Saturday, January 18, 2014

A Gathering Storm

To an art geek, it's gratifying to see the VMFA so busy on a Saturday afternoon, especially one with a VCU game scheduled.

Arriving at the museum to see another part of the Race, Place and Identity shows, "Signs of Protest: Photographs from the Civil Rights Era,"  I was greeted with a massive line of people snaking through the atrium waiting their turn to be allowed downstairs to see the "Hollywood Costume" exhibit.

I've already seen it twice but that had been on weekdays and during the first two weeks after it opened, so it had been a most civilized affair.

Today looked more like Picasso had returned to Richmond, which shouldn't have surprised me since I'd heard tell that the numbers for "Hollywood" were rivaling those for "Picasso," but seeing it was a different story.

I also admit to being spoiled by being able to go to the museum mid-week and avoid the  twirling children, bored-looking teenagers and stoic parents waiting in lines that rival those at King's Dominion in July.

Luckily for me today, I was on my way upstairs to the photography gallery to see a slice of history, so I sailed past them.

I have to admit, the photography gallery was far busier than I'd ever seen it, a pleasure to witness.

The black and white photographs in the show were clearly picked with a great deal of care and an unerring eye for key moments big and small in the fight for civil rights.

I was particularly struck by the two Richmond images, both from 1960, one of the Woolworth's lunch counter protest and the other of a Thalhimer's picket line with protesters holding signs saying, "Turn in your charge-a-plate" and "Don't shop where you are arrested."

Since both were taken long before I came to Richmond, it was a look back on a time I'm glad I missed here.

A 1966 photograph by Gordon Parks of Stokely Carmichael in Watts showed him looking impossibly young, which he was- only 25.

The most dramatic image was James Karales' "Selma to Montgomery March, Alabama" from 1965, shot from below and showing a line of marchers along the crest of a hill with an enormous dark storm cloud overhead.

One of those images that encapsulates a seminal event and could never have been planned for.

I was surprised to see a Diane Arbus photograph in the exhibit, thinking of her as more of a photographer of odd people. I'd seen a stellar show of her work at the Hanes Art Gallery at Wake Forest back in 2005 and nothing I'd seen there gave me reason to think she'd be represented in this show.

Wrong. "Boy with a Straw Hat Waiting to March in a Pro-War Parade, New York City" showed what surely must have been odd to a lot of eyes, even in '67.

Not just that he was wearing a straw hat (although try finding a boy today who does), but a bowtie, an American flag bow on one lapel and a "Bomb Hanoi" button on the other.

I'm betting he grew up to be a good conservative.

The exhibit ended with two images from South Africa's apartheid protests, a fitting reminder that the fight for civil rights is ongoing.

After seeing all the photographs, including one of Martin Luther King walking arm in arm with Dr. Benjamin Spock, the baby expert, I did a second lap to look at them all again.

When I got back downstairs to the atrium, the lines were even longer and I almost collided with a man retrieving his family from the museum gift shop.

"Is this the line?" his wife asked incredulously.

"Uh, yea," he said testily. "That's why I've been trying to get you out of there!"

Hopefully, they'll both calm down once they see the splendors of the costume exhibit, even if it's sandwiched between dozens of other visitors.

I know this art geek benefited from an afternoon devoted to a slice of history in the form of a moving photography show.

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