Rhapsodies

Serendipity is an interesting thing.

I had gone downtown to the Seattle Art Museum to continue with my viewing and recording of the Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Gainsborough: The Treasures of Kenwood House, London exhibit. When I got there a good chunk of first avenue was cordoned off and people were in the process of setting up a stage. All of this made finding a place to park my bike. When I got into the Museum it turned out that admission was free today so the exhibit was packed which meant I only got one sketch done which I botched completely. As I’ve mentioned before I really have trouble getting into my zone if there are more than five people in a gallery and this was considerably more. I found out that the hubbub on first ave was for the new Mirror exhibit by Doug Aitken that was going to be a new permanent fixture on the outside of the exhibit. I was encouraged to hang out to see it get unveiled at 6:30. So I dragged my feet to do just that.

It turned out that they were running late and didn’t start the show until 7:00 then after speeches by Mayor Michael McGinn, Museum Curator Catharina Manchanda and Charles Wright they got the ball rolling. The whole thing is a set of large LED screens that show several hundred hours worth of Seattle footage in an abstract “kalidosope”stye. This was accompanied by what sounded like a tone poem performed by members of the Seattle Symphony. I watched for about a half hour before heading home glad to have been part of the experience no matter what I thought of it..