MFA Boston

Hello everyone!

Whenever I visit a new city, I try to find time to visit their art museum.  Usually, just a quick visit doesn't leave enough time for a visit because I like to spend a couple of hours there at least, but whenever I've lived in a city, I have loved visiting as frequently as I can!  These are the posts about the art museums in Houston and Seattle, and finally, here is Boston!

I've actually visited 3 times already -- twice with David, and once with Ted and Pamela -- because it's that. awesome.  So here are a few photos from the multiple visits!

Boston MFA is gigantic, so before we went inside, we just walked around the perimeters looking at the different sculptures and the garden.

hello there, creepy baby head..

Once inside, we found ourselves a little bit overwhelmed.  There are so many wings, and exhibits are on 4 different floors!

So let me show you around a little bit and tell you what's at MFA Boston!

There are furnitures,

(I mean, I had to!  Hello, fancy music stand!)

Many different Asian art wings including paintings, sculptures, photography, etc that I explored with Ted and Pamela very thoroughly.

Exciting ceiling/mirror photo-op opportunities,

There are also a few different cafes where you can grab a few bites to refuel your body (because you will need to if you're going to try to conquer all of the exhibits)

Different sculptures inside,

an interactive work station where you can pretend you are one of the famous artists

Our masterpiece!

Jackson Pollock,

and a painting of a room that is in the room that is in the painting.

yup.  I think that is what I meant to say.  haha

Inception.

so of course, we had to recreate this painting that fascinated us so much.

What do you think?  I think we did a pretty good job, no?  ;)

Towards the end of the trip, we walked by this handsome, fashion forward gentleman who requested Pamela's hat.  Pamela was nice enough to let him borrow it for a photo  ;)

Since the camera was out anyway, we thought we'd snap a few photos ourselves  =)

cutie pies!

I swear we didn't know that we were both making the same faces!  It was completely not planned.

What can we say, great minds think alike.

I love visiting the MFA, and It was so fun to explore the museum with some of my favorite peeps  =) I'm excited to go back once they have new exhibits up during the fall, and I hope you'll get a chance to go see it as well if you're ever in Boston!

Thanks for stopping by!

--Janny

DIY :: His and Hers Wall Art

Hello everyone!

David and I are looking at a year (hopefully only a year) of long distance, and well... who likes long distance relationships, eh?  but having something close to you that reminds you of your loved one will definitely help you get through it!  

Thinking about decorating my new room and apartment in Boston really gets me giddy, and during one of my daydream sessions about the decor, I thought it would be nice to create something to hang over my bed in Boston!  Then, I thought it would be nice to create something to hang over the bed together with David!  I had the idea of what it would look like  (something like this)

and pitched it to David over the phone (because we were apart for the whole summer) but he wasn't really able to visualize it, so we put that on hold until we were back together in Houston.

When I got to Houston, I went to go pick up the supplies at the art store, and lo and behold! the canvases were buy 1 get 1 free!  so the idea of creating something to hang over my bed became, let's create 'His' and 'Hers' that can stand alone, but still work together when they come together!  so 'His' will stay with him in Houston for the next year until David (and the 'His' painting) can join me (and the 'Hers' painting in Boston!  =D   yeah I know.  it's cheesier than nacho cheese, but hey, we're looking at an impending long distance relationship here.  we'll take it!

So with our supplies in hand,

--2 canvases

--paint brush

--paints

we began our art project.

Now, if it was up to me, I would just dumped the paint, and begin creating something. and then we would see where that leads us, and then make things work with the rough idea of what I wanted it to look like in my mind.  but it wasn't 'MY' project, it was 'OUR' project, so this is where we ended up. A rough draft of what our handy work would look like on a white board.  haha  We each designed our own, and then tweaked them to make them work together

Throughout the project, we just had to step back and laugh at how different we are as people.  I think it works though because I would come up with these crazy ideas, whether it's for an art project, or for our dance routine, and then David would set about making the ideas come true.  and we're pretty good about being flexible... like if I really don't like the placement of the word 'love' on David's design... then he would let me change it  mmhmm  ;)

David wanted a certain type of blocky/bubbly lettering, so we put down a layer of masking tape, and drew the letters out.  Then, we cut it up, and placed it on the canvas so that we could paint the background over it.  We used the plastic wrapping of the canvas to use as a backing for the tape, but we wouldn't really recommend doing that, because after we cut it out, it turned out to be pretty difficult to take the plastic wrapping off of the tape..

For mine, I just wanted a free-hand cursive, so I just free handed mine.

So this is what David's looked like in the middle of the project,,

and what mine looked like haha

so different..

For the colors of the background, we used blue and orange because they are complementary colors, and to apply the paint, we just balled up some paper towels and dabbed it on.  We didn't want a super precise line between the colors and the white part of the canvas or anything, and wanted a more hazy look, so dab, dab, we went!  It felt like a 2nd grade art project, and we loved it!  haha

Then, I free handed my gold fireworks, David and I dabbed some orange paint to make the spheres on his canvas, painted the edges of the canvases gold,,,

and tada!!  Our His and Hers Wall Art  =)

looks a bit different than our original designs, but that's the beauty of art, isn't it?  ;)

Now we just gotta transport my half safely to Boston this year, and David's half next year!

Did you do anything crafty this weekend?

thanks for stoppingy by, and have a great week!

--Janny

Rice Gallery

Hello everyone,

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

It seems that Tuesdays are my blogging days  haha.  It's completely unintentional, but I guess Tuesday afternoons tend to be my freer afternoons!

Last week, David and I visited the Rice Gallery for their grand opening for the year!  The work is by the artist Gaia, and the installation is named 'Mashland', after the Rice University's founder William Marsh Rice. The work is a reflection of Gaia's perceptions of the Rice and Houston communities, and Rice University's relationship to the city.

The work consists of 3 floor-to-ceiling mural walls that reflect Gaia's views and perceptions of Houston, and a structure in the middle that mimics the architectural style of Rice (arches and bricks!) that has paintings of different administrators, faculty, and students.

It was so interesting to walk around the installation and to learn about how he went about working on this project through different video clips that were playing in the foyer.

We also had fun trying to see if we recognized anyone among the paintings.  =)

It was a neat little installation, and we recommend visiting (and mosey on out of Shepherd once in awhile if you are a Shepherd student  haha) if you are around Rice!  It's a good study/practice break, and also a nice relief from the heat... because yes, it is still soo hot in Houston!  hello?! it's October!  where's my fall weather!!

Another funny thing about my experience with the installation was that I automatically knew that the structure in the middle with all of the arches and brick was about Rice even before reading that the work was about Rice.  How did I know, you ask?  That is because all I see all day, every day at Rice is exactly that kind of architecture.  Like this one!   =)

We're so blessed to have such a beautiful campus, and I absolutely love, LOVE this type of architecture. David, on the other hand, Mr. Berkeley hippie, (=p) feels that the architectures seem all too similar and old fashioned.  I guess every person's entitled to his/her opinions!  haha

Thanks for stopping by, and have a wonderful rest of the week!
--Janny