The Tate Modern

Yesterday when mom, dad, and Thomas were at the Belfast, Joshua and myself went to the Tate Modern. The exterior of the building was nothing impressive - just a very rectangular brick building. We found this very surprising because we expected cool and funky architecture for a modern art gallery. Another thing that was quite surprising was the amount of school groups that were there. Everywhere you turned, there was a group of uniform-clad British school children. My personal favourite group that I saw was wearing bright yellow construction vests - they would never be lost in a large gallery.

The first section of the gallery that we went through was Surrealist and Post-Surrealism.While this was interesting, there wasn't anything that really gave me an emotional response or pulled me in. Eventually, we made our way to the section that included Minimalism, Cubism and Modernism.We saw some interesting pieces, but once again nothing really that drew my attention. Then, as we ventured further into the exhibit, I saw the Cubists. I was awestruck at the Picasso piece. After this, I started to see artwork that gave me that emotional response that I was hoping for. The one piece that particularly drew my attention was "Snail" by Henri Matisse. It was an enormous piece - at least 10 x 10 feet (these are purely estimations since there were no dimensions given in the description). The vast size and purely simplistic nature of the art was striking.

Both mine and Joshua's favourite part of the gallery was the Minimalists. The simplicity and elegance of the artwork was truly both understated and meaningful in the way it was presented. Some of the sculptures that were created in this era were astonishing. There were sculptures we saw that were 12 meters high! Possibly the more striking pieces of art were actually photographs. They say that a picture tells a thousand words, and I think I fully understand this cliche statement now. The photos allowed the viewer to interpret the meaning and intention behind the photo in a way that gave a means for an emotional response.

The Tate Modern was the one item on my to-see list in London, and I am so glad that I saw at least some of it. If I go back to London one day, I am going to make sure that I give myself plenty of time to walk around the various exhibitions so that I can take it all in. It was the highlight of London for me thus far.