The magic of art

I am an art and music afficionado.  I have zero abilities in creating art or in creating music. My only artistic expression was dance for many years. (and maybe writing bad poetry in my angst filled teen years.)   But I looooooove both art and music and feel that they are essential to living. Or maybe if not living per se, to finding a way to express the things inside us.   I could live without TV. I could NEVER live without music for instance. 

Today we braved the heat and set off for a sculpture park and museum not too far from where we live.  I packed a picnic lunch as I am all about frugal and I know cafes at museums are not frugal.  The sculpture we were focussing the most on was by Booker and she creates the most amazing art out of all kinds of cut up tires.  Truly they don't really look like tires when she is done with them; they are amazing.  The outside exhibits are very tactile and the pefect intro for the kids as they can touch them

 This was cool as they wanted to see how the pieces were created.  There was also a musical sculpture that you could make the most gorgeous music on and KC spent the longest time there grooving out tunes.  When others stopped by and started playing as well, you could see him listen to their melody lines and incorporate the sounds into what he was doing. It was quite amazing.

After lunching al fresco, we went inside and toured those galleries.  These are "no touch" zones which might have been hard except that this museum had something cool.  Kits that kids could use to try sketching what they saw, scavenger hunts they could do, magnetic tiles they could create art with.  All 3 of my tribe  were so absorbed.  Kirsty and I  could just sit on a couch and relax in the a/c and marvel at it.  Rob really enjoys contemporary sculpture--the kind of thing that 3 different people could look at and each come away with 3different impressions of what it is.  He was copying on paper his favorite piece.  Lissa loved the tiles and also a tire rubbing activity. KC enjoyed all of it; he couldn't sample enough of it all.  He said he wished he could have met the artist and we spent some time talking about how looking at her work was in a way like having a conversation with her.

It was a great day, and probably the absolute best way we could have chosen to spend today.  This morning didn't start off spectacularly as Rob had some signficant issues with truth telling and family rules before really even getting up at 6:30.  But I am glad that instead of it being "all down hill from there" that this was a vehicle for him to get out some of his emotions in a constructive and healthy way. I am glad that Lissa was so engaged as well. She loved this art in a way that other art forms have not spoken to her before.  And I am glad that my wife had the energy to come with us--it was exciting for the kids that it wasn't just Ooma doing the field trip!