Visiting Art Museums

One of the best ways to educate yourself about art and hone in on the art that speaks to you is to see a lot of it! The more art you see, the more you notice what style, genre, color, mediums, stories and artists resonate with you. Museum shows are a great way to see work in a variety of different genres and styles.

Tracking Museum Exhibits

There is never enough time to see all of the museum exhibitions that are on my list, any maybe yours too. It seems like when I happen to be in a city or town I am either a week too early or a week too late for the exhibit I really wanted to see.  It’s so frustrating.  And, I often can’t remember the ones I really want to attend, much less the dates.  To solve for this issue, I recently started a new organizational approach and it works well for me. I created a new “Google Art” calendar. Now, whenever I read about a museum exhibit that piques my interest, I add the event into my Google Art calendar as an all-day event from the opening to the closing.  I title the event with the name, museum and location.  

For example: “Monuments,” MOCA, Los Angeles

When I am traveling for other purposes, or visiting the city to see another anchor art exhibit, I can quickly glance at the other exhibits in town I want to see.  Perfect!

Ann Lyne, The Bedroom, 1975

Finding Museum Exhibits

So, how do I find out about exhibits, fairs, etc? I always read The New York Times New Season section, published every mid-September, for an overview of some key shows. I go through the list carefully and mark the ones that interest me and add them to my Google Art calendar.

I also read The Art Newspaper’s The Year Ahead Essential Guide to Exhibitions, Art Fairs, and Biennials Worldwide: a pocket(ish) guide published every January that breaks down the listings by month and country and city, making it very easy for me to add things to my Google Art calendar.   The amount it costs is well worth it. Or, reach out to me and I can look stuff up for you.

Susanne K. Arnold, Italian Landscape

What’s on my October Art Calendar?

So, now that I’ve walked through how to organize your art exhibits and given you some resources on where to find exhibits to see, I’ll give you a kick start on some places that are already on my October Google Art Calendar.

1. I will definitely be visiting the above mentioned “Monuments” exhibit at the MOCA in Los Angeles.  Kara Walker has reinterpreted and reconstructed the Stonewall Jackson monument that was taken down in Charlottesville, VA in 2017.  As a native of Richmond, I am interested in seeing how an artist makes meaning out of this historical event. 

2. The Victoria and Albert Storehouse “museum”.  This isn’t an exhibit per se, but I have this on the calendar because I didn’t want to forget about it when I went to London.  With my extensive background in archives and collections, this creative way of making an archive accessible to the public is applause worthy.  I wanted to check it out.

3. The Lee Miller exhibition at the Tate Modern. is on my Google Art calendar since it is hard for me to pass up a photography show, especially by a pioneering woman who crossed many genres–surrealism, photojournalism, fashion. And, I liked the movie.

4. Lastly, -And since my Google Art calendar also includes fairs…I have Frieze London and Frieze Masters as well as Art Basel - Paris, or, as the Parisians like to say, Paris Plus (said with a French accent).

Don’t forget to also follow along on the Keating Art Advisory IG feed as I (visually) tick some of these off the box this month.

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