I like going to museums alone because I like to do my viewing at a personal pace, without minding if I'm going too fast or dawdling behind. So I went alone to a Story of the Image, a very extensive collection of old and new work from Antwerp, and absolutely failed being alone.
The collection is so vast and varied: Anthony Van Dyck, ancient etchings from printing houses, down to modern installations like Joelle Tuerlinckx's slide projections of meaningless dimensions and Honore d'O's Tant Pis (I don't care), which is an 800-page book of contextless images. So vast and varied, that I had to pick up a Visitors Guide for the first time in all my lazy gallery visits.
The exhibition is like a lecture on universal art history, not just Antwerp's: there are the old masters who told you what you're supposed to learn through their narrative paintings, and there are the new masters, who leave everything open to interpretation and revolve around themes of meaninglessness. But without knowing this, one is left to wander in a maze of seemingly randomly selected works spanning a few centuries.
I found a museum guide (or it could have been a history professor) giving a private lecture to a group of students, and I latched myself on to them rather obviously. If they hadn't been at the tailend of their visit I would have been their constant stowaway.
There is just too much, but too much of good things, and I will have to go back for the free guided tour. Sometimes you really have to find out the story behind the image. Who wants to go with me?
1 comment:
ive been wanting to go for that exhibition! when are you next going?
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