Nam June Paik's "Requiem for the 20th Century" is my favorite piece at the deCordova sculpture park in Lincoln.
Last week before my class I wandered up and enjoyed the piece again. Nam June Paik was the father of modern video art, and the piece merges art, music and technology in a poignant way for me.
The 1936 Chrysler painted flat silver seems a ghost of a lost era, while also evoking the modernist design and hubris of the 1930's. Hitler's relentless march to power and inhumanity as well as the world-wide economic depression seem to be embodied in the form of the car. Mozart's unfinished and final work "Requiem Mass in D Minor" quietly plays from the cars stripped interior as a modern dance performance shows through the partially blocked windows.
If you have a chance go to the deCordova and see if the piece affects you as it did me. Or find another work of art (sculptural) to use as muse for a painting or assemblage.
See you next week, john.
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