Sal at the Butler Institute of American Art

Sal enjoys visiting museums, so today she went to the Butler Institute of American Art with two friends and me.  Using my new GPS, we were able to navigate thither without a single wrong turn or missed exit.  (Hooray for the technology that will keep this directionally challenged blogger on the straight and narrow, so to speak.)

I've found that the lighting in museums is not conducive to a project like mine.  The paintings are well lit, but the lighting in the center of the galleries is dimmer.  This means that when I place Sal on one of the benches in the center and take a picture of her with a painting in the background, there is going to be an exposure problem.  If the painting is properly exposed, Sal will be too dark.  If Sal is properly exposed, the painting will be overexposed.  That being said, I am including two such exposure-challenged shots, because these paintings are so awesome.  (Of course I always choose to properly expose Sal in situations like these.  She's the star here, after all!)

This Norman Rockwell painting is called "Lincoln the Railsplitter."  Rockwell wrote "I hope this painting might inspire the youth of this land to appreciate this man who believed so much in the value of education."

John Singer Sargent painted the portrait behind Sal.  It is so lovely -- and my librarian self loves that it shows a mother reading to her children.

When the bench is right in front of the painting, the resulting photos are much better.  :)

This gorgeous painting by Robert William Vonnoh is titled "In Flanders Field -- Where Soldiers Sleep & Poppies Grow".

Love the colors and textures in this sculpture.  When I was down on the floor taking pictures of it, I'm pretty sure the guard sitting nearby thought I was a looney.

This is a small portion of a sculpture by Viola Frey.  I couldn't get more in because I was trying to avoid including the ropes surrounding the art.

My friend Tom had the idea to hold Sal in front of this painting to make it look like Sal was on the table.  Brilliant!  I hope that George Mauersberger -- the artist who painted the original work -- will not be upset by the addition of a uke to his creation.

On the little camera screen this looked perfect, but unfortunately Sal is a titch above the tabletop.  I still think it's a cool picture anyway! 

This is how we did it.  Thanks, Tom, for the idea and for holding Sal so steadily for these shots.  :)

We entered a dark room and saw some amazing things.  Here are just two of them.

A plaque on the base of the aptly named "Harmonic Sculpture #10" instructed us to clap near it to make the little discs move and go around.  We tried it and it was fun, so I decided to ask David to strum Sal and see if this would make the sculpture do its thing.  It did!  This cool sculpture was created by Wen-Ying Tsai.

I loved how "Cantabile" by Stephen Knapp spread colored light all around it.

There was also a room full of sculptures like this one.  A light shining from above made the twisty wires reflect on the wall and create shadow pictures.

These shadow-casting sculptures were so amazing.  I'm not sure if this one -- or the one of George Washington's head -- was my favorite...  The artist is Larry Kagan.

This way-cool work "...is an array of 121 mirror faced blocks.  The faces of the blocks are inclined at the precise angles necessary to direct all of the mirror faces to the focal point, 8 feet in front of the center of the array."  Of course I had to try to get a picture of Sal in all of those mirrors.  My friends and I tried standing various ways holding Sal to try to get a good shot.  Here are three of the coolest ones we took.

I asked my friends to pick their favorite paintings in the museum so I could take pictures of these handsome friends (and Sal, of course) in front of said paintings.  Here are the paintings they chose -- and my favorite, too.

This is the painting Tom chose.  I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of the little sign by it so I could tell you its title and who painted it.  Oops!

David chose to be photographed with Sal in front of "Phenomena Ridge of Fire" by Paul Jenkins.

"Seize the Day" by Robert Natkin may have been my favorite painting today.  I loved the warm and joyous colors the artist used, and seeing the textures and shapes up close made me think of a cozy quilt.