THIS IS THE 303RD BLOG POST OF BOURNE'S BIG TRIP!!!! FIRST IT WAS LEAVING AND THE FIRST DAY, AND THEN IT WAS THE MARK TWAIN HOUSE, WHICH WAS THE 100TH POST, AND THEN IT WAS DRIVE TO KENTUCKY AND IT WAS THE 200TH. THIS IS THE 303RD. Thank you so much for reading all the posts and staying true, I really appreciate this experience and the information that I get to write about it and remember forever. Please continue reading, we might not get to 400 as there are only four months remaining in the trip, but we might. 32 followers and even more readers who didn't sign up to follow. That's pretty good. HAVE A GREAT DAY!!!!!
Behind him was a large hallway, and there was a door to a gift shop, and then more openings to a back place, and then further on was a rectangular ceiling with glass display cases. We walked up, as the nice young man explained the things to us. No photography, because of copyright reasons from the owners and artists of the paintings. People start usually to the left to get a taste of it, and then (and he showed us a white map) stay in the American Artists place, and make their way to a huge painting that had Jesus coming out of the tomb, like 72 feet long by 12 feet high, which is a long painting indeed. He told us that there was a large painting that was world renowned here, but sadly it burned down in the 90's, along with a lot more of the museum. The guy was nice. He said on the South Colonnade that there was a traveling exhibit, about the King James Bible as the 400th anniversary was in 2011. The guy also told us a lot of information about the museum, and that there was a very large painting, 40 feet high and 70 feet long, and it was called "History in Art" with a whole lot of famous people, that in our stay we had to see it. He gave us some audio tour stuff, and I put on the earplugs as we got ready to go in. I asked this guy his name. Nick.
He told us about how Michalangeo did this David piece, and that later a guy did it again in Bronze. It was a smaller version of David looking like a fashion model and standing like one, with a hat and tunic, and sling. The one behind was of a hat, and Goliath's head was under his sandals. It looked very real, and the bronze glistened off of it. I decided right then and there that from now on, I wouldn't look at the caption beside the painting, but rather look at the painting first, determine what Bible story or picture or person from the Bible it was, and then look at the caption to see if I was right. I would test my knowledge of Bible stories. We walked down, talking to Nick a little but eager to get on with the museum. We walked down a large hallway, where there were some folk art and American stuff, people loading hay and slaves in the field, also some little sculptures. This wasn't really Biblical stuff, but there were some lambs and church scenes however. We walked to the left, into the McCreless Collection and the European Gallery, a fairly big sized room, filled with abstract unrealistic paintings and a few sculptures. Most of the stuff was either in Latin or words I didn't understand, and this would be the hardest part in the museum to identify with guessing what part in the Bible they were. Okay though.
A lot of the stuff was about Mary, and there were a few glass display cases with crosses and candle holders, all gold and elaborate. I tried to do the guessing game thing, and Rebecca put her hand over the captions, but most of the time I didn't get it and was close but the artist had another name for it. I did get one right, however, and it was a kingly looking guy with a guard holding a baby and a knife, and too scared women. I said, "Nobody tell me! It's Solomon deciding the fate of that baby, and the two women were arguing about which one had the true baby and who it belonged to!" It was a good painting, of vibrant colors and good themes. Dad called us to come and exit this area. Staying in the American Artists Colonnade only a short while, we knew that the big part that Nick had talked about was coming near. Drum role, please. We all went together, wanting to make this anxious moment last. It was just one of those moments. Was just one of those moments. Just one of those moments. One of those moments. Of those moments. Those moments. Moments. But anyway, enough of that. We walked in. The room was long, as the other one was, and fairly large, with little sculptures at all. I tried to not notice the big thing behind me, working my way along the left wall.
They were more realistic paintings, unlike the abstract and unrealistic paintings of the old World, and the European ones. I like art a little bit, and it's cool to look at them, but religious art is very interesting because they put all their passion in their religion, because it is their life and their reason of being there. But I liked these, they were really cool. One was of a kid in blue jeans, really real looking, was being held up through his armpits, on the highway, by Jesus. It was really cool. There were some others like Moses in the Bullrushes and a few others, like Jesus shining in the light and him being the all so glorious God. It was like going to Church, in a way, and it made me feel good that this was the artists' ways of glorifying the Almighty, and enlightening him. One good oil painting was of the Messiah on a horse conquering a dragon in a cave, and it looked really powerful. Okay, so now I was ready to look back at that big painting. Turning, I saw the bright paint masterpiece lighting in front of me. Jesus, in a white robe, had bright light shining all around him in glorious appearance. There were too roman guards that were on the ground fainted , and large strong bright angels holding the swords. I tried to identify the different Bible characters.
