In 2012 I was fortunate enough to travel to Europe in my first year of art school with predominately post-graduate students and lecturers. I was more than excited to have engaging conversations about the meaning of art, its purpose and what it does to you to experience it in the flesh. Unlike most art enthusiasts on the three week trip I did not have any particular focus in mind.
I had already visited many large art institutions around America but not having any formal schooling in the subject it was a pure visual and visceral experience. I had what we call an ‘art moment’ standing in front of an enormous drip painting by Jackson Pollock at a gallery in Washington DC. However I soon began to question my sense of awe, wondering if it was truly the art, or the fame of the artist, or simply the scale that was so exotic and new to me. I am a thinker and without anyone to bounce ideas off (I was traveling alone for a whole year), soon a sense of isolation set in, inheriting the work and my experience of it with a sense of melancholia.
The trip to Europe three years later was going to be different. I had people all around me just bursting to ask my opinion and to share their own. Or so I thought. Instead, after 15 minutes or so of sitting in the hotel foyer in Kassel, Germany searching through the Documenta 13 guidebook and pawing over the map of the town (absolutely riddled with dots marking the spot of each installation, gallery, temporary beer house, sculpture, projection, etc) the ‘we’ became ‘I’. My travel companions scattered to the wind in pairs and threes, on their own voyage of discovery, having recognised certain artists listed and now on the hunt to track them down. The isolation came back and I felt a pang of despair. I was in a town I don’t know, with no one to talk to and no particular interest (just a general one that was slowly dissolving).
After a few embarrassing tears in my hotel room, I decided to suck it up and pretend I was traveling alone again. I ventured out and investigated randomly and timidly the art on the map. I headed to the main gallery of the town and was unimpressed. I was not in a good state of mind. There were too many people. It was hot and I was carrying around my raincoat. I was in need of a bathroom, a coffee, some water, a sit down, lunch, anything other than art. I felt a sense of longing for my days traveling alone. I had no expectations that could be dashed. I could spend hours in a café watching people go by, listening to funny accents, with my giant pack by my side unceremoniously lying on the floor beside me (or carefully leaning against a wall so as to keep out of other patron’s way).
After 3 days I started to connect with a few of the younger people in the group. Things got better. A few cities and a week or so after that we were in London. I had been there before but had more of a local experience wandering around neighbourhoods, going to a park to watch fireworks on Guy Fawkes night, having a pint at a pub with my cousin and visiting the ANZAC memorial with some ex-pat friends. This time a little group of us decided to do the ‘big gallery’ circuit. Portraits, historical works and contemporary.
Tate Modern is large. Very large. After what felt like a few hours, I came across a series of rooms displaying a familiar style of work. It was modernist. Some of it was American. I can’t even remember if I had my little posse with me by this point. I don’t know if it mattered. I felt comfortable. The ceiling was lower, the corners of the rooms seemed dimmer. Simply forms confronted me with their ease of existence. “I am here just as I am” they said to me. I read labels, recognised names. Took photos. I did not rush through like in Kassel. I was not cramped or hot or thirsty like in Kassel. I was calm. Serene. Smiling to myself and gliding delicately from one to another.
Untitled, Donald Judd, 1972, collection of Tate Modern. Photograph by Laura Ann Woodward, 2012
Past the Andre there was a doorway on the left. I went through it and fell into another world. I could have sat in that room all day. An emotion swept through my body which I did not recognise. Perhaps it was relief from despair. If I was alone in there I might have cried a little. Around me was work by Judd, LeWitt, Turrell and others. My eye lingered on a sealed clear cube with water in it, ‘Condensation cube’. I felt appreciation and my heart lifted. My mind wandered around the possible meaning. In the middle of the room was a jewel. A shiny metal box. I knew it was Judd. I had seen pictures and been curious. I approached it, assessing the quality of the material, the sheen and finding it most pleasing. I looked inside and almost laughed at the release of tension. Row upon row of pinky-red cubes reflected and extending out forever. I want to be there. I had an urge to reach in and touch them. I looked at the rim of the box and saw others must have had the same sensation as there were fingerprints circling the void. But it wasn’t a void. It was lush and rich and beautiful. I recognised an ethereal delicacy to it and did not want my clumsy, dirty fingers to lift the dust from the butterfly. I wanted to live lightly and briefly and not to make a mark.
Photos from my visit to Tate in 2012
(click image for title)
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