Brooklyn Museum of Art

After my normal morning routine at the apartment (working out, construction watch, lunch with Dan), I set out in late afternoon to see what there was to see at the Brooklyn Museum of Art.



I really do love going there. It's an easy subway ride away- just three blocks to the Wall Street station and the 2/3 train to Brooklyn. It takes about fifteen minutes, and I read part of a newspaper or a Chekhov story, until we reach the Eastern Pkwy-Bklyn Museum stop. The subway station has these cool museum-style carvings and plaster masks on the walls, and the museum is right at the top of the stairs.

Good thing too! Brrrrrr, it was windy and chilly today.

It certainly wasn't crowded on this quiet December Wednesday afternoon, though I got to the museum late- many folk had probably already come and gone.

I like to focus on the special exhibits when I visit a large, undifferentiated museum like this one. I glance at the brochure at the desk where you pay for your ticket, and pick one or two exhibits I think I'll like. On this visit, I had paid my entrance fee, dropped my coat at the coatcheck, and headed off down the corridor in search of enlightenment all withing five minutes of entering the lobby.....

I truly lost myself in "Brushed with Light: American Landscape Watercolors from the Collection". Many famous names were shown here, including Edward Hopper's breakthrough painting (yes, in watercolor!) Mansard Roof. It was entered in a watercolor contest hosted by the Brooklyn Museum in 1923, and they purchased it for their permanent collection. It remains one of the few paintings of his they own. Winslow Homer had some real beauts too, including Homosassa River- lovely.

My brochure said there was a small special exhibit of Egyptian art, so after I finished seeing every single watercolor in "Brushed with Light", I headed upstairs. The Brooklyn museum, like the Met, has a wonderful collection of Egyptian artifacts. Though the special exhibit didn't interest me overly (artifacts demonstrating the importance of magic in the Egyptian world), I found myself wandering amid the regular collection right up until the final bell. My mind rattled around a bit as I looked at piece after piece of art dated 1200 B.C., 1340 B.C., etc. The metalwork and sculpting was all quite intricate, and the subjects too real. Makes you really understand, when you look at these ancient things, how little people change, even as the details of their lives vary from generation to generation and culture to culture.

They had to practically drag me out of the gallery at 5pm.