The Half We've Known: Gilt and Marble

The memory that rose before me, tall and bright and whimsical, was unbidden. What had called it forth from the long-forgotten annals of my past? What was it about the book I read that summoned this particular memory? I could not say, for the words I saw on the page had little association with that image in my mind. It was then I thought of The Half We've Known challenge and knew it was something I ought to do for myself at least. What was this memory? My visit--years past now--to the art museum. (The Chrysler Museum of Art)

I recall bright sunlight without, and marble steps. A few pillars. I recall slipping through from the tantalizing Cityness into something dimmer, older, cool and echoing. There was a dusty old man in one corner who eyed the young lady and her Grandmama as they stepped inside. Perhaps it was a stern glance, perhaps curiousity that one so young would come here of her own accord. We passed the gift-shop which I mentally made a note of to visit later, having always loved to poke around and buy for myself miniatures of the great things I saw in the museum.
The first room was full of mummies and ancient things I felt little kinship too. This was not beauty. This was not art--it was something crumbling and crude and deadly. I have been described as idealistic, and perhaps I am, for I hurried from that room and found myself somewhere else. Long hallways now, pompous and beautiful with their long red carpets and dark wainscoting that seemed to catch and hold the whispers of the people who had gone before me. I craned my neck to see to the top of some of the tallest paintings. Alternately I marveled and blushed at some of the paintings from the great European masters--all were grand, most naked, some singularly striking with their scenes of tragedies and sad deeds long ago done.

From there I entered the hall of gay, pretty, sunshine-and-gossamer paintings of the Impressionistic-era. 

I recall little of Grandmama's presence beside me, yet I know she was there--it was, in fact, Her that I felt throughout the museum. She was always there and I overlooked her only because the place was so like herself...refined, gilded, heavy with something old and venerable and dove-colored brushed over with a deep plum shade. Every cultured taste I had caught from her was distilled now into the very air of the museum. I walked as if on hallowed ground, knowing I was in a place that few people entered whom were unlike me. For what call would a realist have to come this far into this place? The people who took time from their halcyon lives to stare at a painting could not be all-bad. The eyes which had looked on the study of sunlight on the sea could not be cruel and unfeeling. Idealism--but it was mine and someone shared it with me.

At the end of one long hall I happened upon a stand with paper and crayon, available to all who might wish to attempt a copy of one of the great paintings. I was no artist...I was hardly one to attempt a serious sketch. But copy I would. I chose a portrait of a beautiful, dark-haired duchess in a black suit. She looked somber, dramatic, gorgeous in her grave way. I scrawled the attempt, concentrating...my brow pinched, my mouth working. A small group of children led by a thin woman entered the hall. "Now, children," she warbled, "when you grow up and become a Student you can come here to copy paintings too." She indicated me with her head and gave me an indulgent smile in passing. I laughed to myself--so she thought me a student of art! I glanced down at my poor crayon-drawing and laughed again; what a student I should be!

I lingered long in that hall, not wanting to leave the glory and elegance of it. But, with one last happy sigh I left the paintings and tried to be interested in the glass display, finally finding a bit of Tiffany to my liking.

The rest of the visit fades in my memory, mingling in a pleasant haze of Renoir, Cassatt, and the long-awaited trip to the gift-shop. The museum, the paintings, the realization that this was beauty captured and kept in an untainted way...I had forgotten it all. How glad I am to find it still alive in that secret corner of Memory's lair! Who would have thought that an afternoon spent thus would forever impress me with a love of good art and quality paintings?

I was no art critic and I am sure I admired the wrong things and thought the right ones ugly. I was uncertain of what I looked at at times and could only imagine--in my own thoughts--the history of the figures in the paintings. But oh, it was a happy time spent with Grandmama in that museum she had loved since her girlhood. In a way I believe it was one of the first moments that I realized she and I were so alike...the Museum--full of the great and good things of a higher, richer past--brought the two of us together as we shared a mutual wonderment that emotion so fleeting could be held round in a gilt frame with a few daubs of paint on canvas.