A Day at the Museum

Sometime around the end of January, I decided it was time to take my daughter to her first art museum.

My decision was aided by the fact that for one day each year, art museums around the city offer free admission, which was enough motivation for me to plan a trip to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.  I had never been there and had always wanted to go, so my excitement when I first broached the subject with Ashley was matched only by her phone distracted apathy.



Me (to Ashley): How would you like to go to LACMA on the 25th?

Ashley (staring at phone): What's LACMA?

Me: It's the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.  It's free that day.

Ashley (still staring at phone): What do you do at a museum?

Me: Look at paintings and sculptures and stuff. 

Ashley (looks up skeptically from phone)

If you have ever gotten the side eye from a kid when trying to convince them to do something that will separate them from their beloved technology for more than a few minutes, you will know that the next sentence in this exchange is CRUCIAL: it will mean the difference between an affirmative cultural experience with your child, or another Saturday spent watching her watch a screen.

Me: We can have lunch while we are there, and make a day of it.

Ashley (shugs, then goes back to the phone): OK, I guess.

---

We got up early on a Saturday morning, and started the cross town journey to the museum on the bus.  My normally talkative and observant daughter was engrossed by the games on her phone during the long ride, and I quietly wondered if she was going to get anything out of this experience.  I didn't get into art until I was a senior in high school, and Impressionism was one of the subjects I had to study for Academic Decathlon.  Up until that point, I was aware of paintings and sculpture, but only in a peripheral way.  I knew it was there, and I knew what it was, but that was about it.  I didn't understand beauty or expression, or point of view until much later.  I was determined to remedy that lack of knowledge with my son, and took him to the Getty Museum twice, so that at the very least, he could say that he had been exposed to fine art.

When we finally got off the bus in front of the museum, my daughter was immediately charmed by the hugeness of the structure.  To my surprise, she decided to use the phone on her camera to take pictures of whatever we saw on our walk through the museum.  We got in line to get whatever free tickets, passes and maps we needed for the day, and started our walk in the gallery closest to the ticket boot which featured a display of Chinese and Japanese art and artifacts.  After warnings not to get to close to anything, and definitely not to touch anything, and encouraging her to read the small letter board displays at each piece, I allowed her to lead the way as we explored the first exhibit.  She just looked at paintings and took pictures for a couple of minutes, until she stopped and pondered a wooden sculpture of a horse decked out in fine livery.  She stared for a full two minutes, before I asked her what she was thinking.  

"This looks like the horse from "Mulan".

A couple near us heard her, and gave me the pressed lip smile that let me know that they thought it was funny, but they didn't want to discourage her.  I smiled back.  You gotta start somewhere.

We finished that particular exhibit in about 30 minutes, and by then, she was ready for lunch.  While we were eating, Ashley took the map from me, and started looking at the names and description of the other exhibits, and talking about what SHE wanted to see that day.  I was happy to let her lead.  This day was about her, and exposing her to something she might not otherwise see, so I fell back, and let her pick what sounded interesting to her.

We next went to a Latin Art exhibit, where she saw paintings by Diego Rivera for the first time, as did I.  We also got to see some of the early film work of a pioneering Latin filmmaker, which started freaking her out a bit because of the early 20th century special effects, so we had to move on.  As we were exiting the Latin art exhibit and about to make our way into the next pavilion, we came across what looked to me like giant spaghetti, drying on a rack:

This was one of the many outdoor art installations that invited visitors to experience art through play.   It made me dizzy, but she thoroughly enjoyed twirling herself around in the long strings.  She was having a great time with other kids in the long spaghetti, but we eventually moved into the next pavilion where we settled, after looking at four entire floors worth of choices, on European art.  When we walked into the room where the impressionist paintings and sculptures were, and she immediately looked for a bench and sat down.  I asked her if she was starting to get tired.  We had been there for two and a half hours, and in all honesty, I was up to my ears in culture by now.

"Well yeah.  And all this stuff is starting to get a little inappropriate."

She pointed behind me, to the sculpture Eternal Spring by Auguste Rodin.  She had this same reaction to other partial nude paintings in other parts of the gallery.  I had forgotten to explain to her that artists throughout history have viewed the human body as a work of art, and painted and sculpted it regularly.  The only way she is used to seeing the human body portrayed is on television or in movies, and then only in a sexual way, so what else would she think?  Even as I explained about the human body as the subject of art work, I could see her really starting to consider the human body as more than a sexual object.  Maybe this visit was paying off in ways I hadn't thought about...

Our last exhibit for the day was a room with art from Southeast Asia and India.  Ashley was quickly burning out, and spent as much time looking for someplace to sit as she did looking at the stunning art pieces.  While I was fascinated looking at the hindu gods and goddesses, Ashley mostly looked at doors and archways:

Occasionally, I can take a hint.  We made our way out of the pavilion, down into the sculpture garden, into a beautiful light installation, then out into the street.  Ashley asked me right away when we could come back to see the rest of it.  She figured we already saw part of it, we might as well see the rest.  A small part of me thinks she was also more than a little fascinated by being exposed to something outside of her everyday experience, and eager to continue the adventure.  I asked her if maybe next time we could go to the Getty instead.  I immediately threw in the fact that they had beautiful outdoor gardens, and we could have lunch there as well.  She asked if she could bring her phone.  Just to take pictures of course.

I'll be planning that trip for later in the spring.