Friday, February 29, 2008

"Oh, The Met"






High on our list of places to visit in NYC was the Metropolitan Art Museum and we were definitely not disappointed and were wishing we had the time to spend the week there, but alas only a day. My first memory after entering this grand building was walking through the Greek and Roman Art gallery. I meandered among the statues and sculptures which transported me to another time and place, and in the blink of an eye I was admiring the precision of the artists as they chiseled humanity into a piece of stone.

As I think back, the other exhibits that amazed me were the "Arms and Armor" with more armor than I've ever seen, except possibly in an epic movie. I didn't realize that so much armor remained in existence! Other highlights for me were the Egyptian exhibit with one of the largest structures I've ever seen in a museum, the Old Kingdom mastaba (offering chapel) of Perneb, (ca. 2450 B.C.) that you can actually walk through. The room in which it was displayed looked very familiar to me and then I thought back to some famous movies of the past, like "When Harry Met Sally," that have scenes with the large wall of windows in the background.

The one spot I had to return to several times before we departed was "The Great Hall," full of an interesting eclectic collection of different statues from various time periods and cultures. From there we entered the "American Paintings and Sculpture" building, and I had my first glimpse of the famous painting of George Washington, and I was stunned by it's vibrancy and the fact it was displayed there! The painting that stands out in my memory from the European collection was Claude Monet's "Parc Monceau," which I would love a copy of someday to display in my home. So as I entered the museum, I came in with "Oh, the Met," but as we left the building, it changed to "Aah, the Met!"

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