Seeing the Light
“Sometimes I go up close, and sometimes I stand back here,” the museum guard said, gesturing to the back of the room. “It looks different in the morning when I come in, and different again in the afternoon.” She laughed. “Some people tilt their heads, and bend over and listen. I don’t know what they think they’re gonna hear.”
Even after she said it, I couldn’t help but move my ear closer.
What Color is Divine Light? is a stunning exhibit – an intricate pattern of threads crisscrossing the room, illuminated so they dance and blur, changing colors as they travel from anchors on one side of the room to the other side.
“You probably know this piece better than anyone except the artist,” my friend commented to the guard. For forty hours a week, she studied both the installation and people’s reactions to it.
“It’s peaceful,” the guard told us. Perhaps that’s a welcome gift. I found her taking a quick break in the restroom, talking to a teenager in tones of frustration. I know the pitch of that conversation. Outer peace is a welcome balm.
I’ve always wondered about how security guards see the world. Does being in the presence of art make the work easier? Are they bored? Or, perhaps, secret philosophers? Is guarding modern art better than being in an office building? What do you see, when you see the same thing every day?
On a different day, as the pandemic eased in 2021, I went to the Peacock Room. The guard and I were alone in the room and so I asked her, “Which one is your favorite?” I asked her. “It’s not in here,” she said, waving at the splashy display. She pointed around the corner. “G-6.” It took me a while to find G-6 on the bottom shelf, and I never would have noticed it without her guidance.
The museum guard sees the unseen. They witness the ignorance, peace, questions, and hope we carry into the exhibit. They see the art, and they see us.
-- Mary Austin
(image at the top from the Textile Museum. Really: go see the exhibit.)