part 2 :: long weekend in berlin :: hamburger bahnhof

there was an open house at the hamburger bahnhof, which is the national art gallery, on the weekend we were there. that meant free admission! yay!

the bones of the old train station were visible and it made for some great spaces. there was lots of interactive art going on and gertraude even called her daughter to bring her grandson, who they knew would love it. they spent the rest of the afternoon there, after emmy and i went off to find some lunch.

eva fábregas made these enormous, tactile sculptural pieces that were in the main hall when you came in, but they were somehow cool and a little bit disturbing at the same time.

lots of little side rooms had interactive projects, where you could contribute. these bits of yarn made visual the connections and entanglements between people. 

american artist christina quarles was featured upstairs. she had curated the exhibition as well and there were all these cool elements involving screens and art on top of art that lent a cool and fresh perspective.

her own works were very bold and colorful and the orange vinyl laid over was really interesting, expanding the work beyond the border of the canvas.

the works behind the screens were part of the museum's collection and were chosen by christina to complement her work and all displayed behind these screens.

i hadn't seen her work before and found it quite thought-provoking.

there was an amazing exhibition of the work of fred sandback in the other wing and this picture by no means does it justice. it consisted of very simple lengths of yarn discreetly strung. you could walk into the middle of the works and it was weirdly moving in its simplicity. 

loved these giant flowers in the entrance to the "a collection for the 21st century" part of the exhibition. my brain had taken in a lot by then and i'll admit i didn't appreciate it as much as i maybe should have.

but this enormous ombre cloth was cool. but by then, i was getting "museum legs" and just needed to leave and sit down and let all of the visual impressions simmer in my mind. 

capturing the spirit of the times

copenhagen picture - 1983-89 - even the frame was handmade by the artist, otto frello

i went on saturday with our local creative group to an exhibition of the works of danish artist and illustrator otto frello at the museum in varde. i'd never heard of him but i intentionally didn't google him or look at the museum's website before we went. i wanted to have a totally fresh, unbiased first experience of seeing his works.

he was, for many years, an illustrator for a danish publisher and didn't start painting until he was in his 40s. he's now well into his 90s and still going strong. while his works weren't exactly my taste and not something i'd want hanging on my walls, i do think they were very interesting.

perhaps his most famous work is the copenhagen picture above. the woman at the museum told us that he had once bragged that there was nothing he couldn't paint and so someone asked if he could paint the spirit of the times. and he embarked on this painting of amagertorv in the heart of copenhagen, depicting the many layers of people who had passed through it over the years and years it's been there. from 17th century fishmongers to an 80s punker, times are all mixed and melded and present there in the picture. so while i wouldn't necessarily want it on my wall, even in poster form, i think it's quite a fascinating depiction of the imprints and layers of history that are left behind, whispering in a place, if we were to just listen attentively.

and i very much enjoyed the experience of just letting the impressions of something new wash over me, without any preconceived notions of what i would be seeing. it feels like with all of the information we are bombarded with all the time, it's hard to have such experiences - where it's just completely something fresh and new and we get to experience it for the first time. i'm going to be looking for more chances like that.

malevich's black square (1915, tho' this one was a version from 1923)

it was interesting to contrast with the experience i had of malevich's works at the tate modern a few weeks ago. there, i knew a great deal about the works and the history and the whole era in which they were produced and i appreciated them in a completely different way. a way that was, admittedly, probably much deeper than my otto frello experience. but that could also be because malevich himself was much deeper. looking at the black square today, it doesn't seem radical, but it was truly radical in its time. and as i stood before it, staring into its black depths, and feeling for a moment a sense of vertigo, i caught some spirit of those times.

it struck me that the way in which we experience art matters - whether naively or in an informed way. the malevich moved me much more. it was partially a matter of taste, but also a matter of knowledge and yes, also of talent. but then, the black square was valued at $60 million not that long ago and for one of frello's paintings at the museum, which was for sale, they were asking 300,000DKK ($53,000). a pretty penny for a living danish artist, but ultimately frello is no malevich. and while both experiences were interesting, give me malevich any day.

magic in the museum with iPhone photos

late-afternoon, energy flagging, i decided to go for a little walk for some fresh air and to clear my head. the office has a park-like campus along the oslo fjord and a short distance away is the henie-onstad modern art museum. i walked in that direction, thinking i'd just have a walk in the sculpture park and not go in, but for some reason, i was drawn inside. and happily, i learned that the museum is free on wednesdays!

first, i checked out the to be heard is to be seen exhibition, which featured paintings specially done directly on the walls and several interesting video installations, a sound installation and a rotating rhinestone-clad accordion. i wasn't supposed to take pictures, but since i was all alone, i sneaked out the iPhone and snapped some shots. they of course don't do it justice. even just the architecture of the place means it's a tremendous space, even without the art.

one of my favorite parts was a series of art-journal kind of pages featuring a poem by a scandinavian poet who i didn't know and whose name i failed to write down. this was my favorite page:

i like screaming i like my brain i like horses

in type, on ordinary paper and with faded cello tape. i love it.

tapestry by asger jorn
and a little peek of the hallway i describe below

then i headed for the other wing of the museum, feeling content with the fact that i was the only visitor. the exhibition on the other side was entitled the art of tomorrow today. it's a selection of pieces from their permanent collection, displayed in beautiful surroundings that completely do justice to the art. danish artist asger jorn apparently loved norway and the henie-onstad museum and donated a whole lot of his drawings and sketches and doodles. they were matted and framed and all hanging together in critical mass along a long, curved wooden hallway. my iPhone couldn't come close to capturing it, but it was so marvelous i had to go back and have a second look. here are a few shots i did manage to get.

in addition to jorn, there were miró, a couple of picassos, a matisse, jasper johns, warhol's electric chair 1-10 and some rauschenberg soviet pieces from 1988 that to me were very evocative of those waning years of the reagan era and the soviet union.

i really couldn't believe my luck, having those wonderful paintings all to myself, to enjoy in silence on my own, no one moving past me, getting in my way or breaking into my thoughts with their voices. the golden light of the afternoon sun coming through the windows into the (typically norwegian) wood-intensive space combined with the art did that thing to my molecules where they hum in perfect alignment.

i told the girl at the desk on my way out that i thought it had been quite magical having the place all to myself. and for free to boot! how lucky was that?