Okay, so the first guy in a green robe with a white beard, medium size leaning toward the big side of that, was pretty obvious. He was holding up two grey stone tablets. Moses. The next wasn't as easy. It was a young man holding something in his hands, kneeling on the ground with a blue kingly robe and a yellow cape. No crown. I thought for a while, and then thought some more. I looked closer to see what he was holding in his hands, and then saw it WAS a crown. King David or Solomon! Well, I thought about how prim and proper Solomon was and who was supposed to be younger and was more closer to God, and I then confirmed it had to be David. Alright, so far so good. Next figure: brown coat, leaning back in glorification of Jesus, with a short beard. Hmmmm....I thought about who he could be. While thinking I noticed all those figures were translucent, and that they were see-through. We were all in awe of this painting, and Mom looked to the caption and said that it said that the figure was Isaiah. "MOM!" I said in disappointment, wanting to find out on my own. Oh well, it was ruined now. I took hold of the figure after that, who was Arabian or African-American, with a staff, holding his hands up in praise. I didn't know. Mom told me it was Abraham. OH! NOW THAT MAKES SENSE!
Okay, so now I looked at the right side of the huge painting in front of me. I couldn't get the two men, one in sheepskin with a brown beard and the one in red robe with a grey beard, but I supposed they must be Noah and somebody else, and I read from an app in my phone, the message in Hebrews that the painting is supposed to replicate in art, that one of the people was Elijah. The next one was a girl, in pink and very pretty with brown hair. Queen Ester! Now all that remained was two more guys. One had a staff and I deduced it might be John the Baptist, as he was mentioned in the Hebrews text and it looked like him. He was in a brown robe, and had only a small beard. The next guy was kneeling, in blue and yellow with a small beard around him. The only guy left was Daniel, so I picked him and looked at the caption. Out of all 9 of the figures I guessed 7 correct, which isn't too bad I suppose. But that was one of the best paintings I've EVER seen, really true. If you go to Dallas I wish for you to see this wonderful thing, and even if you don't please look it up online or something... it'll really be worth it. You might find it in Google under "The Resurrection Painting" or something of the sort. Anyway, please look at it someday.
We went out of this area back the way we came, actually, and went back to Nick in the reception area, and then into the gift shop. Rebecca found some bookmarks of the Resurrection and we were glad she had, for no pictures were allowed or you to take on it. I looked at a sketch of Dante's three scary books about the after life from the Catholic standpoint, and some of that stuff was really freaky and weird, I must say. Mom talked to Nick about what he was going to become(a minister) and his experience with the Lutheran Church. He didn't have a good experience with one denomination and wasn't learning anything about them, so a guy who actually worked at a computer shop he met there actually taught him more than anybody else. It was interesting. Dad had drifted off by this time. The gift shop was a pretty big room, full of trinkets and everything like that. A few offices in the back. Mom told us to go, for we had a lot of the museum to still delve deeper into. Waving goodbye to Nick for the moment, we went down the area which was dedicated to the King James Bibles. Dad was there. But first, we were going to go into a place, large actually, square or rectangle too, called the Judaical Galleries. Boy would this be interesting, the Jewish part of the museum.
Mostly there were weird paintings, like the revenge of the Messiah and stuff of the sort. A lot of them were abstract also, with a lot of flowing colors. No depth, really. A lot of stuff that doesn't even make sense, you know, like you have to read the caption and then look at the painting, caption, painting, painting, caption, until you find out what the thing means. There were a lot of Hanukkah scenes also, and many flat lambs in the back. We left after a while, back in the South Colonnade where the King James stuff was. I hadn't really used the audio tape mostly in the museum so far, just because I had just read the captions and it wasn't too interesting, some of the time they just told you what you saw. But not this time. I looked at the bulky huge brown parchment papers in the King James Bible. Rev Dr. GUYWITHLETTERSTARTINGWITHR, and another guy who was younger talked about it on the audio tape, and it was very interesting that they made different editions, in easier print, in more bold, later after the other one and how they wanted people to be able to have a Bible. The Catholic priests and the pope didn't, however. I'm not making an opinion about it; I will be talking about it forever. But anyway...
