I wrote this, sat in O’Hare airport as the sun set on a long, long but
enjoyable week.
It started well, arrived Sunday lunchtime and spent a calm 2
hours wandering around the Art Institute.
I’d love to sound erudite but in honesty I was very tired so just tried
to absorb and get inspired by just being there.
I had my “go where your gut tells you” brain on…not hugely interested in
Asian ceramics I ended up there in error and thought about turning back to the
main corridor, but some thing told me to keep going. So I did and that is where I found the
coolest artwork. In the Japanese section
there is a darkened room with 16 identical square pillars (can a pillar be
square? Dunno). It was calm, quiet and it had serenity and
soul. The art was the physical and the
spaces in between. Did I stumble on it
by chance? Universe at work? Planets aligned?
... there is something in this intuitive business.
Storms raged in the East so my trip to NYC didn’t
happen. I stayed in Chicago the whole
week; had a great meal out with colleagues and then 4 great meals by myself in
my PJ’s. They were room service rather
than a fashion choice in a restaurant.
My need to be in NYC was for a 2 day meeting so in order to participate I
ended up dialing into that from Chicago.
Two days, in a windowless room, on a conference call speaker phone. And then a saw it…the wall of the room was a
white board. 14 foot wide and 10 foot
high…it had to be done. I drew a
mandala…then it got bigger, then it became a flower. By last night it was 8 ft high and 4 feet
wide, with a flower pot at the base.
Then there was an elephant next to it – a request from a colleague in
another State.
Last night I wandered back to the Art Institute to get a
gift for small person, both for my being away and for his achievement at school
– he was given an award for his conscientious behavior – best in his year last
month. That’s huge progress from last
year when he was miserable and struggling to find his tribe. So I
surfed the gift shop and got cool museum gifts and then I wandered back to the
hotel via a different route. Looking for
a tech store, but also getting some air.
I turned right on instinct and saw what looked like a tech store 300
yards ahead. It turned out to be a men’s
clothes store but right next door was the biggest most fabulous art store ever...Blick. All tech purchases became irrelevant and I
had a great hour drooling and buying sale items. “Look how much I saved!” being my mantra.
So today, back to work – same room, no window, day
three. The white board now clean and
white - much to the disappointment of the team sat outside the room. Earlier today a young guy stopped in the
doorway, wanting to see it close up! I
had thought that I was doodling in private.
We had a chat, he asked me if I was an artist and I said “yes, I am”
which was cool.
Then as he walked away it occurred to me that if they could
all see through the etched glass office window, to see the doodle, then most
likely they could see other stuff. Had
they seen those Curly Sue moments earlier in the week when I was wearing a
dress and had to keep yanking up my tights like a six year old at a birthday
party? We shall never know.
