December 26, 2007
LoVE loves... The American Art Museum
It turns out that LoVE loves art. And not just her Papa's art, which I need to blog about as well, but all kinds. Portraits especially. Today we visited the newly remodeled Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery with Rosie and Audrey. I've been wanting to go for awhile now and Rosie's visit from England was the perfect excuse to find the time. A few weeks ago I found Abbot Handerson Thayer's Angel on the SAAM Web site and was absolutely enthralled. It actually stunned me with its beauty. Well, I really wanted to see what Lydia Violet would think of it and folks, even at 5 months 13 days, she was enthralled too. We strolled into the gallery where the painting is hung (it's 10x more stunning in person) and I took her out of the snap n' go and held her up to see it. She studied it intently and then focused in on the eyes, which held her gaze for a good 10 or 20 seconds. Now, that might not sound like a long time, but in baby time that's an eternity. Just count it off and imagine an infant doing any one thing for that long of a stretch. Really... the only way to describe it is awesome.
We spent the rest of the afternoon at the museum and it looks like she loves all varieties of paintings and art pieces. She liked other Thayer paintings as well. Virgin Enthroned especially. (Again with the eyes.) And a striking portrait of jazz singer Sarah Vaughan from the Let Your Motto Be Resistance: African American Portraits exhibit in the National Portrait Gallery.
Her reactions to everything she saw made me want to just jump into her brain and listen to what was going on in there. Having witnessed it, and how she reacted to the art in general over the rest of the afternoon, all I could think of was how much I look forward to raising her to appreciate experiences like that. I want to take her to museums all the time. I want her to be starved to learn.
I can't wait until she starts talking. Imagine the things she will say.
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2 comments:
Very cool! A wee little art afficianado in the making. :)
Babies and stroller age tots are GREAT in art museums. Once they want to walk under their own steam and choose what to look at they become less wonderful companions, but I think mine will be ready for something other than natural history exhibits and science centers again soon now that they're all school age. Enjoy the moment.
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