Over the years after 1611 they made smaller editions, and I listened to Rev. Dr (can you really be both a Rev and a Dr.?) R. talk about how one Bible said "Thou Shall Commit Adultery" and that people found out a few years later, making the person who made it recall all the Bibles and then he became into financial debt. It was actually the trick of some competitors who wanted him to recall them and help their business; you would think that people would at least not allow dirty business acts to be in the Bible making business. The poor man got in debtor's jail and died there. They didn't want that to happen, though, it got away. It was cool to look through the glass cases and see the Bibles through a mirror, and look how old the spines were and of what material. Actually really interesting, reading and doing audio and seeing the headings in the museum. That was actually my favorite part, besides the Resurrection and what I was about to see next (foreshadowing!). I ended this and peaked in a small empty library, with some shelves and old, old books that Moses read or something (not that old). This was the small Religious Architecture Library, and I looked at books, amazed, of some of the makings of Notre Dame and other things. I got out, though.
Mom and Rebecca had already gone into the Contemporary Gallery, right by, squeezed into together with the Jewish part. I went to the restroom which was facing the South Colonnade, after looking through glass into a large Wedding and Events ballroom, with small tables showing the diagrams and such for the part they were going to add, a botanical garden. Then I went into the West Colonnade where I didn't look for long, coming into a marble floor high ceiling Sculpture Atrium, with a lot of different colored sculptures, gold, silver, stone, rock, anything you could think of. Dad was seated in the middle on a bench, and Rebecca and Mom's voices could be heard in the Reception talking to Nick. Then, I saw it, as I turned right. I saw it, and will never forget it.
It was the "History in Art" painting that Nick had spoken of. HIA (the thing I'll be calling "History in Art from now on) was huge, as I had said, it could've of been a baby whale if it looked like one. There were all sorts of colors and faces on them, and as I got closer to the painting which was high and took of the whole room in height, I recognized a few at the bottom, like Adolf Hitler and Pablo Picasso. There was the Tog Mi Hall, and Queen Elizabeth the second there too. For minutes and minutes I stared, identifying people and then if I couldn't going to the left, seeing the face on the miniature version by it and then seeing the number, and confirming the number on the list of like 300 they had. Hitler was on their four times, two as a person and two as a cartoon. In the right corner was a lot of aviation people, and The Wright Bro's all the way to Neil Armstrong. The left top corner had the Earth from space, and Sally Ride, along with many other space stuff. In the center of this was Jesus Christ, which made sense because Jesus is the center of the Universe and stuff. The Nativity was the center top. A guy talking to Dad with grey hair, named Rick. He told me that it was painting by a Russian guy and that it's supposed to get older and older as you go in, but mostly it has no pattern. HIA was the largest and one of the coolest things in the museum. No doubt about it.
(If you want to see the painting and click on the heads and see info about them, go to www.historyinart.net. Rick wrote it on the back of my map. He's the one that told me.)
I went to Mom and showed her and looked a little more at this great masterpiece, and saw an angel sculpture with a sword, and listened to the audio tape which talked about the Artist dying and seeing this image and then coming back to life, with comments from his friends and family and even himself. Rebecca showed me behind the atrium a section, a little room, which had no white people on the paintings at all, but these were made by an African American and there is multiple scenes, making food, sleeping, playing in the yard, and an African-American Mono Lisa, a black baby Moses, and an African-American Jesus. Interesting, I suppose. Never thought about it like that before. But anyway, we went back out, got some stuff in the gift shop, and said goodbye to the cool guy Nick, as we had seen all of the fun museum. I had fun there, and it was really cool to see the Resurrection, HIA, and the Bibles. Very cool place. I may not like art much, but Biblical Art is cool because you already know all the stories and get to see different religious art. Since then I have gone to HIA's site on the Web a lot, and liked it. Well, we got in the car, and drove around, very hungry for lunch even though it was about 3 0r 4 and the sun was dimming. We found a cool little place called Souper Salad (play on words). There was a line of food and salad, and we got trays, paying before hand.
We got a lot of everything and potatoes, sitting down and talking. Dad told me that he was a junior Rotarian in high school, and that he did a really cool project. I told him I wanted to write a biography about him someday, first hand, as we ate the decent food. Pretty fresh, it was. After eating we went back into the jeep, hanging out at the RV park and walking the dogs. It was a relaxing evening. The next day, we would... Well, not to spoil anything... Let's just say it would be interesting and cowboy-like. Assassinations, theories, and 6 floors would be the parts of the day. Goodbye for now.
Oh don't touch that! It is a work of art! You mean my spit? Yes, it looks like Jim Carrey. How much money do you want for it? 5,000?
Wish we had photos of the art....
Andrew.
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