Art Target Acquired

The first Saturday of each month is Target Saturday at The Brooklyn Museum of Art. Since they had two exhibits I wanted to see and it was FREE, I wanted to go. So that's where Eddie and I drove to in the evening. We found a parking spot on the street about two blocks away so we didn't have to pay the parking fee. As we approached the museum, we saw massive amounts of people. Then we realized it was not a line, but a crowd waiting to see a performance. Phew! It was crowded but we didn't have to deal with lines.

Basically, we walked in, got a map, and off we went. There were people everywhere, but it wasn't wall to wall once we got into the exhibits. We went off to look at everything since he'd never been there. When we went to go to the second floor, we quickly decided that we would not take the elevator at any time because they were packed and we don't really like people, so we didn't want to be that close to them.

We took the stairs to the second floor. The second floor smelled baaaaadddddd. I don't know why. It was just really icky. We plowed through it and then made it to the next floor. Or did we?

You see, the museum is so huge that we kept forgetting what floor we were on and what floors we'd gone to. None too helpful was the map that showed certain pieces of art that seemed to be on one floor when they were on other floors in the actual museum. But getting lost is part of the fun.

I learned that he likes Egyptian stuff when we went to the Met, so I directed us towards the Egyptian collection. At which point we realized the fun we could have with the camera.



When we got to the next floor, we walked around and around and then thought we'd finished until I saw a sign for one of the exhibits I wanted to see--it was about erotic stuff. The security guard came up to me and was like, You didn't see it? I was like, no. She said, go back through BOTH double doors. We hiked all the way back through a wing and then through BOTh double doors and then we found it. Wow. Lots of boobies and weiners. Everywhere.

This is also where we began to find the other wonders of the museum: the visitors. Two guys, unimpressed with one specific piece, decided they needed to move on. One commented to the other: Let's go check out O'Hara's dick. The other agreed vehemently.

To my knowledge, none of the artwork was entitled "O'Hara's Dick," but I do know that some of the works were inspired by O'Hara's poetry (including one with twine and a fork and some shutters that Eddie shook his head at). In fact, many pieces were inspired by several poets such as the painting Poets (clothed) and then Poets (naked) which also included O'Hara with three other poets and what they might look like naked if they stood and sat in exactly the same order around a bench around which they stood and sat with clothes on.

While returning to the main part of the floor to go to the final floor, we passed by a little Asian lady who was standing on one leg, arching herself to the side with an arm over her head. We looked at the sculpture she was in front of. It was doing the same thing in a much more successful fashion. Take note--this was happening in the busiest and narrowest part of the museum, so how she balanced is a mystery. Also a mystery: why she was imitating the sculpture.

In an attempt to go around her, I veered left. There, I encountered a very tall, very old man who decided to snort quite loudly and contort his face. I heard Eddie start to snicker behind me. I veered right instead and Eddie grabbed onto me and was like, you heard that, right? We left for the fifth floor laughing.

The final floor was set up, as Eddie observed, like a store. It was like a stock room of odds and ends. We saw a huge statue of a naked woman. Time for fun with the camera. The plan was I would stand behind her and he would take a picture of me through her legs. It was a great plan.

Except for the photographer obsessed with her from every angle. He was there for a good fifteen minutes taking the same shot of her big butt. Over and over. Then when we thought he was leaving, he took pictures of her boob. Over and over. He retreated only to reappear on the floor next to her. He was turned towards the bicycle next to her so I hopped behind the statue and we got our shot before he could turn around.

Then we got out of there. We'd been through the museum entirely in a little over two hours. On our way out, I saw some activity at the front windows and realized, hey there are slicked down body builders in the window. They were posing for a picture from the inside so their backs were to the outside. Maybe no one realized that we could see from the outside. Maybe no one knew how a window works. When they stopped posing for the picture, they turned and saw the outside crowd and everyone was cracking up, and one woman was trying to get one of the body builders to call her.

We decided to skip the body building show and instead head to Roll N Roaster. They both involve protein but only one offers cheese on everything. Now that's a business model I can get behind: Cheese. On. Everything.