I was craving something more profound, something more reflective of Charlottesville that gave it its own taste of art. Luckily, I have two friends who attend the Art school. Serina is a art printing major and Denise is a photography major. They nonchalantly invited me to tag along on as they went art gallerying last Friday. I was reluctant to go considering that I have final exams, but I promised them I'd go, and I'll never regret coming. Apparently, art gallerying is a Charlottesville tradition whereby all of the city's galleries put up their new art work on the first Friday of each month. I had run into a couple of hole-in-the-wall art galleries but would have never fathomed of hopping from one gallery to another until I would see all of these galleries in one round! Luckily Serina and Denise were there to be my tour guides. We first went to a holiday party at the art school, which was packed with the artsiest people I've seen on university grounds yet. The art school is structure of magnificence in and of itself:
All this art was such a breather for someone who is used to living the rigid life of an engineering student. Serina then showed me everything from how to make paper, the print pressing process, the photography dark room, and actual painters who were working on some of the most amazing works I'd seen yet. After nibbling on a few snacks, we hopped on the trolley to the downtown mall, where we viewed one of their professor's galleries that was on display. The work was magnificent as you can see below:
We then went from gallery to gallery downtown. We stopped by the Mudhouse, which is my regular stop when I'm down at the Mall and realized that there was a new photography exhibitions. One of the galleries even had a mini-jazz band performing to entertain the art viewers:
What truly fascinated me about all this new art was that it all had a message, that it all showed the artists' perception of the world, it expressed those emotions that one can only transmit through art, those impressions that Goethe can only express through literature. In this case, art captured a moment in time and allowed the viewer to infer it as he wished based on his own experiences. I was amazed at how art artists could be so passionate about what they do, the extent to which they could become so hysterically eccentric about their works. It hit me that art was a reflection of their life.
For someone who comes from a very technical background like myself, it was difficult to fully absorb the essence of the art we were viewing in these galleries, but I was gradually learning to appreciate the art. It really captured my imagination. For example there was a painting to an island that led me to drift into thoughts of myself sailing to distant exotic lands, where the climate is tropical, but then I was brought back to reality when seeing that it was freezing outside. We then went into a very unique gallery of a friend of Serina's. This gallery was merely a garage with jars in it. Each of these jars possessed a object that was collected from different parts of campus and hung up over a map of the university corresponding to where each of these objects were found:
I thought it was a pretty subtle idea. That's what it is...the idea behind art is what makes it Van Gogh quality or rubbish. The longer I was exposing myself to this art, the more I felt it sink into me... I was beginning to appreciate and live art.We then ended the night at some Chinese dumpling place where we discussed the two worlds we come from, I from one that looks rather dull, grey, and systematic, and they from one that is vibrant, dynamic, and vivid. The grass is always greener on the other side I remind myself, but I am glad that I can include art gallerying to another one of my escapist hobbies.
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