Last Days

I am officially into my last week here now—my last less than a week, actually. I fly to London on Saturday, and then back to LA on Sunday. I have enough time in London to hit up the TATE Modern, and maybe get me some high tea. The TATE is the reason I am studying art history, specifically Bill Viola’s Five Angels of the Millennium, so I really hope that is on exhibition right now.

Today was my last free day here—Wednesday and Thursday I have class, and then another genius idea from the Berkeley program to have us give our presentations on FRIDAY morning. Our last day here, and we have to spend at least two hours, likely more, making our own stupid presentations and listening to everyone else’s stupid presentations. For a one-unit class, we are expected to have a powerpoint, interviews, handout materials, and give a lecture that people will really learn something from. For one-unit classes, usually you bring cookies on the last day. This shit is ridiculous and a total waste of my time. I emailed a few curators some questions on the Backjumps show, but if they don’t get back to me I am hardly going to chase them down. I was going to ask the gallery attendant some questions, but he spoke less English than I speak of German. So that wasn’t going to happen.

I figured while I was here, I might as well see “ Die Schönsten Franzosen Kommen Aus New York”, a show at the Neues National Galerie. It is just a bunch of really famous French paintings from the Met in New York. It was insanely crowded even with their magic little line system. When you bought your ticket, you got a number than corresponded with a group time, so numbers 1100—1175 would be able to get into the exhibit as of 11:00am, 1175—1240 as of 11:10am, etc. I was number 1609, so I had until 12:50pm to wait. They had a text service, too, that would send you a message thirty minutes before your time to go in. I went to Potsdamer Platz to use the internet and then was about to buy a ticket for the Gemaldegalerie when my text came. I decided to just sit it out in the shade somewhere. The show was good, lots of neat things to see—my old friend Victorine Meurent in a matador suit, a Cabanel Birth of Venus, Matisse goldfish, Rodin, all the big names. There were just way too many people for my liking, and also in museum settings I have to deal with something I really hate about Germans. They push. They will elbow you in the side and then stand directly in front of you. While you are reading something, they will lean over and put their head directly in front of the label. They will not enter into the delicate dance that accompanies a crowded space. They will stand in front of that work or get to the front, everyone else be damned. I would hate to be inside a German building in a fire. Yelling “ENTSCHULDIGUNG” doesn’t seem very polite, so I am trying to learn to elbow back, just in time for returning to delicate dancing museum land.

It was nice to get out of that exhibit and head to the much quieter and less populated Gemaldegalerie, which has German, Netherlandish und Flemish from the 13th to 17th centuries, Dutch from the 17th century, German, English and French from the 18th, Italian, Spanish, and French from the 13th to 18th. It was nice to calm down from the hubbub with some sweet Northern European crucifixions. And then, you start hitting the big ones. Van Eyck’s portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini. His overscaled Madonna in the much smaller church. Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s Netherlandish Proverbs. Geertgen tot Sint Jans’ St. John the Baptist in the Meadow. Vermeer’s Music Lesson and Girl Putting on a Pearl Necklace. And just on and on. Raphael. A study by Botticelli for the Birth of Venus. Some Giotto and Masaccio. It was a nice review and catch-up.

I navigated the U- and S-bahn station without having to look at signs once. I know where I am going now.