My little holiday

Because Matt worked every day except Christmas over our Christmas break, he's taken a couple of days off this week. Yesterday (with handbag full of medication) we went into the city just the two of us. This is how I had envisioned our lives moving back over here, but sad to say it's the first time. We caught the train in and after running into an old Aussie friend of ours in a cafe in Grand Central (what are the odds, honestly?) we walked up to MoMA.

I had been to MoMA once before with Oscar, but it was in the week before it closed down and moved to Queens and it was not quite what I had expected. I also went to the Matisse Picasso exhibition that was held while the museum was in Queens. And both those times I was filled with pure excitement at actually seeing all those works of art that I studied that made me want to be an artist. It was like meeting a pen pal (or internet friend) for me. Someone I knew really well, but had never actually met.

So yesterday was a little different, and I must say that by the time we got all the way to the top to see all my old friends I had lost a little of that excitement. Maybe it was because I was with Matt and it was all new to him and I was "the guide", I'd hate to think that I've become comfortable with them already. But maybe it's because we are old friends I can just enjoy being with them and appreciate them for what they are without all the hype. And of course this time there was so much more to see. From the ridiculous to the sublime.

I cannot walk around a modern art gallery without chuckling to myself. Some people take it very seriously, but to me a gallery is not a serious place. I even find the reactions of the viewers of art amusing. Sometimes I'm sure I've got the artist's joke and sometimes I may actually be laughing at the fact that something really is pushing the boundaries of what "art" is. Really pushing it. I don't have a problem with art that makes you think, but when there is art that you still don't understand after reading the artist's "justification" then I start to wonder what it is all about. One of the reasons I loved studying art was to understand it and the ideas behind it, but I think a lot of modern art today has become more about the idea than the actual art. BUT THAT'S JUST MY POINT OF VIEW. Matt made the comment, though, that he prefers modern sculpture to modern paintings or installation art as it is still capturing something that is pleasing to look at.

Of course I am all inspired now. I will have to get some canvases in as ideas that have been forming like bubbles in the back of my brain really began to take on some shape yesterday. Not to say there will be any masterpieces coming out of this house anytime soon, just that it's nice to have something to say artistically.

And today, well today the the temperature is set to soar to a balmy 19 deg C...in January!!!!???? If it gets that high then it will beat last year's record breaking 18 deg. I think we owe it to Honey to take her out for a romp at the dog park and then maybe some fish and chips by the river for lunch, who knows...First I have to get Matt off the Bleeding Nintendo DS. It's not just the kids who get addicted to that thing!