I'd like to say sorry for missing a post last week, but I'm not quite sorry enough to just do it. So instead you get this half apology from the space in between.
The reason I didn't post last week is because I was traveling. I wen back home to visit my family. For a variety of reasons we do our Christmas celebrations in the first week of the year instead of the actual week of Christmas. This allows up to be more low key about the whole thing, which I really appreciate.
The flight itself was not particularly interesting, and just barely tolerable. Flying on a airplane is one of those things that should be magical, but instead has had all the fun squeezed out of it through things like unnecessary security theater, price gouging, and the still ongoing pandemic. No matter what is going on in your life outside of the airport, everything becomes a little worse once you are inside of one.
While in my hometown, I did take the opportunity to visit a MeowWolf exhibition. If you're not familiar, MeowWolf is an art collective that focuses on interactive and inhabitable spaces where the art is part of a larger world they are crafting. They're also incredibly instagram friendly, which would be cooler if I hadn't mostly stopped using the 'gram sometime in the middle of last year. But it was still a cool experience, and unlike anything else I've been to. Part of the fun is the fact that any given doorway can (and usually is) a portal to somewhere else. You can move from a living room to a nexus of refrigerators, to an alien back-alley, to a trailer in the desert, to a room that contains a slimy rainbow waterfall frozen in time. The place is frankly overwhelming, because around every corner is something new and different. Or more likely fifteen new and different things. I could tell that a lot of work had gone into crafting this experience, so I was also a little disappointed in how there was an unintentional pressure to experience everything quickly then move on to something else. Part of this is the design of the space, where discovery is part of the top billing, but also because it was crowded inside. Many of the art pieces were interactive, but not meant to be interacted with by more than one person at a time. So if you spend very much time at all interacting with and experiencing a particular artwork there's likely to be other people waiting to do the same. I spent two hours wandering through the place and I was never alone (or with just my group) for more than a minute or two at a time. It felt like I was experiencing a weird novel on fast forward. And there was clearly a lot of work put into everything, and things that were meant to be experienced for more than 30 seconds at a time. I found a journal in someone's bedroom that was easily 50 pages of written material. It would take a significant chunk of time for me to sit down and read it on the owner's bed. And I tried to do that, but every page I turned was met by someone else entering the bedroom to look around. I felt like I was taking away from the other patrons' experience every extra moment that I took with even this one corner of the experience.
The whole thing was clearly a labor of love for the artists involved in making it, and I'm so happy I got to spend time there. But by the very nature of the exhibition it felt like the work itself was being undercut. In addition, by being an "Immersive" experience all the credit was unavailable inside the exhibit itself. There was an interactive information kiosk on the outside, but I felt a little bad for the hundreds of artists who didn't get recognition for their work inside the work itself. And how many people attending actually take the time to read everything in the kiosk? I only looked at it for a few minutes to pull up a few pieces. I could have easily spent at least half as long again looking at the information as I did looking at the art. If anything it reminded me of the culture of the internet where things get reposted and shared without attribution, or "credit to the artist" instead of actually looking for who created the thing being shared in the first place. It might seem like I didn't enjoy myself based on what I have written above, so I do want to make it clear I had fun and I am glad I went. I might even go to one of the other exhibitions they have across the US if given the opportunity. But If I go back I'll certainly need to plan how I want to experience it more.
We'll get back to a more traditional format next week. Probably. But here's this week's Crazy Ex Girlfriend Song of the Week: Textmergency
Here's a picture of a cat An orange cat peeking out from inside a cloth giftbag
