Yesterday we took a trip to two museums. The first museum we attended was the Victoria and Albert Museum. I was extremely looking forward to the V&A because of it's art and design focus. I love fashion design. So in particular, the fashion gallery was what I was most excited for. I had seen promotional posters around the city advertising an Alexander McQueen exhibit happening there. So I knew the museum would have an emphases on fashion. What I didn't know was how large the museum is. The V&A's galleries are both beautiful and extensive.
The fashion collection at the V&A was wonderful. Very interesting to see a retrospective look at the way fashion has evolved over the centuries.
My favorite display featured work by Christian Dior. The displayed explained how he became an 'overnight sensation' with his 'New Look'. The New Look launched in 1947. This time has been refereed to as 'The Golden Age Of Couture' celebrating the end of the war and starting something new in high fashion during this era.
This is an evening ensemble he created.
Even the cafe in the V&A was beautiful and stylish.
After the V&A we went to the Tate Modern. Which houses a collection of innovative paintings, pictures, and sculptures. As well as some multimedia works. The art pieces ranged in all ways. All were different from anything I had seen before as well as different from each other. It certainly felt like I was looking at modern art. It reminded me of the Walker Art museum in Minneapolis. There was a space that had no lights at all, completely black with subtle background noise. Another art piece was a mirror that had a caption explaining to ' look at the bigger picture'. Many of the pieces on display at the museum were unusual. Which is pretty typical in modern or contemporary art. The Tate Modern is certainly a thought provoking place. Weather you find some of the artwork captivating or ridiculous , there is an almost guaranteed reaction. 
To end the evening, we went back to the Nation Theatre. We saw the play "Everyman". Which coincided with the whole art theme of the day. The play was unlike any play I have seen before. It was a contemporary approach to a timeless concept and story of death and God. And it was done very well. I really enjoyed this play. It incorporated really amazing media backgrounds and incredible choreography. As well as comical and conceptual costuming. At one point actors were dress all in gold. Gold wings, heels, and gold face paint. This part of the show was representing the superficial materialism. Another part of the show the actors were walking garbage to represent the homeless in the streets. This part ended in a radical and chaotic way. Loud news reporting played as a large fan came out to blow rain and money all around. This entire scene symbolized the suffering in the world. And how the main Character, Everyman, turned his back and ignored it. The stage was black and an empty space with a giant screen as the backdrop. But the stage would be filled with chaos. And the screen would show visuals of the sky and close ups of people talking and many other visually stimulating things. It was such an interesting play and was my favorite that we saw on the trip.
It seems like we had very different experiences at the Victoria & Albert Museum. I had fun walking through all of the different sculpture exhibitions, but seeing the pictures from the fashion exhibition, I would definitely have preferred to see that! I also thought the performance of Everyman to be the best play we've seen here, even better than The Mousetrap and The Play That Goes Wrong. Its amazing how powerful and contemporary a play written during the medieval era can be when you change some of the dating references. (Like iPhones vs horses!)
ReplyDeleteI was very surprised at the variety at the V&A museun, with exhibits from the Renaissance to Rome and fashion through the decades. It was fascinating to see the wide variety at the Tate Modern as well, which just goes to show the definition of art is entirely determined by the creator and pretty much anything can be made into art.
ReplyDeleteAs for the show, I was very intrigued by the modern day twist on a 15th century show. I feel that the contemporary version made it very relatable and contested better with many then the original sprit and staging would have.