Guggenheim Museum | Exile on Pain Street

When four people who have four different agendas spend five days in the pressure cooker known as Disney World, disagreements can, and will, arise. Don’t ask me how I know. Just take my word for it.

This is going to be my second wife. She’s a Muslim princess. She’s RICH. Her father owns a kingdom.

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My office was closed on Veteran’s Day. So, like all good veterans, I went to the Guggenheim for the Agnes Martin retrospective. Her early work is super-boring but her later stuff is fine.

While there, I waited in line for :25 minutes to piss in Maurizio Cattelan’s America. The security guard assigned to crowd control told me that, at peak times, the wait can be as long as two hours.

It’s an 18k solid gold, fully functioning, toilet. It’s said to be worth upwards of $11M. I guess it depends on the price of gold that day. That lid is very, very heavy.

They had some problems installing it because gold is such a soft metal. Hell, yes, I used it. You would’ve too. Something tells me these are being installed in the White House as we speak.

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Another journal excerpt:

October 24, 1991

I saw the Warsaw Symphony at Carnegie Hall with Elvin last night. He works for a woman who’s a classic New York City overachiever. She has subscriptions all over town but can’t attend any of the shows because she works day and night, so she gives the tickets away. Wonderful seats. I love Carnegie Hall. The theater is nice and movies are just movies but walking into Carnegie Hall makes me feel like I finally did something right for once in my stupid life.

I took Maureen to “Breaking Legs,” a terrible play starring Philip Bosco and Vincent Gardenia. It was an insult to my Italian half. It had every negative Italian stereotype you can imagine and a stupid plot. They’d never produce a play with Stepin Fetchit and Mammy characters so why do they produce crap like this?

Maureen is really down in the dumps. It’s the first time she’s had a real job with real workplace pressures and office politics and it’s killing her. All she’s ever known is academia and artist colonies. Now she’s in publishing and it’s a shock to her delicate system. She’s got a suffocating workload and works for a woman who demeans her. I’ve seen this before. Some adapt to having their dreams crushed. Others leave town. I’d offer some platonic comfort but I’m afraid she’d run with it.

I just won tickets to see the Stray Cats at the Ritz on Halloween night.

My phone just rang and when I picked it up there was no one there. This has been happening a lot recently. I think I have a secret admirer. It’s like when you’re on the school playground and you like someone so you give them a good, hard shove.

Donna is ignoring my calls and messages. I wonder what I did this time?

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The Shroud of Turin

The Waffle of Orlando

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Just look at this douchebag. Not only did he take two spots, he took the two next to the handicapped parking (the blue lines). That means he took the closest possible spots. And there were TONS of empty spaces not far away. I don’t know why I let this stuff bother me so much. Maybe I’m jealous because he drives a nicer car. I wish I could be more Zen. Humanity, you dirty slut.

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Okay. I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going Muslim for my second wife. I’m definitely going Native American.

Here, Pocahontas points the way to the best divorce attorney on the reservation.

It’s amazing that these girls played along with my foolishness and treated me with such good humor. Later that evening, my wife told me that 14-year old daughter came up to her and asked why she puts up with this stuff.

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I know how he feels. At least he got a response.

I’ve heard architect snobs snidly refer to the rotunda of the Guggenheim Museum as a parking ramp. It features a floor that gradually winds up six stories. Exhibits are mounted along the length of the walk (in the case below, a Kandinsky retrospective).

The same idiots who call the rotunda a parking ramp have referred to the exterior as a giant toilet bowl. I think the building is beautiful, inside and out.

James Turrell uses the rotunda as his canvas. He has worked since the late 1960’s with light as his primary medium. His installation, Aten Reign, is a brilliant example of how environmental art can envelope you. A white fabric scrim was installed in the rotunda and colored lights are projected onto it. Viewers are seated on the ground floor in seats that are angled up towards the rotunda, or they lay down on a huge futon in the center of the room.

One of its designers describes the work as a stack of five giant lampshades as seen from the inside.

The colors slowly move across the spectrum, the full cycle taking about 60 minutes. Each level is a different hue of the base color.

Lying down and starring into the slowly changing light is a meditative experience. The ground floor and visitors fade away. You’re pulled into the work and lose your sense of time and place.

None of these photos have been retouched in any way. It really does look this bizarre.

There are four other light pieces by Turrell in this exhibit, which I will post photos of later. They’re interesting, but they don’t have the breadth or impact of this main showcase piece. How could they?

There’s no limit to the amount of time you can spend in the rotunda. People wait patiently for a spot to open and when someone finally gets up to leave, they pounce. The exhibit is a huge hit, as you can imagine. If you’re a museum member, you can attend private “quiet hour” sessions after the museum closes. If you’ve always been curious about psilocybin mushrooms, this might be a good place to experiment.

I am highly susceptible to this sort of spectacle. I willingly give myself over to the artist’s vision. It took several minutes but I lost myself in the piece/peace. I forgot my troubles and floated up into the slowly-changing colors. To enhance the experience, I did what anyone who grew up in my generation would do:

Peek-a-boo, bitches. The exhibit runs through September 25th. Come to town and I’ll get you in for free. Don’t ask me how I can do it. Just be glad I can do it.