A Brief Visit to the Museum

The temperature has reached a new low this week. It was not funny this morning to have the first class in the Natural Science auditorium after the heat of the building had been turned down for three days. I was so cold and hardly had enough energy left to survive the following two back-to-back classes.

The weather seemed to get better after my friend and I got out of my film class—at least the sun came out. However, it turned out to be merely a veneer of agreeableness, because I felt like that the biting winds almost penetrated into my skin like daggers. Trying to escape from the freezing snowland outside, we chose to walk into UMMA for a temporary shelter of warmth as we passed by the façade of the museum.

As we entered the museum, my friend’s glasses immediately fogged up. He wiped his glasses as he walked toward the apse, and when he put his glasses back on and raised his head, he was astonished to see the sentence on the screen hanging on the wall. “They stop at the screen, lower their heads, and look at the phone.” Obviously the recorder misrecognized the fogging glasses as a phone. However, having anticipating such reaction from him for a while, I was satisfied to see that this misrecognition did not affect the surprise in his eyes. I finally told him about the secret of this magic screen by pointing at a student typing on his computer at the corner of the gallery space.

The installation by Dora García, called Instant Narrative, is a part of the “Affecting the Audience” project at UMMA this semester. Basically there is a performer who records what is happening within the exhibition space. What is interesting about this project is that it invites the visitors to actually participate in the artwork and watch their own participations in the project on the screen at the same time. In an attempt to emphasize my sense of being, I jumped up. As expected, “the girl jumps into the air.” the screen followed.

If you would like to watch how every action you take is recorded on the big screen, come visit this great exhibition at UMMA. Wear your craziest costumes or think about some weird gestures before you come—trust me, these would make your experience even more remarkable.