American Modern Art, in All its Glory!

The National Museum of American Art and the National Portrait Gallery are housed in a building in Chinatown that is just a quick metro ride from my office, so I've spent a couple evenings after work browsing their collections.

The collections seem a little schitzophrenic because they have some amazing modern art and then some incredibly dull portraits of historical folks. The portraits are detailed with dense historical panels and in order to maintain my sanity, I gave up on reading all of them fairly early on in my visit. I began reading random panels and let go of the fact that it would not be possible for me to learn every single fact that was available to me. Sometimes it's hard for me to do that.

I really like the building's interior. Check out that floor tile!The top floor had some random but more contemporary portraits and this is a Warhol of MJ!

I love her.

Lovely ceiling.

So, the reason I love the American Art Gallery is their awesome, AWESOME modern art collection! My first experience of the collection was sitting in this dark room with a piece of abstract art covering the floor and the wall in front of me. Over something like 10 minutes, some installed lights moved and changed color in different paterns, in effect basically bringing the painting to life. At different stages, it seemed to depict fields of verdant pastureland, the fiery depths of hell, the tranquility and shades of the ocean and clouds...the experience was magical! From there, I wandered from room to room and reveled in the work. There was a display of George Ault's paintings, and the exhibit referred to him as a "poet of empty spaces." I liked that. His paintings are often of spaces like a barn at night lit by the moon or a single street lamp, or the beach, and rarely are there people in his paintings. He uses the most vivd colors and contrasts so that even the emptiness feels vital and alive, almost crackling with urgency. I really loved that exhibit; unfortuantely, I couldn't take pictures of my favorites of his work because the museum doesn't own any of it.

Here are a few of my favorites that they did own:

This one was so awesome. Each state was filled with small tvs playing videos of images and media that reminded the artist of that state; for example, a clip of the Wizard of Oz was playing in Kansas. (Alaska and Hawaii were on the opposite wall and impossible to fit in my frame.)

The galleries are located in Chinatown; here is the friendship arch.

According to Georgia O'Keeffe, "One can't paint New York as it is, but rather as it is felt."

Even the courtyard is modern and awesome!