remains of their past, Mary Miss wanted to redevelop what she viewed as an archeological site. The material she used, mostly wood, is not treated with any type of protective coating, so it too will reflect the passage of time as it ages and decays. Her point, I believe, is that time eventually erodes away everything we create, sometimes with the exception of the basic forms and foundations which are buried. Buried and lost, or perhaps buried with the hope of eventual rediscovery. She calls our attention back to the past and how it shapes our present and maybe even our future. That's pretty deep for a six-foot shallow swimming pool. It's an amazing piece. I also just want to add that the name Mary Miss is an incredibly endearing name and makes me like the piece more.
There is so much more art to be discovered and explored out at Laumeier Sculpture Park. In addition to the permanent pieces they also put on rotating exhibitions, both in the indoor galleries and out in the park. The current exhibition is Camp Out: Finding Home In An Unstable World. Tied into this exhibition are programs and activities, like the festival I happily stumbled into, and I already have plans to return for the September 7th campfire chat with the Camp Out artist Michael Rakowtiz (with the added plus of ghost stories), as well as the September 8th-9th overnight in Laumeier. Setting up a tent and toasting some s'mores next to a work by Donald Judd!? Yes Please!!!
Have you ever visited a sculpture park or garden? How did you feel about viewing art out in nature rather than in a traditional museum?
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