Example Of Museum Analysis Essay

“Redtail” is a sculpture created by Jason Walker in 2014 and exposed at the Bellevue Arts Museum. The art piece exhibits a deer, with a funny tail, shaped as a claxon, wearing several automobiles on its back, serving a two ways road. The deer sculpture also contains a black and yellow stripe design on its upper limbs, surrounding the animal’s stomach, which contains a river, upon which lays the bridge on which the cars travel. The deer looks peacefully towards the visitors, turning its head with the green leaves – like ears on its left side. The animal stands in the middle of several buildings, as a giant creature protecting the center of a city. The sculpture is created from stone and porcelain, covered with china paint. The sculptor used the underglaze method for decorating the art piece. Concrete is another material used for completing the sculpture (Belleuve Arts Museum, 2014).
Analyzing Jason Walker’s entire collection exposed at Belleuve Arts Museum, Allyn Cantor (2014) explains the artist’s art pieces as symbols of the surreal environment, wherein animals have evolved and developed into hybrid beings, serving humans’ needs. The “Redtail” depicts the loss of innocence, wherein the natural elements are incorporated into the civilization for serving its evolutionary purposes. From an anthropological perspective, the deer symbolizes the intense urbanization, which tends to cover the natural environment and to transform them into man-made resources. The sculpture, created in the modern U.S. city Washington D.C., reflects the artist’s concerns that the world is losing its natural environment in the favor of the civilization. Walker’s concerns are justified by the fact that he lives in a big city – Washington D.C., and that around him the civilization is advancing into the wild life’s territory.
A woodened dog sitting on what seems to be modern furniture, is the artistic creation of Elaine Hanowell, called “Crouching Dog”, exposed at the Belleuve Arts Museum since 2014. The sculpture is made out of poplar, polished with oil paint and wax, measures 28 X 12 X 20 inches (Belleuve Arts Museum, 2014). The oil paint that the artist used create a peaceful, yet, rather distant world, because the coloring is merely based on dark and grey colors. The dog’s presence, looking humbly towards the right, with ears pointed and tail down, indicates a submissive attitude, in a domestic space. The colors used for representing the dog are lighter than the rest, indicating a discrepancy between the living presence and the un-animated environment, represented by the piece of furniture on which the dog rests. The sculpture is part of “Dog, Monkey, Crow” exhibition, which reflects Hanowell’s interest towards the wildlife and the indoor space, hence the presence of the animals in the domestic spaces, in integrative images that convey both the natural and wilderness (Art Xchange, 2012). The dog seems to own the space wherein he sits, hence the artist’s philosophy that there is a universal law that allows people and animal to share the experiences (Art Xchange, 2012). Hence, natural or wilderness and domestic spheres are blended, because, according to Hanowell’s representation, humans and animals are alike. This perspective comes from the sculptor’s ancestral culture, as a Pacific Northwest native, influenced by Buddhist philosophy of universality and reincarnation. Moreover, her art style has spiritual accents that result from her residency to Indonesia, which are combined with a sense and sensibility for art based on colors and textures inspired from global cultures (Art Xchange, 2012).
Humara Abid is a Pakistani artist, who grew up in the strict Muslim tradition, with many restrictions that made people act in a certain way, not allowing them to do what they want and explore their individualities. Through her “Self Portrait” sculpture exhibited at Belleuve Arts Museum, the artist is exposing her life struggles, in a more complex representation, which also includes two actual self-portraits, one with the traditional wear and the other with occidental wear, four guns, ants and feeders. All these elements depict the artist’s life struggles of finding her individuality beyond Muslim tradition, the global perception of the Pakistani people and her various miscarriages, until she was able to give birth to a child, represented by a tricycle (BAM Biennal 2014: Humaira Abid). The wood pine sculpture that includes red wood stain, wire, epoxy putty and paint measures 22 X 17 X 18,5 inches (Belleuve Arts Museum, 2015) and indicates circularity of life, through the representation of the rolling wheels. The wheels represent a symbol of hope for a better life, which the sculptor expects to attain for her daughter, while the entire tricycle is a symbol of the childhood, depicting both Abid’s happiness for being a mother and her childish nature. With the birth of a child, a new life begins and the freedom that the parent who lacked can be attributed to the new life. The circularity of life is a North Pacific motif that influences the art from this region, shaping also the spiritual expression of Abid’s work.

References

Art Xchange 2014 Dog Monkey Crow New Work by Elaine Hanowell. http://artxchange.org/dog-monkey-crow-new-work-by-elaine-hanowell/?pid=1493.
Belleuve Arts Museum 2014 BAM Biennal 2014: Humara Abid. https://vimeo.com/116809671
Belleuve Arts Museum 2014 Current Exhibitions http://www.bellevuearts.org/exhibitions/index.html.
Cantor, Allyn 2014 Jason Walker: On the River, Down the Road. http://www.preview-art.com/previews/11-2014/walker.html.