Brent was off of work for President's Day and Liesel had been requested for a study at the University of Chicago. I decided to sneak off with her and make a day of hanging out downtown. After making another chunk of money for college, we headed to The Art Institute of Chicago. Turns out Liesel was free and I was able to score a reduced price because I'm an Illinois resident. It was a good start to our time at the gallery!
I wanted to hit as many highlights as possible and see how Liesel reacted to them. When we got to American Gothic, I started to explain to Liesel how it was painted on wood and the woman was the artists sister and the man was his dentist... Liesel stopped me and told me I didn't have to tell her those things... she could just read the plaque like everybody else.
We headed to the Monet's and Manet's (somehow missing the Degas!) and stopped for a while at Sunday in the Park. Liesel and I played a little game of I Spy which was fun because every time I look at that painting I find something new. Liesel was so excited to point out the monkey; the guard nearby became clearly on edge. I think Liesel came to love Chagall's Windows as much as I do.
Many guards told us to try out the kid's center which piqued Liesel's interest so we made our way there. It was SO lame!!! This was more of a baby center for tiny toddlers than for grade school kids. They did have a table set up so the kids could make their own puppet and Liesel was engrossed. There was no cell reception so I was bored to tears. I begged Liesel to leave so I could catch the Pollack and the new interactive installation everyone was talking about. Finally, she finished her unicorn puppet and we left.
The Pollock was like seeing an old friend and with time on our meter ticking away, I almost skipped the installation, but it wasn't far so we decided to make it our last stop before lunch. I'm so glad we did, because oh WOW! I mean, WOW!
In the simplest terms, it was just plastic strings hung from a grid overhead. People moved through it and all those strings moved along with them, but not long after they'd been left alone, they swung right back into their place of perfectly neat rows and columns. I loved how living things unsettled the perfection... which somehow created an even more beautiful perfection, only to end up where they's begun. Sort of like the cycle of life.
Liesel and I walked through those strings, gathered them, spun around in the middle (turns out that was a bad idea- a little girl watched us and spun until her hair was completely tangled), and walked out again to watch everything just rest in it's proper place. Am I sounding a bit too enchanted with a bunch of plastic strings? I just don't know if words can do it justice. I loved this installation so, so, SO much! So did Liesel.
Michelangelo said "The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection." I believe Liesel and I encountered that today.
We capped off our day with some lunch in the museum cafe. I had so much fun talking to her about the art work we'd seen. Apparently the ones that made the biggest impression on her were the ancient Greek vases which were made hundreds of years B.C. She couldn't fathom much of anything being in existence before Christ, let alone hundreds of years before he was even born. Isn't she just the cutest lunch date ever?
We particularly enjoyed the fancy schmancy dessert (a sort of banana bread with whipped cream and ice cream concoction. After our brush with culture, we headed back home to face the everydayness of our lives once again. I'm glad we snatched this bit of time to do this. it was worth every penny.
