Return to the Metropolitan Museum of Art -- the Megablog

It's been a while since my last visit to New York.  Three years apparently.  One of the things I really wanted to do again was visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art again.  The last time I was there, a full day of staring at artifacts wasn't enough to take it all in, and I was pretty sure my brain had melted before the end anyway.  This time, I was pretty sure I knew how to pace myself.

a piece of one of the many wonders at the Met

I started with the greek and roman era.  Marble busts, marble statues, rooms and rooms of it.

And the pottery.  I realized that when I think of the classical theme in my head, I picture gods and war scenes, so this one jumped out at me because it was based on a fisherman.

When you go to the Met, your eyes and mind cannot take it all in during the span of a day trip.  I quickly realized that what I absorbed on my first visit 3 years ago -- my eyes had locked onto everything I had seen before in pictures and magazines and shows, happy to see the classic rare treasures with my own eyes.  On my second trip, I quickly recognized and remembered some things from my past visit, but my eyes sought out something new -- the things that were different that what I expect from those pictures and magazines, and shows.  The bust below is actually a bit uncommon for the smoothness of her eyes.  In most, the eyes are placed using a second material, such as limestone, that do not withstand the ages, making this bust a beauty amongst the remains.

This next bust shows the more typical limestone eyes and cuts a beautiful figure on an intricately weathered stone.

And if you stop to look at every trinket, you would need days, but some just catch your eye.  They had this labelled as a two headed creature, type unknown.  I remain convinced they are double heading snapping crocodiles.  World history would be different if I had gone into archaeology (not necessarily for the better)!

I wandered out of the time of the greeks into a more modern era.

But it turns out modern art is still too modern for my tastes.  All I could think about when I saw this was the poor mother who has to explain to her friends why they really shouldn't go to her child's show.

I found a favorite piece from my last trip, the Demidof table, which actually isn't all that old.  1845 to be exact, carved in Italy for a russian prince with a bit of a bad reputation, but a beautiful piece.

I came across a man sitting quietly and drawing one of the statues in charcoal.

Turns out he looked talented enough to be on display himself!  Check out that drawing!

This is perhaps the oldest painting I saw.  It's a funerary painting from Egypt around 60AD.  It's amazing that something as fragile as a painting survives 2000 years.  I fear our only legacy will be plastic.

And speaking of Egypt, it's always fun to visit the Egyptian wing.  Once again there are the more classical sarcophagus figures...

...and the likes of which I have never seen in my books.  I acutally think I like the mummy with the lifelike painting more than the traditional form.

I am used to thinking of Egyptian culture as being adorned in gold, such as this below.

However, I honestly didn't realize they had glasswares, like these shown below.

Nor did I associate Egyptian relics with the brightly colored artifacts of adornment seen below.

There were rows upon rows of carved Egyptian figurines, but this little section of cobalt blue ones caught my imagination. 

And in a "yick" moment, there were shelves and shelves of these.  Creepy little carved scarab beetles.  Yuk.

This room has hardly changed since I was here last.  I had to ask -- is this just a fake display?  They wouldn't seriously have gotten all these stones from Egypt, would they?  Well, it turns out, yes, they did.  This is the Temple of Dendur, built in Egypt, under Roman rule, 15 years before Christ.  For millenia it sat peacefully overlooking the Nile.  However, with the construction of the Aswan Dam, it was to be flooded and lost.  Since the United States assisted Egypt with relocation of several ruins threatened by the damn, the Temple was given to the United States as a gift from Egypt in 1965 (Jaqueline Kennedy was on hand for the occassion).  The Met took possession of the temple in 1975, promising to build a room in which the temple would be protected from the elements (and further vandalism and grafitti such as that which adorns its walls from the 1800's), and also in a location where it could be seen even at night, through the windows, when in Central Park.

The temple isn't too lonely -- Cleopatra's needle, another gift to the U.S. stands in Central Park to this day.

I walked through one door and found I had left Egypt and arrived in America's Industrial Revolution.  If you were a Vanderbilt, this was what your clock would look like in New York in the mid 1800's.

And this is the kind of chair you would sit your rich butt in.

The American wing hadn't changed much since my last visit, so I went on a mission to find the Masters.  En route, I was happy to find this, one of my favorite statues in the whole museum.  It HAD been moved since my last visit (9 days out of 10 I can't find my car in the parking lot, but I remember the placement of 1 object out of 2.4 million in a building I saw once three years ago...my brain is wierd).  Again, from the 1800's, but I like it.  The children are Apollo and Diana, the woman, Latona, mother of the two gods.

I lost a few hours in the European Art Collection.  Literally.  I couldn't find my way back out of the maze of paintings.  Here is a classic Rembrandt.

And another not so classic (ok all Rembrandts are classic, but a female nude was an unusual painting for him).  This is "The Toilet of Bathsheba," a somewhat erotic rendition of a biblical tale.

Overall it turns out I was in a Monet mood.  Monet paintings look more beautiful and lifelike the further you are away from them in my opinion.  I am still a little too close to get the best effect, but look at how well done the reflections are (and not the one on random dude's head -- he was just going to stand there all day so he got in the picture).

Up close it's easier to see the individual brushstrokes that create the effect.

Another Monet...the water in this reminded me of my Bermuda days.

One of my favorite paintings however remains Monet's "Bouquet of Sunflowers."  The museum notes a letter from Van Gogh, saying Gaugain saw this painting by Monet but preferred Van Gogh's, but Van Gogh believes Monet's is the better.  While I like Van Gogh's Sunflower very much, Monet's just always makes me smile.

And speaking of Van Gogh, he had many gorgeous works on display himself.

Pablo Picasso is so known for his bright and bold works, but my favorite piece of his is this almost sepia simple image of "A Woman in White."

Ah, here is one of Van Gogh's Sunflowers, but I believe the one referenced in his letter is a vase of 15 sunflowers.  I quite like this one though.

Degas is most famous for his ballet scenes.  There were quite beautiful.  

The Degas images that I was most drawn to though were those with the bold, charcoal outlines.

One last Degas to end the day.  The Met.  Always a great experience!