Still don't know what the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art is? The answer is extremely simple - it is a welcoming place that encourages dynamic interchange between making and presenting art, between the visual and performing arts. Opposite to the conventional museums - it is an open platform, which is indeed open to everyone interested in art, both for art amateurs, eager to appreciate masterpieces, and those creating art, the Museum of Contemporary Art provides excellent conditions for artists to discover and develop their talents.
The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art exhibits all the latest art streams and tendencies in various branches of art. Great works of modern artists, photographers, painters, sculptors, geniuses of technology and film-making and lots of other artistic people are displayed for your appreciation here.
Rural photography is the thing occupying the minds of the most progressive modern photographers. Being considered as a distinctly American genre, rural photography is not new. It dates back to the times of the Great Depression. Obviously in today's rural photography the social and political context has been changed, but such photographers as William Christenberry, Matthew Moore, Julie Moos, Paul Shambroom and Alec Soth still continue the tradition.
As to modern tendencies in technology, Dave Cole's exhibition will make you understand what it is about. His unique aggregate The Knitting Machine consists of two excavators fitted with quite massive 20' knitting needles. The Knitting Machine's purpose is to make the American flag, which is always on display. The Knitting Machine is just a part of Cole's exhibition in the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art. The Memorial Flag (Toy Soldiers) is another part of it. This huge flag is a composed of 18000 plastic toy-soldiers. The Evolution Of The Knitting Needle Through Modern War Fare is the third part of this unusual exhibition. It is a collection of needles, which, according to the author were used by the army throughout the seven wars.
Many contemporary artists are eager to find out the difference between animals and human beings. To do that, they use animals as metaphors in their work. In the project Becoming Anima l- Contemporary Art in the Animal Kingdom - quite a number of modern artists, 13 altogether, take part. They are: Jane Alexander, Rachel Berwich, Brian Conley, Mark Dion, Sam Easterson, Kathy High, Natalie Jeremijenko and Phil Taylor, Nicholas Lampert, Michael Oatman, Motohiko Odani, Patricia Piccinini and Ann-Sofi Siden.
Joseph Beuys is a bright representative of sculptors exhibited in the Museum Of Contemporary Art. His Lightning with Stag in its Glare is the only work of the artist made of bronze. It is covered all over with deep sense. It shows a lightning striking the ground and illuminating a stag. There are also some other animals in the composition, and the Boothia Felix with a compass, bearing this name to remind of the place in Canada where the magnetic pole was found. Beuys invokes the creative energy of nature with the forceful bolt of lightning in this work, using a stag as a symbolic animal.
Contemporary Art Museum is a good place for artists-experimenters, such as Natalie Jeremijenko. Her Tree Logic presents six live trees inverted and suspended from a truss, symbolizing the contrived growth responses of the trees through the time. Trees are dynamic natural systems, and The Tree Logic reveals this dynamism.
Where else can you find more brilliant, sophisticated and unique works of today's art if not in the Museum Of Contemporary Art? And where else can you try to realize your most crazy ideas? Museum Of Contemporary Art is a place worth visiting, that's for sure.