Free Tuesdays

The Contemporary Art Museum has free Tuesday admission during the summer, followed by live jazz on their terrace.

I went this week with my roommate, Chantel. It was interesting.

I totally felt like I was in that scene of 'Along Came Polly' where Ben Stiller and Phillip Seymour Hoffman go to the art exhibit with the bizarre sculptures. The layout of the galleries were similar, as were some of the exhibits.

There were giant balloon art animals, several instances of vaccuums mounted on the wall or inside plexiglass boxes, and an extremely graphic pornographic section of photos that were blown up to huge proportions. Chantel actually yelled an exclamation when we walked into that exhibit gallery. There were also several pieces of sculpture that consisted of blown up pool toys (think the baby rings or plastic blowup animals that kids sit on in the pool) stuck in ladders or tied to string and hanging from the ceiling. My personal favorite was a small, dark room with speakers inside that were shouting voice-altered recordings in such a way that you couldn't understand what they were saying. I almost burst out laughing when we left the room.

Let's just say I'm more of a traditionalist when it comes to art. There were a couple of exhibits I really liked: Leon Golub and Alexander Calder. Calder's sculptures were colorful and something I would have in my house. Golub's art is a political commentary which I found intriguing and important, and his style is impressionistic (my favorite.) Most important, Golub's work evoked an emotional resopnse in me.