How to Love Art-And Not Be Confused or Dumb, Simple Advice

My apologies for the headline, the algorithm made me do it. 

I love looking at art and I’m a fool for wall labels.  Wall labels are the blocks of text to the right of a painting likely not written by the artist. And likely going on too long with syntax not even AI could decipher-take that Chat GPT.  Worst of all, wall labels serve mainly to deny you of the experience of wonder.  Artist statements are kissing cousin toads to the the wall label and God help me I’m guilty)

According to published reports museum-goers spend just 8 to  30 seconds in front of a painting before moving on. Ouch. Confused? Maybe. But not dumb..

Bianca Bosker found a better way to be with art.  Bosker is the author of “Get the Picture,” a classic of investigative journalism sans tragic victims and justice delayed.  Bosker’s “simple” task with her book was to understand the New York City art world. Whether working as a gallery assistant, a museum guard or an artist helper, she needed one elemental skill, she had to have an “eye.” Art connoisseurs/cognoscenti defined an “eye” for Bosker as an ability to see beyond the surface of a painting.  Turns out that was bullshit.

Bosker labored mightily to develop an “eye” of her own, a way to love art and not be confused. Then she heard some simple advice from a painter friend.  “Just walk up to the piece and try to think of five things that it brings up. Just five things you notice either in the work or how it makes you feel.” 

This should NOT include any deep analysis as in- “This piece probes patriarchy as it passes through the crucible of social media posts #MeToo.”

I decided to test out Bosker’s looking technique at the Tucson Museum of Art (TMA).  It was an exhilarating experience.  Not exhilarating like riding the “Zipper” at a state fair but certainly uplifting, freeing and richly new.  So yes, in some ways very similar to being simultaneously flung and spun into space as your senses are assaulted on all sides.

First up for TMA’s “Time Traveler’s” show was Wendy Red Star’s “Four Seasons: Fall Winter Spring, Summer” accompanied by 125 words of explanation. Most of which was unnecessary to the appreciation of the work.  Red Star creates set pieces featuring an indigenous model in a mostly manufactured environment with painted backdrops and artificial animals.  The five things I noticed about the work: 

1. The overall orange hue of the work. I felt pleased, warm and fuzzy.

2. The model’s matching horse earrings

3. My bifocals are playing tricks as I try to discern the ground the model rests on

4. There seems to be a face formed by folds in the faux deer’s plastic ear

5. The mountains in the painted backdrop appear as islands on  fogging brown clouds

And that’s it. That’s my five things about “Four Seasons Series (Fall)” And, I now adore the work-powerful, arresting, compelling, damning which I got to by simply finding five things.  I took a photo of the wall label to the right of the piece.  It’s weighty and fascinating and important. And mostly unnecessary.

Bosker describes wall labels as “the answer key at the bottom of a word search.” She also points out that the wall label’s greatest flaw is that it imagines only one right answer for a piece of art.  Likely there are 7.951 billion right answers to what a painting is about. (In other words, to each his own; one for every one of us on the planet right now.)

Now I can truly see and I’m beginning to love art (more) with Bosker’s simple advice

Next up at TMA’s show I came to Robert Colescott’s, “The Light is On, Moroccan Pink to Drip and Smear” 

Five things:

1. The full body Black figure comes into focus last of all

2. A scene so picaresque

3. I’m pained by the tentative and shrunken eye shapes the painter’s given his model.

4. The painter’s thinner bottle seems to be smoldering

5. The painter's studio background wants to swallow me.

The New York Times journalist and critic Arthur Lubow doubles down on Bosker’s indictment of wall labels.  In a review of several shows featuring documentary photography Lubow writes, “Asking viewers in a museum to stand in front of scroll-length explication is asking a lot. ...testimonies overwhelm photographs...as if the artist has lost conviction that the camera can transmit her message.”  Bosker’s method is considerably more reasonable and democratic.

And lastly, Tony Abeyta’s “Other Worlderness” comes into view down a ramp to the museum’s middle platform. My five (oops, six) things:

1. I’m reminded of 50’s and 60's curtain or upholstery patterns

2. Those shapes on the lower right remind me of Isamu Noguchi

3. Now I’m starting to see some distinct shapes appear

4. I’m in love with the depth and the layering

5. I’m really drawn the the sensuality of the coarse rough edge of the paper 

6. Figures now appear throughout the drawing, they seem to have a Hopi influence

While Bosker’s dictum to find five things may be the new golden path to experiencing art, it’s not foolproof. Abeyta is in fact Dine’ Navajo, not Hopi. My apologies to Mr. Abeyta.

You too can love art AND not be confused-just follow Bosker’s five things plan.

So now it’s your turn. Go see some art. Cover the wall label with your hand, a book, a brochure from the front desk; I don’t care.  Next, find five things the piece brings up for you. Keep them short, skip the grandiose, stay present and notice despite yourself you’ve stayed with the piece way more than just 30 seconds. Big win for everyone.