I went to look at installation art at the Metropoltan Museum, which abounds there. By that I mean the period rooms that can be found all over the museum, interior spaces that have been meticulously reconstructed to resemble the original spaces. (Kind of the opposite of site specific art, if you will...) The rooms range from the Damascus room to the bedroom of a Roman villa to my new favorite, a "studiolo" from a ducal palace in Urbino around 1500. This room, intended as a small space for study and meditation, has walls entirely of wood inlay, with various trompe l'oeil effects, and lots of musical instruments.
Then there are all the period rooms, which attempt to display the kind of interior decoration used in various European palaces. I get a very odd feeling from these rooms; an interior, without natural light, deprived of all context, inside of a large museum in contemporary New York City. Where am I? The oddness may also have something to do with bringing back memories of the innumerable European palaces and stately homes that I was dragged through in my youth on family vacations. Did I really care what the interior of rich peoples houses from the past centuries looked like? Though I do get some pleasure out seeing places with authentic historical resonance, like the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg.
But this bedroom looks very welcoming...
Later, I saw this as I was wandering through the Lehman collection, one of my favorite places in the Met.
You never know what you will find!
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