Earlier this year I visited the newly opened Museum of Old and New Art or MONA. These are some photos from the trip. MONA is impressive. The first thing you'll notice is the architecture, sophisticated yet approachable easily drawing you in to David Walsh's underground world, and make no mistake, this is Walsh's world.
The maiden exhibition at MONA, "Monaisms" centres around themes of sex and death. I found the explorations of these themes, particularly sex, to err towards the masculine in most cases. Even works by iconoclast video and performance artist Marina Abramovic, whom I view as an extremely powerful woman, seem somehow depreciated in this context. Presumably Abramovic's work is seen as an exploration of sex in the context of this exhibition. Although Abramovic's work is laden with heavy masochistic and sexual symbolism to assert , as i believe this exhibition does, that her work is about sexuality is an over simplification to say the least. To me Abramovic's work is a rich and complex exploration of art itself. Abramovic presents herself as an art object and therefore the masochistic and violent overtones are more about the destruction of art objects and object fetishism rather than anything sexual. It is perhaps ironic that Abramovic's works and celebrity are now fetishised in the same way as traditional art objects once were, an irony David Walsh is probably very much aware of.
Don't get me wrong I thought it was astonishing, I was dumb struck, enthralled and overwhelmed but for some reason I have some reservations about my experience of MONA. Experience is the right word. I went with two of my best friends who are also very interested in art and it took us 12 hours over two days to make it through the whole museum, and I am fairly certain there was work we didn't see. While there is something quiet remarkable about seeing the likes of Abramovic, Basquiat and Hirst on the same floor there is also something about it that lacks cohesion and feels chaotic. Its as if each work doesn't have enough breathing room or rather the viewer does not. Its amazing work after amazing work in a dizzying explosion of spectacular. To me there was something a little too glamourous about it. The whole 'anti-art' and 'anti-establishment' vibe got a little tired after a while as well.
Wow! It sounds as though I didn't enjoy MONA at all. Not true. I loved it. It was an incredible experience and despite all my latent criticisms of David Walsh it is his bold, if not egotistical, curation that makes MONA so stimulating and thought provoking. Best thing to hit Berridale since the Grenada Tavern.
