Loveseat Layers

The Work: Loveseat (1991) by Rona Pondick

I chose Loveseat by Rona Pondick at the Carnegie Museum of Art because it caught my attention in some strange way. Placed in a much sparser room than most in the gallery, it quietly sits close to the floor. It seems an interesting balance between abstract shapes and textures and recognizable objects, so I decided to choose it.

Experience

I've documented and detailed my experience in the pictures below.

Product

I decided to create the experience as a piece of audio, as that was the only way I could imagine abstracting an experience like this. I went down to the piano room in my dorm and spent 20 minutes layering together stuff I made up as I though about everything about seeing Loveseat, from the CMOA building itself to the gallery and the setting of the piece itself.

The audio file is more than 20MB, so here's the link to download it from Google Drive: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzQR-vymHunAcEZEYlBkTUZ6MU0/view?usp=sharing

From the outside of the CMOA, I first noticed the squares present in everything about the architecture. As noted in the first layer of the song by the four chord changes at regular intervals, everything was constructed from squares and rectangles.

Then, I noticed the fountains and falling water -- this contrast appears later on in the gallery and is represented by the high, repetitive notes that play through the entire piece in the second layer.

Once inside, I noticed more falling water and the continuation of square patterns in less exciting colors (yet still a happy feel to the place).

As the third layer comes into the piece, I reached the stairs to the gallery. Here, I get the first bold color of the experience.

Now, to reach the chosen artwork itself, I find myself walking through brightly lit rooms with little color (save for the more bold pieces of art themselves). Each room looks fairly similar, with hard square edges, white walls, and bright lights.

Then, I reach a room that feels much different than the others (if you're following along in the music, this is when everything fades out to one slow movement again). It is more sparse, with larger works covering the walls and the floor.

Then, just on the left as I enter, a large empty space of wall makes room for this small piece on the floor. At first, it utterly confused me (see rolling minor chords near the end). I'd like to say that it made more sense as I looked at it and examined it, its five legs on three shoes (two left, one right), its wax and lace form quietly disturbing and mild in color, not form. But it didn't make more sense.

My thoughts on Loveseat

At first, I was utterly confused looking at this piece, but the longer I looked at Loveseat, the more sense it made to me. I think that it is much more impactful when given a simple spot on the floor near a blank wall rather than the pedestals that most pieces were placed on in the gallery. The piece, to me, represents a unique mash-up of the love-seat sofa and the physicality of the connotations of its very name. It was placed in a room of completely abstract art with no recognizable shapes, but it seems far less so to me -- maybe that's why it tripped me up.

Reflection

I feel as if I give abstract art a more serious and more critical look after this project. As my first visit to an art gallery or museum of art, I found it easier to chronicle the experience. Next time, I would try to manage my one hour better by including more about the actual artwork in my creation. It took me 40 minutes to layer the music just to get to Loveseat itself, so I didn't quite capture it in the detail that I intended.