Brisbane, QLD


Saturday, September 28, 2013

AN AFTERNOON OF ART

After we had visited the Tar Pits and Page Museum, it was time for Sonya to go to work. Bernie came to pick up the boys and Carol and I were given the afternoon off from babysitting duties. We walked to the next block where LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) is located. We had a nice lunch at the restaurant there and then we bought tickets and set off with a map. The place is huge and there was no way we would see all the buildings in one afternoon. So we only did one.
 Before we entered the building we saw this outside installation called, 'Levitated Mass', Michael Heizer. It is a 460ft concrete slot sloping down to a 15ft depth under a suspended 340ton granite megalith. (A bloody big rock as we would say in Oz). A special transporter had to be made to carry the rock through the busy streets of LA.

 In the fore court next to the main road is another installation called, 'Urban Light',  Chris Burden. There are 202 vintage street lamps arranged into a square formation. They are solar powered and light up at night. I rather liked this one. I only had my P&S camera and the lens wasn't wide enough. If I stepped back I would have been in the path of hundreds of cars.


There were some great masterpieces but there were also the weird ones. Here is a red , highly polished plank called, 'Don't Tell me When to Stop',  John McCracken, 1967. Apparently it is hand lacquered and polished hundreds of times.  The one on the right is a frame wrapped in a tarp and rope. It is called, 'Portrait of Ray',  Christo Javacheff, 1969. ????

 I liked this one. 'Giant Pool Balls',  Claes Oldenburg.

My favourite of the day was, 'Toward Disappearance' Sam Francis, 1957.

It was time to get a taxi home and relieve Bernie of baby sitting so that he could learn his lines for his audition the next morning. 
I took the kids into the back yard. While the boys were on the swing, I thought time for a nice shot of them together, when Fox spotted my camera and asked,
"Grandma can I have a look at your camera? Can I hold it, please"
('Gulp,' I say)

 "Yes that is the button."

 I left the camera with Fox , hoping for the best, while I ran off to help Banjo with the finger paint. His painting challenged some of those that we had seen earlier in the afternoon at LACMA. It was time to distract Fox from the camera and remove Banjo from painting everything in sight including me.

I even conned Fox into pushing his brother to save me the job.

(I take my hat off to all the grandparents in the world who care for their grandchildren full time. I was worn out after 10 days part time.)

18 comments:

  1. I agree ... I find kids exhausting these days.

    The street lamps are good. I guess the Christo package is before he started wrapping up cliffs.

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  2. What a neat museum, the street lamps are my favorite. And your little grandboys are so cute, it must be fun to be there and watching them. Fox is a great photographer! Have a happy weekend!

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  3. The children are beautiful.
    Not sure what would draw me to that big rock. I do like the lights, I bet it would look lovely at dusk or dawn.

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  4. Art is in the eye of the beholder, so they say and although one or two of those installations were interesting, Banjo could certainly have given the others a run for their money.

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  5. Yeah! I once took care of my grand-daughter while her parents went to Cincinnati to find a house to buy. From Thursday to Tuesday. Seriously...By Sunday night I was truly looking forward to Tuesday. And I loved that kid to no end.

    The boys are so cute and getting older and cuter. I love seeing pictures of them. I'm not allowed to put pictures of my Cincinnati girls on the web. :( Poor sports.

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  6. they're so cute. :)

    i liked that street lamp one, too.

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  7. Nice to see them growing up, and they look so very different from each other! The older I get the more I am attracted to traditional, representational, art.

    How often do you travel to LA? My daughter met a grandmother today who goes there 5 times a year to keep up with her grandchildren. They built an apartment onto their daughter's LA house.

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  8. I wouldn't like that rock ( I mean levitated mass ) to drop on my toe .... Ouch! Love those Fox -shots.

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  9. I like the street lamps. The last photo Fox took is great perhaps because it is not like an adult would take a photo.

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  10. I keep thinking of unprintable things have said (and certainly Bill would have) about some of those works of art(?)...but fun to go anyway and a few of them are really cool.

    There definitely is a reason we have kids when we're young!

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  11. loved the series and I would've been equally gulping re the camera in little hands. Child-care IS exhausting; we'll never forget it.

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  12. Your grandson made a nice photo of you, I can see how busy you were with runnig after the kids.

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  13. I love the street lamps! And fun to see a Cristo mini wrap.
    I have a photo story--Twin 1 was "holding" my camera for me while I tended to Twin 2. We were in a quiet situation and suddenly Twin 1 sang out in his piercing little voice, "Look Nana! I took a picture of your butt!"

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  14. Waht a special place, certainly the exterior with the rock and the many latern poles.

    Greetings,
    Filip

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  15. That Urban Light display is bloody awesome, love it and the fact that they now light up via solar power is just great.

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  16. I totally agree with your praise for full time grandparents watching the grandchildren. I always am beat when I've spent time with mine---love them as I do, they wear me out! I'm sitting for three of mine on Thursday night and I promise that as they are in bed by 8, by 8:30 I'll be dead asleep on the couch (no doubt the dog will be with me)!

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  17. Great times Diane!
    I always think I'd like to be close enough to watch my daughter's kids every day but I have to rest a week when I get back from visiting so I know it would be a hard job.
    I just saw "Urban Light" in a movie the other day. There's a scene in 'No Strings Attached' with Ashton Kutcher and Natalie Portman pushing each other around among these lights.

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