Cobra Museum of Modern Art
August 11, 2006 at 11:45 AM
by Ashleigh
On Tuesday we visited the Cobra Museum. I'm ashamed to say that we live no more than five minutes walk away and yet we had never been! Astonishingly embarrassing!
We remedied this on Tuesday by taking the kids to the summer exhibition 'Play- The Art of the Game'. The permanent collection is quite breathtaking, with works by Dutch artists like Karel Appel, Corneille and Constant. I had seen Constant's iconic Red Fist (pictured above) in various instances before, but never realised that the original is in a museum so close to us! Of all the works the one that struck me most was called 'Domestic War' which unfortunately I can't find listed on the website. It's a recent acquisition by a Danish artist, I think, and it is an angry, intimate look at married life.
For a description of the CoBrA group, take a look here.
The kids enjoyed the exhibition, but enjoyed the 'speurtocht'* even more. They were handed a box of puzzle blocks depicting various parts of the art throughout the 'Play' exhibition which they had to turn over to reveal a word. There were a couple of other puzzles in the little booklet too, all involving the blocks and art (in some way or form). If the kids got the puzzle right they could choose between an ice-lolly, a sweetie or a little cake. One of the puzzles was too difficult for me or the kids, but Brad got most of it right. The last one was where a work of art was reproduced in puzzle form, but you could substitute blocks of plain colourto see what impact inserting that colour into the puzzle made. That was fun.
Sebastian likes to look at the exhibits and tell me if they are calm, angry, or what feelings they evoke. We also try and pick out familiar shapes and patterns in the pictures. I encourage him not to read the name of the piece before he tries to work out the subject, as it colours his interpretation. Joe loved some of the pictures by Karel Appel depicting animals. He identified particularly strongly with a pink dog.
One of the 'Play' exhibitions that was really interesting and caught everyone's attention was a face projected onto a fabric pillow in a trunk. The projector and sound were motion sensitive so as you walked past the face said 'hello' and started to deliver a monologue, timed just so that it seemed he was responding to your questions. Very cool! I didn't note who the artist was. Some of the other 'Play' exhibitions were really out there, and some of them left you thinking 'wow, these people had an awful lot of time to think things up'. ;)
In the interests of popping in and out of museums without spending too much money on ten minute trips, we decided to invest in Museum cards for me and Brad. We'll probably get one for Sebastian too. They allow free entry to a variety of museums, and the cost is very reasonable - 30 euros per year for adults and 20 for children over 5. Joe is still free at most museums until next year, so we won't get him one just yet. A handy list of museums, in Dutch is here.
Tell me about museums in your town.
* The closest translation I can think of for 'speurtocht' is 'treasure hunt'.