magical places: naoshima (detail)

you walk into a great grey darkened hallway, and see light emanating from a room to your right (or is it your left?) a young woman, with broken english and a huge grin, bows and in an inaudible whisper asks you to remove your shoes (you divine this because the family - was it a family? - next to you starts to remove their shoes.) you slip on white slippers, noticing the tiny marble tiles comprising the floor beneath your feet. a fleeting thought of all the people that might have been in your slippers crosses your mind, you silently thank yourself for wearing tights though, in this wintery climate, why you wouldn't be wearing tights is a mystery. it's hushed, quiet. people speak in soft, low voices, if they speak at all. the young woman gestures for you to enter the room, after the current occupants exit it. all white walls, all white frames, all white everything. your slippers are padded, and make no noise as you move into the room. you stand at the mouth of the room, staring, in awe. five paintings are all that is in this cavernous room. high ceilings, all white. recessed natural lighting spills onto the walls from cleverly designed architecture. you are underground. you are in awe. you have seen paintings like this before, at the art institute in chicago, at the deyoung in san francisco, at the louvre in paris, but you've never seen paintings like this before. you had a print of paintings like this that you hung on your wall in seventh grade, but you've never seen paintings like this before. you spoke about this art with derision during your formative art-school years: it's bourgeois, middlebrow, easy, and yet you've never seen it like this before. color spills from every canvas, your eyes drink the paintings like you've never seen a painting before. you are an atheist, but you feel a swell in your heart like you are seeing the face of god. this must be what religious people feel when they walk into churches, you think, gaping at the five paintings in the room. you walk around the room, refusing to take your eyes off the paintings, refusing to blink because you might miss exactly how that light hits that piece at that moment at that angle. you are breathing but you feel like crying. you are lucky. you are here.

on the memory of seeing the Monet's at the Chichu Art Museum, Naoshima, 2010

08.05.13