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Sunday: Clark, Moonlight, 413 Bistro
May. 28th, 2023 11:00 pmThe three of us went to the Clark today. We spent about an hour and a half, which is more or less A.’s current maximum time at a museum. We had lunch at Moonlight, which has not changed (look, prices are higher, but it’s been over 20 years so what does one expect); I had breakfast for lunch and it was delightful.
We had dinner at 413 Bistro. I had the brussel sprouts and the calamari, and I had an old fashioned and a manhattan. All was wonderful. It was super quiet, and also it was 5 pm on a Sunday so what does on expect.
I’ve been harshing on Impressionists for decades now, but today I figured I was stuck at the Clark anyway, so let’s do a little experimenting. I basically went to the center of each room, and turned in a slow circle, and used what I got from that to decide whether to further adjust distance to fully appreciate various artworks. Primary observation: museums really do hang these things wrong. Some — like a Sargent that shows a sharp perspective on an alley — are too low to properly appreciate the effect the artist has gone to some trouble to create. It should be higher. Much. Higher. It wasn’t the only one, either. Others require you to be a fair ways back, and the Clark put some sculpture right in the way. Annoying. I mean, trip hazard if you are trying to back up, but I’m smart enough to not make that mistake. You can move side to side, but some of these things have an optimum viewing angle that is to one particular side at a particular angle. Plopped sculpture down in a way that blocks the optimum viewing angle is just a fail.
I definitely should harsh on Impressionists less. When properly viewed, quite a lot of this stuff really does have delightful reflections that include a great deal of wonderful detail. Most of it pops out in a super cool three dimensional effect if you can get the right distance and angle — the ones that don’t pop correctly but look like they should may be lit incorrectly. I don’t know enough to be sure if there are other factors as well.
Altho I will note that there’s something really off about the bowl those apples were in. Either Renoir got the shape wrong or … I dunno. People seem to like it well enough, but it grates. The apples are fantastic tho.
Interesting to revisit the Clark after so long. It is still an unpleasant people environment. As R. put it, it is “tres serieuse”. Not wrong and sorry about the missing accent.
ETA: Totally forgot to mention when I blogged this after returning home, but I’ve had tea the next morning (May 30) which does help.
The exit the museum art of note at the Clark is a dead, upside down tree sculpture with a new tree (sculpture) growing up from its roots. The Clark kinda looks like a bomb shelter, and its location was driven — so I was told a couple decades ago, but never checked! — due to the combination of it being accessible (sorta) to both NYC and Boston visitors but also being far enough from each to perhaps survive the nuclear event we all feared back then. What an upside down set of priorities, to want to save the art, vs. people. Art without people obviously has no meaning, and while there has been a great deal of wishful thinking about perhaps we could get a different set of people, well, none of that has panned out so far, and also why would those people want our art? Would they even recognize it as art. The tree growing from the roots is a trite form of hope — hope that something new could grow from something as dead as … whatever the dead tree represents? Har de har har. Could be us. Could be the museum. Could be the art in the museum. I neither know nor care; it made me laugh on the way out of the Clark and that’s worth a lot.
Also, I am reasonably certain the artist thought through the probability of the new growth toppling the dead, upside tree and branches, thus killing the new tree, unless everything is absolutely perfectly balanced and there is no wind. This is almost certainly the point.
We had dinner at 413 Bistro. I had the brussel sprouts and the calamari, and I had an old fashioned and a manhattan. All was wonderful. It was super quiet, and also it was 5 pm on a Sunday so what does on expect.
I’ve been harshing on Impressionists for decades now, but today I figured I was stuck at the Clark anyway, so let’s do a little experimenting. I basically went to the center of each room, and turned in a slow circle, and used what I got from that to decide whether to further adjust distance to fully appreciate various artworks. Primary observation: museums really do hang these things wrong. Some — like a Sargent that shows a sharp perspective on an alley — are too low to properly appreciate the effect the artist has gone to some trouble to create. It should be higher. Much. Higher. It wasn’t the only one, either. Others require you to be a fair ways back, and the Clark put some sculpture right in the way. Annoying. I mean, trip hazard if you are trying to back up, but I’m smart enough to not make that mistake. You can move side to side, but some of these things have an optimum viewing angle that is to one particular side at a particular angle. Plopped sculpture down in a way that blocks the optimum viewing angle is just a fail.
I definitely should harsh on Impressionists less. When properly viewed, quite a lot of this stuff really does have delightful reflections that include a great deal of wonderful detail. Most of it pops out in a super cool three dimensional effect if you can get the right distance and angle — the ones that don’t pop correctly but look like they should may be lit incorrectly. I don’t know enough to be sure if there are other factors as well.
Altho I will note that there’s something really off about the bowl those apples were in. Either Renoir got the shape wrong or … I dunno. People seem to like it well enough, but it grates. The apples are fantastic tho.
Interesting to revisit the Clark after so long. It is still an unpleasant people environment. As R. put it, it is “tres serieuse”. Not wrong and sorry about the missing accent.
ETA: Totally forgot to mention when I blogged this after returning home, but I’ve had tea the next morning (May 30) which does help.
The exit the museum art of note at the Clark is a dead, upside down tree sculpture with a new tree (sculpture) growing up from its roots. The Clark kinda looks like a bomb shelter, and its location was driven — so I was told a couple decades ago, but never checked! — due to the combination of it being accessible (sorta) to both NYC and Boston visitors but also being far enough from each to perhaps survive the nuclear event we all feared back then. What an upside down set of priorities, to want to save the art, vs. people. Art without people obviously has no meaning, and while there has been a great deal of wishful thinking about perhaps we could get a different set of people, well, none of that has panned out so far, and also why would those people want our art? Would they even recognize it as art. The tree growing from the roots is a trite form of hope — hope that something new could grow from something as dead as … whatever the dead tree represents? Har de har har. Could be us. Could be the museum. Could be the art in the museum. I neither know nor care; it made me laugh on the way out of the Clark and that’s worth a lot.
Also, I am reasonably certain the artist thought through the probability of the new growth toppling the dead, upside tree and branches, thus killing the new tree, unless everything is absolutely perfectly balanced and there is no wind. This is almost certainly the point.