When you visit an art exhibition the artist is trying to evoke emotions and feelings within you. All elements are critically important for a show as they each play a part in conveying the message. Some exhibitions are more compelling than others in their ability to grab you and your emotions.
The walls on which the works hang can help send the message or simply surround it.
What a location adds to the artwork had never been so obvious until recently when I attended two similarly themed exhibitions in two very different locations: one a famine era workhouse and the other an art museum.
Both were art exhibits having to do with Ireland’s “Great Hunger” and its affects on human life and daily life around Ireland in the mid-1800’s. Both exhibitions had works that were equally beautiful and impeccably displayed. The art museum had a variety of mediums while the workhouse art was all the same mediums by the same artist.
The art museum had a contemporary setting with beautiful lighting and video presentations to help explain the time period. The other was a restored famine workhouse with 150+ year old roughly textured walls. The two venues were completely opposite. The workhouse contained deep dark bog oak sculptures. Bog oak is not a particular species rather oak that has been buried for hundreds sometimes thousands of years in a pet bog. The oak’s dark brown almost black coloring comes from the peat in which it is buried. For me the emotions evoked with the unity of the workhouse and the deep dark bog oak sculptures was simply magnificent. There was a strong contrast between the whitewashed wall color and the deep brown hand-rubbed oak. This venue magnified the message of the trials and tribulations, that are still felt today, with the Irish people.
Remember a lot can be added to an exhibition that is viewed in a space other than a standard gallery or museum. Never by-pass an exhibition in an alternative space as it may hold visual treasures within its walls.
Where is the most interesting venue you’ve visited for an art exhibition?